Tiny House Treasure Hunt

 

My Tiny House Started with a Window, and A Beautiful Arched Door, and A Sink for Good Measure. So I ordered my brand new Custom Vardo Trailer from Iron Eagle, too. Then a few days ago I found My Kitchen Windows, just in the nick of time!

Now that I'm preparing for my tiny house build this spring my tiny house treasure hunt begins in earnest. I know that the next important steps are refinishing my door and building my arched rafters. The materials I should be keeping an eye out for at this point are things like cedar siding, metal roofing, and half-used rolls of house wrap.

But I couldn't help but get a little distracted by shiny things when I popped into an antique store that was moving locations and found these copper canisters. I've always had a soft spot for these countertop containers and I'd never found a set that seemed quite right for me. I found myself melting a little when I realized these little copper canisters were labeled: Cookies, Flour, Sugar, Coffee, and Tea. So it's a good thing for me they were also on sale half-off! I think they'll be a charming addition to my gypsy wagon kitchen, right there near my hand-hammered copper sink.

Apparently Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow on Groundhog's Day, which is probably just as well since we need more rain this winter. Looks like I have six more months to boneyard materials and work out the construction details. I'll be requesting building help later on, so you can be looking forward to that. (Nudge, nudge, wink, wink!)

In the meantime, if you see great deals on small batches of building materials or if you happen upon something wee and beautiful, please let me know. It has to be just right, of course. It has to sing to me. But I'm open to the possibilities now. I'm on a tiny house treasure hunt!

My Kitchen Windows

 

My Tiny House Started with a Window and a couple weeks ago I dropped the sashes off at Wooddale Windows so that a frame could be made for them. I knew that Wooddale, who has been making wood windows for the past several decades, was precisely the person I wanted to build the arched frame for the window that started this whole project. I believe it will be the piece de resistance in my wee home and I was pleased that Wooddale was fascinated by my project. I grinned when I read his emails:

"Ya know, we have built many arched windows in the past. There is a lot of labor that goes into building arched top frames and sash. Along with that costs are much higher. We are interested in your project. We have never built windows for a Gypsy Wagon, which will be a nice change... Send a 50% deposit that gets you in and I'll buy lumber and get it in here, when I trip on it a couple of times, it's time to build your windows. Thank you so much, looking to enjoy this job." - Wooddale

Besides the arched window, my vardo design called for two more windows, one for either side of my galley kitchen. So I had been haunting the ReBuilding Center for the past few months, looking for my kitchen windows.

I knew just what I wanted: They had to be a matching set. They had to be double paned. They had to be wooden, at least on the interior. They had to be about 3 feet tall and between 4 and 6 feet wide. They had to be in good working order. They had to be beautiful. Not that I was picky about it...

Needless to say, I hadn't found them. So I was just about to commission Wooddale to build me the kitchen windows of my dreams. I thought I'd wanted a little curve in the top trim the way old streetcar windows are, but I also wanted some sort of divided lites and when I tried sketching it out I realized it just didn't look right. So I came up with a new design, one that had both the curve and the divided lites. After I sent Wooddale the sketch of what I wanted I started seeing similar windows around town. And every time I did my heart skipped a beat. So I knew they would be gorgeous. And probably worth every penny of the price tag that accompanies meticulous craftsmanship.

But yesterday, just before I was going to send a deposit check for my windows, I decided to make one more trip to the ReBuilding Center to scout for my kitchen windows. And this time, when I walked among the rows of windows on a Tiny House Treasure Hunt, there they were.

My kitchen windows.

Two matching Pella windows. Double paned. Wood interiors. Three feet tall and 4 feet wide. In good working order. And beautiful.

Yes, one of them needed a new crank. Yes, their flanges had been cut off, as they so often are on reclaimed windows. Yes, they needed a good wipe down. Yes, a new coat of sealer probably wouldn't hurt either. But otherwise, they were just right. They were also a fraction of what I would have paid for brand new custom windows.

As I admired them I realized that my only hesitation was that if I purchased these windows Wooddale wouldn't be making me the windows of my dreams. I love supporting craftspeople like Wooddale, especially those carrying on traditions like building wood windows the old-fashioned way. So I'm delighted that Wooddale will be building the frame for my arched window. I know he has customers lined up, eager to have him create beautiful windows that match their historic homes. So I certainly know who I'll turn to if I ever decide to have the windows of my dreams built for me.

For now, I'm thrilled that I found my kitchen windows. It means I'm this much closer to being able to order my Structurally Insulated Panels (SIPs)!

