We bought a camper!  ???? If you missed the ORIGINAL before pictures, I talked all about it in this post.  Yesterday, we started the demo.  I do have to say, it was so FUN ripping it apart!  The ugliness of it all was too much to bare.  ???? Why do they make campers so ugly?  Granted, ours is a 2003 but from what I hear, they haven’t come too far in that department.  Unless you want to pay $1.5 million for an RV that has all of the bells and whistles.  I wanted to share what we got done on day one of the camper demo, and answer a few questions that keep popping up over on Instagram.

Question and Answer

Q:  Why did you buy a camper?  You have a rental house.

A:  We LOVE to camp.  We have talked about buying another camper for years, but living in town, we had no place to store it.  We had a small camper years ago that we spruced up.  I say spruced up because we simply added wallpaper and curtains and made it look so much better by doing those two things.  That thing was so little and janky on the outside but we thought it was THE BEST.  We have such fond memories of it.  As soon as we pulled into the state park, we would walk around to see if we had the jankiest camper.  We always wanted it to be.  ???? Because if you are going to be JANK… you want to be the worst JANK… Not have 2-3 janks below you.  ????

Also….  we are building in a woods.  When we are there working on the property, we don’t want to have to sit in our truck to eat lunch, relax, etc.  If it starts raining, we want to be able to sit and relax until it stops.  AND, if we just want to hang out and have a campfire and spend the night, we can.  We only live 15 minutes away from the site, but we thought it would be best to be able to stay there if we want.

Q:  WHY are you renovating a camper in the first place?

A:  We LOVE projects.  We have always wanted to renovate one.  We found this for a great deal and thought it would be fun to do while we wait on the house.  And, besides… did you see the thing?  ???? I have said before that we love to be surrounded by pretty things.  We cannot live amongst boxes, dirt, ugliness.  We CAN, but we feel more at ease and less anxious when things are in order.

Q:  What are you going to do with the camper when you are done building?

Um…… camp?  ????  Remember… we LOVE camping.  If we find ourselves not wanting to camp anymore, we sell it.  We have already had 2-3 people approach us to let them know when and if we ever sell it.

Q:  Are you even going to have any storage left after ripping out cabinets?

This question has been asked a million times over on Instagram.  ???? It really makes me laugh.  Have you seen the kitchen in the rental?  I have NO STORAGE.  I have a little strip of upper and lower cabinets that are so small they won’t even hold my dishes, so I improvised.  You should know enough of my shenanigans by now that I have lots planned.  Besides.  It’s Deb and I.  We don’t require much when we camp.  Quoting Deb when I told her people keep asking this question:  “It’s you and I.  We don’t shower when we camp, we don’t change clothes.  All we need is alcohol, a lighter to start a fire, and a hot dog stick.” ????????????????????

Q:  Why aren’t you finishing the rental before starting another project?

A:  It’s a RENTAL…. we don’t own it.  We asked the owner if we could paint the walls white before we moved in so that I could still run my business out of a house that looks decent.  She paid for the paint.  We did the time.  The overall feel of my business doesn’t include lime green and bright yellow walls.  Why would we put our hard earned money into a house that isn’t ours?  We will get nothing back out of it when we leave.  Therefore, we are putting lipstick on a pig…aka painting.  That’s it.  It doesn’t make sense to us to use all of our time renovating a house that isn’t ours.  We will never get anything back from that time we put in, let alone any money.

AND…..  Once it is Winter here in Indiana, there will be no camper renovations.  There will be basically nothing going on outside.  We want to enjoy being outside, working on something that is OURS… We will probably start chopping down trees shortly, too.  So we will start ANOTHER project.  But rest assured, they all get finished.  We fly by the seat of our pants every day and that’s how we function the best!  And, it makes our lives very interesting and fun.

Q:  Where are you getting all of your energy?

It simply HAS to be from our 4 workouts we do each week.  I SWEAR.  Our trainer piles on the weights so it has made us SO MUCH stronger.  Therefore, when we are working on a physically challenging project, it seems so much easier.  We don’t get as tired as we used to.  I remember working on flip houses ten years ago.  We would limp around for the first several weeks because our muscles were so sore.  We don’t have that now.  I KNOW it is the gym.  We started those workouts in January and will NEVER stop.

OK… onto day one of the camper demo.

