Home Sweet Storage Unit

When I lost my home for the second time in ten days, I decided to look outside the box for affordable ways to live. I started my journey in a storage unit, and have since progressed to a tiny house in my parents' backyard--which I am building myself out of recycled materials. Stay tuned for social commentary, tips and tricks for building a home on a budget, and some potentially hilarious stories.

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Bunny doesn't know what feminism is, but is definitely against it.

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My Blog Activity Has Flatlined...

So this is where I am now.  It's finally warm weather, and I finally have some time, so I'm back to working on renovating the tiny trailer into a livable, off-grid, eco-friendly, social gathering worthy space to call home.  As you might remember, I bought this trailer for less than $1,000 and was over the moon about it.  I lived in it for most of October, November and December, which was not great because I made the mistake of believing the seller when he told me everything worked and it was liveable.  

Anyway, I'm using a friend's backyard to fix this thing up, and I recently noticed that under the nice, pretty wood flooring, the subfloor is rotted to hell.  The trailer was originally built in 1978, and it's really looking like the guy I bought it from did an absolutely horrible job restoring it.  I think he just made everything look good and didn't actually repair anything.

Here are some of the features I am planning to incorporate into my design:

1) Compost toilet and worm compost factory

2) Solar roof (for passive solar heating and cooling as well as natural light)

3) Garden beds for organic vegetables (probably in a pop-out section)

4) Rocket stove with heat storage in a sitting area

5) Hot tub (wood fired) for awesomeness and to release heat at night

6) Rain barrel, because I hate showering in chemical-laden city water

7) Solar panels

I do really wish I had some reliable helpers because there actually are only 24 hours in a day and maybe MAYBE two months of good weather left.  Le sigh.

[occupytinyhouse]

This woman is a sustainable living genius.  I just purchased two of her books and I am in a perpetual state of amazement and excitement.  She has designed revolutionary systems for energy conservation, food production, and waste management.  She also discusses some VERY important issues about government regulations being unrealistic for user-built designs, even if they are tested and proved to be more efficient and less hazardous than standard designs.  

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Laaaaaame.

So you know how I was all excited about finally getting my composting toilet?  You know how I paid a ridiculous amount for shipping and handling because I ordered it off Cabelas.com?

It's not even a toilet.  It's bags of compost additive.  Bulking material.  

On the website, the product description said:  Composting toilet.  It showed a picture of a toilet.  There was absolutely nothing to indicate it was not a toilet but bags of bulking material.  

I called Cabela's and submitted a complaint, but I'm still out the money and now I have a huge box full of bagged bulking material.

Be careful what you buy online, I guess?

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Networking

What are some good ways to connect with people (network) for causes and projects?

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The tiny houses playing their small part to help solve homelessness

Occupy Madison Build, in Wisconsin, is hoping to create a cluster of tiny houses like those in Olympia, Washington, and Eugene and Portland, Oregon.

I REALLY want to be a part of this.  But I have to wait until I have enough money and assets that it's practical for me to go there.  I hate wait.

[occupytinyhouse]

Build a Bicycle Trailer

Whether carrying groceries or building materials or a child, you'd be surprised how many chores a two-wheeled bicycle trailer like this can handle.

I've had my eye on this project for awhile.  My truck got totalled on my last adventure, and I haven't been able to get another vehicle.  At least I don't have to buy gas!

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Oooo it's so cute!  My camper needs to drive itself.  Towing it is kind of a pain.

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New Post has been published on http://www.tinyhouseliving.com/making-a-life-size-tape-floorplan/

Making a Life-Size Tape Floorplan

Sure, I have been in other tiny houses, and I know how much space I will be dealing with. But I have never sketched out MY floorplan and felt what the space would be like…” - The Tiny Project

See more about making a Life-size tape floorplan

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[occupytinyhouse]

Now, this is something I wish I'd thought of before I started construction.  Hindsight.

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Here's a quick explanation of my rocket stove/heater design for my camper.  This is a rough sketch to give you an idea, this is NOT a blueprint!  The audio didn't turn out, so I added some captions.  I figured this would be the simplest way to explain it rather than photos of the actual prototype, cuz it's kind of hard to see what's what, and the whole thing is basically inside of a closet.

[occupytinyhouse]

Here's the video that got me interested in rocket stoves/mass heaters.  They're like super efficient woodstoves that emit fewer toxins and can be customized to do a lot of different heating tasks.  

