Our BIGGEST RV Mistake after One Year Full Time RV Living

it's our 1 year no matter bursary and we have learned a lot over the past year and made a lot of mistakes have we ever so we thought we would share all of that with you [Music] this video is gonna be a little bit longer than a lot of our regular videos so I'm gonna actually put timelines down in the description so if there's something specific you're looking for you can actually jump to that time but if I were you I would just watch the whole video because there's a lot of good stuff here yes there's gonna be great stuff and those of you looking for all the finances the money spent how many days we were wherever that's gonna be in our next video we couldn't squeeze it all into one it would just be too long yeah and who likes to talk about money anyway we know you don't alright and also you're gonna see me looking at my phone a lot I swear I'm not on Facebook but these are right notes for this video to start off with we're gonna go straight into emotions so our emotional journey over this first year yeah it's abdun float let me tell you so to start off with you were I was apprehensive when we first started very apprehensive I was excited well I was apprehensive in the fact that I had never driven something this big before so that's where my my angst was it was mainly with that yeah and for us it took about three or four months of what we call vacation mode right where we were moving fast and furious for us really for this to become a normal way of life yeah it was probably at that four month mark when we stopped referring to Ruby as the RV and started calling her the house the good part is we still get really excited when we leave one place and head to a new place yeah the view outside the window is always changing and we just seem to trump ourselves with our views yeah and it's been amazing and not once I don't know about you but not once have I second-guess my decision to go full-time how about you oh no I have not either no no and as far as our most difficult adjustment I think for me it was just slowing down and realizing that we don't have to do everything right now that if we miss something one place we can come back or we can just decide to stay someplace longer if there's more we want to see slowing down is my biggest joke that's it that's the beauty of the lifestyle yeah it totally is alright next is what do you miss most so for me nothing okay I like maybe I miss a hot bath every now and then when it's super super cold outside but I can live without that yeah I miss and mainly gizmo misses it but the backyard I really like to still bring the door and let him go out because he can go do his business and I can stay inside when it's raining you got to take him out you can't hold it so me it's more of the yard and the other one I think would be just the ability to go and when we're boondocking to turn something on and it worked like it's supposed to and now I have to think about it and not have to think about it so I know a lot of you guys are thinking oh you didn't mention friends and family and how much you missed them well I got to tell you that missing friends and family for us is a way of life so we've been in the military for years and years so there's always someone that we've left behind and we're always missing somebody yeah and and we do miss all of our friends and family but the beauty of the lifestyle is we're actually seeing more family and and friends on the road and we ever did in our sticks and bricks yeah so the next topic is community let's talk community since we've been on the road yeah I tell you what I didn't know the community was as big as it is and we we seem to have made friends faster than in our sticks and bricks and we've met so many like-minded people we we knew that RVing was a thing we just didn't know that there were so many like-minded people out there doing it and I'll have the same passion to travel and seek that adventure that we were seeking and these are people we'd never would have met on our day to day lives and our being has allowed us to make these not just you know temporary friends but life long friends that will always be connected with ya and the the way that we've done it and as fast as we've done it has been phenomenal and it's great because we're all in this together all right so the next topic is what you imagined as full-time living what is actually the reality if did it meet up yeah campfires and s'mores every day is that what we're supposed to be doing that's what all the ads show all right so I have to say as far as driving in the RV it's twofold for me one me actually driving it it scares me the death which I never thought it would be that scary and two when we first started out sitting in the driver's seat actually scared me to death I always actually white-knuckled probably for the first three months I'm better now but I still have my moments but what she doesn't know is it scares me to death and I'm the driver yes so that's the reality really of the driving portion of our be still can be a bit unnerving yeah it took it didn't take me a minute to you know figure out the rig how she handles using my cameras and whatnot but now I'm very comfortable driving her I know what she's capable of doing and I wouldn't have it any other way alright let's well let me let me back that up I would have it the way she drove a little bit because I sat in the passenger seat when she was doing her practice driving on base and I actually like the view from over there and I would love to kick back with my feet up going down the interstate but I don't know when that will happen it's coming yeah soon famous last words alright so next let's talk domicile so our domicile is in Texas through escapees and the one of the main reasons we chose that place is because we were arty Texas State residents so we didn't have to make any huge changes it was really easy for us yeah so like Stacy said it was very easy to change our basically just change our address to let me say Texas and we're good to go yes so that is what's on our driver's license are our Livingston Texas