Adventuring with Amelia

Long post today… sorry, not sorry… We have made some (not all) of our important next decisions. The biggest one being is that we are going to attempt to drive the camper to VA and deal with the insurance inspection and whatnot upon arrival to VA. We decided we don’t have the mental brain capacity at this time to purchase a new camper while in the middle of this road-trip and move. That is a complex decision… do we upgrade, do we get another 17B, do we get something like a schoolie and renovate it ourselves? We also decided we don’t really need to ditch the camper ASAP as it is driving ok still. Clearly we will be careful, but trying to ditch it and swap into a u-haul seems like a big and somewhat unnecessary task.

Next important decision, is we will not be staying in the camper for obvious reasons. We don’t have a toilet and probably shouldn’t attempt to hold any water in the grey (or black) tank.

The next details are TBD… like how quickly are we going to try to get to VA. We don’t start renting our house until March 15, so we still have a few days and originally we weren’t going to arrive until the 19th/20th. Our household goods shipment won’t be delivered until the 20th. (But obviously we have all the stuff in the camper we have been living with/off of for the last 2 weeks). We are running into decision fatigue and haven’t committed yet to a set plan of action for how to proceed with the actual travel details.

We are also running into issues filling Amelia’s seizure meds, but that’s a whole story on it’s own… and is part of the factor in how our next days will go.

This morning we checked out of the Jellystone cabin and headed to the nearest Walmart. DJ spent a couple hours patching/ fixing the camper to make it better suited to drive.

DJ first attacked the passenger side. He got part of the frame hammered down that was sticking out and reattached the paneling.

Not to shabby! No more insulation peaking out and everything is flush.

Double sided tape for the win. We grabbed a cover from one of the side lights and hobo-attached it to the brake light. Not ideal, but it’s red. Again, goal is to just patch it to get it to VA.

Next the license plate had been run over by traffic and was folded over itself. DJ got it flat again and attached to the bumper with 2 big pieces of that clear heavy duty double sided tape and 2 big zip ties.

The last thing DJ worked on was the driver’s side big bash. This was a little less willing to be put back. He added screws, several heavy duty L brackets, and duct tape to attempt to secure it. Not ideal, but slightly better.

Hobo, yes. 100%.

Ironic side story… as DJ was finishing up his repairs in the back of a random Walmart parking lot… a South Dakota license plated truck came up to us and asked if we needed any help. The couple had been on the interstate with us and their camper. They are camping nearby and recognized us from yesterday. We had a few minute chat with them about the accident, and we noticed the husband was wearing a BUC-EE’s t-shirt. They had just been to one too and admitted to spending too much money there as well. Small world. They were sweet and it was nice they stopped to check in on us and offer assistance.

After all that, it was time to get Jackson some beignets.

This place was so incredibly cute and was definitely a well-deserved treat for all of us. No, Amelia didn’t have any. We honestly didn’t even offer. I had given her a gtube feed while we were at Walmart and when she is full, she won’t even eat her favorites like French fries and bacon. We made it up to her tonight though and got her some McDonalds chicken nuggets and French fries, which she ate all of the 6 piece Happy Meal! (See photo below of her contently eating).

Back to beignets… THEY. WERE. AWESOME.

The beignets were HOT, fresh, and covered in waaay tooo much powdered sugar.

His face says it all. Those beignets were well deserved after the work he put in at Walmart patching the camper.

We got 2 orders, which had 3 beignets in each… meaning we each got 2. They were YUMMY! This is how much powdered sugar was at the bottom of each bag. It was probably close to a cup.

After beignets, we traveled to about 1/2 hour to be close to a pharmacy that said it had one of Amelia’s meds in stock that we needed filled before this weekend. Literally hanging out, staying put while I desperately tried to get an RX sent for that med. This was more drama that it really needed to be, especially considering I started asking specifically for it on Sunday…5 full workdays ago. Not going to lie, I hate dealing with Amelia’s RX’s. Controlled seizure meds can’t be transferred between stores and can’t be filled early. It’s already a headache before any issues come into play like getting a new RX sent out of state and getting past the staff that control what gets sent on to her actual neurologist from the MyChart messaging and phone messaged (yep, left both types of messages today).

Happy to report 1 med is filled and we will pick up tomorrow before we leave here. As we haven’t entirely decided our next steps, we still need to deal with the 2nd med I tried to get filled this week too and a 3rd med that Amelia will run out of by next weekend. (All the Amelia-related admin tasks, really is a full-time job).

As mentioned above, Amelia skipped the beignets and we made sure to get her favorite chicken nuggets and French fries from the McDonalds next-door instead. This little lady is definitely more of a savory girl and doesn’t do much for sweets. She was super happy to see the little red happy meal box in my hand when I walked back into the room with it tonight.

The rest of us ordered DoorDash for dinner. DJ tried a catfish sandwich. I got a veggie burger and Jackson got a normal cheeseburger. We are all overly stuffed on fried food and we aren’t complaining.

Time to get snuggly and cozy. We didn’t travel very far today. We are maybe about an hour away (maybe less) then where we started our day.

Honestly we all needed a non-travel day again today to take a breather.

I took a super long hot shower tonight and got into lobster mode. Amelia snuggled up with me while I’m finishing writing this post. Cozy, snuggly, slow evenings are my absolute favorite.

Picking up her med tomorrow and deciding how the rest of the drive will go… until tomorrow!