Letting Go

I'm really enjoying this thread! Dennis and 2gypsies, I love the way you incorporated the grandkids into your lifestyle.

I'm still 12 years or so from being able to do it myself. But already thinking about what choices we'll make and have been purging "stuff" little by little. The purging process helps make the fantasy a little more real. :)

The kids left, the first one a long time ago, the second after we gave her an essentially free house inthe town where she grew up. Still, while we traveled more than half the year every year, we kept a home for them to come back to, where we stored all the junk we bought for them that they've not yet decided to abandon, and they pick through from time to time. They come home between moves, they come home in times of trouble, and they come home to take cate of us.

Since my wife died, I travel less, 2-4 months out of the year, mostly to visit my kids, and they visit less often, but stil visit. I keep the home base for me, I have 30+ years of connection with a small city community. I keep it for them, it is where they grew up.

I live in a low cost part of the country, can afford to keep a home base and travel as much as I want, for a small fraction of urban or suburban life. I don't have to break those connections to afford travel, but my travel doesn't have to be full time, and doesn't have to be RVing full time,since my interests are more global. Full time RVing would be pretty much boring for me, because it would mostly be in the U.S. where every city and town is culturally interchangable for another, my experience 20,000 miles a year road tripping 21st century U.S. (It wasn't like this 50 years ago).

If you havedoubts, keep the home base, try the travel.

Executive wrote:
We take the grandkids with us. Full timing 7 years now. They've spent the past 7 yrs traveling the country with us. That said, we only take the two oldest, they're now 15 and 16 but still want to travel. They've visited 42 States and loved every one. Since they live in separate parts of Ca. their summer vacations start at different times. Once they know when their vacation starts they ask where we will be and their parents fly them to the nearest airport. We pick them up and they travel with us until their vacation is over then they either fly back home or their parents come to meet us, spend a week or so depending on where we are and then head home. Nothing beats camping several months with your grandkids. Think of the memories they've taken back to school with them....Dennis

That is very cool, Dennis!

The kids must love that time with you, and I bet the parents miss the heck out of them by the end of the summer!

Having full-timed for 16 years our grandchildren grew up with us in a RV. Back then we didn't have a computer, no cell phone, no email. We spent many hours in a phone booth and writing letters and postcards.

We visited them for a week or two and they would visit us in nice areas. We took them traveling with us. We were there for their important milestones - first day of school, sports games and tournaments, school performances, etc. If you know the background of the school project 'Flat Henry'...we took him with us to many neat places. The kids and their classmates were thrilled to learn of his travels.

We've done volunteering in parks and sometimes the kids would visit and volunteer along with us. They still talk of it.

When we gave up full-timing (miss it, by the way) they were very disappointed. They loved hearing of our lifestyle and sharing in vacations.

Regarding the house and everything in it....that was easy and letting go of it was like a big weight lifted from our shoulders. 'Stuff' owns you. We found so much that we hadn't laid an eye on for 30 years or more. We found living in a small space with minimal 'stuff' is liberating and so easy to manage.

Full-timing is not for everyone. You both have to want to do it and you need to be adventurous. It's a wonderful lifestyle and we haven't regretted it for a second. Good luck with your decision. We don't feel we or they missed out on anything.

As our grandkids got older they weren't around anyway. They have their own lives as they should. We actually enjoy our time together more now. We keep in touch via Facebook and text messages mostly. We explained to the kids that we wanted to do this. They understood. Letting go of material things was the easiest part. Less to take care of. We gave some to family members, sold some, gave some to charity and threw out the rest. Very liberating! You can't take it with you anyway and we found out during the process that the kids and grandkids didn't want the stuff either!

Don't let go. Cell phones, email, etc. Swing through for a visit now and again. :)

wantobefree wrote:
How do you let go? How can you leave the grand kids, house and everything?

It can be easier than you think... in the old days it was not uncommon for 3 generations (or 4) to live in the same house. In fact when I was a child, once my parents settled down, it was less than 100 yards from Grandma's house (Across the shared driveway) and when Grandpa died Grandma moved in with us and we rented out the old house.

3 generations in the same house

But then we kids moved One went north, One moved around a bit and wound up west, I went east and my youngest sister went way east (Cape Cod) (The rest of us were in MI)

Now I'm full time RV so I can visit.. My daughter left home and went to Las Vegas, then came to S.E. GA and now lives in Wyoming with Grandchild (and Son in Law, yes she did it properly).

SO for me.. not as hard.. Your "kids" will likely move out eventually as well.

LET GO is an app for a smart phone, One of the "Re-cycle" apps like E-bay or Craig's list.

3oaks wrote:

DownTheAvenue wrote:
Before you go fulltime, why don't you go part time? Leave all your stuff and just go an a very extended trip. That will tell you if going full time is in your cards.

That would have been my suggestion to anyone contemplating going full time. Try it first before giving up the homestead. :@

X2
Yup, my advice would be to do a trip to Florida for the winter. In those couple of months you will have traveled and stayed in the RV you will know if you like it or not and if the lifestyle is for you.

I had no intentions of a Full Time RV lifestyle....that is until I made my first trip to Florida for just the winter months. Got back home, put the house up for sale and turned around and hit the road. :C

We take the grandkids with us. Full timing 7 years now. They've spent the past 7 yrs traveling the country with us. That said, we only take the two oldest, they're now 15 and 16 but still want to travel. They've visited 42 States and loved every one. Since they live in separate parts of Ca. their summer vacations start at different times. Once they know when their vacation starts they ask where we will be and their parents fly them to the nearest airport. We pick them up and they travel with us until their vacation is over then they either fly back home or their parents come to meet us, spend a week or so depending on where we are and then head home. Nothing beats camping several months with your grandkids. Think of the memories they've taken back to school with them....Dennis

Here's what worked for me:

The first winter, I told people, 'I don't know when I will be back. Maybe a couple weeks, or a couple months, or longer.' Turned out, I was gone 6 months. I kept everyone posted, online and by phone.

The second year, I knew what to expect, so I could make a more definite plan. I cleaned out my house, got rid of a lot and stored the rest, and rented out my house for 9 month stretch. Having the rental income is awesome!

I love my house, so I don't plan to sell it. I also love my stuff ;). And my hometown peeps. I think I will stick with the 6-9 months thing, for now.