Mel fording service address it is honor driver's license that is considered a home of record and is a legal address for banking for insurance for all of that so if you're looking at a domicile that address is a legal address and it's also a register to vote so we're full up around Livingston Texas residence and of course bill did get his first summons yeah like a month after we we completely moved over to Livingston I got my summons for jury duty which you know obviously we couldn't do it we were in Virginia at the time so it totally didn't work out for us they got me quick yep all right let's talk about the ease of mail and the difficulties of getting our mail yeah it's both it is both it's really it's really easy to get our mail all of our mail that we still need to get we send to let me send Texas and when we're ready to receive it in a in a play we're gonna be out for a while we just either email them or go online to their website and tell them to swear to send it it's that easy but the difficulties arise when we're not in any place for any length of time or if we're in a place that won't receive our mail so if we're only there for three to four days that's not enough time for them to actually get it to us we got a few bills in the mail that sat set and they were a little late because we had we weren't in a place to get them yeah the upgraded our mailing service so they scan everything that's still on the table are our bills that we get through the mail are so infrequent that's why I've debated the extra money if it's really worth it so we're gonna plug along and over the next maybe six months decide if that's an option for us as far as ordering things in the mail we pretty much ordered exclusively from Amazon their two-day shipping we either send it to a Dropbox or we don't order unless we know we can receive it at the campground direct right and you got to watch out when you're ordering on Amazon because if you like me and you don't pay attention to the shipping address you'll send it to your domicile address and we had to pay extra to ship toilet paper back to us so don't make that mistake yeah all right so our next topic is what have we learned so these are gonna be just some tidbits of info that are just kind of random we put into this pot that doesn't really fit anywhere else but we're thinking some of it is info you might want to know let's talk about how to open and close our slide which we found out about what year we owned Ruby for a year and we we always thought that we had to turn the engine on to open the slides so we're at Tiffin in Brent at Red Bay the home of Ruby and we're in the service bay and the technician said go ahead and pop the slides out and I looked at him and I said is it okay if she turns this engine on cuz we're inside the bay he says well you don't need to do that just trying to key and hit the button but a lot of our other are being friends did it no leaders so we were able to impart some wisdom on them and make us look good yeah yeah so we weren't looking so lame all right so next boondocking is not hard no it's not it and we didn't think we'd ever be able to with LED lead acid batteries yes no solar but you can't do it and the point is don't be afraid once you do it a few times you're gonna realize it's really not hard and we have several videos on boondocking if you go to the playlist I'm gonna make a playlist of everything that talks about boondocking how to save water all kind of stuff that topics we've hit up on so that way if you're still nervous about boondocking you can check those out but we love love love it and we're so glad that we finally tried it and stopped being big chickens and we've figured it out and I tell you what it is freeing if you haven't done it play with the rig know your rig and do it alright next thing we've learned is just because you've been RVing for a year doesn't mean you're not gonna trip your breakers we yes tripped our breakers the other day because we weren't paying attention we're on 30 amps they it was dropping down to 45 overnight and it was pretty cold during the day so we had the electric heater on Phil had turned on the little electric fireplace which I didn't know about and then what did I do I hit the microwave so needless to say we tripped the breaker so you still have to pay attention you know even if you think you all have it down when you live in an RV you are in a constant state of purge well Stacey is I'm not quite there okay I am always purging and we found that a lot of stuff that we brought in to the RV thinking that we needed we got to have it we purge like four or five times major purging since we moved into the RV after the first time we purged like what are we doing with all this stuff that's why we started this yeah so don't be surprised if routinely you're purging stuff and getting rid of more stuff that you thought you needed but you really never use this is probably more for me than fulfill but the generator is our friend when we first started our vieng i felt like if we had to turn on the generator we were doing something wrong and I think that's why boondocking was such a block for me because I wasn't thinking of the generator as a tool I was thinking of it as okay what did we screw up now we have to turn on the generator this is true but I knew that the generator was there to save our tail and I knew that if we cranked it on it's because of our lead acid batteries were too low we probably weren't using the generator properly in the beginning to keep our batteries charged yeah yeah enough you know we our should do it no it shouldn't so again those are some things that we learned another thing that we did not know about after having Ruby for a year was that our black and gray tank that comes into one too where you attach your sewer hose to actually swivels they didn't know that either so where does that come in to play is when you're at a dump station and you don't want to have to you know open up the bottom of the bay and run it through there you just pull the swivel out hook it up and let it fly we didn't know that that was another aha moment that