A Sink for Good Measure

For several of my tiny house heros The Kitchen Sink was the first purchase. It was their way of saying "Hey, I'm really going to do this thing! I'm going to build myself a tiny house." And then things started to fall into place for them.

My Tiny House Started With a Window and I felt pretty lucky that I'd found My Beautiful Arched Door, too. Since I'm a rather superstitious person, and I wanted the good luck to keep coming my way, I decided I'd better find myself a sink, too.

One morning I came across a beautiful hand-hammered copper sink on Craigslist. When I called the number the man who was selling it said he was on his way downtown and he offered to bring it by so I could take a look. I decided if he was determined to get his asking price I'd have to let it go. I am hesitant to pay more than I've budgeted since I know how budgets creep. I really can't afford to let that happen.

On the other hand, I know that a handful of beautiful things really matter. For me, the parts of a house I interact with daily - the sink, windows, door, knobs, pulls, and latches - are the parts that need to be beautiful and functional. It's like my cousin explaining that it's okay to buy jeans, t-shirts, and socks that don't speak to your soul, but you've got to have good shoes and a coat you love.

Fortunately, when I offered the man the amount I'd budgeted for a sink he accepted. He lives in a floating home, but he thought my tiny house was novel anyhow. When he saw Bayside Bungalow, the tiny house on wheels I'd rented for the year, he was pretty impressed. He liked the idea of his tiny sink finding a place in my tiny home.

My copper sink is large enough and deep enough that I'll be able to do dishes easily. But it's also small enough that it has moved with me three times now. First to My Summer Garden Cottage, then to my Home Sweet Yurt, and most recently to Sweet Pea. I love knowing that the next time I move it will be to install it in my vardo! I've begun scouting for a copper faucet that will match my sink. It seems the only way to do it justice.

So it seems My Tiny House Starts with a Window... and A Beautiful Arched Door... and a sink for good measure. With these three pieces guiding the character of my gypsy wagon, I think it's going to be lovely!

Let the Tiny House Treasure Hunt begin!

My Beautiful Arched Door

The summer before last I had My Summer Dream Job: Tiny House Design-Building. It was brilliant, lucky, backwards, or some combination of all three that I had the chance to build a tiny house for someone else before I built my own.

While I was finishing out Tandem (which is now located at Caravan - The Tiny House Hotel and available for nightly rental), I soaked up as much information and muscle memory as I could so that someday I would be ready to build my tiny dream house. And I started scouting Craigslist for materials, just to get a sense of what was out there.

I wasn't going to actually buy anything since I knew I wouldn't be building that summer. I definitely wasn't going to buy anything large!

But a friend invited me to visit the ReBuilding Center on a Saturday afternoon in August and I saw it.

My door.

An arched door with an arched leaded glass window and an arched frame, too. The fella I asked about it said it had been there a couple weeks. The price was more than I'd been wanting to pay for a door, but it was just what I wanted.

I decided to sleep on it.

And I didn't sleep well because I was nervous about making the commitment... but even more nervous someone else would get MY door. So I reserved a truck through Getaround and was at the ReBuilding Center before it opened on Sunday morning. When I walked in and told the guy I was going to buy that arched door he grinned and gave me a discount. The man who helped me load it into the truck said arched doors are rare but arched doors with frames in good shape are one in a thousand. I feel lucky that we found each other despite the odds, my door and me. So My Tiny House Started with a Window and then, all of the sudden I had a beautiful door, too. With an arched door and an arched window, my house was definitely taking on a life of it's own. And a shape of its own. When I found my arched window I was already pretty sure my house would be a vardo, but finding my arched door sealed the deal.

Then I started getting a little nervous because I didn't have A Sink for Good Measure, so my scouting began again...

Happy Birthday to Niche Consulting LLC

A year ago today I started my own sustainable design consulting company, Niche Consulting LLC. So my baby company is one year old today! Happy Birthday, Niche!

For Niche, like for most start-up companies – and most human babies for that matter – the first year was full of experimentation and growth. Through Niche this year I taught workshops, met with clients for design and lifestyle consultations, sketched up tiny house designs, participated in conferences and working groups, and supported other sustainable development companies. I worked with dozens of great individuals and a handful of wonderful companies, including Intrinsic Ventures, Portland Alternative Dwellings, Caravan – The Tiny House Hotel, and Yestermorrow Design-Build School.

