Camper Love

What do you do when you are out of school, bored out of your mind, and have a camping trip coming up? You buy a camper of course! I woke up one morning and told BJ I wanted a camper. So we went on good ole Craigslist and found this beauty!

It is a 1971 old school camper. Wood galore and dark brown tablecloth fabric every where. I couldn't pass it up. It sleeps 4 adults comfortably, has a heater, a stove, an oven, a sink, and lights that can run off of a car battery. 

 I figured if we put Rylee on the bed over the table and we slept on a full on the over hang we would be nice and comfy while camping.

It is small but has a ton of storage. The fridge doesn't work but we scored one from my sister in laws ex in laws that fits in the same spot so we will put that in at a latter date. You also have to have full hook ups to run it so I'm not sure how much use it will get. RV camp sites are pretty pricey. I'm thinking this bad boy is just for fun random trips out. We can even go in the winter time if we want! I really want to see Yellowstone in the winter. Can you imagine snow everywhere and seeing the hot springs and geysers going off. Sounds pretty cool to me!

Once we got this bad boy home I had knew I was going to redo it. It wasn't in the plans but I told BJ I wanted to paint and he said have at it! I have been DYING to paint where we live but since we rent we aren't allowed. I got my "redoing a living space" out of my system for awhile. It was hard work and a lot of time. Nap time and late nights made this bad boy pretty!

Of course I picked a pretty green color! Thanks to Pinterest I was able to convince the paint guy to tint my primer so I would only have to prime and not cover it with a color. I had him tint 2 gallons, antique white, meadow green. Thanks to the wood paneling we could easily do stripes without having to measure and tape off.

BJ was dying to paint the stove but I was weary of pulling it out and painting as well as putting it back in all before our big trip. It is the only thing not done. I even sewed curtains that weren't up yet when this picture was taken. The poor fabric lady spent a lot of time listening to my I want a cute pattern but sophisticated fabric ramble. The fabric I got was pretty cute and I actually did them like the youtube video said and didn't take the short cut like I wanted too. It made a big difference and finished it off too. Hopefully I will get a picture of them soon. We also put new flooring down. That was BJ's job. It looks so much better then a ugly plywood and made clean up go so much faster.

I tried my hand and covering the ugly brown fabric with a light brown fleece. I super suck at measuring for some reason and one side doesn't completely cover the dark brown and the other side has a patch like look to it. Oh well. I got it down and it looks 100 times better even if I can't do it right. BJ also installed his stereo and speakers so we can have music in there. 

It took many naps, many late late nights, and a lot of elbow grease but I think it looks so much better. It was a huge success on our Yellowstone trip. BEST night of sleep camping EVER! One night it got down the the 30's and my camper was set at 75. We all slept without the covers and it was amazing. We also cooked ourselves french bread pizza the second day in the park. It was nice to have a hot filling meal while out playing. BJ kept saying he nieces and nephews were going to love it. He was right! They called it their "clubhouse" and played it in the whole weekend. We didn't care. We have lots of stuff left over if they ruined something we could fix it later. It took a lot of convincing parents that we really didn't mind and loved that they wanted to play it. In the end it looks just like when we finished just a few crumbs here and there. Thanks my dad being a genius we were able to get it in the back yard to store it. This baby is going to be our new best friend!