somebody had to teach us all right finally the last point under this topic is don't be afraid of truck stops you know just get in and do your business and roll on the truckers are not gonna beat you up they're not gonna kick you out that's right they don't care that you're there no in most times I've had conversations with truckers who are more interested in the RV and maybe gizmo in the window than anything else you kind of just look around and know where you can and can't go and if if ever in doubt oh hey community whenever in doubt just ask my recommendation or tip when you go into a truck stop gas station have a good pair of gloves those nozzles are pretty slimy just hanging the next topic is what would we do different everybody asks this question that's like the big question bah bah bah the answer is nothing I say nothing to and the reason I say nothing is because you don't know until you know yeah you don't know what you don't know so there's no right and our biggest thing really we would be referring to is our dolly yeah so we started off with the dolly to save money cuz both of our vehicles were paid for we had to to choose from that we could pull on the dolly it was less expensive but we ended up hating it and and some people love the dolly and I'm gonna reference a Motorhome experience experiment because they use it he has no problems with it he's great at backing up with it but us on the other hand you know we had issues with it so we got rid of it and was our luck and we didn't we didn't give up on it right away read the both cars that we had we took trips with both cars and we tried to make it work we thought we could make it work that's the only thing that I would have changed but I didn't know we thought we had the grand plan when we left and if you want to overall video about our dolly and flat towing and why we switched I'll post a link to that video down below I think the only other thing I would do different would be to buy an RV years and years and years before we went full-time so we could take our kids camping and we can unplug for a while and you know there's so many benefits to our being and getting away from it all and I don't know I wish we had done that so our kids could have experienced it growing up that's the only thing that's a good point I yeah that would have been something that would have been phenomenal for the family yeah oh well their loss alright our next topic is safety yeah so one of the things we have onboard our fire extinguishers and I should say three of the things that we have we have three fire extinguishers we have the one that came with the rig up front by the passenger seat we've recently purchased two other foam point-and-shoot type fire extinguishers one in the kitchen and one in the bedroom on my side of the bed so that we can access it if Ruby's closed up so if you had to spray one essentially now gonna get a powder or something that that jacks up your whole RV all right next let's talk about the gas stop it's just an extra layer of safety when it comes to our propane and the biggest issue for us would be a tire blowout ripping out that line that's right there behind the front passenger tire now there are other circumstances that would cause your line to break or rupture as described in the video but for us it was just another added layer of safety is peace of mind basically for us when we're driving down the road we've turned our propane off when we drive it anyway as the other safety layer we recommend that I don't want to debate it down below I know everybody has a different opinion and no we do not have a propane fridge so we have an electric fridge but even that being said even if we did have a propane fridge I just would rather be cautious and turn it off all right next in line with safety has to be the big one for us and that is during break down and set up almost all of our mistakes have occurred when someone has come over to talk to us during these two critical points and we really whole heartedly believe that should be off limb to everyone and but if you are interrupted then just start back at the beginning go down your checklist and make sure nothing's mess yeah I agree with that completely I mean we're friendly we're outgoing we love to chat with people we love the like-minded folks in the park but when we're breaking down and setting up that is just the wrong time and we've had first-hand experience with major mistakes yeah I may even have some t-shirts made let me know if you want a t-shirt that says something about do not disturb breaking down or setting up camp all right so of course this the next one goes back to their checklist no matter how long you've been our being I recommend a checklist yep absolutely and we we use ours every time we get underway and every time we come in next is spotter safety we we will not back ruby up unless one of us is behind well I should say I won't back up and let she's behind me behind the RV now and then I pull it forward I back it up that's my driving well when I'm backing into a spot Stacy will be behind me with our either our cell phones or our two-way radios guiding me in and letting me know we're at you know how I'm doing for clearance and it's it's more important to have somebody back there because you may you know look in your rear-view mirror and see that you're going to miss the tree the side of the tree but the spotters back there looking above the rig and below the rig as you're pulling in most people in a car don't look up when they're backing into the spot they look behind them we've seen and heard of many RVs that have clipped tree branches on the top of rip gashes in the top of the RV because nobody was looking up and more importantly just recently it was because of Stacy spotting behind the RV that she noticed there was a curb stop in our back in sight and as far as back as we went had we dropped the air pressure out of it to level we would have dropped the transmission right on top of that curb stop and that would have surely done days they would have done some kind of damage and our rule of thumb is if I can't see her in the mirror