A while back, Alex did a great job outlining the 13 RV supplies you must have when you go full time RVing.

Although that was an extremely inclusive list, there are certain RV accessories that a Mom RVing full time absolutely needs to make sure that the inside of the home runs as smoothly as the outside.

The iPad (here being used by Eli) is just one of the RV accessories a full time RV Mom cannot live without...

And all the kids get home schooled properly as well.

Although these may not be “traditional” RV supplies or accessories, like sewer pipes and stabilizers…they are absolute “must haves” when going RVing for any period of time or if you take the plunge and go full time RVing like we have for the past year:

1.  The Kindle

The first RV accessory you must have is the one that both saves you an enormous amount of space while actually helping your kids learn. A two for one as it were is Amazon’s Kindle.

On our first fulltime Rving venture. I packed four (4) HUGE plastic storage boxes of books…homeschooling books, reference books, favorite books, rving books…..these boxes took up 75% of the RV’s storage space!

Best of all, you can even borrow books on the Kindle at no charge!! Check out that feature here.

You see, I was totally against the concept of my children reading electronically.  I wanted them to read real books.  Well I was wrong!!
We were just lugging around too much stuff and when we got the kindle we realized four extremely helpful features for those full time Rving families:

• Enlarging Fonts: The Kindle (and with other electronic readers) you can increase the font size which was very important to assist one of my children in reading more fluently.

• Multiple Readers: If you purchase one book (at least from the Amazon Kindle store) every member of your family can read the same book on all your Kindles and iPads at the same time!

• Electronic Dictionary: Yes we make the kids look up all the words they dont know and this feature really makes it fun to do that and it doesn’t interrupt the flow of a good book.

• Text to Speech: (soooo cool!) This is truly helpful for reading in the back while the parents are driving,  pronunciation and also for tired eyes!

Note to all future full time Rvers…save your back, open up your storage space, help your kids out and save some money….buy a Kindle and although there are multiple kinds and versions…..the Kindle, Wi-Fi, 6″ E Ink Display only costs $79 at its least expensive of all of them.

If you must have the color while reading then buy a Kindle Fire or even an iPad ( see below).

Don’t forget to get the Kindle Light and the Kindle Power Adapter too. We really like the Kindle Cover with Book Light best of all.

2.  The iPad

Nothing  beats the Apple iPad.

Although we love the Kindle, the iPad is an essential tool when RVing. We have found it to be so useful for so many different tasks, including:

• Emailing work and friends – quick emails are easy on the iPad
  

• Facebook – check in on Facebook in a second or two…but not too much time there!
  

• Doing Quick Internet research – Google searches are a breeze
  

• Blogging – blogging and writing posts are simple to do on an iPad
  

• Thousands of Cool Apps – and hundreds you can use to assist in homeschooling

• Reading Books – backlighting makes it easy to read at night and so portable! ‘Nuff said!
  

• Working – when on the road when one of us is driving or with the kids, the other can be working away on the iPad

• And tons more cool stuff….

I love to read on my iPad in bed late night or early morning when everyone is asleep. One of the coolest things about reading on the iPad is I dont need to turn on a light and wake everyone up. That’s because the screen is backlit — but NOT harsh on your eyes at all. I also love to read on the iPad in those rare times when the RV is completely silent!

Also we have never let our boys have ANY electronic video games, no Nintendo, no Wii, no Xbox etc…

So the only video games they are allowed to play are apps on our iPads, kind of old school, but it works for us. This rv accessory especially comes in handy when we need a reward for an above and beyond task accomplished or on those super loooong days on the road driving through endless plains or cornfields.

And you don’t have to get the spiffy new iPad 3, the original Apple iPad (first generation) you can still get on Amazon for nearly half the price and they’re just as good.

We have both an iPad 1 one and an iPad 2 and although the Apple iPad 2 has a few more features, the original iPad suits our needs just fine.

However, if you are hell bent on getting the best and newest, then go for it on the Apple iPad 3. The screen resolution is really unbelievable and all the extra features are very cool.

When you get one, don’t forget to get a good iPad cover, especially if you get the older iPads, because they don’t come with a case.

3. Audible.com

Audible.comhas been a lifesaver!

I recommend you get your first 3 Months at Audible for $7.49/month and purchasing some downloadable audiotapes for the long rides ahead…we  love the Joy Hakim Series called A History of The US.  Joy Hakim  makes history come alive.

Other favorites are:

• David McCullough’s books are some of our favorites…and more classic books than you could ever possibly listen to in fifteen cross country trips!

