The Wanderbus

21/12/2019

It will be one year on December 30th that we officially finished Luna’s renos and moved into her full-time on the 31st!!!
Here’s a throwback to her fancy new facelift! 🚐✨

19/12/2019

Who’s dying to see pictures of Luna our campervan fully renovated???

27/11/2018

Our little bathroom has has quite the makeover! Once we confirmed that we'll have access to a bathroom (& shower!) where we'll be parked and living all year it was a no brainer to turn the space into more storage.

Courtney designed & built a frame to sit over the toilet so the weight of a shelf wouldn't be directly on it. Finished off with some particle board and we now have plenty of extra room for our 3 drawer plastic organizer for toiletries, makeup, towels, etc. Super handy for two girls in a small space! 😛👭🚐

07/10/2018

Hammered in the final piece of Luna's new flooring! Candice also got our driver's area ceiling spray painted white (formerly very yellowed/weathered & stained), and replaced some gnarly old insulation that had remnants of mice with new fluffy clean stuff.

We also got a sneak peak at part of the amazing custom electrical cabinet/ bench/ table Candice's brother Aaron is making us. It will also convert to a 2nd bed/loungey hangout area.

We are getting so excited as she comes along! And learning soo many valuable lessons for building the bus next. (There's been some confusion but Luna is not The Wanderbus! She will be our tiny home while we build the bus ;-))

Stay tuned for more fun!!

15/08/2018

Those brown countertops definitely had to go once the cabinets and backsplash changed.

Sanded with 2 costs of primer, ready for proper white and a hearty top clear coat!

It's crazy all the little things that stick out once you start changing things...like our light fixtures that suddenly looked super 70s yellow (shown half painted) or that brown outlet cover that's definitely getting spray painted white.

Coming up:
*painting and sealing the countertops
*finishing up the bathroom walls
*putting new trim up on the new shelf (where we repaired major water damage) and the original railing back up
*adding a turquoise accent to the toilet
*contact paper on final accent wall
*replacing our converter w/ an inverter
*running wiring for additional outlets in our new bench seats
*installing our cork floor insulation and gorgeous vinyl flooring
*installing our amazing custom bench seats Candice's brother built us
*building our new table, using reclaimed hardwood flooring
*ordering our custom foam mattress
*installing our new ceiling fan above the bed
*making new blackout curtains for all the windows

Wooooo here we go!

05/08/2018

Round one!! Still need to do another coat, add turquoise accents, and properly do the floor area but absolutely stoked how much better it looks.

There are scratches from sanding I did too rough that show through a bit but...DIY. It'll do!

05/08/2018

Prepped and ready to go. Goodbye 70s yellow toilet!

29/07/2018

Cabinets are all hung and we are in love!! Plus a little progress on the contact paper with some more to go in various spots.

The more we change things the more we see that needs changing 😂🤷‍♀️

For instance, the very yellow plastic light fixtures (partly covered by duct tape in the 1st pic) or the super dark brown countertops. We really want Luna to feel light and open so we decided those need to go too!

Going to do it simply though- sand the hell out of them and the paint them white with a good top coat. Stay tuned!

29/07/2018

Adding a new backsplash! Getting that distressed wood look the easy way- contact paper!

Many of the edges in the van are not straight. So we've found one of the easier ways to do it is to simply overlap it on the edge I want instead of trying to measure and then scoring it with a utility knife. Gives a near perfect finish!

Props to our friend Cass who has the same van and came over to show me some tips & tricks. 😎

For ex. Peel the front off the backing instead of the other around. Counterintuitive but works really well.

P.S. How 70s was that original backsplash?! Almost worth keeping it. Almost.

29/07/2018

Transporting our freshly painted cabinets from our apartment back to Luna. I didn't want them to get dinged up so I layered a sheet and towel in between them all.

There are always so many more steps to think about when doing a project which is why it's so good for people like me (Courtney) who are optimistic with time to double or triple how long you'll think it will take! Even just the back and forth or moving things around in the van to have space takes time. Plan for it if you can! :-)

29/07/2018

Taking off tape. A LOT of it! Like with the cabinets we had to score a lot of the tape to keep the paint from coming off too.