anywhere while I'm moving I just stop and I wait for her to come into mirror view or camera view yeah and that's really important people have been injured backed into run over squished between fifth wheel truck so it's really important if you're behind the wheel you don't move unless you see your spotter ya next it's some equipment more equipment that we purchased to keep us safe on the road you want to start with the TPMS absolutely it's so are easy easy TPMS and the tent sensors that we have for it have paid dividends for us I check it before we leave make sure that my Pete my tire pressures are good and that it's reading all the tire pressures and temperatures because one of the things you don't want to have going down the interstate at 60 65 70 70 miles an hour is a tire blowout yeah and you set the parameters your your tire psi psi and your temperature to go off before anything happens so if you get an alarm on your tires something is is happening and you need to pay attention to I highly encourage you to have it for your rig and/or your towed all right so next would be the safety Plus yeah safety Plus has been huge for us I'm not only in the way it tightens up your steering it makes the rig a little easier to handle in high winds and when truckers are passing but more importantly we got it for it the tire blowout I wanted to be able to control the rig get it off much as possible yeah and get it off to the side of the road after a tire blowout and knock on wood we haven't had one nor I hope we ever have one but the safety Plus will help you control the steering tighter and it gets you back to centre quicker when you're making turns so in the actual test after it was installed the technician had me go off the road and uneasy an uneven road so I could feel that tired jerk and it was really smooth and there was no real jerk of the wheel I mean it was just smooth and safety plus lived up to what it's supposed to do yeah and the bonus with this product is if you happen to be in Atlanta or driving through there if you have it installed with the manufacturer they don't charge you for labor they just charge you for the safety plus the bar itself yeah so that's a good tip it to know if you know you're going to be in the area I would definitely wait and have it installed there yeah and it took us I think we're en out in two hours and the last one of course is our surge protector which can withstand being pulled out of the pedestal while with the RV in motion Holly why not testing that again so our search protector is a progressive EMS and it does a multitude of checks prior to even plugging in our rig so I'll plug it into the pedestal I'll trip the breaker let it run through its checks and make sure I get no error codes if I get an error code it'll tell me what it is and then I can either go back to the office and asked to move sites I let them know there's a problem oh they'll come out and address it right away yeah and it's really also not only prevents you from plugging in to bad pedestals but if there's a surge it prevents a surge from happening in our rig and I would much rather rather have to replace the surge protector than to completely redo all the electrical in the RV it would be much cheaper just to do the surge protection and if you're thinking this could never happen to me I have a friend of mine that it happened to I'm Julie over in cheek grease travels actually it happened to her while of course while her husband was gone and she had not driven the rig before so she had to pack up her 5th wheel drive it somewhere and have the electrical redone which cost a pretty penny and then drive it back without him so I'll see if I can find a link to either a video of hers talking about it or a video of ours because I know she talked about in one of our videos will the the surge protector and the TPMS were two of the products that I knew without a doubt we needed in fact I had them in my hot little hand before we owned Ruby that's how important they were to me yeah so next is a big topic that a lot of people ask us about food no that's what you asked okay they asked us about medical oh yeah the other important yeah we have TRICARE and through the military and they of course are contracted with Walgreens so we do all of our prescriptions through Walgreens we get make sure we have a 90 day script and as we're transferring from location to location you can transfer all your prescriptions form one-girl greens to another now that being said if you have a narcotic or some kind of pain meds there are specific rules on some of those medications so you're gonna have to check with those specifically when it comes to being transferred but for the most part it's worked great for us alright so next let's talk about how we deal with our appointments for me it's much easier because I really don't have any medical problems my thyroid which is only an annual check so I just go in for annual checkups mammograms that kind of stuff so going back to our what we call our home port which is where all our docs are in San Antonio for me I could go back once a year but for Phil on the other hand I've got to go back at least twice a year to see my Doc's for my knee in my back so that kind of it poses a traveling and planning challenge challenge so depending on what your medical requirements are it's going to vary from person to person as what your needs are now that being said if you are military there is another option for you you can become a part of the VA system and and do all your medical appointments through them and then that way you're locked into their system and you can go to any VA all over the US and they'll have your records there but initially you will need to transfer over to get all your medical stuff in their system and we this is our choice we chose to stay TRICARE and stay out in town yeah we have a ton of friends that are in the VA system and absolutely have no issues luckily for us Phil hasn't fallen off the roof or broke anything since we've been RVing so we haven't had a need for any emergency treatment or urgent treatment but if that were to be the case all we