Visiting Home: Flying to CA for 5 weeks

Two duffels and two backpacks packed, holding tanks dumped, awnings in, Reflectix up, Fantastic fans set, propane off and fridge stocked with beers for the night we'll return from 5 weeks in CA. We'll hit two music fests, see two much-anticipated live shows, have a 2nd birthday party for Mae, see friends and family, check on the Farmlet and finally see some progress on our "small house" remodel in Petaluma (permits approved yesterday!). But first, 7 hours on a plane with two kids (and 250 other people wondering what they've gotten themselves into). #wishusluck #airstream #liveriveted #myrivetedlife #airstreamwithkids #travelwithkids #familytravel #nomadicfamily #reflectix @thenorthface

After the bluegrass festival, I got a chance to head up to Petaluma to meet with our contractor and see the 800 sq ft house we're planning on using as a homebase starting Nov 2016 gutted to the studs for the first time.

The design process endured the usual delays, including the firing of the first architect while on the beach at the Padre Island National Seashore, but is now complete with permitted plans. Walls will be removed in the pic above to create a single great room with the kitchen in the back left, a dining table in the middle across from a fireplace and the couch in the front. The back wall will be a big slider out to the deck with raked windows extending up into the newly vaulted ceilings. Doors to the right will enter two bedrooms, both with lofts below their vaulted ceilings, and a Jack 'n' Jill bath between. A new second bath and stacked laundry will be underneath the loft in the rear room. Exterior walls, originally without a vapor barrier or shear paneling, will be spray foamed and sheeted on the inside to essentially create a foam-core structural insulated panel construction. Ceiling will be reinforced and spray foamed, then finished with natural wood tongue and groove paneling with three skylights in the main room and one in each bedroom.

Framing and foundation work to support the wall below the vaulted ceiling to begin 7/5. While we're here for the next few weeks before returning to the trailer, we'll be picking windows, doors, appliances and starting to spec cabinets and fixtures!

#smallhouse #nottiny #remoteremodel #advodnasmallhouse

Whew! I needed that. Ann got the kids to bed around 7:30 this evening, and I realized I had another hour until sunset, so I checked the pressure on the new rear tire @l3bc and I installed the other day and fired up the orange sparkle '73 CB750. I said I was just going to go up and down the road to blow out some cobwebs (literal), but before I knew it I was picking my way through one lane roads on a beautiful loop of the Two Rock and Chilleno Valleys west of Petaluma and taking in the sunset over Bodega Bay in the distance. #cb750 #vintagehonda #hondacb #sonomacounty #tworockvalley

Our first week back in CA, we stayed in a one bedroom garden apartment below some good friends in the Outer Sunset. At maybe 500 sq ft, it was perfect for us to transition out of the trailer and think about our 800 sq ft home design, and receiving a package with these awesome "Home" shirts from @followthesun.earth made it even better.

But the best part of course was being right below friends we'd been missing on the road. The kids played with Paw Patrol characters and Wynne slowly got up to speed on Star Wars (she insisted that Chewy was the bad guy, R2D2 could talk and the Stormtrooper was her favorite) which meant the parents actually had some free time.

So what did we do? Organized their kitchen drawers, of course! Do you really need all these pencils? How many pairs of scissors do you have? How long have the batteries been stuck in this flashlight crammed in the bottom of the junk drawer? Do any of these plastic containers have tops? Plans for all these corks? These coupons expired in 2012. I honestly couldn't tell if our downsizing experiences had made us the best or the worst house guests.

But we loved being back close to friends and involved in their lives, and especially the ability for a last minute pizza night (Paxti's in SF isn't quite Little Star or Zachary's, but it's good!) with the gang. The guys got out instruments and rendered some of our hot hits as best we could with pre-schooler accompaniment on wooden xylophones and overturned pots and pans. I feel like the best way to get kids interested in music is for them to see friends casually playing and enjoying themselves, and it's been a challenge on the road. It's all part of the balance we're trying to tweak, but we've definitely really missed this.