As I've embarked on Lina's Next Adventure, I've learned a great deal through trial-and-error as well as from the advice and support of friends, family, colleagues, and a few perfect strangers, too. Sometimes it’s felt like I could barely hold my head up and sometimes it’s felt like I was crawling, but now that I’ve got my feet underneath me, Niche and I are eager to toddle out and explore what this second year of life is all about. (Hopefully, it won’t be the terrible twos!)

Of course, I’ve also been overwhelmed by the support from my friends and family. Special thanks go to Sandy Hall, Amy Gammill, Rose Jones, Kathy MacMaster, and Pat Hovis for being my cheer squad! It’s also been great to be starting up my company while several friends and two of my sisters start companies of their own.

These friends and family members of mine also welcomed new businesses into the world this year:

• My sister Sarah created Farthest North Films so that she can pursue her love of documenting life in Alaska. (Her company is so new the website hasn't been built out yet - stay tuned!)
• My sister Katie created Bring Baby Fitness so she (and her infant son Caleb) can help other new parents take good care of themselves and their little ones. (Her company is so new the website hasn't been built out yet - stay tuned!)
• My friends Derin and Andra Williams have created Shelter Wise LLC to build tiny houses and do energy efficiency work.
• My friends Deb Delman and Kol Peterson created Caravan - The Tiny House Hotel.
• My friends Jeremy Beasley and Kelly Nardo are creating a film about tiny living called Small is Beautiful.
• My friend Karin Parramore co-founded Good Life Medicine Center (and its development overlapped with construction of her tiny house on wheels, Serenity! Two new babies for Karin this year! She deserves a medal – and a break!)
• My friend Lindsey Thompson started up Thompson Family Acupuncture Clinic and began blogging at Stick Out Your Tongue.
• My friend Lisa Curtis has developed Kuli Kuli Bars which you can now request that your local Whole Foods carry.

Meanwhile, I continue to be inspired by the friends who have blazed the entrepreneurial path before me and created sustainability-focused companies of their own:

• Brittany Yunker rents out her sweet Bayside Bungalow as a tiny vacation rental.
• Tammy Strobel teaches e-courses on simple living, writing, and photography (I've just registered for her latest one A Simple Year and I'm so excited to get started!)
• Dee Williams and Joan Grimm provide inspiration, education, and information for people creating tiny houses through Portland Alternative Dwellings
• Matt Eppelsheimer does web development through is company Rocket Lift Incorporated
• Corey McKrill builds websites through Jupiterwise Design
• Curt Bowen supports sustainable farming practices in Guatamala through Semilla Nueva
• Emily Dietsman and Andy Asmus grow amazing food, flowers, and community through Welcome Table Farm
• Apologies to anyone I left off the list! Remind me and I'll add you!

It’s been an honor to work alongside these impressive folks as we create companies that strive to do well by doing good. Here’s to supporting small businesses with big hearts this year!

Looking Forward to 2014

With the transition to a New Year, I'm celebrating Another Year of Little Living. (You can read the highlights of my 2012 A Year of Little Living, too.) Here are some of the things I'm most excited about for 2014:

January & February

On January 6th and 20th I'll be teaching Organize Your New Year: A 2-Part Decluttering Workshop. On January 25th and February 8th, I'll be co-teaching Portland Alternative Dwellings' Tiny Chair Workshop, which is an introduction to power tools. I'm exciting to be co-teaching the Tiny Chair Workshop with Laura Klement, who participated in the Tiny House Design-Build class at Yestermorrow. The first weekend of February and the first weekend of March I'll be helping out with PAD's Tiny House Basics Workshops. This weekend workshop introduces tiny house enthusiasts to everything they need to consider from tiny house structural issues to regulations and community building.

Over the next couple months I'm also Coordinating the ADU Case Studies Project, which involves interviewing ADU owners from across Oregon and writing up case studies which are featured on the AccessoryDwellings.org website. Our goal is to help people articulate what motivated them to develop an ADU on their property, what's working well and what they would do differently, and what advice they have for people considering building an ADU on their property.

I will also continue to build out TinyHomes.com, a website for tiny homes and the people who love them. Our goal is to create an in-depth, engaging, and informative website for people interested in tiny homes. We are currently collecting Profiles for tiny homes and tiny house enthusiasts. We look forward to having the profiles serve as a who's who of the Tiny House Movement, so we'd love to have you add a profile for yourself or your tiny home! We also feature regular blog posts from people who are exploring, designing, building, living in tiny homes. If you would like to be a contributor on our blog or facebook page, please contact me at lina@tinyhomes.com. I look forward to meeting more bloggers and supporting the small house movement through TinyHomes.com!