would have to do is call TRICARE let them know we're out of their region for approval and see which er our Urgent Care we would need to go to so it's not a big deal key word yet yet yeah well knock on wood right so next question our topic is banking really our baking hasn't changed at all so we're pretty much doing the same thing now that we did with our sticks and bricks we still use Navy federal we well I should say the one change is we don't use our check card for everything anymore we'd use our credit card and transfer money over I'm just more nervous about our card being stolen and it has been stolen and used a Navy Federal caught it likely before there were a lot of charges twice but that being said it also was stolen several times right before we left our sticks and bricks so there really hasn't been an increase in our car being stolen but I just like knowing the fact that if anybody charges we get that money back and they're not actually taking our cash which is harder to get back right so the next big topic is all about Ruby why did we choose Ruby and would we choose her all over again we chose Ruby because of the floorplan and the diesel floorplan and the decent and the price we had already chosen Tiffin as our manufacturer we did a lot of research on manufacturing we had some insights actually from a friend of ours and his dealings with them covering their warranty work and some things they did so Tiffin was at the top of her list after that we found two floor plans that we really loved I of course was leaning toward gas because I wanted to go cheaper Phil on the other hand when a diesel because we were going full time we were going to be in it and driving it a lot more so he of course like all men wanted more power he actually found Ruby and the price was fabulous and really that's that's it it was meant to be I mean the price fell right into our lap we hadn't seen them this model this low of miles for that price gap so I do not regret getting Ruby we I wanted something around 30 feet Phil wanted something around 40 feet so this was our compromise so she's 35 feet so that is perfect for us well you've probably heard us talk about the lack of basement storage and the bathroom being a tad small but it works for us we knew going into it that those were two items that we were going to have to work around and we have we kind of started talking about the pros and cons with Ruby the cons being the lack of basement storage and the bathroom for me a negative is the amount of counter space once I have the stovetop open and I'm cooking I hardly have any counter space at all to prep so and I'm used to prepping all over the kitchen and cooking multiple things that wine and don't even say it she's good at making a mess while she's prepping that's what she needs but I don't have that so I really did had to had to rethink the way I prepped and cooked so that is one downfall all right so let's talk pros of the Ring the biggest one for me is I feel like when I'm sitting in it I feel like I'm in a living room and we can pack some people in that living room when we want to hang out yeah we've had eleven adults in there are these no problem yeah and we were all comfortable so that I love love love about our rib next of course is onboard generator which we've discovered is my friend yeah absolutely and the next one would be our washer and dryer which for me is definitely a pro is now yes initially I hated our washer and dryer because when I pulled the clothes out of the washer they were still so wet it took two hours plus for them to dry but we discovered a trick yeah a quick trick 16 minutes yes so what I do is after it's finished washing I turn it to an extra spin cycle which bumps up the RPMs pulls that water out and now my dry time is normal dry time like I would have in my sticks of bricks if I have full hookups I am doing my laundry in the rig and then I'll also prepare like if I know that we're gonna go boondock or I'm not gonna have sewer I will make sure all my laundry is called up before we leave let's talk about privacy close the blinds don't look at my rig not that kind of privacy Oh got you my privacy when I want to get away from you it's a thing it's totally a thing so basically there is no privacy that's what he's trying to say there is no getting away when I need a break from Phil because you know he never needs a break for me never I'll send him outside he watches TV outside by himself with one of those many TVs we have in the rig or he goes to the store I go for a walk or you know we just take him in and go walk the dog and that's really our time we get to ourselves all the time we need we got into this knowing we were going to be confined in a 35-foot house so I mean you just make it work really it's not bad but you just remember I hope you like the person you're living with love and like is not the same thing you have to like hang out with them and spending time with them because you're gonna do that a lot yeah it's fine what's the one thing we have on our list that we purchased that we probably wasted our money extended warranty yes extended we're sure why did we buy it I don't know we were dumb and scared and we used it nope are we ever gonna use it probably not so I don't know I I for us I think it was a waste of money well we say that now because we haven't used it and nor do we want to use it or expect to use it however ask us after we have an issue where we need to use it I don't know but I don't foresee that yeah it may it may just have been something where we got caught up in the hype and and you know didn't know so we said yes let's get it yeah I think most of them especially if you read all the fine print are a waste of money I think it's more important to have an emergency fund and protect yourself with a full RV inspection so then you know what you're getting into and I think the fear of getting that RV warranty it's not so great we found our inspector through the National RV inspectors Association nervier and our via I think it is in our via Novi yeah something like that he did the inspection without me being there so it wasn't