29 days in Wilmington

Well after almost a month of being here in Wilmington NC, we are preparing to return to Lee's Summit MO on Sunday.  We are sad to leave and we have had such a great time being here.  Our trip plans have been interrupted due to the sale of our house.  While we are super excited about our primary house selling it has thrown a kink into our travelling plans.  So for now we are going back to MO to pack up our house and then sign it over to the new owners.  When we return this time next year to MO after our journey we will purchase some land (20-100 acres) and start building our own home with our own designs. We are also eagerly awaiting this!

Solar hot air balloon project!

We made some new friends here at the campground.  Two of those new friends Milo and Felix, are 10 and 8.  They love to catch lizards and they are being home schooled as well!  The kids have been hanging out with them and spending time riding bikes, playing outside and playing games.  It's really good to see them experiencing life like it used to be.  I remember being a kid and being gone all day from the house with the only rule being come back before dark.  Those days were awesome exploring and learning.  I learned so much about life, friends, responsibility without even realizing it.  I want my kids to have and do the same.  Rory agreed with me to let the kids ride bikes around the park without supervision! That was a huge step forward.  I am sure that many more of those decisions are to come.

Home schooling is going well.  We are teaching the kids fun and cool concepts everyday.  The other day we did an experiment.  In the picture above you can see we made a solar hot air balloon.  We took 3 trash bags and taped them into a large cylinder.  After that we filled them with air and tied it off on the open end.  Then we waited for the air to get hot enough inside to start rising the balloon in the air.  It was a great time because we had an opportunity to teach on experiments, hypothesis, and conclusions.  The experiment was not fully a success but they learned anyway.  We are trying to do field trips and experiments like this weekly to keep the kids learning in so many ways.

Also while we have been here we had the not so great job of evicting a non-paying tenant :(.  This is the first time in 10 years of owning property that I have ever had to do this.  It has been the main reason we have been here so long.  I really tried and tried to work things out with this tenant but he is just continuing to make foolish, prideful choices.  So I resorted to the court system to have him evicted.  Please pray for his heart to learn through this experience.  I have to say, I have had so much compassion and empathy for him.  I truly desire him to prosper and at this point have no other choice than to evict him.  Hopefully, at 23, he can learn from this mistake and prosper from hard taught wisdom in the future.

Thank you all for reading!