We've had a busy month here in Kissimmee. On Sundays we met my brother and family and another couple for lunch at Perkins and then spent the afternoon visiting at my brother's house. We went to my brother's house for Thanksgiving dinner and my niece and her family joined us.
We've had 2 meetings with our realtor here in Kissimmee and have looked at about 10 houses so far. A couple of houses that we were really interested in already had contracts on them, so we didn't look at them (maybe the sales won't go through). Our realtor, Dave, recommended Broadway Pizza Bar in downtown Kissimmee and we ate lunch there one day after house hunting - we will definitely go back again.
Since we sold all of our furnishings from our house in Dothan when we started full-time RVing, we will have to completely furnish the house that we buy. Our son, Fletcher, suggested we check out Ikea, so we drove the 12
We got up at 7:00 this morning and started breaking camp right after breakfast. Glenda came by to say goodbye before she left to go to church. Jimmy also came over to see us before we left. We paid W.T. for the electricity for this week ($25.20) and after saying goodbye to W.T. and Jimmy, we left The Willows at 9:00 (CST).
Mike drove the RV down to Tractor Supply to get propane and I stopped at Publix to do some last minute shopping. We had planned on filling our propane tanks at Tractor Supply since they were charging $2.29 a gallon for propane, but the employee there hadn't been certified to fill propane tanks on a RV. We had to stop at the Flying J in Dothan and got the propane there and paid $2.999 a gallon.
We left the Flying J at 10:30 and drove south on US-231. We passed by the Peanut Festival Fairgrounds and I took a photo of some of the rides there - yesterday was the last day for the Peanut Festival.
We crossed into Florida
We've been here in Dothan for 3 weeks and will be leaving tomorrow to go down to Kissimmee, FL. We've been busy for those 3 weeks with doctors' and dentist's appointments.
Mike and I went to our primary doctor for our regular checkup and she said we're doing fine. I had injured the toenail on my left big toe and it had turned black, so our doctor referred me to a local podiatrist. The podiatrist suggested killing and removing the nail - I didn't like that option since the nail would never grow back. I think I'll get a second opinion when we get down to Kissimmee.
We both went to our dentist for a checkup. Mike still had one of his wisdom teeth (it was impacted and loose and it had been hurting for a while), so our dentist pulled it. I went to the chiropractor for a few adjustments. Tinker was due for his canine influenza booster and I took him to Care Animal Hospital (our vet for over 30 years) for that.
We met Mike and Gayle (our friends in Ozark) at Cracker Barrel for dinner one night. Mike and Gayle had driven their motorhome to Alaska this summer and we enjoyed hearing about their trip. We visited with W.T. and Glenda here at The Willows and our friend Jimmy came by often. We ate dinner twice at Mexican Connection and visited with Sharon, Debbie, Sandy and Chad, but we missed seeing Frances and Caroline since they work during the daytime.
Mike and I have been talking this year about looking for a home to buy. We think that with the housing market the way it is and mortgage interest rates being low, that now it is probably time to buy a house. We had planned on full-timing for 10 years and we are entering our 8th year. We usually spend the winter months in Dothan or Kissimmee and rarely travel, so the only difference will be living in a house during the winter instead of the RV.
We have contacted USAA (we're pre-approved for a loan) and signed up for their Movers Advantage program. We told them we are looking at homes in the Kissimmee-St. Cloud and Vero Beach-Sebastian areas. USAA contacted a realtor in Kissimmee and 1 in Vero Beach and both realtors have called us. We told them what size house we're looking for and that we want to be able to park the motorhome at the house.
We still plan on RVing because we haven't visited places like Monument Valley, Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon and Yellowstone National Park (we did drive through Yellowstone in 2011).