like I was pointing things out or asking questions and then he gave us a 20-page report when he was finished with pictures and it was phenomenal and it was the best peace of mind going forward with the purchase that we could have had so it was even two things got repaired because of his inspection that we never would have noticed and our dealer never would have noticed so of course we recommend everyone have their RV inspected before they purchase it and that is new and used RVs because just like when you buy a house that you build there's still punch items that may need to be corrected absolutely and the peace of mind that we got out of the inspection was I mean it was phenomenal yeah so if we had to do it all over again I would say no to the warranty unless it was something that I had time to really go through and look at and make sure it was a good deal right you know it's good call all right next we're gonna talk about roadside assistance everybody always asked us our opinion on roadside assistance and I can tell you we don't have an opinion no we haven't had to use it thank goodness we can't tell you what we have we did purchase through our insurance company which is progressive it wasn't very expensive to add it on there and we also got a Good Sam policy only because we were getting their credit card no we were getting the pilot rewards card so we had to be a member of Good Sam to get that so we ended up doing the whole package at Good Sam luckily like I said we haven't needed either right so the the benefit of getting that is we have the pilot rewards card so we can pay for fuel at the pump instead of states you having to go in and walk across the trucker lanes and then come back but more importantly we say probably 8 to 12 cents a gallon I think depend on which gas station we're at that that's the most important part so the next topic is our biggest mistake and we kind of alluded to them earlier so quickly we will remind you how dumb we are and we we once pulled our cord out of the pedestal while driving well no we weren't actually driving we move the rig 10 feet up so that was driving it okay you were at the wheel and we did that as well as forgot to put the pin in our dolly so we literally drugged the ramps down the road a couple miles before somebody flagged us down yeah let's just say we were at Disney and it was not the happiest place on earth that day so have we done other mistakes sure we've done a ton of mistakes we make mistakes every day right but thankfully we've learned from them and haven't repeated any so hopefully it continues that way yeah so next topic is gizmo pets on the road we say take them yeah gizmo was the perfect RV Road dog if you will yeah he he loves it there was an adjustment period it took a couple months initially he was pretty nervous driving down the road now he's very comfortable and he loves going on walks all different locations the only negative is that we found is the fact that he is on leash a lot more than he used to be we did have him off leash at a harvest so so a couple days ago and literally you could see the smile on his face as he was running through the field he was in heaven yeah he definitely was smiling and then some of the steps we've taken to make sure that he's comfortable when we're not in the rig is we have a Wi-Fi thermometer that we could monitor on our phone when we're away from the rig and it just lets us know the temperature inside Ruby and if I don't get a reading or an update then I know there's a problem with the rig powers out AC went out something and will come back to the rig and we'll check on it the thermometer we purchased has a great purchase there's no monthly fee we get emails telling us what the temp is if there's an alert and if not PO can just go into the app and check it can link that down below it'll be in our Amazon store if and that's at the bottom in the description it works well so let's talk about the vets we use pet smart the Banfield that's in Pet Smart for our pet they have record if we need anything we can Hannah Petsmart around the country which we have done and we also use our grooming services if you don't want to use a national company like Pet Smart you can go to different vets throughout the country just make sure you always have a full copy of your pet's record the benefit to having it at Pet Smart is for grooming it's got all of the sizes of blades and guards and how they're the cutting stays in the system so when we take them to a new city and we get him cut they just pull it up in the system they verify it with us so we know it's the right one and he comes out looking just like he has so if he was back home yeah and we've never had a problem with either the vet or the grooming the only other thing to be aware of is even though restrictions require dogs to be on a leash not all campers take heed of that rule so just be aware that sometimes when you're walking your dog on a leash other dogs can charge at them which has happened to us it's happened to friends of ours whose actual dog that attacked so just be aware of that your dog might be the sweetest dog ever but that dog coming at yours may not be yeah and it's so it can be a little scary to both you and your pet alright next subject is working on the road so when we first went full-time Phil was in full work mode for his Navy contract which we have a gap in we've had a long gap being connected was key to working on the road and we have a dedicated 18 t hotspot that we use we've had no issues with it and whatsoever but we do have a reboost sail booster in the event that we have a weak signal we put that up on top of Ruby reconnect and boom we're up and running but again we've not really had a problem other than just maybe slow or low coverage so I haven't missed it I didn't miss a beat when I was right we also have a very small printer it's almost a mini mini printer it's bluetooth and it has a rechargeable battery so it can be cordless so it fits perfectly in the rig we can whip it out when we need to to print something and it's toes very easily so that's also in our storefront if you need something