December 19, 2009 through January 15, 2010

Well, we had a great Christmas holiday season with family and friends. However, we did not put up a tree or any holiday decorations. Things seemed quite busy just getting settled in to being home and no longer being on the road.

On Christmas Eve, I got an email from one of the area vice presidents that I had interviewed with that he would contact me in the next couple of weeks to discuss the offer process. So, that was a nice Christmas present knowing I would have a job offer in the new year.

We went to a New Years Eve party at the Barrister House. Heather and Chad went to the party with us. We had a great time ringing in the new year. We have been enjoying our time at home the first couple of weeks of January.

Financially, things will be a bit tight for 2010. I got my Job Offer. My new job starts on January 25th; I am very excited because it is the job I had hoped to find. I may have to do quite a bit of travel, but will work remotely when not on the road traveling. This gives us the option to be anywhere in the country, as long as I am near an airport and have internet and a cell phone signal. Of course, if they give me a customer to support in the Detroit area, they might not appreciate me sitting out in the desert in Palm Springs flying each week to Detroit. We shall see how it all works out; I know I am recharged and ready to work after this six months off, and an almost four month sabbatical on the road in our RV.

I have already booked a couple State Parks for this summer. One is just a weekend in Holland State Park, and the other is five days at Ludington State Park. It is very competitive trying to reserve sites for the summer. People reserve sites at these Michigan State Parks the second (literally) they become available.

Anyway, our house is in order, our cars are cleaned, shiny, and maintained. We are ready to work and have a busy set of goals to achieve in 2010. Financial goals are a given; we have to pay down on some of the debt we accumulated in November and December. However, Carolina will be working her Mary Kay Cosmetics business full time now. We have drafted a revised business plan that sets aggressive goals for each quarter of the year for her to have solid targets to meet. I believe that I will only be able to count on my income for paying the monthly expenses until she can build her volumes up to something significant. This will make things a little tight but manageable.

I have had quite a bit of time each day to sit back and reflect on our journey, our future, and our objectives that we had originally set out to achieve during our sabbatical. Many of the 'Sabbatical objective' were NOT met.

Originally, the goal was to take off in the RV into the middle of nowhere. We were going to eat our own healthy whole food, get in good physical shape, and write about it. I wanted to take some time to do some writing for a book. A book that would have healthy easy cooking on the road type of recipes and a workout routine for on the road. Typically, in an RV you cannot carry a set of weights. However, with our own body weight, a person can get a good workout. Yoga is a great stretching routine that works out the body. However, also there are push ups and sit ups routines, like the "100 Pushups" workout plan.

Again, about five years ago, Carolina and I followed the "Body for Life" and "Eating for Life" programs written by Bill Philips. Both of us lost considerable body fat and we were both in better physical condition than most of our grown children. It is very unfortunate that we 'lost our way' and over the past five years we have added solid belly and back fat onto our bodies. Niether of us seem to have the same discipline to do it again. Yet, it is a lifestyle choice that we know we have to make for life. After all, eating good healthy food is very enjoyable and feels good. It feels way better than high fat, high sugar foods feel.

The goal is to eat the right foods, in the right amounts, at the right times each day, and to add daily exercise. That is the reason we had named this blog "Our Recipe for Life". This is because we wanted it to be an introduction to our book. It morphed into a travel blog because we ended up vacationing and partying the entire 109 days on the road. I have to admit that it was a very FUN and LONG Vacation. I will never forget it.

We left our full time jobs that provided us a household income well above $150,000 annually for $0 annually and most people would call us crazy. We had Faith and a Power of Intention.

Through the Power of Intention, we have new jobs and a recharged life ahead of us to look forward to being actively embraced in Life.

Next steps are to grow our careers, and get physically healthy. I am ready.