We float

Dear Friends and Family,

Christmas was wonderful especially since Jimi gave me (my very own) digital SRL camera. Yes, that was great, but the better part was just being able to spend time with my family. We soaked up every moment of the five and a half days. While in Nebraska, the weather didn’t get above 15 degrees. Can you believe it? It was sooo cold. After the extremely sad trip home we arrived in Florida to wonderful eighty degree weather. Love it!

We gave our notice to the rental company that we will move out on January 31, 2013. This makes our move official and there’s no turning back now. We have to be ready or at least moved out and with no other place to go, we WILL be living aboard.  I’ve lost count of how many goals we have now accomplished – but I know it’s a lot and here’s another one down.

Work commences: I made a nice Sunbrella cover for our grill to protect it from the elements and I completed the cockpit pillows (finally)
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On January 2nd, Sanibel was launched. It was an exciting day. Here is a link to the video. (turn your sound on). The video is only five minutes long, but the launch took an hour; And added to that we hung in the slings

for almost an hour while Jimi painted the areas he couldn’t paint while on the blocks. So total time waiting and watching was about two hours. Our anticipation rose.

I tore the house apart going through anything I could (stuff we weren’t using) and staged a ‘get rid of pile’ and then I began moving anything I could aboard. For example: all the clothes I’m taking with me are aboard, all our towels except one each, and some miscellaneous bathroom supplies, etc.

We took 25 gallons of fresh water the boat everyday to fill up our 140 gallon fresh water tank. We’ll clean the tank with a mixture of bleach, drain it and then refill it with the fresh water we’ll use.

I fought a sore throat for one week from the day we got home until it finally hit me and I had the flu. I was laid up on the couch for three days while Jimi continued work as usual without me. It has now passed though I still have a dry scratching throat and a teeny cough that comes on suddenly out of nowhere. Ricola really seems to help.

Our friends from Colorado, Brad and Ellen had an overnight layover in Miami on Friday the 11th, so we went down to spend the evening and night with them. It’s always so enjoyable to see friends knowing we’re so far away from everyone. We had a great time. They are going South to the Islands for Ellen’s birthday. Happy Birthday Ellen!

Jimi is trying to hook up our self steering wind vain. This is something that couldn’t be mounted until we were in the water because we didn’t know where our water line was. He’s now waiting on a couple of pieces of aluminum to complete the project.

Jimi finally hooked up the stern light and the anchor light. He has tested the water systems; the fresh water pumps and the salt water pump work just fine. We had a slight issue with the routing of the vent hoses for the toilets, but he has gotten that worked out and all is fine now.

We took Molly to the boat – YAY – she did very very well. She explored the inside for about twenty minutes and then walked around the parameter of the deck peeking over the side to the water on occasion. After her 360 tour, she recognized the companionway to the inside and tried to go in. This is a good sign. It shows that she sees that as a safe and preferable place to be.

Jimi has ran and tested the engine in place a few times while tied to the dock. It starts right up, runs well, and changes gears without problem. At this point he is very pleased with the engine. He has plans to take the boat off the dock and motor it up and down the canals to get a real feel for it and let it stretch it’s legs (haha).

Jimi uses his spare time to list items for sale on craigslist and Ebay.
Be sure to watch the launching video and here are some pictures of the inside.

Love everybody,
Lorie & Jimi