Dear Family, Friends, and new friends, 

    We have been meaning to write this for a while to explain what our mission is about with Meandering Bain’s. Life has been crazy so we weren’t able to find the time to do this until now, which is day 2 in our first long road trip.

    About 3 years ago I was working in Sparks and was wearing a ton of hats; youth pastor, athletic director, dad, bus driver and I’m sure a few others that I am forgetting about for my own sanity. God met me where I was and I felt the strong urge to lay down most of those titles to focus on family and refocusing on what God had in store for myself and my kids.

    During that same time as I was trying to step away from where I was I met Natalie, who at the time was living over a hundred miles away from me and we started to date after a crazy mission trip I went on. We grew closer and got engaged in late 2019 and had expectations to be married in spring 2020. We had grand plans but God knew better. Obviously 2020 was a challenging year. We were not able to have a big family wedding in April of 2020 so we had a super intimate family wedding in late March of 2020.

    God knew far better then we could have ever imagined; come May we knew we were expecting an addition to our clan. I was out of work from march until the end of May, during that time Natalie and I grew together and had dreams of possibly one day being able to travel and be a blessing wherever our feet landed. At that point we were struggling to purchase a new car, and really had no direction. By the summer I was back at work and we received the news that our family was growing not by one but by two!

God blessed us by having the new truck we tried to purchase (before we knew a pregnancy was coming) fall through. While we were disappointed with our initial car choice gone, we didn't lose hope and when the dust settled, we had a paid off SUV that would fit the twins and the rest of us and still be able to tow a trailer. We also had enough funds left over to outright buy a trailer. We spent the summer and fall fixing up this trailer to accommodate our needs and the dreams started to feel more possible.

Winter of 2020 was very difficult for our family; as most twin pregnancies are no walk in the park. But late December finally came and our girls arrived safe and healthy! We hunkered down like everyone else during the craziness that was late 2020, early 2021. But we had been saving and praying about what God had next for us. Early February we took our first trip with the twins camping to see if it could be a reality to take them out in our camper for an extended period.

    The blessings continued as we were able to make our finances work so that this summer we could begin to travel and we started planning a trip. We had a test run trip planned for the week of the older kids spring break. This was a test run to really test our limits. It wasn’t a perfect trip but it helped prove that we could and should take our family out and bond for the summer. When I returned from the trip we decided to commit and give ample notice at work that we would be leaving in mid May.

That was 7 weeks ago, we have been frantically trying to prepare ever since. Solidifying plans, packing, working on the trailer, making sure my work was left in good hands, and trying to parent newborn twins. It was a lot, but God has uniquely equipped our family for just such an occasion. It was not easy, we fell behind and some projects had to be delayed. The day did arrive, and the finances made sense, and we have now embarked on a fascinating adventure that will take us up the west coast for sure.

    We will be regularly updating people on life and there will be many stories from the road. For the next week it will just be the twins, Natalie and I in Southern Nevada and Southern California. We will be joined next weekend by the older kids and our trip will begin in earnest. Please be praying for safe travels and opportunities to be a blessing as we go.

    If you know of a church or person that could use a visit from a crazy traveling family please get us in contact: part of our mission is to serve those we come in contact with in anyway God leads us. The hope is that through our Meandering Bain’s site we can travel and write and create a following; so that we can continue our missions trips with our family.

    This ended up being longer than I expected but hopefully gives decent context for what will follow in the next 7 weeks. Please comment and share our pages as we want this to bless anyone and everyone anyway we can!

    You can also look forward to new books being self published along the way; this is how we hope to stay afloat financially. Currently we have a camping book published, and we are diligently working on a children's travel series as well as a young adult novel.

God bless.

Love Mitchell, Natalie, Peyton, Fletcher, Kayleigh, Charleigh, and Katie

 

CampLog by Meandering Bains

Are you ready to head out on your next adventure? Or do you travel a lot and just need one book for everything from shopping lists, to journaling? Never forget the coffee again! 