like that it's been one of our better purchases and we don't we don't have to print many things but it's good to have so it is possible if you want to work on the road you totally can do it alright next topic is finding cab sites so we kind of went over this before in one of our interview series videos which I will link below but the main thing I used to find campgrounds is all stays Compendium I use the co e recreation.gov of course there's America I think it's America comm I pretty much go through everything and use it all as I'm looking the easiest way for me to initially find it is with the Allstate's app so I'll go in in the area I'm looking for see what's available and then kind of go from there my last resort is always private campgrounds I usually don't like to stay at private campgrounds they cost more your closer together but sometimes they are more convenient for specific location so just kind of keep that in mind I also use RV wizard to plan my routes is it RV trip wizard oh yes sorry it's RV trip wizard to plan my routes and have everything organized so we know what days we're gonna be where so there's no confusion with pulling in at the wrong place on the wrong date tree that would be awkward and all I do is dry it so she tells me where to go I get us there been doing that for 30 plus years yeah I'm very good at that alright next let's talk about TV everybody's dying to know when you hit the road can you watch TV absolutely you can so we have the dish pay-as-you-go satellite service and it's truly that if you use it you pay for it if you don't want if you're done using it so you put your rig up your you're not gonna travel for a couple months don't pay for it they cut it off when you're ready to travel and utilize the service you pay them you pay your bill they turn it back on and you're good to go or if you're gonna be at a campground for 30 days and they have cable and you don't need it you can also turn it off for that so whenever you need to the other way we watch TV is through our internet hotspot so we stream Netflix Amazon Prime and that's what we watch mostly yeah yeah YouTube yeah alright so let's talk about cooking on the road I love to eat she likes to cook I mean win yeah so really cooking on the road for me did change but just a little bit so I really have to negotiate how I'm cooking because I have less countertop and I have less space on the stove I really can't fit multiple pots on my stovetop so I do a lot of one pot cooking a lot of instant pot cooking we also grill outside also eating out is pretty much the same for us too so everybody asks about that I thought well once we get on the road I'm not gonna eat out anymore we're never gonna do that but really we're just as busy as we were before but in different ways and our eating out is exactly the same we haven't missed a beat on on our favorite meals no we don't miss meals do not miss meals we don't absolutely don't miss meals of course my storage space in the kitchen is much less than it used to so there's no more just going to the grocery store and buying a bunch of stuff you have to have a plan you have to have a menu because you need to use what you have before you start bringing more stuff in so really that's the biggest thing but for me I've been making a menu for years now so that's not really a big thing I like to shop with the list and get what's on the list all right let's talk about the future of the Farley's on the road what do you see for our future long term we're gonna start a road for a while yeah initially we said one year then we said five years but really we have no idea when this game is going to end yeah you're having a blast yeah our timeline has been pushed to the right probably a lot we just it was everything and then some after we after the first four months that we hit the road all right the only thing that might change is we're probably gonna throw in some trips to Europe and do some Airbnb s and stay out there for maybe a month at a time we're hoping our first time will be next year to say a whole month but you know we're not sure when or how that's gonna happen and then eventually we'll stay over there more and more we will RV and leave the RV behind for a month and go to Europe and then come back and go back and forth so that's probably in our future eventually but who knows when yeah we just love to travel and you know if we can find a sweet deal and go overseas that's what we're gonna do and as far as our exit plan we do have money from the sell of our house set aside to purchase another sticks and bricks whenever that day might come but we have no idea when that's gonna be all right these next few questions are we're gonna do what's called a speed round these are all questions from subscribers that have short answers so we're going to ask starter questions and hopefully one of those questions is yours or it's something you've been wondering about how do you handle grease in the sink that's easy we don't put grease in our sink if you pour grease down your sink it's gonna line it and code it and eventually cause problems so what I do is after I'm done cooking I put it in another bowl to cool and then it ends up going in the trash can what's the one thing that has surprised you the most how fast we've adapted to the community the RVing lifestyle that's a good answer yeah you're supposed to be speed sorry how do you manage the house trash or the garden the only time it's a concern is when you're boondocking on like BLM land so when we were out in Arizona we would hold our trash and there was actually dumpsters throughout the town that would allow you to throw trash in there so it really wasn't a problem tell me about these colored rings what's that all about our blue and pink rings we got these because we didn't want to lose our bands a real band's when we're out biking kayaking swimming the occasional hitting the gym where they can pitch your finger and whatnot but the main reason is we didn't want to lose them so we figured these were just kind of cool colorful yeah why not and they're silicone you can get them online or you can also get