Birthday

June 24, 2011 | Birthday,Family,Iowa,Norway,Vacation

It was a little early, but we celebrated Bestemor’s birthday while she was here.

Posted by Becky @ 6:00 am | 2 Comments

Lefse!

June 23, 2011 | Family,Iowa,Norway,Vacation

Bestemor and Bestefar made it safely home Tuesday, but I still have photos to post. We had a wonderful visit, but the house is a bit quieter now. We’re looking forward to the next time we can be together.

Here’s our lefse day. We’ve done this before, but last time, we had to use sour cream in the recipe. We had the same aprons, the same grill, but this time, we had kefir for the recipe … and some smaller helping hands.

Posted by Becky @ 6:00 am | 5 Comments

Books: The Glass Mountain

June 22, 2011 | Books

I read The Glass Mountain by Diane Wolkstein in February. Wolkstein adapted the story from “Old Rinkrank” by the Brothers Grimm. It’s a typical fairy tale of a princess held hostage, but she saves herself. The book has beautiful illustrations by Louisa Bauer.

Posted by Becky @ 5:54 pm | Comments

Books: The Princess Knight

Books

I read The Princess Knight by Cornelia Funke in February. It has a fun gender twist on the knight-in-shining-armor story, and it’s beautifully illustrated by Kerstin Meyer. They also worked together on Pirate Girl.

Posted by Becky @ 4:02 pm | 1 Comment

Books: The Great Christmas Bowl

Books

I read The Great Christmas Bowl by Susan May Warren in February. (Yes, I’m still getting caught up.) The author is related to a friend of mine, and she lives close enough (in another state) to be considered “local.”

I’m not a fan of romance novels — even less so of Christian romance novels, which is what this author writes — and, luckily, this wasn’t one of those. It was a sweet and often funny story about family. Very nice.

Posted by Becky @ 3:37 pm | Comments

Heritage Park

Family,Iowa,Norway

We visited Heritage Park last week. Oh, we’ve been there before for the Steam Threshing Festival and for a Sons of Norway dinner at the old Norwegian church. But we’ve never taken Bestemor and Bestefar there before. So we did.

We had a great tour with Jim Oulman. My father-in-law, who grew up on a farm and operates a backhoe for a living, was especially interested when we were surrounded by tractors and steam engines. It was a great afternoon!

Posted by Becky @ 6:00 am | 1 Comment

Father’s Day

June 21, 2011 | Family,Iowa,Norway,Vacation

We celebrated Father’s Day early, because we planned on being in Kansas this weekend. Turns out those plans changed. (Long story. More to come.) At least we still had a nice celebration for the best Pappa in the world.

Posted by Becky @ 6:00 am | Comments

Winnebago

June 20, 2011 | Family,Iowa,Norway,Vacation

After almost three years here, we finally took the Winnebago tour. Yes, we live in Winnebago County, home of the Winnebago recreational vehicles.

It’s actually a sign of spring here. Where most people look for the first robin of the season, I look for the first Winnebago to come out of storage and hit the road. (Here’s a little bit of Winnebago County history. Ah, that’s why there’s a Clark Street.)

Before the tour even started, we got to check out a 1967 Winnebago, which sold for $6,645. The kids seemed to like it. I thought, yeah, this is the first thing we’ll see. The last thing will be a luxury apartment on wheels that cost more than our house. (I hit that nail on the head.)

We weren’t allowed to take photographs in the plant, but we went to several buildings and got to see how a Winnebago is made from start to finish. It’s actually quite amazing. And the plant is big enough to have its own water tower.

And here it is — the luxury apartment on wheels. Wow.

Ouch!

Granted, they don’t all cost that much, and it got me to thinking. Oh, sure, I’ve joked about taking off in an RV, especially since we live so close to Winnebago headquarters. You should be able to take advantage of what’s nearby, right?

With a huge chunk of change every time we visit family in Norway, it’s not like we have a summer cabin on the lake or a boat or even an RV. Even so, I’ve wondered what it would be like to have something like that to “get away from it all” on vacation.

I’ve looked into the cost of renting an RV to travel the eastern seaboard in the fall to see the changing colors. (Gosh, we’ve talked about that one for years. Still haven’t done it. It’s pretty expensive even to rent one of those things.) I’ve said I should get an RV and take a road trip with other bloggers, picking them up on the way to North Carolina to write a cookbook with Ilina. She’d cook, and I’d take photos. I’ve joked about getting out of town during the winter with friends … somehow getting Winnebago to sponsor our trip South.

Then there’s the thought … what about living in an RV for a year? Could I sell my house and live in an RV for a year … with a husband, three children, a dog and a goldfish?

I remember following the adventures of Marlene Smith-Graham and her family more than a decade ago. In the “old days” before blogs, they had a website to chronicle their year-long travels across the United States in a van. A van. They were following in her parents’ footsteps — they traveled across the country with their family in 1976 in a VW Beetle. I followed them online from Norway. I bought their book. Their adventure stuck with me.

And I started looking for folks who do that today.

I ran across Miss Britt, whose family just sold their house and took off for the open road. I met Britt a few years ago at a conference. She lived in Florida, and she’s originally from Iowa. I started looking some more.

I found Brad Herzog, whose book, Turn Left at the Trojan Horse, sits near the top of my to-read file. In addition to books, he writes a travel blog and is known as a “Picasso of the Winnebago.” Wow. How did he get sponsored by Winnebago? Did he negotiate that himself? Or did his publisher? And … how do I become the Georgia O’Keeffe of the open road?

There’s quite a collection of travel bloggers … those who travel for a living. It’s quite amazing. I still wonder … could I do that? Would I want to?

Check these out:

Adam Baker
Alison Gresik
Heather Greenwood Davis
Jennifer Miller

Tell me if there are more.

For now, I live vicarously through them. Someday? Maybe I’ll join them.

Posted by Becky @ 6:00 am | 5 Comments