Navigation for hung over speed boater

Last year for Father's Day we took our trailer sailboat to the big lake about 30 minutes from our house.

We planned this out pretty good, Thursday night after work we launched the boat and docked it at the public docks, getting ready for the weekend.

Then Friday after work we headed for the boat, we ate dinner in the city then we thought we would head over to the yacht club across the lake and dock there for the weekend. Well, when we got there it was smaller than we thought and no space for docking and no one around. It was getting dark and we were not sure if we had enough gas to make it back to the public docks, so we decided to stay at the dock at the house for sale close by.  It looked desolate with an empty dock and we could easily use it. We were not quite sure if someone would come down and kick us out, but we stayed there all night and got up early when the sun came up and headed out.

Our sailing trip started up the mouth of the lake early that Saturday morning, with our main and genoa sails out. The early morning had great winds and a quiet lake, no motor boats creating numerous waves and noise. Until a motor boat came along noisily, it seemed to be going around us back and forth. I was in the cabin making breakfast and hubby was in the cockpit. The motor boat stopped near us and the young man inside asked where a certain Point was, we got the map out and showed him, then he was off. He looked somewhat disheveled and as if he just woke up. We figured he had too much to drink and ended up lost during the night awakening in the early bright sunshine not knowing where he was at and without a map.

We continued to sail all day, loving and learning how our little boat worked. Another sailboat passed us, it was a twin, same make, model, and year. We watched them and learned how they did it, it was so much fun. Our little guy loved it, he held the tiller steering, ate some lunch, and napped. No seasickness for him, and that boat you could feel every wave.

Then we docked at a beach marina, watched the motor boats spend thousands filling up their tanks, drinking, and tanning. Noticed many fake blonde females accompany their male motor boat captains, too funny. It was a nice trip.


Below was our trailer sailboat, a 27 foot Clipper Marine, named Venus.

LGBT Parade, a Tattoo, Our new neighborhood

A couple years ago we were attending my stepdaughter's graduation. The day after there was a LGBT Parade, so we went with my mom-in-law and my hubby's auntie (who is lesbian and dated my mom many years ago - a long story).

So we went to the parade and had a good time, drank some cocktails, then auntie and hubby decided to get a Tattoo. And oh we had to wait with a toddler for 3 or 4 hours for this to happen. That was a drag, tired me out!

Anyhow, we ended up mooring the boat in a marina at the city where the LGBT parade was held. It is sort of eclectic city, a variety of people, we love the diversity.

The marina is nice, it has locked bathrooms, showers, and laundry. There is 24 hour security and trails all over, which we can take kid and dog on. We are close to amenities, we can walk to a park, grocery, restaurants and a farmers market. We go out our door/hatch and there is the water, it is beautiful. And we pay about $400 a month, not bad.

Eventually, we will do this off the hook, for free!

Final week in our house, get rid of it!

So this last week was like a marathon. We had a lot left over to get rid of and then we had more than we thought we actually had.

We posted our fridge for sale and got several responses that we had to divert until our last days. Then no one responded to our posting of our stove or washer and dryer. Finally, the last days we had interested people and they came quickly and bought them. It happened so fast. Eventually we had no appliances and lived a couple days in a bare house. 

Our garage sale brought in some money, we were glad we did that. Money in exchange for people taking away our stuff, can't beat that.

The day after our garage sale ended we packed up our stuff in the back of truck and left the house for good, to the boat. We got to the boat and all was good, after 4 weeks of being gone we were worried there may be some issues inside. But we were pleasantly surprised when we found her as we left her.

The cushions were first things unpacked and they went in nicely. Then we unpacked the food and kitchen items, and our clothes and bedding. Now we have no room on the boat. Our galley and vbirth are full of stuff, so we have to rethink what we really need. 

And the cat and dog are transitioning nicely. The first couple nights so far they get up in the middle of the night, waking us up causing us some sleep issues. Neither have fallen in the water or tried to escape, so that is good.

Next step is to get rid of more stuff, UGH!  

Homemade Toothpaste, Deodorant, and Bicycles

This past weekend while we are at our house I made this much needed homemade deodorant. We were both getting ripe without the deodorant, and now the weather is starting to warm up, so it was pretty much necessary.

Homemade Deodorant Recipe:
coconut oil 2-3 tablespoons (enough to make moist),
tea tree oil 1 tablespoon,
corn starch or arrowroot 1/2 cup,
baking soda 1/2 cup

I mixed the corn starch and baking soda, added the tea tree oil, then added the coconut oil to moisten it. Mixed it to make a smooth concoction, and placed in fridge to harden. I store it in a mason jar and we use a piece of old sock rim to apply. If our bathroom gets hot then it becomes more liquid, if our bathroom is cool it becomes more solid. Either way using the cloth to apply works, and if the cloth gets dirty or stinky I can throw it away and get another one. My husband prefers to use patchouli oil, so the next batch I may put some of that in there instead of tea tree oil and see how it comes out. 