• How to Win Friends And Influence People by Dale Carnegie – why isn’t this taught in school? As this classic book states, 85% of your succcess in life depends on how you interact with other people. In our case, we still have a few things to learn here. One of the best books on a subject that ever roadschooler (or traditional schooler) should read!

4.  The Trusty GPS

We’d be LOST without our trusty GPS while RVing full time…need I say more?

We highly recommend the Garmin nüvi 2455LMT as it is easy to program, has traffic monitoring in it and has multiple voices to keep the kids entertained.

We have our guide is an Australian and we call him “Brett”…for absolutely no apparent reason.

The kids and we always crack up when we miss a turn and Brett gets obviously upset and blurts in his mechanical Australian accent “recalculating”…endless hours of fun.

Most importantly, Brett gets us to where we want to go. And when you’re hauling a 6 ton behemoth fifth wheel, you don’t want to take the wrong exit or get lost…that could spell disaster.

The Garmin nüvi 2455LMT GPS has been a lifesaver for us.

5. Netflix

Netflix is a mom’s best friend for those nights when you just want to watch a chick flick and all the guys are watching sports or war movies!
You can get it on the iPad, which makes it a “movie for one”…a great escape for the full time RV mom.

Plus, the Netflix subscription is really cheap and you can get it for less than $10 per month when you click here.

Totally worth it!

Just think of all the space you save by not lugging all your DVDs on the road with you. That unto itself is worth the $10 a month!

6.   Mattress Foam Pads

Although, the foam mattress cover is not an electronic device like some the other RV accessories listed above, this is an absolute MUST for saving your back in the not so comfy RV mattresses.

You can certainly opt for upgrading this RV accessory and replace the mattress with one like the Sleep Number Bed for an RV, but the cheapest and easiest solution is to just get a mattress cover. Although we are mattress snobs, to a certain extent, this really works just fine and best f all is one tenth of the cost of a new mattress.

Of all the RV accessories we recommend this one is especially important for MOMs!  Since we have a full sized mattress, I like the Perfect Harmony Mattress Topper – Full, but if you have a Queen bed, go for the Perfect Harmony Mattress Topper – Queen.

And a must have considering your mattress sits on a plywood board in most RVs!

Where To Buy RV Accessories That Mom’s Need Most

When you’re shopping for RV accessories, Camping World has a great selection of these as well as has tons of other small RV accessories (links provided here). They are a trustworthy and reputable vendor to find many of your RV accessories.

We have long recommended Amazon.com (links provided here as well) as their customers service is amazing, returns are easy and the vendors they deal with pass a rigorous testing to be qualified to sell on Amazon. With either store, you can’t go wrong.

Both Camping World and Amazon.com ship out your RV accessories quickly and the customer service is top notch. We have even ordered supplies in advance, gave a forwarding shipping address of our next RV stop and then picked up the RV accessories when we got there.

How cool is that!

So that is the top 6 RV accessories a Mom must have (and for the Dads out there, seriously consider these as well to keep the wife happy ), although for you Dads, please refer to Alex’s post on RV supplies for more of the outdoor “manly” RV supplies that you must have.

Please SHARE this post with your friends on Facebook as there are so many people who are looking to both RV full time as well as just go RVing who would really benefit from these RV accessories that every RVer must have….especially Mom!

Well, not really looking for bears, but we did want to see some wildlife in their “natural setting”.

We saw some buffaloes, some elk and some mule deer, which don’t get me wrong – was very cool. We didn’t see any bears so we were all kind of disappointed though…

Thank God we didn’t see any bears because one of our friends doesn’t exactly like bears much.

In fact, we got him some bear spray when he landed in Jackson Hole, kind of tongue in cheek to poke fun at him. We all thought it was really funny and a big joke.

But he knew something we didn’t.

Bear Attacks

As fate would have it, the exact DAY we were in Yellowstone looking for wildlife, some unfortunate hiker was hiking alone and was attacked by a bear. He unfortunately didn’t make it.

He was hiking alone, lost his way, came upon a bear and the rest of the story is a bit uncertain. What the Rangers who found him do know is that he made some poor decisions that led to his unfortunate demise.

That same day, we were blissfully hiking to beautiful Jenny Lake on the lookout for our wild prey…

Although we kept to the regular populated path and minded the precautions, you tend to forget that when you’re out in the wild, you are totally out of your element.

YOU are in the animals’ house, not the other way around. So when you’re out of your element, make bad decisions and get a bit cocky, bad things often  happen.