March & April

In March, I'll be teaching a week-long Less is More class at Yestermorrow Design-Build School in Vermont with the fabulous Dave Cain. This course, which I took myself in the fall of 2010, helps people design a small (or tiny) home of their own. After seeing a great set of presentation following the two-week Tiny House Design-Build, which I co-instructed in October, I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone comes up with!

The first weekend of April I'll be speaking at the Tiny House Conference in Charlotte, North Carolina. There's a great speaker line-up, including Dee Williams as the keynote, so I look forward to this opportunity to meet giants of the Tiny House Movement.

I'm considering staying on the east coast during the time between my Yestermorrow course wrapping up and the Tiny House Conference starting up. I've got connections with Greater Boston Tiny House Enthusiasts, Boneyard Studios, and an artist community in West Virginia, so it seems like it could be a fabulous adventure. If you know of other things I should check out if I decided to spend this time on the East Coast, please let me know!

Dee Williams' book, The Big Tiny (which I've already pre-ordered in Kindle format!) comes out on Earth Day and there will be festivities surrounding its release. I'll likely join in the fun here in the Portland area.

It looks like 2014 is off to a great start! What are you most looking forward to in the coming year?

Another Year of Little Living

The end of the year presents us with a great opportunity to look back and reflect upon what we've accomplished and what we've learned. I cataloged A Year of Little Living back in 2012. In 2013 I wrote 87 posts about my Little Life experience and you can read the best of the best here. I'm grateful for the opportunities that were presented to me in 2013 and I'm already Looking Forward to 2014.

Here are some highlights from 2013:

This Is The Little Life

I started blogging two and a half years ago, but I was shy about it, so I didn't tell anyone at first. For all intents and purposes, this month marks my two year anniversary as a blogger. It's been an incredible experience to share my vignettes about my Little Life with all of you. I've enjoyed engaging in fascinating conversations with followers from around the world. It's especially been a pleasure to meet many of you over the past couple of years at gatherings or during visits. Word Press conveniently showed me yesterday that in 2013 This Is The Little Life was viewed approximately 140,000 times by people in 155 countries. Thank you for your support, encouragement, ideas, insights, and for following along!

Niche Consulting LLC

In January 2013, I started up my own sustainable design consulting company, Niche Consulting LLC. I created Niche so that I could work with clients from across the country and around the world who want to create a little home of their own. I've enjoyed doing individual consultations, teaching small group workshops, and assisting clients with small home design work. It's a real thrill to see a design that I helped a client develop be constructed in real life! I've also been able to partner with fabulous sustainable development companies like Portland Alternative Dwellings, Caravan - The Tiny House Hotel, Yestermorrow Design-Build School, Shelter Wise, and Intrinsic Ventures.

Workshops

I kicked off 2013 by teaching a tiny house workshop for my cousin's fifth grade classroom and discovered Ten Year Olds Design Awesome Tiny Houses! In February, April, July, and November I co-taught Tiny House Basics Workshops with Dee Williams and Joan Grimm of Portland Alternative Dwellings. In April, I worked with Shelter Wise, PAD, and six amazing students to build a tiny house in two days for the Casa Pequena workshop at Casa Verde in McMinnville, OR. In a July PAD Tiny House Build Workshop we constructed the floor of Dee Williams' vardo and built three walls for Naj Haus. In October, I co-taught a two-week-long Tiny House Design-Build class at Yestermorrow and in December I taught Unstuff Your Holidays: A 1-Day Decluttering Workshop.

My 200 Things Challenge

Before Downsizing from a Tiny House to a Tinier House, I decided to embark upon My 200 Things Challenge. This time last year I was half way through the challenge. I did a New Year's Re-Inventory and spent some time Taking Stock Without Stocking Up. I also made a New Year's resolution to go paper-free, so I was Strategizing Digitizing and Getting All My Docs in a Row. I recapped What My 200 Things Challenge Taught Me in October.

Masters Degree & Urban Design Certificate

From January through June I worked with Five to Nine Consulting to develop a framework for reintroducing housing into downtown Oregon City. This was our workshop project for our Masters of Urban and Regional Planning (MURP) degree. In June I graduated from Portland State University's College of Urban and Public Affairs with a MURP and I wrapped up my Urban Design Certificate the next month.