Even so there were lots of little gaps like the 3rd pic shows around the window. So we detailed all over with a tiny paintbrush.

29/07/2018

Progression of painting

29/07/2018

Painting our cabinets! Bye brown, hello turquoise! One coat of primer and two coats of turquoise had them looking sharp.

They also took so much longer than planned because of the rubber seals along the sides. We taped them off but then discovered the paint would come off with the tape, even when we scored it with a utility knife. So we ended up having to detail them with a tiny brush etc etc.

We love them now, just don't look to closely! The magic of DIY ;-)

29/07/2018

So it turned out we had a leak from one window, which meant both fixing the window aaand assessing the damage. 🙄

Our awesome friend Jess came over to help, we stripped back some pieces, and luckily it wasn't too bad. The water basically ran straight down to this shelf and then along a fiberglass channel underneath til it pooled at the end.

The only real damage was this totally warped board so we cut it out, used paper towels to soak up excess water, and then ran a shop van in her for a few hours to totally dry everything out.

We also sprayed benefect (a disinfectant for mold) on any trouble areas and then used a mold/mildew paint to seal everything up before moving forward as planned.

29/07/2018

We moved Luna to at the beginning of summer and it's been the perfect place to build.

Not only is it an amazing community that grows free food for Calgary's hungry, so many people have been offering us help with the build.

18/06/2018

Converting an entire school bus is going to be a massive undertaking for us, but we are getting a great lil taste as we renovate Luna, our '79 Dodge campervan and future tiny home for the bus build.
Just like everyone says, you'll have to figure out things as you go no matter how much you plan and nothing will be perfect.
Sometimes it gets overwhelming but then there are times when we look over at each other while working and say "Hey...This is our home!" and get so excited. At the end of the day, that's what it's all about: creating an epic life and doing it together.

16/05/2018

A small start on the repainting of Luna, our campervan and future tiny home while we build the bus! Everything is sanded and a couple of the cabinets are now painted with primer.

The hardest part of painting isn't getting the paint in the right spot, it's *not* getting it on the wrong one! Who feels me on that one??

Also...any opinions on if primer strokes need be nice and even/pretty to not show through the real paint badly? I did a rough job thinking it didn't matter but maybe it needs going over?

04/05/2018

Our new wall covering came in today and we love how it looks against our new flooring! Now to narrow down our cabinet paint colors. Who knew there were 86 shades of white?! 😂

26/04/2018

The weather has finally turned and it's time to start building asap! Finished a solid draft of Luna's new table & seats tonight. Besides wanting a setup that could convert to a bed, we also wanted more storage and more access to it.

This design has a new table with a full-length drawer underneath that will slide out into the aisle (perfect for books, laptop, etc.). We also added more access to the under the seat storage. Bench #1 will have a door to the first 1/3, and bench #2 will have a long slide out drawer.

This means that in addition to accessing everything from above, a good portion can also be reached without asking someone to move ;-) We also cut the backing of bench #1 on an angle to allow more room while walking through the aisle.

When we want an extra hang out space/ bed, the table lowers right on to the lip of the bench seats and the cushions form the mattress.

We're pretty excited. What do you think?

02/04/2018

Measured for Luna's new convertible table area this weekend. Though almost everything is original from 1979 (like that gnarly piece of carpet in the pic), the previous owner had redone the bench seats at some point.

They were still very basic with the downside that they did not convert into a second bed using the table between them. So now we're rebuilding it!

Living in a tiny space will be challenging at times and it's critical to us to have two different areas where we can hang out or sleep.

Especially when it gets really hot and we want extra space to ourselves. Sleeping in separate beds may sound like a marriage fail to some but we have a feeling it will help us at times in the long run! 😂🤷‍♀️😚👭

For the moment Calgary is still in fake spring (check out my puffy coat & gloved hand, it was -17C) so that means designing the new bed area in Sketchup and getting ready for the thaw in a few weeks!

21/03/2018

We've been pretty quiet the last few months while a cold, snowy winter fell upon us but things are quickly thawing out and we're excited to move forward!