Phil's answer some sports stores will answer it completely or you can get them at sports stores what was elected year before you went full-time RVing I was actually working still between anywhere from 40 to 70 hours a week so I was pretty busy but on top of that we were purging we were selling stuff we were planning we purchased our RV in October of the year before we set out so we were really busy we were also trying to spend as much time with our friends as possible before we headed out so the first year was pretty or that last year was pretty crazy but it was also super exciting we were so psyched and all that work we had to do to get where we needed to be really wasn't a big deal because we were so excited about the process all right Phil how do we handle bad weather situations we monitor the weather channel the weather station or the Weather Channel app it's on the TV 24/7 and in most cases I'll watch and see if there if it's severe enough that we have to move and if it is where do we move to so I'm constantly you every minute I'm watching it we've even turned on the Dish satellite while going down the road so Stacy could watch The Weather Channel so we could see where the cell the storm cell was just in case we needed to get off the road find an underpass to park under something but if there we're in an area with severe weather the app on the phone and The Weather Channel we're all over it how do you get your hair done on the road all right this is a true dilemma this is actually one of the things that does kind of make me crazy about being on the road there's not very many things but this is one so I don't get my hair done on the road Road is the short answer I wait till we go back to San Antonio as you guys know we are in San Antonio at least twice a year so that's the only time I can hide my gray so you guys will know when it's getting time for us to go back and hit that Sigma six-month mark when you start seeing the gray come out it's also why I have a just a plain easy cut it's not a style it's just a straight cut because then I don't have to worry about getting it cut frequently we are a group of five there's five couples and we all hang out together four of these ladies all went to different places to have their hair done on the road all four of them had their hair mussed up they are all upset disappointed two of them spent hours and hours at a beauty school and separate parts of the country and still didn't get their hair finished I would recommend if you need to get your hair done on the road make sure you read lots of reviews or find somebody local who knows where to go or like me wait to get home how do you split up chores when it comes to chores Stacy cooks most of the meals like 99.9% of the meals and I'll begin on that though and I'll do the cleanup so I'll do the dishes I'll put the stuff away cleaning the rig on the inside we just jump in we both do it yeah I may get the bathroom one time she may get it another time you know we both always work full-time so we've always equally contributed to the household so you're gonna have to find what works for you as a couple so everybody does things a little bit differently this is just what works for us what did you do with all your stuff I ditched it well most of it we ditched we do have a small storage unit it's a 10 by 10 with momento spills Navy stuff some of the kids things and a couple of furniture pieces that I've built there are also a few things in there that we kept just in case that I decided I hated full-time are being but I've started selling that stuff off that's a good sign yes sir our goal is to drop down to a five by ten the next time we are there if we have enough time so that is our Year in Review I hope it's helpful for you to see your future as full-time our viewers and what it might be like for you we have two more videos coming up for you as far as our year year end and that's going to be our year annual maintenance for Ruby folks gonna go through and show you his checklist for his annual maintenance and then we're gonna do our all of our numbers so we're gonna have a video with all of our finances what we spent where we've been how many miles we drove all of that will also be in an upcoming video yeah so as you can tell this has been a whirlwind of a year again it has been everything that we thought it would be a penny more thank you so much for watching and hanging out with us over this past year the 15th was actually the anniversary of our very first video that went up on YouTube so our channel is a year old and we've been on the road since the 13th so our gnome anniversary was on the 13th and it has been awesome so please make sure you hit that subscribe button come back and join us again we have a lot more planned for you this year as well yeah a lot of fun and exciting things ahead and we're excited about what's to come for the channel and just our family in general yes so give us a thumbs up and hit the notification bill and we really hope to see you on the road just do it thank you it so to start off with less talking about that already yeah we're already talking so let's just keep moving yeah they fixed the two items it but gizmo is benefiting from her lack of counter space because she does knock a lot of food on the ground at gizmo stands right by her feet looking or I should rest over we have the what do we have you're like what's true yeah we got bugs right in front of us all right just fake it okay it's our what you just fake it and you tell me it's a cake you

Channel: Today is Someday

Views: 853,003

Keywords: One year full time rv review, one year of full time rv, one year full time, rv lessons learned, rv regrets, full time regrets, full time rv mistakes, rv one year review, biggest rv mistakes, rv living full time review, full time rv regrets, 1 year full time, full time rv review, biggest rv regret, rv newbie mistakes, 10 rv newbie mistakes to avoid, newbie rvers, newbie rving, today is someday, you me and the rv, Our BIGGEST RV Mistake after One Year Full Time RV Living

Id: uYRSx6ep_WE

Length: 47min 27sec (2847 seconds)

Published: Sat May 18 2019