Trailer Testing and Sis is Giggling

The Orange Jeep with my trailer

I hooked up the trailer today to go for a road test. Sis started her second term of summer school this morning so I used that as an opportunity to check on the trailer...and her. The trailer makes the already bouncy Jeep a little more bouncy.  I guess it harkens us back to some silly childhood ride at the fair because within a few miles we're giggling our butts off.

I have always enjoyed shuttling the kids to and from school. I think it is a terrific time to bond and chat. Sis and I stopped for a treat on the way to school and I caught her in the act of BEING HAPPY! She stayed the night with a BFF last night and according to her texts (I checked on  her around 10pm) they were crying and saying their goodbyes.

Love my happy Sister!

It must have been therapeutic in some girlie way because she is ALL smiles this morning. Or perhaps it is just because she is hanging out with Dad! Yeah, that's it! Right. I had to capture the picture of her in one of my favorite skirts that she wears. She spent a good half hour Sunday mending holes in it so she could wear it to church. Gotta love a gal that can mend her own clothes!

I swung by to pick up my temporary trailer plate from Mr Trailer Fixer this morning. Mr. Trailer Fixer's Boss pointed out that the nose of my trailer was sitting WAY to high thanks to my manly lift kit on the Jeep. (insert manly grunt HERE for having a lift kit)  He suggested a hitch with a two inch drop for two reasons:

1) it will make the trailer drive straighter down the highway and cause less wobble

and

2) a smoother drive means better (more even) wear on the new tires.

As the blessings continue to fall, Mr. Trailer Fixer's Boss just HAPPENED to have the exact hitch I needed and he swapped mine with his for $15. I wish I had met these fellas years ago. They are terrific fabricators. I was eye-balling a custom made overhead Jeep rack laying on a nearby table. Sweet!

He reassured me that my six cylinder would be up to the task of towing a trailer. He recommended timing my departure so that I would be driving up and down the most mountainous terrain in the early morning hours. Straining up and down mountains in the 110 degree heat out here might spell trouble. Duly noted!

I swept the trailer out and have it nice and clean. Time to start loading it up. Mr Trailer Fixer's Boss recommended that I should have 65% of my load IN FRONT of the axle. I'm going to take mostly bulky items so when it is time to rent the U-haul truck, I have more room for boxes and don't waste precious space on eight bicycles, table saw, etc.

Gotta run. Time to go pick Sis up from summer school and then start packing up my stuff. I'm learning so much about planning for a homestead and how to get there that I plan on writing up what I've learned and sharing it on a Guest Post on SurvivalBlog in the next week or so. Let me know if you read it. I think I'll title it "How to Decide on a Homestead Location AND Get There!"

~OJD

Next: Macky passes out in the hallway.