The awesome @democratictravelers and @thedemocratictravelers were passing through Petaluma, so we got them to come over and check out our new tiny house. I think John got a little confused, but we didn't complain. We also just barely missed a long overdue rendezvous with @joehendricks and @rhondahendricks.

And the same week, we hung out in the backyard of longtime friends, ran into other Petaluma folks spontaneously around town and met a buncha new great people. I guess you could say, we're feeling a groove of combining our travel life with a dose of small town community. And we've barely even seen our world traveling family (they get back today from Peru and Czech Republic)! And at the same time as framing is starting on our house in town and we're shopping for cargo bikes, we still love telling people of our adventures planned for late summer and fall in the Airstream - the Canadian Maritime Provinces, Maine Coast and New England - and look forward to getting back out there. More than ever, I think a new balance for the near future is coming into focus.

#tinyhouse #tinyhouseliving #hotspouseswashingtinyplastichouses #airstreamfriends #nomadiccomunity #advodnasmallhouse

Airstreams and adventure rigs everywhere. Happily, we've been waking around town a lot, and peeking through gates and behind fences has discovered several Airstreams (including the two at @metrohotelandcafe you can stay in) and this sweet @adventuresinskyhorse -esque double decker bus.

Meanwhile, I've been drawing up sketches for a permit for a driveway gate with a curve on top that will just show off the logo on the front of our 25' when she's resting in the new driveway between trips.

#airstream #liveriveted #adventuremobile

Table for six adults and five kids on a beautiful crowded Sunday evening at the Lagunitas Taproom. It wasn't likely, but we made happen. Great visit to our hometown brewery after having been to innumerable breweries on the road (including Lagunitas in Chicago!). They now have their own farm supplying local meat and produce and plans in the works for more tables and parking. #beertravel #beertourism #takingkidstobreweries @lagunitasbeer #petaluma

Happy 4th of July and thanks to this awesome ranger in Shenandoah National Park who invited Wynne to help him bring the flag down for the evening and fold it. The #sisterhoodofthetravelingparents may not quite understand the idea of the country yet, but they've sure seen a lot of it! #4thofjuly #americanflag #findyourpark #shenandoahnationalpark #juniorranger #roadschool #airstreamwithkids #familytravel #travelwithkids

There are two ways to get from Petaluma to San Rafael and the back way only takes a little longer than the other. I took the back way. #cb750 #vintagehonda #vintagemotorcycle #westmarin #nicasio

Ever since we decided to make an offer on this small house in Petaluma while hurdling east across South Dakota last Fall, we've been working on maximizing the design, of course while also trying to keep it simple. That's meant a lot of time in SketchUp and with good old pencil and paper (usually the perennially-available kid's marker paper). Most recently, it's been figuring out cabinetry design for the kitchen and drawing up fence plans to submit to the city, and oftentimes Wynne will ask for a sheet of paper and a ruler so she can design a house too.

This pic is in the trailer back in October of 2015 as we attempted to envision the layout of the house as it stood from the few dark, camera phone pictures that were posted on the listing.

#smallhouse #roadschool #upsizingalittlefromdownsized

Decide at the last minute to actually have a birthday party for the two year old, call two local friends with kids, order pizzas, pick up cupcakes and candles at the grocery store, run into a new IG friend @zanosaurus who randomly happens to be at the same playground with her two kids, light eight candles so everyone gets to blow one out. Happy 2nd Birthday, Mae! #toddlerlife #happybirthday #cupcakes

A woman who lives in an Airstream wearing a @followthesun.earth shirt with "home" written on an Airstream reading a @sunsetmag issue with an Airstream on the cover. #BOOM #thatsoundwasyourmindbeingblown #airstream #liveriveted #myrivetedlife @airstream_inc

We're used to being a one car family, but then again, we're usually no more than 25' from each other, so when the opportunity came up to see one of my mandolin heroes, Sam Bush, at a small venue in the East Bay while Ann needed the car, I decided to take the motorcycle, my vintage 1973 Honda CB750.

