Easter RV-Style

Easter 2017Spending the holidays on the road in the RV, even as a full-timer, can be a challenge but can also be rewarding. We searched for a few stories that we thought our guests here at Floridays might find inspirational or comforting—at the least, entertaining. Here are a few of our favorites:

Easter Holiday On The Road

by Karen @ RVing Guide
My most memorable holiday so far was when Jim and I were working in south Texas at a large resort. We had several Hispanic guys working for us in maintenance. One of them invited us to spend Easter with his family at a local park. We enjoyed grilling “fajitas” on the barbecue grill, dancing to lively Mexican music, cracking cascarones filled with confetti or flour over each other’s heads, and watching the children break open the Easter bunny piñata.

Read the rest of Karen’s article

Holidays and RVers

by Nick Russell @ Just a Gypsy
We know some snowbirds who wait until after the holidays to head south, and full-timers who brave the weather to travel to be with family. While some take their RVs, others fly or travel by automobile, leaving their RVs in a park down south or out west.

Some of our RVing friends actually do it in reverse, making arrangements for their family members to fly down south to be with them over the holidays.

Read the rest of Nick’s article

Spending Easter In Your RV

by Pleasureland RV Center
One of the fun parts of the RV lifestyle is being able to spend your holidays on the road, but still enjoying the comforts of home. You can always just pick up a corned beef sandwich and some beer for a smaller holiday, like St. Patrick’s day, but conducting an Easter Egg Hunt or roasting a whole ham in your RV can be tricky. Here are some ideas to make Easter work even when you’re on the road:

Here’s the list…

If you have an Easter in the RV story, please share it with us at info@floridaysrvpark.com or post a photo on our Facebook page.

Happy Easter! Happy Spring! And remember, home in an RV is always just where you are.

Celebrations at Floridays

Floridays Thanksgiving collageWe never brag about Floridays being the prettiest RV park in Florida. But we do brag about its charm and friendly people. Your view from the stoop may be your neighbor’s awning, the beach is a hike away, but we’re definitely an RV-friendly park with some great get-togethers. We know how to celebrate.

Thanksgiving celebrations centered around a spread of traditional holiday goodness that saved more than a few small RV ovens having to be cleaned. We swapped stories and told tall tales while consuming a ridiculous amount of calories at an Olympic pace.

New Years Eve at FloridaysNew Year’s Eve had us carving up yet another 23-pounder turkey, ham and beans, cornbread and all the traditional fixings in the glow of yet another golden Florida sunset. After dark, we lit the fire pit and somehow kept the cornhole tournament going. Live music and our favorite DJ kept most people on their feet. We danced and chatted toward the midnight countdown. For all our readers, we wish you happy cleanouts, functioning jacks, smooth transmissions, and smooth sliders throughout 2017!

History of Labor Day—RV Style

Labor Day, the first Monday in September, can’t come soon enough for working folks who get an extra paid day-off. Often celebrated with BBQs, picnics, and apple pie, it almost feels like a second 4th of July! But instead of celebrating our independence, we celebrate a day off and the end of summer. Yet what about that labor thing?

Labor Day in New YorkWhen the first Labor Day parade was held on September 5, 1882, few knew that a movement had begun, state by state, to make it a federal holiday and indeed, in 1894 Congress passed an act making the first Monday in September of each year a legal holiday. But to this day, no one is quite sure who first proposed it.

Both possible founders had the same last name, but were unrelated except that they both were union people. Peter McGuire was with the Brotherhood of Carpenters & Joiners, and Matthew Maguire was a machinist with Local 344 union. What is clear is that when the Central Labor Union proposed Labor Day as a holiday, they held a picnic.

The celebration of Labor Day was to be observed with street parades to demonstrate the strength and brotherhood of the trade and labor organizations. This was to be followed with “recreation and amusements” for the workers and their families. These things were happening while America was creating the highest standard of living and the greatest production the world has ever known. It literally celebrates our national strength, freedom and leadership based on traditional ideals of economic and political democracy. In other words—the American Worker!

The RV Capital of the World—Elkhart, Indiana—was never big on labor unions. In the early 2000s, the RV industry was doing so well, and their workers were so well-paid by benevolent company owners, that the unions had a hard time organizing and enlisting laborers. Then came the panic of ’08 that walloped the industry—28% free fall in sales from manufacturers like Jayco, Monaco Coach and others. From Elkhart to Middleburg and from Mishawaka to Wakarusa—areas considered the backbone of the RV industry—families were hurting and unemployment soared. But people love the RV lifestyle, as proven by the steady rebounding of the RV industry. According to the RVIA, RV shipments in 2008 were down 32.9%; yet by 2014 they were up 11.1% for the fifth straight year, with promise for growth.

Whether laborers in the USA are union or non-union, Labor Day is still a time to celebrate our freedom from any labor—be it from an 8–5 job or just not doing laundry on Monday. So get out there and celebrate with a good old-fashioned red-white-and-blue picnic!

Ditch Suburbia

Christmas in the parkWhen a typical suburban couple and their two adventurous teenagers decided to seek a life of significance instead of complaining about finances and lawnmower repairs, they sold their house, gave away their possessions, and hit the road to dream big while living the RV lifestyle.

Michael and Crissa Boyink travel the USA pulling over now and then to use a campground or national park for a classroom for their homeschooled kids or an RV park with WiFi to run their online business.

Michael blogs about their adventure at Ditching Suburbia, which he subtitles as “helping common families create uncommon lives.” He’s passionate about living your dream, and he’s sometimes brutally honest. For example, he admits that his Christmas blog in 2013 was more “inwardly-focused” that most. Not because any of the family had experienced anything tragic or terrible, but because it was their first time living without what they call “Christmas influencers”. They had to figure out to celebrate the holiday on the road and on their own. From reading their Holiday blog that year, you can surmise that:

  • They missed attending a Church where everyone knew their name with a service that was comfortable and familiar.
  • They missed snow. Well, at least they had the good sense to drive south for the winter, though it made it hard for them to get into the Christmas mood.
  • They missed going to the rounds of parties held by old friends and close relatives. The kind where all sorts of traditions are built and stories long told.
  • They missed the crowded malls filled with decorations, piped-in Christmas music, and so many Santas that it’s impossible to miss that fact that it’s Christmastime.
  • They didn’t seem to miss the commercialization of the season or the noise it creates.
  • They preferred the life of being centerstage with nature under a really black canopy of stars where one might see Santa’s sleigh against the moon, or point out the very star that led the wise men to Bethlehem.

You can read more about the Boyink’s on the blog and check out the book Michael is writing about ditching suburbia. We wish our Floridays RVers a Merry Christmas and a happy holiday season.