The Daily Hailey

This is it, friends! If you remember from way back in the beginning of this series, we had six weeks to have our camper parked in the lot beside our house, and that fell yesterday. Yesterday was Dekker’s birthday, and the post about him and his sweet little face comes SO far before our camper, it isn’t even funny. Goodness I love that kid! I’ll tell you all about his birthday soon. Tomorrow, probably. But today is a grand update on our camper!!! 

Its been a long time coming, and as you’ll soon see, there are still things that need doing. The catch-22 of doing this project during this whole crazy stretch of life is that when a person has money, they don’t have time, and when they have time, they don’t have money! We had a project budget going into Spring that made so much of this possible, but some costs had to be cut. Some are more evident than others. I plan to make a whole additional post about what isn’t done, but that’s not what this post is about! This post is about the VICTORY that is our camper!!!

We should probably venture back into before land first. 

Let’s be real. It was pretty bad. Next to nothing was salvageable. I didn’t want to sit down on the floor even after we had cleaned it. The amount of dead flies was crazy. I didn’t want to touch anything. Gloves. Always. I’d wipe stuff down and then throw away the rag. I was just so nervous and unfamiliar! But myyyyy goodness, folks, she has come together!! 😍

I know. You don’t even have to say. She is GORGEOUS! Even from just one week ago! There has been such change!

For basic all-over information, we put beadboard all over the walls, and baseboards. It is SO homey. We installed real light switches, LED lights, a water heater, etc. The flooring is laminate from Co-op that is already discontinued, but we really like the look of it. Landry installed the bulk of the light fixtures, and Marlen helped us test our AC unit.

Let’s go room by room for the rest of this. 

The kitchen! 

Brady built the cabinets from scratch. Yes, they are pink, and we are STOKED! We aimed for blush, and then the paint dried a liiiiittle Barbie dreamhouse, but as the color settled in, it was actually just so perfect.

Truly, speaking for even the boys in the family, we all really love the pink kitchen. Our RV did have a fridge along with it, but we had a different second hand fridge in mind that was a little bigger and had a single owner, so we sold the camper one and put that money towards this one!

The microwave also came with the camper, though it was meant to be on a wall in a cabinet. We thought it was a loss, but the brackets just came right off and boom! – it was a countertop microwave! Speaking of countertop, this was a HUGE win, and something we’re really proud of!

Even second hand laminate countertops were adding up, until I saw a tutorial on how to make butcher block countertops out of solid hardwood flooring! Believe it or not, this beautiful countertop was one box of solid oak flooring. Brady and I designed it, laid it out, and built it together. We LOVE it! Our sink was gifted to us by friends, and the Kohler faucet was a $40 Facebook marketplace purchase. And we opted against a stove, as we’ll be doing the bulk of our cooking outside, but we did ask my mom to purchase us two portable elements from Ikea when she was there recently, so we’ve got that, rather. And some cute little shelves to hold our stuff when we just get in the door!

The kitchen is the biggest part of the main area at this point, so the “bedroom” and “living room” aren’t much at this point.

Better than it used to be, though!

Eventually, we’d like to have a bedframe with a storage area underneath it, and some kind of comfy couch (ideally a pull-out couch) across the way! Thats all we’ve got, though! 😆Onto the bathroom area! 

The bathroom!

The bathroom is very small, lol! We did not change the shower at all. I was very tempted to remove it altogether, considering the nice shower house at the lake we’re at, and our small water heater. But I figured its an option for little kid baths in a tub in the bottom of the shower, or just for desperate times. So, we’ll see if we change it next year or not. And the toilet is brand new! It was in a box when we purchased the camper! Win! I do wish it was bright white rather than off white, but a free toilet is a free toilet! I won’t complain! The sink is across the way, and we left that the same, too, besides paint, of course. Thats really all it needed!

I’d love to replace the sink and faucet down the line. There are really cheap, nicer looking sink/vanities on buy and sell pages online, but we didn’t have the time.

The kids bunk room is probably the coolest part of all of this!!

Its pretty Pinterest worthy, if you ask me!! This room was previously the master bedroom, at 7’ x 7’. We went back and forth about whether to attempt triple bunks, U-shaped bunks, etc. and when we landed on “gigantic kid shelf,” it was the perfect solution!!

We can fit three camper mattresses across each “bunk,” so we can have three kids on each level, if necessary. Brady built the bunks strong our of 2x6s, and put flooring on them so no one would snag.

He build up a little lip on the fronts so no one would slide out, and he built little cutouts for the windows so we could still open and close them.

Brady’s biggest pride and joy, though, is probably the ducting he redirected, so both bunks would get AC! (See picture of bottom bunk) We took off the accordion door so kids could more easily get in and out. As you might expect, they LOVE it in there!

Ok, some of them 😉

The exterior has been patched, but not beautified. Hopefully eventually, we’ll get to paint and redo parts of the outside, just for fun. I have a feeling there will always be something to work on, so we’ll get our chance eventually!

An AMAZING amount of effort has gone into this project, and truly, I couldn’t be more thrilled with the results! I feel like we’re building a part of our future here. We’re building our summers. Our vacations. Happiness. I am SO grateful for our opportunities and experiences, and everyone who has helped us along the way. Thank you, also, friends, for following along and caring about what happens to our family. We are humbled.

Thank you LORD for this gift!!!