A year. We’ve lived a whole year away from the “typical life.” It was something almost indescribable but we’ll try.

We left Asheville, North Carolina with the dream of buying a school bus, building it out, and creating a home on wheels. It’s crazy to think, but WE DID JUST THAT. We found a 22ft bus in Oregon whose past life was toting around Kindergarteners. For three and a half months we worked 8-10 hour days to create our home. It’s truly insane to look now at our bus and see how much work we actually did. We felt overwhelmed for sure most days, but the end result was worth it.

Dilly Gene Queen. That’s his name. Not sure if we ever told you all, but he’s quite a special lil bus. He carried us and kept us safe on the road. Kept us dry (75% of the time) during storms, helped break the barrier in making new friends, provided some excellent ramen meals, was the loudest travel companion anyone could ask for, carried us to friends and family, and created a space for conversations that only those living on the road could understand.

We travelled 20,000 miles in that bus. But right now, he’s taking a well-deserved rest. We have officially landed back in Asheville. We’re keeping our guy Dilly and will continue to take trips in him, but we were ready for that settled feeling in a home that didn’t have wheels.

We had high hopes and dreams of a newsletter, constant posts of where we were and what we were doing on the road, but alas, that clearly didn’t happen. We will say, we’re grateful that we were able to live in the moment of where we were in the country. But now we’re have a lifetime supply of images from our journey.

We’ll keep highlighting our favorite moments and places here and on Instagram, so don’t fret. We’re still traveling for wedding gigs, but our sweet home base is in a lil Asheville apartment.

Thank you all for being so encouraging and our biggest hype squad with this dream of ours. We feel the most lucky to have you all and be able to call this life our own.

Cheers,
Emma and Ryan

#dillygenequeen
#skoolieconversion
#buslife