New Beginnings

This has been a year of changes. In late November we made the decision to stop traveling due to some health issues my husband had. A couple days later we learned that our youngest daughter is expecting a baby in August. About 6 weeks later we learned that our middle daughter who has a 2 year old is also expecting a baby this year. We already knew that our oldest was pregnant and due in March. Little Elsie was born on March 6, 2014. I took this picture of her the other day when she was at my house.

About a month ago my husband spent 5 days in the hospital with fluid in his lungs and a pretty severe case of pneumonia. I couldn't help but be extremely grateful that he didn't get sick when we were on the road. It was a very difficult time for our family. That was a lot of stress for two pregnant women, a new mom and me.

I suppose that there was a little part of me that thought that after taking a year off there might be a way to do a few shows now and then.  While Alan was in the hospital some good friends of ours who are restructuring their business too, called me to see if I would be willing to sell the pipe and drape for our booth. With him so sick I knew that our show days were definitely behind us. So I agreed to sell it to them. Goodbye to our blue drapes and the pipe to hang them from.

When Alan got home from the hospital he was very stressed out about a lot of things. The first thing that I had to take care of was selling our travel trailer. I wrote some blog posts about our adventures in it. That was our home away from home for about 6 years. But on April 11th we sold it. I have to admit it was kind of bittersweet to see it drive away.

A week or so after the trailer was sold, we decided that we would sell our truck too. We knew we were going to do it so it wasn't a surprise but again, it was another big step. There were 200,000+ miles on it and almost all of them were miles spent traveling from one show to another. Alan knows how many hours were on the engine; apparently diesel engines keep track of that information. I try not to think about how many hours I rode in that truck but obviously if we drove over 200,000 miles it was a lot of hours.That truck was so reliable and Alan loved driving it. When we ordered it he chose every option that he wanted figuring that he would spend a lot of time behind the wheel. He took excellent care of it and when we traded it in it looked brand new. Alan was an expert about getting every nook and cranny of that truck full as you can see in this blog post. This picture is of our truck packed and ready to leave for a show. It was very sad to drive away from it for the last time.

Now we have a Subaru Outback. It is much smaller but is more conducive to our life off the road. It is a car I can feel comfortable driving grandchildren around in. With three new babies and a 2 1/2 year old that was a big consideration. I have to admit that Subaru wasn't my first choice of car. But I also have to admit that seeing their ad campaign with totally smashed up cars and the phrase "They lived" definitely had an impact. It is a nice car and I'm enjoying driving it.

Things have definitely changed for us. I'm still doing business online. I am looking forward to working on new projects, many of which will probably be baby and toddler related. I hope you'll continue to follow me on this new journey.

Happy Quilting and Stitching,

Carol