The rehab is finished

Well, we now have a different looking motorhome sitting in our driveway. Last Thursday we left Maryland via our car and headed to Indiana. After a night in a motel room, Travis' first time, we arrived in Elkhart, Indiana on Friday to get the motorhome from Bradd and Hall's. We were really pleased with the exterior paint job that had been done by Mike's Custom Painting and the interior flooring that Bradd and Hall had just completed that morning. It looked and felt like a new coach. But we were not finished we had to go to Irv Kauffman/ Gene Miller's in Nappanee, Indiana to have the window treatments and headboard installed. So Friday afternoon as planned Irv and Gene installed their part of the rehab in the motorhome. What a difference in appearence did the changing of the window treatments from cloth treatments to wood make. Irv and Gene had also taken the table top and refinished it as it had become yellowed and suffered a few knicks. It now looks better than it ever did- the leaf never did match the rest of the table before but now it matches very well.

Painted Motorhome

After leaving Kauffman's we went to "Camp Newmar" for the night. It was then that we were able to add our touches to the rehab. New braided rugs were placed on the floors and the completed quilt was put on the bed. Needless to say we are very pleased with the end product. It was not an inexpensive venture but it was a whole lot less than buying a new unit. We have been comfortable in this motorhome and have not seen anything else that we just felt we really had to have.
Saturday morning we left Nappanee and headed east. We stopped at a Farmers's Market on Route 19 before getting to Elkhart. This is a nice market with vendors of all kinds plus a food court area. We spent a little time and money here before moving on. Our next stop was the RV Museum and Hall of Fame in Elkhart. This is a must-see museum for RVers. Brings back menories seeing those pop-up and other trailers on display.
Saturday night we spent at Harrison Lake, Ohio visiting with Tom's family. On Sunday we traveled on easterly and stopped in Pennsylvannia for the night before arriving home today.

The Rehabbing Continues

The painting of the exterior has been completed. Pictures of the motothome were sent to us from Mike's Custom Painting and we are real pleased with what we see at this point. On Thursday Josh from Bradd and Hall picked up the motorhome from Mike's in Bremen, In. and took it to their facility in Elkhart,In. Tom talked with Josh on Friday. Josh said the motorhome outside looked like a new coach. Bradd and Hall will be installing new flooring which will take about a week. Our plans now are that on Thursday we will be heading to Indiana. We are anxious to see the finished product.

A week in Biloxi

On Saturday Morning, October 4, 2008, eighteen persons started heading towards Biloxi, Ms. Six members of our group were flying into New Orleans, La and spending Saturday night than driving to Biloxi on Sunday. Four members flew into Gulfport/Biloxi, Ms and the remainder were driving from Maryland to Mississippi.

Tom was in the second group that flew into Gulfport/Biloxi, Ms. he decided to do this because we have been to New Orleans three times. AirTran was used and all of the flights were trouble free.

Our group of four was picked up at the airport by the car rental agency. After signing for the rental vehicle, we drove along Beach Blvd which runs right along the gulf coast. As we were heading for Biloxi and the Back Bay Mission everything looked it had when Leah and I spent a week in Biloxi the winter prior to Katrina hitting the area in August of 2005.

My first impression was everything was back to normal before Katrina. However as I looked around in more detail, I started to notice the aftermath that is still present in the area. Most of the rubble has been cleared away, but the scars remain. Many of the vacant lots have concrete pads where once stately beach front houses stood. Lots of old oak trees have been damaged and many more were uprooted and gone forever.

If you click on the picture, you will be taken to a photo album that will show you Biloxi, the people in our group and the homes we worked on during our week there.

Back Bay Mission Trip

If you have ever considered doing this type of volunteer work, I believe you will never do anything that will give you more satisfaction. It has been three years since Katrina and the amount of aid and volunteer workers has tapered off, but much work still remains to be done.

I and many others in the group will return to Biloxi to continue getting families back into their homes.

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Continuing the rehab process

Tom has been in Mississippi this week with a group of 18 people from our church and community working on the Back Bay Mission project. This project works on rebuilding homes damaged by Katrina 3 years ago. This morning I placed a call to Mike's Custom Painting to see where our motorhome was in the painting phase of the rehab project. I was told that by next Thursday it would be ready to be picked up by the Bradd and Hall folks for their work. I then placed a call to Josh at Bradd and Hall to let him know of the release date. Josh will go to Mike's and drive the motorhome to their facility for the floor work. Josh said he would contact Mike's the middle of next week.
Needless to say we are really excited about this process. Emily at Mike's says the motorhome is looking real good. I have gotten braided rugs for the floors and I'm working diligently on a quilt for the bed

The Rehab Adventure Begins

Wednesday, October 1, 2008
After much mulling over and planning we made up our minds that we would rehab our motorhome as oppose to trading for something newer. We like our motorhome- it is home away from home for us. Although it only has one slide we have been comfortable for the past 9 years traveling and living in it. And it is paid for!!!

We did a lot of planning and this past week started to carry out the plans. Last Thursday, the 25th of September we left home and headed toward Nappanee, Indiana in our motorhome. Thursday night was spent at a campground in Eastern Ohio and Friday we arrived at "Camp Newmar" in Nappanee, Indiana. "Camp Newmar" is the camping area that Newmar Coorporation has for units having servicing. We were scheduled for Monday to have the exterior clearence lights replaced, the awning material over the slide-out replaced, the slide-out seal replaced and a new front window drape/curtain.

On Saturday Irv Kaufman and Gene Miller came to our unit to measure the windows for wood trim window treatments and the headboard on the bed for a wood replacement of that. All the window treatments and headboard are fabric, not something that can be cleaned well and after 9 years have become discolored. When Irv and Gene left they took the table top with them (it needed to be refinished as it had become discolored) and the headboard of the bed had been removed and discarded.

Monday morning, bright and early-6:30am- our motorhome was taken into a shop area for the repair work to be done. We went to get some breakfast and then went to Bremen, In. to see the Mike's Custom Painting. Prior to going out to Indiana we had made contact with all the vendors that would be doing work on the motorhome and had arranged a tenative schedule with them. Emily, at Mike's, said she would have some colors mixed up for us to look at later on Monday or on Tuesday. We had chosen the design from the website and we had some idea of the colors.

After Mike's we went to Elkhart to Bradd and Hall's, the business that is going to be replacing the flooring. We had been sent some samples of laminates and carpeting which we had already chosen but needed to return the samples back.

By 1:30pm our motorhome was returned to us with the work completed. We decided at this point that we would stay the night at Camp Newmar. On Tuesday morning we took the motorhome to Mike's Custom Painting (Mike's open at 6am) . After selecting our colors, we left the motorhome and we're on the road to home before 8am. We were home by 6:30pm. It was a long day of traveling. Travis was the best little dog throughout the whole trip.

The plans are that the painting will be done in 2-3 weeks. Bradd and Hall will pick up the motorhome and do their work, which will take about a week. We will then return to Indiana, pick up the motorhome and go to Kaufman/Miller's for the installation of the window treatments and bed headboard which should complete most of the rehab work. We will finish with a new bed covering and rugs for the bedroom and the frontroom. Needless to say we are extremely excited about getting this rehab done.

We will have before and after pictures posted for all to see.