I am building my own model to heat my trailer.   I got the design down, and it works, but I used duct tape for the joints on the first prototype, which only lasted so long.  Now I have a welding kit.

I don't think this video mentions it, but another advantage rocket heaters have over wood stoves is that due to the design of the wood "feed", the force of gravity does much of the work of loading the fuel.  People say you might have to load your wood stove every couple hours, but a rocket heater needs much less maintenance.

[occupytinyhouse]

Oooo Look What I Found!!!

Indiegogo,com is amazing.  It's a fundraising/entrepreneurship page similar to kickstarter.com, but the requirements aren't as strict.  You can pledge to support up-and-coming inventions, and usually receive some sort of perk.  If you are interested at all in solar power, you should invest in this.  Why?  Take a look at the illustration labeled "traditional solar system".  That clusterfuck is what I've been battling since April.  It's complicated, it's expensive, and like the string of Christmas lights, when something goes wrong, you've got to check everything.  This product would make solar panels more like a "plug and play" monitor--much simpler to use.  Not a bad price either.  I'm not trying to advertise or anything, I don't have any investments in this, I just think it's really, really cool.

[occupytinyhouse]

Hot Potato!

Here's a tip for keeping warm with no electricity.  Cook some potatoes over a fire.  If you have a kettle, you can boil them.  Wrapping them in tin foil also works.  If you don't have either, just roll them right into the fire.  (The skins will burn black, but the insides will be fine).  Cook the taters until they're piping hot, but not mushy, wrap them in some clean cloth (a clean sock works pretty well) and put them under your bed covers.  When you crawl into bed, it'll be nice and warm--and you can have the potatoes for breakfast!

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This actually makes me feel like a toooootal slacker.  New Year's Resolution: update blog more often!

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From the Facebook of Tiny House Australia

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A tiny camper! Who had a garage and power tools that I can borrow?

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This is the coolest thing I've ever seen.  Today, at least.

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A Blur. That's what this whole trip has been.

I'm back from Iowa, and the trip back was just as unplanned as the trip there.

I spent two wonderful weeks at Walnut Woods state park in my camper, and then had to move due to the 14 day stay rule.

I decided that for my next destination, I would take a little side trip to Missouri.  Landwatch.com told me about some interesting lakefront properties selling on the cheap, in a town about an hour an a half from West Des Moines.

It was one of those days where everything was going so well, something was bound to go wrong.  And go wrong it did.

After talking to the real estate agent and viewing the property, we began the process of paperwork to buy the land.  It was about 6pm, so I decided to camp for the night and continue tying up loose ends in the morning.  I pulled into a state campground about 20 min south of the land I was buying.  Big hill, really big hill.  My truck didn't make it, and the truck and trailer rolled back down the hill and jack knifed.

The truck-and-trailer clusterfuck was not only completely stuck, but the road was really narrow and had a steep bank on either side of it, so when I opened my truck door, a bunch of stuff fell out, including my cell phone.  Not a speck of moonlight, no cell phone, trailer and truck were wedged together in such a way that I couldn't get at my emergency kit or my battery.

Heeeeeeeeellllp?!

Eventually I found my near-dead cell phone and called my real estate agent who called a tow truck.  I'm not even sure how they did it (I had my eyes squeezed shut the whole time) but they somehow rotated the truck and trailer so that I could drive it back.  

Then I hit five deer.in rapid fire succession.  Four really.  I hit one twice.

And then the transmission on the truck died.

There are times when even the most determined, die hard people have to throw in the towel and call it a day.

[occupytinyhouse]

I've decided to re-paint my travel trailer.  Right now, it's got a white interior with country blue stenciling.  I just think it looks too mom-ish for my taste.  And I've never really cared for the "country cottage" look, and this color blue I feel is really out of date.  So now I'm going with a neutral palette of beige and soft black.  Reminiscent of birch trees, kind of. I haven't decided on the third color yet.  I just read in a magazine that the classic "formula": for color is 70-20-10.  I can't believe I never thought of it like that.  70% of one color--usually walls.  20% of another color--usually upholstery, and 10% of an accent color.  So simple, yet so effective.   

Anyway, these are two of the cupboards that I designed and painted.  They were just plain wood before and come on, we can't have that!  I think I'm going to do every cupboard differently, with the common themes of the colors and one decal piece.

I like the more nature oriented look.