Camping Logs: Meandering Bains: 9798743355877: Amazon.com: Books

Check out our new book, a blank travel log book, complete with trailer/Rv check lists, shopping lists so you don't forget anything, blank itinerary, maps of California, Nevada, Oregon, Washington (in our west coast edition.) A journal, keep track of your site, and favorites of the surrounding areas. as well as a weekly journal with a nightly reflection time. Completely set up for 52 trips a year (That's one trip every week!) 330 pages for just $14.99

Perfect for any ages. 

Allows your children to participate in your family trips. 

 

Resort Name: Rancho Oso Rv & Camping Resort

Address: 3750 Paradise Rd. Santa Barbara Ca. 

Dates Visited: 3/26/2021- 3/29/2021.

Number of People: 2 Adults, 2 Kids, 2 Infants & 1 Cat

    The drive into this resort is beautiful, as is the resort itself. When you first enter the resort you'll see their cabins, and covered wagons avaible to rent and camp in, across the road from that is the horse stables. 

    A little ways down the road, is a tiered system for RV and camp trailers. All spots are back in spots, at the bottom of the hill is the pool (1 heated pool, 1 lap pool, and a hot tub), courts, playground and store. These are well maintained. During our stay there was a sign up sheet for 1 hour long scheduled time at the pool with up to 18 people allowed in at a time. 

    The area has wild turkeys that come to visit in the mornings. The resort is quiet and perfect for families with older children or just adults. This is a perfect place to UNPLUG. There is limited service here, but there is WIFI at the adult lodge. 

    We visited late March and it was cold at night, and hot during the day. Bring extra blankets or a heater for night time. 

    The public bathrooms were very clean, and large. 2 bathroom stalls, 2 shower stalls, and plenty of counter space. 

 

Resort Name: Soledad Canyon Rv & camping Resort

Address: 4700 Crown Valley Rd. Acton Ca. 93510

Dates Visited: 3/29/2021- 4/4/2021.

Number of People: 2 Adults, 2 kids, 2 infants & 1 cat.

 

      For our children’s spring break, we planned to spend our time in a different Rv park, but due to unforeseen complications we decided to move to Soledad Canyon Rv and camping resort. We had visited this resort once before while I was pregnant, so we knew what to expect for layout and cell service.

      We arrived Monday afternoon and we checked in. The staff remembered us from our previous stay in September 2020 and welcomed us back. The resort was mostly empty with many spots to choose from, we were told it would fill up by the weekend. We picked an end location of the Section A pull through spots near the cabins and dumpsters.

      The second day of our trip we were trailer bound as the winds were crazy and blew sand and dust everywhere; however, we expected this, and we were able to prepare ahead of time.

We purchased a weeks’ worth of internet for two devices. The internet works well, and we were thankful for it as our previous location had nothing, no internet or cell reception. You just have to constantly log yourself back in.

Our previous stay was during the first year of the Covid pandemic therefore they weren’t renting out equipment for mini golf or any of the other courts. This time around they were but with availability and office hours we were glad we stopped at a thrift store beforehand to get our own putters for the mini golf.

We managed to score one day at the pool, the rules were changing as we were staying there and by Friday the resort was packed so getting anytime at the pool was difficult. We adjusted our plans for our kids and went to Acton Park for some energy burn off and then stopped for ice cream at the Acton Grocery Store. If you want time at the pool, I recommend trying earlier in the week or getting there first thing. They weren’t doing a sign-up sheet during our stay but that may change when the resort becomes a busier location during summer.

~~ They do have a larger pool, which they said they were hoping to have open by this summer 2021.~~

    Our only two main downsides of this site are the train’s horn every few hours; with our young babies it took some adjusting on their nap schedules. This can be fixed by choosing a location further from the front of the resort. The second is the dust: it gets everywhere. If you don’t want it covered in dust, you’ll want to take it down and put it away during high winds.

      All in all, we will definitely be returning. This is a very family friendly resort with many activities for the whole family to do. I hope to see more from this resort as Covid restrictions lessen in the future.