Christmas Time - RV-Dreams Community Forum

French Bikers · RV-Dreams Family Member

Christmas Time

Lucky Mike · RV-Dreams Family Member

Thank you and merry Christmas Jean!!!!!

P.S.....doesnt have to be the last year for a tree................except for the last 2 years Ive always bought a live tree with the root ball, used it over Christmas in a flower pot and then planted it at the campground before I left!!!.............it always gives me a good feeling when I go back and see it growing....a couple Ive planted when Ive gone back have been decorated on the holidays......another park that I frequent over Christmas would hold my site and it has 4 trees I've planted and I just pull in and add one when I leave!!

SnowGypsy · RV-Dreams Family Member

Mike: Neat idea! A couple of years we bought those types, small ones, but the drought got them. We have never had a live tree that was cut down by choice.

Everyone have a Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year. If traveling, please pay close attention to the weather forecasts since they change frequently and be prepared for any weather situations that might occur in the areas where you will be driving through. They said it would be 30 degrees here today and it was only 20 which is a big difference!

NWescapee · RV-Dreams Family Member

Jean - it definitely doesn't have to be your last "live" tree. Our little tree this year is a rosemary bush, shaped like a tree with miniature lights and ornaments. Pretty and functional and we used some of that fresh rosemary in last night's dinner!! I seem to have allergies to pine / cedar scents but rosemary is not bothering me one bit and it certainly provides a fresh aroma in the RV.

A previous thread gave a few other ideas on holidays in an RV and yes, some people have a much larger tree than we do, but this one is so working for us this year. Christmas dinner will definitely have some fresh rosemary in the meal!!

rv-dreams.activeboard.com/t55896787/holidays-in-a-rv/

DebbieM · RV-Dreams Family Member

Jean,

That's so funny, my husband and I have been having those same thoughts. But we've already talked about getting a small live one, like Mike, and planting it after also. It's going to be bittersweet with this being the last Christmas in this house, but very much looking forward to flying all the kids out to the Florida Keys for next Christmas!

--Debbie

Alie and Jims Carrilite · RV-Dreams Family Member

Ruth- Thats what we do is get a little Rosemary tree. If the cats don't get it, it will last for a long time. And your rig will smell great too.

Dog Folks · RV-Dreams Family Member

Thanks for your post.

A little advice from someone whom has been there:

As you prepare to enter the best possible lifestyle there is, please don't get into "This is the last time............" discussion.

I did that with both work and at home when we retired, and it is a negative you should avoid as there is so many positive things coming your way. It also made me sentimental when I needed a clear head to make decisions.

Instead of "This is the last time....." Use "This time next year we will be......" Look forward not back.

Didn't mean to preach but rather offer some experience.

Happy Holidays.

French Bikers · RV-Dreams Family Member

Don't worry I'm not negative at all, when I say it is the last time for me it is positive. I've been waiting for this moment for so many years and I agree with you I'm looking forward but since we decided that we both have enough of our actual life I've have a hard time to wait hitting the road. In the mean time I keep reading and planning.

BTW our next X-mas three should be a Palm three no more pine this way it should help me forget the snow and the cold weather, but if the wife say it will be a pine well it will be a pine three.

Jean

VanMar · RV-Dreams Family Member

Jean and Mrs. Jean

Merry Christmas to you, too and all the RV Dreams family.

Vance and Marla

Camper Chronicles · RV-Dreams Family Member

I like the comment about trying not to think it's the last time and love the ideas about buying a small one and planting it. Jean it's funny because Lee and I had a similar discussion and are not putting up a tree at all. What we are doing instead is going to NYC to see the tree in Rockefeller center which we have never done. I cashed in hotel points for a free room so hopefully we can keep the costs very very low. It is weird thinking about this might be our last Christmas in a sticks and bricks...can't wait to see how we can "reinvent" the holiday out on the road.

jrzygrl64 · RV-Dreams Family Member

Bill and I had a similar conversation. Our last big live tree! It is definitely bittersweet.

I am going to try to take the advice Dog Folks offered though. While it did sound a bit "harsh" at first, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that the voice of experience is right. I go back and forth between looking back and looking forward, and I think I need to try and focus more on the looking forward.

That can be hard to do though, because of all the sorting and going through things and purging. Everything I put my hands on has a memory attached to it. Some are easier to part with than others. Either way, the past is right in front of me as I prepare for my future. I say this for mostly myself, as Bill isn't nearly as attached to stuff as I can be.

I also like what Trace said about "reinventing" the holiday on the road. There was a thread a little while back that had a few pics of how people decorate their rigs for Christmas and I loved whoever it was that put garland all around the tops of their slides and hung ornaments from it! I am so doing that, as one of my favorite things at this time of year is my ornaments. They all have a story and a memory.

I also love DebbieM's idea about flying the kids to the Keys next year! I don't want to speculate on where exactly we might be, but it will be somewhere warmer for sure and bringing the kids to us sounds like a great idea!

Thanks everyone!

Kelly

NWescapee · RV-Dreams Family Member

This is our first Christmas on the road and you know what? We're having so much fun realizing that every Christmas might be different and cherihsing that after so many years of the same thing, either travel to Dale's family or my family and spending Christmas rushing around visiting everyone and wearing ourselves out at the same time. This year, the AZ desert, next year we're already thinking beach somewhere, who knows??

What we are enjoying is the release of pressure to be at numerous family events, coordinating schedules of too many people, trying to please everyone and stressing ourselves out in the meantime. Last year we spent much of the holiday trip to Dallas trying to explain what / why / how, we were planning with some family members thinking we were nuts. However, that trip enabled us to find the "right for us RV" in Elk City OK and this year that RV will be our home in the desert. We'll be visiting family in different parts of the country on different holidays in the future but this year Christmas is stress free and seems so much meaningful as we focus on what Christmas is really all about.

Camper Chronicles · RV-Dreams Family Member

NWescapee wrote:
this year Christmas is stress free and seems so much meaningful as we focus on what Christmas is really all about.

I love that!!! And it is exactly what I hope to find. With three kids I always made Christmas a huge deal. We had many many years with piles of presents under the tree and the corresponding debt to slog through in January and February. I don't regret those years at all...when the kids were small it was magical...but as they got older and the presents got more sophisticated something was definitely lost. One of my favorite things when the kids were small was making presents for the grandparents from them. One year we did birdhouses, another plastic spoons dipped in chocolate and wrapped in colored saran wrap. Those presents were the ones I remember and as a family we haven't done that for a long time. I am excited about trying Linda and Howard's idea of a calendar with pictures from the places we have been for family. I am excited about stringing popcorn for an outside tree instead of $35 a strand fancy garland. The more money we make the less the "right" things seem to matter... I am very excited about stripping it down and geting back to the basics.

Dog Folks · RV-Dreams Family Member

French Bikers wrote:
Don't worry I'm not negative at all, when I say it is the last time for me it is positive. I've been waiting for this moment for so many years and I agree with you I'm looking forward but since we decided that we both have enough of our actual life I've have a hard time to wait hitting the road. In the mean time I keep reading and planning.

BTW our next X-mas three should be a Palm three no more pine this way it should help me forget the snow and the cold weather, but if the wife say it will be a pine well it will be a pine three.

Jean

You got it!

Attitude makes the difference between an ordeal and an adventure.

Please keep posting as you progress.

It is really pleasurable to read about your excitement.