When the CB750 first appeared in the US market in 1969, the term "superbike" was coined to describe it, and I felt plenty comfortable on the freeway, though I'll admit to frequently searching for a non-existent 6th gear. But when I hit the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, my confidence took a dive; The grooved pavement, which is supposed to drain water, made it feel like I was riding on marbles. I actually pulled over behind a construction barrier on the bridge to make sure the back wheel wasn't wobbling off!

With white knuckles inside my leather gloves, I made it the rest of the way and enjoyed a great show with my brother and sister-in-law and a friend. Afterwards I fired up the bike and flipped on the lights only to find the rear marker lights not working. After my hair-raising daylight crossing, I opted to head to my brother's place close by for the night.

This morning, I mapped a high route across the top of Berkeley along twisty road with expansive views of the Bay. I cut down through Richmond on surface streets to avoid as much freeway as possible then took the last on ramp for the bridge, hoping that maybe the upper deck would be smoother. It wasn't, and to add to the frustration of the motorists at my cautious 50 mph pace, I was feeling a stutter in the bike as I approached the second tower. I kept my wrist dropped, and eventually the swears inside my helmet turned to sighs of relief as I made it to the exit just past the bridge. Then the engine cut out completely...
😳

As I coasted to a stop on the shoulder, I knew I had one thing to try. I flipped the petcock below the gas tank to "Reserve" and tried to start the engine. Two tries with no luck then VROOOOOOM! Rookie mistake. A quick fill up, and an hour more on the back roads, and I was home. Seems like every ride on a vintage bike is an adventure. #cb750 #vintagehonda #vintagemotorcycle #sfbayarea #petcock

I call these the "pirate" @campendium shirts. Limited availability for the next couple weeks while they raise a bit more money to improve the site we use everyday while on the road. Only the kewl kidz with have these, and I just ordered mine. Okay, plus two koozies and a sticker. Link to the fundraising page temp in profile or at campendium.com. #rvlife #rvthuglife

Yeah yeah, there haven't been many Airstream pictures in the last month or so, we know. So here's one from the Eastern Sierras last January to tide you over while we spend one more week in California helping put on a music festival for a thousand of our closest friends and buttoning up as many details as possible on our small house remodel. Then it's back to the trailer and heading for the Canadian Maritime Provinces for the month of August, Maine coast and New England in September and a "spirited" victory lap back across the U.S. in October. We'll be hanging out the windows slappin' high fives the whole way! Come November, we're looking forward to a lot more travel - in the Airstream and out - blended in with some time for projects and community at home. #airstream #liveriveted #myrivetedlife

If anyone has any questions about how to setup any REI family tent produced within the last 5 years, now would be a good time to ask me. And for all our friends coming to the festival later in the week, your tents are up and you're welcome! Hurry up and get up here! #friendoftheyear #redwoodramble #redwoodramble2016

The festival is underway! Kids, tents, music everywhere, I feel like I've been running around non-stop since Tuesday, but there's still a few quiet moments to be found here in the redwoods. #redwoodramble2016 #campnavarro

We got back late last night from the Redwood Ramble, a music fest for about 1000 people that one of my brothers started four years ago. We actually missed the first one since it was thrown together at the last minute and we were in the Airstream in the Canadian Rockies. And we had to skip the second one since Ann was pregnant with Mae and due the Monday after the festival weekend.

But last year, we flew down from Alaska for it and this year, home from MA for it. It's not only a great festival in a spectacular location in the Redwoods - plus a lot of fun working with my entire family to put it on - but four days over which we can be sure to reconnect with friends from SF, Marin and Petaluma, all my brothers' friends and folks from past music fests and the bluegrass scene. Then you add friends of all those people we get to meet for the first time, and it has been an incredible social anchor for us while living nomadically.

This year, we passed on the offer of one of the coveted cabins, borrowed some family camping gear and, despite having lived primarily in State and National Parks for almost two years, slept in a tent with the kids for the first time.