Tiny House Fair

Unfortunately, I missed graduation because I was at Yestermorrow in Vermont, presenting at the Tiny House Fair. Fortunately, it was one of the best weekends of my life. I joked that I was taking commencement really seriously and getting on with my career. It was a treat to be back on the Yestermorrow campus and to meet so many great tiny house enthusiasts, builders, designers, and dwellers. My posts about the Tiny House Fair were republished in Tiny House Magazine.

Pedalpalooza ADU & Tiny House Tours

In June, Kimber and I coordinated the Pedalpalooza ADU & Tiny House Tours. I'd coordinated the tours in 2012 while working with Orange Splot. In 2013 we put both tours on one epic day, which you can read about in the Pedalpalooza Recap. It was great fun to meet so many small home enthusiasts and show off great spaces. We wrapped up at Caravan - The Tiny House Hotel, where we showed off Caravan's Tiny Houses, including Tandem, the tiny house on wheels I finished out in the summer of 2012 as part of My Summer Dream Job: Tiny House Design-Building with Orange Splot.

Moving from Home, Sweet Yurt to Home, Sweet Pea

In August, I moved from my Home, Sweet Yurt into Sweet Pea, a tiny house on wheels located in POD49. It's a great little place with really great neighbors in a wonderful location. (And the Sweet Pea Plan Set is available for sale through PAD.) I've thoroughly enjoyed this little home. I've had a Snow Day in the Tiny House and I've even tried Sharing Sweet Pea with my Sweetie.

Site Managing at Caravan - The Tiny House Hotel

In July, my friends Kol Peterson and Deb Delman opened Caravan - The Tiny House Hotel. Their soft opening was serving as the final destination for the Pedalpalooza ADU & Tiny House Tours, but the Caravan Grand Opening in July was a truly wonderful party. I loved visiting with the people who stopped in to take a look at Tandem, the tiny house on wheels owned by Eli Spevak of Orange Splot that I finished out as my Practicum Project for my Yestermorrow Sustainable Design-Build Certificate. Speaking of parties, I celebrated my 30th birthday with a Big Birthday Bash at the Tiny House Hotel. In September I served as site manager of Caravan for two weeks while Kol and Deb were getting married then on their honeymoon. I got to know all the little houses a whole lot better as I developed my Tiny House Cleaning Checklist and I joked Everything I Need to Know About Designing Tiny Houses I Learned From Cleaning Them.

Tiny House Mixers

In 2012 I helped coordinate several Tiny House Potlucks. They were a lot of fun, especially when we had them in parks during the summer months, but it was hard to find a place big enough for us to meet in the winter since we all live in small houses. Fortunately, in 2013 PAD began hosting Tiny House Mixers, which have been wildly popular. The November Tiny House Mixer drew nearly 50 people and the December Tiny House Mixer drew more than 30. I'm already looking forward to the January Tiny House Mixer and February Tiny House Mixer.

TinyHomes.com

In October, I began building out TinyHomes.com, a new website which I've co-founded with web developer Kenny Bavoso. TinyHomes.com is a website for tiny homes and the people who love them. Kenny and I are both huge fans of small spaces and we look forward to making TinyHomes.com an in-depth, engaging, and informative website for people interested in tiny homes. You can learn more about what we're up to and how you can contribute in Looking Forward to 2014.

Coordinating the ADU Case Studies Project

In December I began Coordinating the ADU Case Studies Project on a contract with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. I'll be compiling a series of case studies of permitted accessory dwellings throughout the state of Oregon over the next couple months. Read about the ADU Case Studies Project to learn how you can contribute or follow along.

Coordinating the ADU Case Studies Project

While I was working with Orange Splot LLC, a Portland-based development company that specializes in innovative sustainable infill housing projects, I Showcased Accessory Dwellings in Portland on the AccessoryDwellings.org website. You can read these posts here:

• Shawn’s Live Work Accessory Dwelling
• A Sister in Law House
• The Granger House: Own Two, Rent One

Now we have updated the AccessoryDwellings.org website so that we can feature more ADU profiles. Our goal is to compile a collection of case studies of permitted accessory dwellings from across Oregon. I’m delighted to be coordinating the ADU Case Studies Project. I look forward to helping people share their ADU stories so that we can continue advocating for ADUs as a flexible, affordable housing option. You can read our first new case study, Kol Peterson's ADU: A Backyard Home.

If you or someone you know has a permitted accessory dwelling in Oregon and you would like to participate in the project, please email me at accessorydwellings.org.