And then we made homemade toothpaste, this was trialed on the kids because they like sweets. They always want to eat the fluoride toothpaste, which we have mixed feeling about. We take them to dentist and they get fluoride treatments, prescriptions for fluoride drops/pills, and then fluoride toothpaste. In some cities the water is fluoridated. Instead of figuring out whether fluoride is bad or good, I will just simplify life and eliminate all chemicals and use a cheaper method.

Homemade Toothpaste Recipe:
baking soda 4 tablespoons
hydrogen peroxide 1-2 tablespoons
coconut oil 2 tablespoons
xylitol 1-22 tablespoons
peppermint oil 1 teaspoon or 30 drops

I started by mixing the baking soda and coconut oil, make it pasty. I used to mix the baking soda and hydrogen peroxide first, now I make the paste instead and I reduced the peroxide amount because it kept interacting with the soda and messing up the paste. Then add peroxide, xylitol, peppermint, mix all into paste. Taste and if it is sweet enough for you, if not then add more xylitol. I read about adding calcium and magnesium powder to help re-mineralize the teeth, we do not have this so I did not add it, maybe next batch. I purchased this small bottle at Joann's fabric, it is meant for cake decorating, but works great for toothpaste (I cut the whole large at end so paste is easier to squeeze out), or you can use a jar. I now mostly use a small old jelly jar, making fresh batches every month or two. Also, note by a week or so the paste will get sort of dry, I usually mix in a cap-full of peroxide after this happens so we don't loose those good qualities peroxide provides for our teeth. After 9 months of using this paste our teeth are doing great and staying white and our son had no cavities at his 4 year old visit to dentist. Happy brushing!

The kids (our son and granddaughters) are growing and bicycles are no longer fitting them, so I recently bought a new bike for our son and a new bike for our granddaughter. Husband is not sure why I am buying these bikes and we are moving onto a boat. These are the hard parts of this move.

I bought them anyway and they love them. They have been riding them up and down the street for hours. They are all using training wheels, but going much faster than on a tricycle, and having fun.

When we get outta here, we will be able to park and lock our bikes at the marina bike stands. If later, we can't use or take them, then I will get rid of them, for now we are moving with them.

Sewing, Making Cushions Part 1

Initially we were going to replace the wet moldy foam in vbirth, but we changed our minds the more we slept on the uncomfortable seetes and added a pilot birth above starboard seete.

So we decided to replace all the cushions, in the whole boat!

In the beginning, we outlined the vbirth using paper and bought 3 inch foam, medium density. We worried about the vertical limits with the area, not wanting the bed too high. However, we slept on this 3 inch foam for a bit, and it was not comfy, then it got ruined from spilled kerosene and pee (kids are still peeing bed). Those pieces of foam are trashed.

After more time on the boat, and some remodeling of sette on starboard, I made a paper outline of each area and diagram of how many cushions and approx measurements. As I learned, there are no square measurements on a boat, everything is curved, which makes the perfectionist-uneasy, and me who likes to eyeball stuff-cool.

Using my outlines, I took them to foam place and they cut all the foam pieces, 4 inch med density for vbirth and dining seete, and 4 inch high density for starboard sette - a higher density because it will get more usage. I decided long ago, when making cushions for our old trailer-sailor boat closed cell foam is impractical and expensive, so we purchased open cell foam. The foam was costly, about $500 all together. Fortunately, we had a piece of foam left over from our old boat, which fit nicely in our new pilot birth. Then we decided to go replace trashed foam with 3 separate pieces for vbirth, instead of two long pieces. 

Buying foam is tricky, near our house they sell it in flat pieces, you buy the big piece period. Near the boat they want to cut it for you and keep the scraps, and charge the same price. The scraps are mostly useless to me, so it didn't bother me, but I noticed that foam place glued and sold the scraps - probably in custom cushions. Anyhow, there is one use for scrap foam in our house, to hit other people with it. The kids love to use it to whack each other.

So now we got the foam, I had to figure out the material. This was the most tricky part, besides sewing it. I finally chose vinyl on bottom (after lots of research I purchased on sale - at half price, marine grade vinyl and polyester outdoor material at Joann's fabric), lighter in vbirth and darker in cabin seetes, and a light/dark stripe back cushion for each cabin seetes. I've attached photos of the vbirth, still working on the cabin seetes. Overall, the cost of fabric, thread, fiberfil, and zippers, was about $500.

A piece I did not show, but added was fiberfil. I found at Joann's fabrics the waterproof and mildew resistant stuff, its about 1 inch thick and allows for forgiveness if the cover is a little to big or corners not right.

Sailrite.com has DIY web page that is super helpful, I paid $5 for cushion "how to" and it was worth it!  I also spoke to one of the upholsters at the shop near our house and he was helpful in how to measure and sew up the edges of cushions.              

The last picture is my hearty Pfaff 332 sewing machine. We bought it on Ebay and have been pleased with its performance.  Its an old machine, but it has power my household Singer did not have. It is between a household and industrial machine. I repaired our sails already with this machine, had some patch work and seam repairs, it did great on the tougher thick dacron and thin fragile nylon.