The RV Crash

A few weeks before, we were coming through Billings, Montana and I made a somewhat similar, although far less fatal bad decision…

We were low on diesel and were looking for a gas station and feeling the pressure to get the diesel tank filled and be on our way to our next destination a mere five hours away, I made the fateful decision to pull into a local gas station. Overconfident in my ability to navigate the tight turns and curbs only meant for vehicles NOT fifty four feet in total length, I turned in to fill up.

After filling the tank, I pulled our 37 foot behemoth 5th wheel RV from the gas station I never should have pulled into in the first place. It was then that every RVers nightmare happened as a jolting THUD sound came from the rear of the RV….

While turning, I had knocked the gas pump, the gas station stanchion and with the rear quarter panel of our RV, ripped off two feet of our back bumper, causing hundreds of dollars in damage to our once pristine full time RV vehicle.

If it weren’t for the kindness of a complete stranger who knew how to get us unstuck off the gas pump and avoid blowing up the entire gas station (think that scene from Terminator 2 here), we may still be stuck in Billings, Montana now.

Or we may not be here at all…

Another bad decision.

Drama

My parents came to visit us when we were in Glacier National Park, which was one of the most beautiful places on earth. The Going-to-Sun-Road is really something to see:

As a part of our quest to see absolutely everything possible in the quickest amount of time, we decided to see the other side of the park on the Canadian side. It was only 120 miles of so away and we figured, what the hell, we are so close we may as well go.

In Waterton, Alberta the highlight for me was the best run I have ever had…absolutely gorgeous scenery, picturesque in every way.

That was the highlight.

We were not so fortunate the next day…

As we toured the Canadian side, we stopped our tour for a well deserved rest and lunch in a beautiful place known as Red Rock Canyon located at the end of a wildlife preserve, 40 miles from the nearest town.

We ate lunch and let the kids to climb down the rocky 25 foot canyon to play in the cool glacier fed stream. For kids who had obediently submitted to the frenetic travel wishes of their parents and grandparents for the previous three days, it was a welcome break for them.

Hoping to get closer to the kids playing down in the canyon stream below and at the behest of my mother, my very unsteady father tried to get a closer look off the 25 foot ledge. The shale rocks gave way under his feet and although he is barely stable on level ground, he easily tumbled down the precipice to the edge.

Another bad decision…

As he fell, rolling like a sack of Idaho potatoes, he broke his shoulder and nearly toppled the remaining 20 feet onto the canyon floor before being rescued.

He was treated in a nearby hospital, stabilized and flew home the next day to seek further care.

Unlike the man mauled by the bear, my father will recover fully although he most likely won’t be scaling any cliffs any time in the future.

Trauma

One of the best things about RVing full time is that you are somewhat immune to many of the less than pleasant happenings back home.

Things like petty and mundane neighborhood personality clashes that are bound to occur in suburban life you are completely immune to all of it when you’re on the road in an RV full time. Not that I get all that involved in it, but I personally love the escape that RVing full time gives me on this one.

We greatly miss our friends and family however, and that has been the biggest challenge with this full time RV trip so far. And when health related issues occur at home, even minor ones with loved ones, it makes it very difficult to help from 3,000 miles away.

One such medical emergency occurred just this past week with my father in law.

For the previous month he had been in and out of hospitals for a variety of medical disorders that were each treated accordingly. However, some symptoms persisted that made him return to the hospital one last time.

When we spoke with him from Wyoming, he sounded terrible. In fact, it was the worst we’ve ever heard him sound. Although we have always worried about his health in the past, this time seemed far different. And more dire. Suddenly we found ourselves thousands of miles away on the RV trip of a lifetime away from the people and place that needed us most.

So for an agonizing 25 minutes, we discussed the pros and cons of interrupting our full time RVing trip and returning home.

We were faced with some difficult decisions:

• What should we do with the RV?
• Should we bring the kids?
• Should one of us go and the other stay behind to watch the RV, then come later if things worsen?
• Should we store the RV 50 miles away then race back and catch our flight in the nick of time?
• How will we even get flights with Hurricane Irene slashing its way up the East coast?

We literally had minutes to make a decision that would have far reaching implications for our trip, our family and most importantly for my father in law’s health.

So we made the gut decision to uproot our RV trip, take the next flight in three hours. Despite the overnight in Chicago and two layovers, all the while taking our chances with Hurricane Irene we hightailed it back to Boston with the kids in tow.

This was the best decision we have ever made…

Four days later, with the full time RV family back in Boston, my father in law is now leaving the hospital and moving to a rehab center to recover fully under supervised care. His illness although serious, is treatable, having been expertly diagnosed and managed by the Brigham and Women’s hospital staff.