#likeacommoner #festivalvibes #redwoodramble #redwoodramble2016 #nylonwallsprotectnosecrets #tentzippersareloud #ihaveaverysmallbladder

Since I had to work a bunch of the festival taking shifts greeting performers, setting up cabins and managing the backstage, pretty much all of the parenting responsibilities landed on @advodna_ann. She pretty quickly figured out that just saying yes to everything was the best way to tire them out. That lead to face painting, paper crowns, fairy houses, the climbing wall, catching tadpoles, popping bubbles, some sweet festival outfits and easy bedtimes. Of course, not much rest for her though! #meow #zzzzzzzzzzz #redwoodramble #redwoodramble2016 #musicfestivalwithkids #campingwithkids #supermom

Music throughout the weekend was incredible, and the setting made it even more so. Around 5:00, we'd head back to camp to put on another layer and get ready for the evening bands as the sun dipped behind the tall redwoods and the stage lights turned on. #redwoodramble #redwoodramble2016 #musicfestival #festivalvibes

No one wanted to miss the evening sets on Saturday night - Amy Helm and the Handsome Strangers (@amyhelmmusic) and The Infamous Stringdusters (@stringdusters) with Nicki Bluhm (@nickibluhm) - so we packed up the garden wagon we'd taken from the Farmlet with sleeping bags and blankets and attempted the unthinkable. Well, I'm here to tell you, the cold-night music-meadow tandem head-to-toe wagon bedtime is a thing. It's tricky (I had to run back to camp to get "Flower" the stuffed skunk and "Cat" the stuffed, well, cat), but it was awesome. #achievementunlocked #musicfestival #musicfestivalwithkids #festivalvibes #redwoodramble #redwoodramble2016

The latenight backstage jam with @lindsaylouandtheflatbellys, @steep_ravine and @warrenhoodhcc39. Seemed like they were thirsty, so I raided an unclaimed bottle of tequila from another performer's rider package and dug up some limes. I only later found out that they'd already rooted through my backstage storage looking for booze (do I look that stupid? 😜) and all they'd come up with was an ice cold bottle of O'Douls someone else had left behind. #suckers #backstagehospitality #redwoodramble #redwoodramble2016 #bestjamoftheweekend

On the Sunday of the festival, there was still plenty of music including one of my favorites, @lindsaylouandtheflatbellys, and a 2016 memorial set of Eagles, Haggard, Bowie and ☦ (not sure if that's right, but it's close!) by the Grateful Bluegrass Boys with James Nash from the Waybacks.

Then the packing, trying to put everything away for next year a little more organized than we'd found it this year. Not to mention packing up our own camp, but I had a couple helpers working the ATV.

On the drive home, @advodna_ann asked if I'd been carrying my phone all weekend. I said yes and asked why. We opened up the "Health" app and found that I'd averaged 25,000 steps and 10-15 miles a day for the past six days. No time to rest, though. Meetings with the contractor at the new house and a plane to catch back to Massachusetts to get back to the Airstream. #redwoodramble #redwoodramble2016 #unintentionalweekofhalfmarathons #redwoods #sisterhoodofthetravelingparents #camoatv

On Saturday afternoon of the festival, I remembered we had bought tickets a long time ago to see Bela Fleck and Chris Thile at the Fox Theater in Oakland the Tuesday before we'd fly back to Massachusetts. At that moment, I was exhausted and figured there was no way @advodna_ann (or I) would want to go.

On Monday, I mentioned the tickets to Ann casually reminding her that we'd already arranged to have Grandma feed and put the kids to bed. And on Tues, even after a 2 hour meeting with our contractor, dentist appointments for both girls, unloading and dropping off our car at the Farmlet, a last-minute dr's appointment for some goop coming out of Mae's eyes (why does *someone* always have to get pink eye before a flight to the East Coast???!) and a stop at the pharmacy at Costco during which Ann forgot her phone in the car and I thought we may have lost her forever, she said "A night out? Hells yeah!" So glad we did. Amazing show with some good friends at a beautiful theater watching mind-blowing acoustic pyrotechnics from these two instruments masters. #belafleck #christhile #datenight #oakland #foxtheater