Sincerely,

Lina Menard

Coordinator

ADU Case Studies Project

AccessoryDwellings.org

(541) 854-0875

Sharing Sweet Pea with my Sweetie

If you’re looking for a good way to test out a new romantic relationship, let me suggest spending a week together in a tiny house on wheels. I moved into my Home, Sweet Pea at POD49 back in August. I’m in a walkable neighborhood, I have great neighbors, and the house really is sweet as can be.

So I’ve loved living here… all by myself, anyhow!

I’ll admit I was nervous about the prospect of my new significant other sharing my tiny house with me for a week. Matthew’s housemate’s mom was in town so we decided that Matthew should stay with me so that she could stay in his room. Since I was rather honeymooney and didn’t want to be away from him, it sounded like a good idea to me. I figured it would be a good make-or-break experience.

One of my favorite things about Matthew is one of his favorite things about me: we both live our politics. Matthew has been impressed by my fascination (okay, okay obsession) with space-efficient design. He thinks it’s cool that I live in a tiny house on wheels. He is impressed that I’m compiling a series of ADU Case Studies. So I was really looking forward to sharing the Little Life with him.

The day before Matthew was going to temporarily move in with me it occurred to me that if I was going to move in with someone else for a week, I’d really like to have a place for my Stuff - especially in a tiny home where there’s a place for everything so everything can be in its place. I also realized that if I was going to live in a teeny, tiny house with someone else for the long-run it would be best to go into the adventure together, rather than trying to shoehorn someone else into my tiny space. The couples I know who have moved into a tiny house together (like Tammy & Logan) tend to do pretty well, but the ones who have one person move in with the other seem to struggle a bit more. (If you’re doing either, I’d love to hear about your experience in the comments section!)

Now the thing is, even though Sweet Pea is spacious, I’d already done a pretty good job of filling up the closet, drawers, and storage space under the window seat. (And this is after spending nearly a year being very conscientious about my possessions during My 200 Things Challenge!) On the Packing Lightly vs. Packing Densely continuum, I tend towards density. So I had a hard time figuring out a place for Matthew to put his Stuff. I ended up clearing out a bit of the closet so that he could put his clothes in there and tucking away a pair of my shoes so that he would have a place for his. I figured we were pretty well set for everything else since I have a well-stocked kitchen and his extra toothbrush had already migrated to my place.

I was ready for my sweetie to move in.

But the next morning I discovered that my hose had frozen. Now this had happened to me twice when I was living in Bayside Bunglow, but this time we were in for a longer cold snap. I called Matthew and warned him that we’d be living without running water for a few days. “Oooh! An adventure!” he exclaimed and instantly won himself brownie points.

Matthew showed up with a bag of clothes, his coffee maker, his favorite frying pan, and a pair of slippers. Now that, I thought, is my kind of man! He found places for his things and did his best to make himself at home in my wee abode. Two days later, we had a Snow Day in the Tiny House.

We settled into a bit of a routine. We both had days we were out of the house all day long and we managed to alternate them enough that we both had time home alone. My cat was delighted to have such constant companionship. We also made a point to get out of the house together so we wouldn't feel cooped up because of the cold. We took turns cooking warm tasty dinners and doing dishes afterwards. We watched TV shows on my laptop sometimes and read to each other evenings. Sometimes one or both of us would be out for the evening. One night we even hosted a dinner party for five friends. Matthew borrowed my neighbor’s oven to cook a pork roast with apples and potatoes and my friends brought salad, cobbler, wine, and ice cream. It was quite the feast!

With two of us here the house wasn’t as cold as it would have been if I’d been here alone. But not having running water was more inconvenient when there were two of us. It gave me a chance to reflect on Simple vs. Intentional Living. (It was also nice at the December Tiny House Mixer to find out other tiny housers were in the same predicament.) We hauled water from the BIG House every day. I showered at my neighbors’ place and Matthew showered at school. My neighbors were gracious about loaning us their space heater and letting us doing dishes at the BIG House. I even used the dishwasher after the dinner party. That was really exciting since I hadn’t lived with a dishwasher since I was in college!

Matthew was a good sport about living in a tiny box with no running water for a week. All in all, we got along just fine. He still likes that I live my politics. I’m more smitten with him than ever before. But whenever someone finds out Matthew lived with me in a tiny house for a week and asks how that was, Matthew laughs and says, “Well… it was during the cold snap so we didn’t have any running water” and inevitably the other person winces.

So here’s my advice:

If you’re trying to convince someone that tiny house living is simple, don’t pick the coldest week of the year to show them how it’s done!