Advent ornaments

In our "tiny house", we don't really have room for Christmas decorations. I posted about the Sparkle Magic light (http://trekincartwrights.blogspot.com/2016/11/sparkle-magic.html) and we've enjoyed it at a few campsites now.

We also got some Advent ornaments (also known as Jesse Tree ornaments) from the youth girls at our church - they were selling them to help with funding with one of the missionary families from our church. They are just small enough and light weight so we can easily use them in the bus.

Since we don't have a tree, we decided to hang them along a string on one of our window valances.

Each day, we move one ornament over to the left,

and read the scripture listed on the back (December 5 was Genesis 22:1-19).

I think the girls did a fabulous job making these, and we are enjoying them in preparation for Christmas!

In search of warmer temperatures

There is a cold front moving in so we're heading south. We decided that we'll head for the coast of Texas off of Corpus Christi for a little while, and watch the weather before heading west to Arizona.

Right now, we are in a Walmart parking lot in Rockdale, Texas. Lord willing, we'll head to Columbus, TX, tomorrow to stay at a Thousand Trails campground for a few nights and then to the coast.

Visit to Irving Mosque

On Saturday evening, a friend of ours, Renod (with http://ihopeministries.org/) was invited to present about Jesus at the Irving Mosque. He invited Christians to come too. The mosque was very interested in this topic because they have been trying to have interfaith events and very few non Muslims have come. Renod had 200 folks sign up to come, so the mosque was very glad to host the event.

The event included Renod sharing his testimony and what the Bible says about Jesus. There was also a Muslim speaker from India who told about what the Qu'ran says about Jesus. It was quite interesting and we were glad we were able to go.

At the end of the event, Dwayne was able to ask one of the folks from the mosque some questions that he had.

We are praying that many who heard the good news about Jesus might come to faith in Jesus through this event.

Do NOT hop in front of a big rig and put on your brakes...

I'm posting this dashcam video as a reminder to car drivers to be aware that big rigs keep space in front of themselves for a reason! They can't stop on a dime!

This video is particularly interesting because the incident happened near Richmond, VA.
https://rumble.com/v325pz-no-way-out.html?mref=6i76&mc=8jxox

Great driving by the two truckers!

Christmas get-togethers with friends

We're wrapping up our time in the Dallas-Fort Worth area with Christmas get-togethers with friends.

Friday night we were with our Sunday Bible Study / Community Group:

Jim's back, Yogi, Dwayne

Joyce's back, Clif, Landon, Will

Keith, Gary's back, Sherman, Melva, Mary Beth

Jane, Cecile, Arden's back, Amutha

In foreground - Otisa and Beca

Today we were at Faye's with many friends:

We learned about Jewish traditions at Faye's house!

We are going to an event this evening at the Irving Mosque - a friend has been invited to share about Christ there. We've been praying ever since we heard about this event and finally the evening has come!

Revisiting fire safety

This evening we were with our Community fellowship group from church (aka Sunday School class), and I was talking with one of our friends, Clif, a retired fire-fighter, about smoke detectors. Our conversation made me go back and revisit the information that I posted a bit over two years ago. If you want to go back and check out the whole post, it is here: http://trekincartwrights.blogspot.com/2014/10/fire-and-life-safety-in-your-rv.html

But here are the things that I want friends to remember, whether they are in an RV or a sticks 'n' bricks house: Get a photo-electric smoke detector!!! Make sure the smoke alarms you have are either both ionization and photo-electric, or ensure you have a photo-electric smoke alarm. When you're together with family during this month, check out what kind of smoke detector your parents or children have in their home. Give a gift of a photo-electric or combination smoke detector.

Here's some quotes from my post back in October, 2014 on the talk we heard from "Mac, The Fire Guy":

Mac said that the most important thing is to get an early warning that you need to get out, so the discussion then moved to smoke alarms. Smoke from burning food (that may often set off your smoke detector) is different from burning furniture. Most smoke detectors have ionization technology which is good for detecting active fires, but not as effective on smoldering fires.
Take a few minutes to watch this video: http://www.today.com/id/49214422/ns/today-today_news/t/rossen-reports-popular-smoke-alarms-may-go-too-late-experts-warn/

The technology that will give you earlier warning in smoldering fires is a photo-electric detector; although these have been around for decades, most of the smoke detectors sold are ionization. There are smoke detectors that have both technologies - those are the best to get.

The other thing that Clif told us tonight is that some fire departments, Irving is one of them - the firemen will come out and change the batteries in smoke detectors for you. He said they will even install smoke detectors for you. So... friends who are getting less sure climbing on ladders - check with your local fire department and see if they will help you out with changing the batteries in your smoke detectors.

Reminders

One of the hardest things about starting RVing when you are "older" is that there are a LOT of things to remember. Each time we need to move the rig, there are checklists that we need to go through.

With Miss Daisy, we had a printed out checklist.

Beginning of the file that we created for the Safari Trek - the last item on that list was to locate the cats before we started moving!

I'm not sure why we haven't created a similar list for Miss Doozie... we had started a list on our phones, but we don't refer to it. A lot of the systems on Miss Doozie prevent you from doing things you shouldn't - like it has audible and visual warnings if the electric cord is still deployed or the jacks are down.

When we were with the Texans on Safari group back in September of 2014, one of the members, Haazra, shared with us the reminder system that they had put together. It was rather low tech, but effective.

Bright orange colored and labled closthespins on the steering wheel.

We have found that these work quite well - when we deploy something (the entry step), its clothespin goes onto the steering wheel. When we store the item, the clothespin goes onto the dashboard in easy reach for the next time we park. We have pins labled for the entry step, awnings, outside thermometer, bird feeder, etc. Haazra even suggested that you might want to have one for "spouse" to ensure your wife or husband was on board!!!

The problem occurs if we deploy something and neglect to put the reminder clothes pin on the steering wheel.... When we got to our latest campsite (only moving from site 34 to 95 within the same park, I looked for the outside thermometer to put it out... but couldn't find it. I found the clothes pin on the dashboard... usually with the thermometer, we would attach the clothespin to the wire that we used to hang the thermometer when it was inside the rig, so that would remind us to put the reminder pin onto the steering wheel. You guessed it, we didn't...

Dwayne went back to see if it may have fallen off somewhere between site 34 and the dump station and site 95. As he headed out, he remembered seeing a strange looking white thing on the park road... so he found it quickly...

Unfortunately, it got run over by someone (maybe by Miss Doozie or by the Jeep even)

He took the batteries out of it.

The good news is that we could get the part number from the printing on the back and that we could order just the sensor from the company and it is ordered and on its way...

And we'll probably be more careful to ensure that the thermometer is inside before we leave a campsite in the future!