Our spring & summer will be focused on renovating Luna, our campervan, so she's ready for us to live in full time while we build the bus. We'll also be doing lots of planning for the bus.

One of our first projects for Luna is redoing the bench/table combo that can turn into a 2nd bed. Court ripped out the old benches in the fall, along with the original floor, and is now designing the new setup.

We also want to re-upholster the cushions that will form the bed. Besides wanting to change the color & fabric, the ones that came with her had the fabric stapled into place. We want covers that can be taken off for easy cleaning (or to change our decor!)

So it was perfect timing that our friend Skye Dreamur had a community work day for his amazing Dreamweaver bus to make new cushion covers. Candice was still away on a magical retreat in Panama but Courtney went to help out for the day and learn a new skill.

Skye figured out a clever way to cut only one piece of fabric, sew really nice seems/edges into it, and end with a zipper. It took us all awhile to figure it out (felt a bit like a rubik's cube at times 🤣) but was totally worth it!

Neither of us had used a sewing machine in years, even though we have one, and kept saying we need to get back into it. So this was perfect! It was also so great to see a community coming together for a project, which is a huge basis for the Dreamweaver bus.

16/03/2018

Guess who's learning Sketchup?! Started with the basic tutorials yesterday and beyond excited to start playing around with different floor plans for The Wanderbus, and a new bench/table design for Luna, our campervan.

If you have any tips or tricks for a CAD/3D model design newbie, throw em our way!

30/01/2018

Calling all van lifers with dogs! Looking for suggestions/recs for keeping Luna, our Dodge campervan, cool in summer & warm in winter for our little man.

Luna will be our home while we build The Wanderbus in southern California mountains and temps can vary greatly. For summer we're thinking of replacing a roof vent fan with an ac unit. For winter some kindof heater. Suggestions? Luna isn't a from scratch job like the bus will be so needs to be easily incorporated.

Also- This is him every morning knowing he's about to put on a coat and go into Canadian winter 😂

05/11/2017

It's fun to figure things out on your own, but it's also fun to be smart and not lose a finger because of ego.

From Court: I got a bunch of new tools(!) a few weeks ago to work on Luna, our campervan, and eventually for building the bus.

As fun as it would have been to just grab & go since I know how to use a circular saw (and trust me I wanted to) I knew it was smart to take the time to figure out this particular one.

So yes, I actually read the directions and checked out each of its features before heading to my project. As anxious as I was to get working while we had good weather, I know it was time well spent.

30/09/2017

Luna's first major renovation started today! Ripping out the benches & original floor, aaand clearing out mouse p**p. Next up is replacing part of the subfloor that had mold, before building new benches that can turn into a bed with the table, and a beautiful new floor.

[Luna is our '79 Dodge campervan we bought in July. We are fixing her up and she will be our home while we build The Wanderbus.
] 💪🚐🔧🔩

17/09/2017

Check out 4 hours or so of work in 1.5 minutes! We plan to move into Luna in the spring while we build the bus so we're prepping her before winter hits.

First job is to reseal all her windows. Courtney learned a few things today that we'll do differently on the next ones, plus the reminder to always have a snack nearby. 😙 https://youtu.be/02fvhhfHEp4

Our 79 Dodge Camper van Luna is getting all her windows resealed before winter hits. This was the first!

16/09/2017

Luna getting her first upgrade 🚐

12/09/2017

We are back in Canada after a truly epic honeymoon by camper van along the Oregon Coast & a festival for the solar eclipse. We loved having Woogie, our mini camper rental, and it made us that much more excited for our own journey. It's now time to start putting love into Luna, our 79 Dodge camper, as we prep for spring...she'll be our home while we start building The Wanderbus! That is, if all goes to plan ;-)

This pic is a perfect example of why we are stoked for and adventures. We spontaneously pulled up to some incredible sand dunes early morning, started cooking a fresh breakfast of eggs & fruit out of the back mini kitchen, and then climbed over the dunes for a gorgeous view and miles of desolate beach to play on. Living out of a van definitely has its challenges but the perks far outweighed them.

16/08/2017

Our amazing morning yesterday on the Oregon Dunes. Having such a great time exploring as we go before heading to the festival. 👭🚐🏞💖