Focht Family Blog

I really need to go back and fill in some pictures on events that have happened this year. We have spent all of January in Florida. Only 10 days were at Disney this year. However, we found a really great campground in Orlando and I think next Winter we will come down here for 5-6 months and my mom and I are going to try getting a job with Mickey Mouse.

Sunday we leave Florida and head back to Statesboro, GA for another month. Nathan and I will be busy getting ready for CommerceV3’s 2011 User Conference that will be held in Chicago at the end of February. After the conference we will spend a few days with my brother in Atlanta and then spend a few days being tourist in Nashville. We then have an appointment for repairs at Newmar and plan to be back in Pennsylvania by the end of March so that Timmy can have his First Reconciliation with his class.

I will try to spend some time editing pictures this week so I can fill in some blanks on the year.

My dad told me about IKEA a few months ago but I still had never been to one. When we came down to FL, my in-laws came with us for the first few days and we headed to one for the first time. We had so much fun we went back twice more while in Tampa. Once with my mom’s college roommate, Esther, and once with our friends Scott and Nancy that now live in FL during the winter.

During my first visit I just looked. The second visit I bought some plastic bowls for the kids, towels for the bathrooms, and some decor. When my grandfather Henry passed I received two African sculptures that I had put in my kitchen. However they were getting really wet so I bought some cool baskets that looked African to me and put the sculptures and baskets in my bathroom….

A bigger shot that shows my new black towel and the baskets…

One of the other things that I noticed at IKEA that I liked were some pictures of beach scenes that were in black and white. I realized that I had some great pictures from the beach in Pacifica, CA that were just as good so I bought four black frames and started picking out pictures to print out in black and white to decorate the bathroom with. I was going to stick with four pictures of the beach but then I decided to do all four seasons. Winter is a picture of a tree that is outside the Newmar office in Indiana. It has beautiful red berries on it and the branches are covered in ice. Spring is a picture of a flower in Helen, GA that was taken by my mom’s friend, Tom Nash. Summer is a picture of the beach in Pacifica, CA although Nathan is quick to tell me that the picture was taken in the winter. Fall was taken at Twin Lakes RV Park in Cumming, GA. Some of the pictures would probably look better in color but I wanted to stick with the black and white look….

A closer look of the pictures…

This week has been busy as always but we have had some fun surprises. On January 14th, my baby boy turned 6!!! I still can’t believe that he is already that old. On Joshua’s birthday we spent the day at Hollywood Studios since he wanted to have lunch at the Sci-Fi Theater. After lunch we headed to Rock-N-Rollercoaster so that Samantha and Timmy could ride. When we came out of the ride, my mom was talking to a woman and her kids and it ends up that it was Kerry from the comments on my blog. Kerry was one of the first people that was not family to leave a comment on my blog. Over our years on the road I have emailed her many times because she wanted to be able to do the same with her family. She is now on the road and somehow my mom and her met up outside of the ride. Kerry has 6 kids and her oldest daughter is the same age as Samantha. The girls instantly bonded. Kerry and her family ended up at the same campground as us for the last few days so the kids have been playing together, doing school together, swimming together, and we even had a sleepover at our house for the girls. Here is a picture of Samantha with Katherine this morning as their family was saying goodbye…

New toys… I finally ordered a dishwasher. It is a portable countertop dishwasher that holds 6 place settings. I LOVE IT!!! I am convinced it takes less water than I use when I wash dishes and it gets them much cleaner than I could. Nathan is already trying to figure out how to get rid of it but I don’t think he wants to pay for the drawer model to be installed since there would be cabinetry changes needed. Here is a picture…

New Skills… Samantha has been wanting to learn how to cook. I told her that once a week she could choose something to make. Today we were at Publix getting groceries and I was looking at some of their recipe cards that are free to take. Samantha asked if she could pick one to make so she chose a Raspberry Salmon with Butter & Herb Rice. Since we don’t eat seafood we changed it to a chicken recipe and gathered all of the ingredients. Tonight she made dinner and dessert. She did everything herself including turning the chicken when it was needed. She has never cooked before except for making brownies. Everything tasted WONDERFUL!! She did an amazing job! Here is a picture of my dinner…

Samantha chose Pillsbury Grands cinnamon rolls for dessert. Again she did everything by herself….

I should have let her try this years ago! It was so nice to have a wonderful dinner and dessert and not have to do anything but the dishes and with the dishwasher that was an easy job!!

I don’t think my pictures will do justice to Nathan’s hard work but I will try. Here is a picture of Samantha’s room area….

Nathan’s dad built the base for the bed and the dressers and mattress are from our old house life. They have been in storage.

Here is another picture of the dressers with the guinea pig cage…

Here is a view of the major building project… the boys’ loft.

There is a hole in the middle of the loft that the boys crawl through to get to their beds. The loft is mounted on the hydraulic system so it can still be raised if we need it to be. Otherwise we leave it set at 60″ from the ground. Here are pictures of the loft taken from above…

Nathan still needs to add railings to the feet of the beds and the sides of the hole and build a ladder. Right now they are using a step stool to climb into bed…

One of the things that we lost with this fifth wheel was a bigger fridge. We had a 12cf fridge in the RV but this one only has an 8cf fridge. So Nathan bought a small (10cf) residential fridge and put it in the garage area….

We also lost our large pantry so across from the fridge is a new pantry…

AND the best addition is Nathan’s Christmas present to me…

Now we can do laundry without having to go to the laundromats. My mom doesn’t know what to do with all of her time since she is the one who usually went to the laundromats while I stayed home with the kids.