Tough Decisions

Although sometimes you make bad decisions in life, the right decisions at the right time made not for yourself are the ones that really stick with you the most…and have the greatest impact.

Although our full time RV trip is one of the best decisions we have made as a family, its one that is completely absorbed in our own self interests and those of our kids. By RVing full time, we’re thinking about our own wants and needs, while seeking our own sort of traveling self-actualization.

However, the decisions you make purely for others, while they may come with a certain degree of sacrifice, are the decisions that give you the real feeling of true self actualization.

Although we went on our RVing full time trip to seek that wisdom elsewhere, it seems it could only be taught best by returning to the one place we were escaping from…and that place is home.

How about you? Comment below your thoughts on decisions you may or may not have made?

If you want to go RVing full time in the big rig, you gotta know your mission and your time frame!

So, you want to go full time RVing?

In our first post in this series we discussed the importance of being flexible and your mindset for living in an RV full time.

So here we get to the next important step in the process of planning your full time RV trip, mission and time frame.

What’s Your RVing Mission?

It may seem kind of obvious, but without this you’re going to wander around aimlessly as you try to plan your full time RV trip. You full time RV mission could be any number of things, but the most important thing in this step is to figure out what you want to accomplish with your family.

So what do you really want to see? Some ideas to answer this question include:

• National Parks in every state?

• Baseball fields across the US?

• Historical sites?

• Amusement parks?

• Antique shows?

• Museums?

• Natural wonders?

• Craft Fairs?

• Your 72 cousins spread across the country?

• The 4^th grade curriculum of the western movement?

• All of the restaurants that you’ve seen featured on “ Diners, Drive-ins and Dives”?

It could be any of these goals (or more) or a combination of them all. Whatever it is, start there.

Map It Out

Start by creating a list of your “must  see’s” and plot them on a map.  Now, for each member of your family this could mean a different  genre.

If your husband is a history buff (like mine), historical sites and battlefields were top priority to him, as were the baseball fields; you know that he had to get his MLB fix too!

For me, the history was ever so important:  I just HAD to see Laura Ingalls Wilder’s house, the Henry Ford Museum, and Abe Lincoln’s house too.

For our family, we tried to build much of the trip around the kid’s school curriculum that way we could tie lessons plans into real life exposure.

Get Some Travel Books

This is a good point to get some travel books on both full time RVing and travel in the US and Canada. You may stumble upon some other areas of interest to add to your itinerary.

Some of our favorites:

• 1,000 Places to See Before You Die

• Life: Heaven on Earth: 100 Places to See in Your Lifetime

• Frommer’s Exploring America by RV

• Off the Beaten Path: A Travel Guide to More Than 1000 Scenic and Interesting Places Still Uncrowded and Inviting

• Live Your Road Trip Dream: Travel for a Year for the Cost of Staying Home

• Road Trip America: A State-By-State Tour Guide to Offbeat Destinations

Whatever it is for your family, start there and then you can connect the dots to develop your route.

After you have done this then its time to figure out your time frame…

Determine Your Time Frame

What is the duration of your trip?  Is it a summer?  A year?  Decide how long you have and how much time you want to allocate to each general area of the trip.  For example one month in the Northeast, go for a full year cross country or by September you want to be in Seattle.

Write it down and decide how long you’ll be away.

• Decide how long you want to stay at each spot 

Do you like to set up, do a quickie of the area, see the sites and get out within a couple of days?  Or do you like to unpack, call it home for a week or two and enjoy the surroundings as a local?

• RV driving considerations

Its very important to take into account the amount of driving that you want to do in between destinations.  We knew that we never wanted more than a 6 or 7 hour driving day.  Others don’t mind a 12 hour day behind the wheel if it gets them to the next location.

• Events to plan around?

Also are there any events that you have to get to be a certain time?  For example, we want to be at Uncle Lou’s family reunion in Nebraska by July 4^th or we want to see the Rose Bowl parade in January in California?

Or maybe you want to plan a trip home for a “visit” in the middle of your trip.

For us, we planned a trip home for November and December.  As a family, having never been away from home for this duration of time, we wanted a scheduled-in time to go home and see our family and friends.  The holidays seemed the perfect time to go home for a visit, catch up, regroup, and avoid the winter roads.

Lots of things to consider when planning an RV trip full time.

Comment below and tell us what you think. Or at the very least please “Share” this article on Facebook or Twitter by pressing the button on the left!