Day One of the Camper Demo

Our camper is 27′ long, so it is a nice size for two people.  Camper manufacturers squeeze SO MUCH ugliness in that space by putting cabinets EVERYWHERE.  When we started looking around, we realized we really don’t NEED all of that storage.  We aren’t going to camp for weeks at a time.  And, if we do, we will get more creative.  There is PLENTY of storage for us.

Couch Area

We started by removing the cabinets above the couch.  That space felt so heavy when you walked in.  It made a world of difference not only in the look, but the overall feel of the space.

Entertainment Center Area

Talk about feeling claustrophobic.  Oh my gosh, that huge cabinet above the entertainment center not only felt ginormous when you are standing in that space, but it obstructed views etc.    The hallway going back to the bedroom is tight.  That cabinet made that space feel tighter.

Dinette Set with Storage Benches

Ummmmmmm….. NOPE.  I feel claustrophobic smashed in between tables and benches that don’t move at all.  I feel that way in restaurants, too.  I hate that… unless there is LOTS of room in between for me AND my belly.  I need breathing room.  ???? In campers, they SQUEEZE everything in small spaces… which I understand why, but again… NOPE.

Shelf Above the Bed

We removed the shelf above the bed because that’s just a HARD NO from me visually.  We still may remove the two smaller cabinets above the bed and leave the two side ones with a mirror.  That is still to be determined.  We want some type of a fantastic headboard.  I will keep you updated on that, because I know you will be holding your breath turning blue.  ????

Bathroom Medicine Cabinet

That entire wall was a total waste of space for a tiny bathroom medicine cabinet.  There is plenty of storage in the bathroom vanity for baskets, etc, for what little we would keep in there.

Flooring

We ripped that nasty ass, faded, smelly carpet up for the obvious reasons.

Storage Ideas: Adding in ALL THE THINGS….

Here are a few ideas that I have regarding storage.  Remember… we don’t need much.  ???????? Oh.. and I want to keep the theme woods and whites.  It’s my favorite look and think it’s so comfy and cozy feeling.  Woods and white and crystals…  ❤️

The Living Area

I plan on putting nothing but some type of decor above the couch and entertainment area.  Those two areas were so stressful.  ????  Probably because they hit you at eye level.  It felt like the walls were closing in.  I am only going to hang some type of decor there.

The blinds are all going to be replaced by bamboo blinds for the warm and cozy feeling.  And, I want to replace some of the lights but unsure which way I’m going to go.   I know I need a few sconces, and would love to replace some of the ceiling lights.  Also… we will be installing some type of laminate flooring that looks like wood, add a couple of rugs, maybe wallpaper.  ????

I originally wanted to get a new Ikea Ektorp couch for that area.  It comes with a slip cover, it’s very budget friendly, and it comes in three pieces, so we would be able to get it through the door.  BUT, we figured out during demo that the wall behind the current sofa angles up.  Which will then push the new couch out farther into the walkway.  We may just keep the one we have and have a slip cover made.

Dining Area

The dining area is where I am going to get creative.  I would LOVE to add some type of a small round table and a few benches.  The benches will have a hinged top so that we can have the storage back and it will still look pretty.  We will actually have as much storage in them as we did in the old ugly ones.  It will just LOOK better.

I LOVE these benches but need to measure yet.

The Kitchen

We hardly touched the kitchen as far as demo.   The kitchen cabinets will be, of course, painted white.  It will be getting a new sink and faucet.  And, I want to add a cool backsplash.  And maybe do some type of sticky paper to cover the countertops.

This is my favorite backsplash, thus far in my search!

Bathroom

By removing that janky little medicine cabinet, it will make room for a large wall mirror which will automatically make the room feel bigger.  We will add storage baskets under the vanity for all the things.  We can even have a few baskets up on the counter.  We will hopefully get a new sink and faucet in there, too.

Bedroom

Like I said above, the mirrored cabinets have closet rods.  But since “we don’t change clothes”….  that won’t be an issue.  ????  I may have Deb put a shelf in the middle of each of them. We could have baskets for anything small since we won’t be hanging lots of clothes.  That is actually a wasted space for us as far as hanging items go.    We want some type of headboard but haven’t figured that out yet.  One thing we know with campers is that you have to watch the weight that you take out and put back in.  You want to keep it as lightweight as possible.

I hope that answered your questions and gave you some type of idea what we have in mind.  I want the camper to have the same vibe as our home.  It will essentially be a home away from home and a fun place to be.

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