Spring, travel and writing elsewhere…

Spring is springing on the coastside, with beautiful sunny days and perhaps a bit more wind than I’d like. Local folks say that’s pretty typical for this time of year but we’re talking blow your hair off wind here. Yesterday we went to the beach and the wind had herded giant collections of sea foam into every available space between the rocks. It was like a blowing blizzard of golf-ball sized foam that stuck to the surrounding plants and wobbled like globs of jello. Weird…

7 months in Little Yellow, 6 with my boyfriend and 2.5 with Tumbleweed. Little Yellow and the boyfriend are always wonderful, and I’m starting to feel comfortable presenting these workshops. For a while I found it tough to overcome the thought that I don’t know what I’m saying. I mean, I obviously know enough to have built my house, but to stand in a room with 100 paying attendees and spew the information in an intelligible way was a totally different game. I just have to remind myself that here, in the tiny house section of the construction world, I know what I’m on about. People at the workshops I’ve done so far are AWESOME, and they’ve made it so much fun. I can’t believe this is my job!

We took a road trip last month, north through Oregon and all over Washington to visit family. Nearly 2000 miles driven and so many beautiful sights. I have a new favourite place! Vashon Island, WA. 20 minutes on a ferry from the heart of Seattle, it sits in a perfect state of laid back, middle-of-nowhere chill. I’ve put up some pictures just because

I am now a weekly contributor to the blog on the Tumbleweed website! It’s more on the lines of informative article type stuff, but I pretty much have to do it every week (part of my job and all) and thought I’d start putting up links so this poor site doesn’t have so many months of wordless drought. There’s some other very good content on the TW blog as well, but I’m sure many of you read it already.

So! Here are the two I’ve written last week and this, and a few pictures.

Finding a Place for Your Tiny House: Renting

Let’s say you’ve just built a wonderful Tumbleweed. Construction is over and you’re ready to move in, but where do you put it? Where can you live in your wee house on wheels?

continue reading…

The Other Freedoms of Tiny Houses

‘Financial freedom’ is a phrase rooted in the appeal of tiny houses. I used it before I lived in mine because not many people seem to have it, and it was a great reason to give to inquiring minds that must know why the heck you want to build this unusually small house…

continue reading…

A functional door, system improvements and new things…

Can you believe it’s coming up on 5 months that I’ve lived in Little Yellow? It feels much longer to me, and also much shorter and then longer again when I think back. But time will do that to you. She is such a good house Better all the while as life gets easier and easier with the fixing of slight systematic annoyances.

The wonky door situation has been remedied and it FINALLY closes and locks now, which is quite the luxury. There was some wicked cold weather and it being partly open didn’t do any favours. Used to seeing your breath inside your house? I wasn’t. Enter the Origo heat pal I bought second hand (or maybe third, by the looks of it) on ebay during the build and totally forgot about. It runs on denatured alcohol like my 2 burner boat stove, and puts off a goodly amount of heat when you sit around it.

I’m begrudged to say we also got a refrigerator, albiet a very tiny one (1.something cubic feet). I really wanted the icebox system to work, I really did. But when you come home to find the block has melted and your food is swimming in a cooler filled with water of questionable sanitation every 3-4 days, you get over it. It ended up costing more and being more of a bother to get the ice so regularly than it does to run the tiny fridge, so a fridge it was.

A dandy craigslist find that happens to fit perfectly under the house outside between the wheel wells and the stairs. One of the main reasons I didn’t want one was for the noise, and the ever so slight inconveniece of having to leave the house to get things is outweighed by the beautifully unhindered silence in Little Yellow. It’s also a tad ugly (no offense, little fridge) so hiding it where it is keeps the inside pretty. The picture I took of it came out horribly for some reason, I’ll take another and put it up soon!

My boyfriend is good at keeping growing things alive and bought us a bunch of lovely potted plants from the local nursery. My previous track record leaves little question that I am not good at keeping growing things alive, so I mostly leave that to him. I water them, they look happy, then they die. What can I say? Anyway, none of them have kicked the bucket yet. They’re set all pretty on the old tractor bones outside the font window and I hope my fondness for looking at them doesn’t cause any wilting.

Over time, this house has totally changed the way I look at ‘stuff’. Current stuff, new stuff, I am finding a way to let go of ‘stuff’. Before I moved in I didn’t like the idea that I had to get rid of everything. I decided mine would be featured in the hoarders edition of tiny houses because I loved my collection and didn’t feel I had to part with it. So at first, I didn’t. But I am finding now that I strangely don’t want it all anymore. From clothing to knicknacks to kitchen things, I have willingly opted to sort through what’s around me and let what isn’t essential move on. Bags of things to the goodwill or friends means less things around to crowd my space, and I LOVE it. It feels so freeing.

I had heard tiny housers talk about downsizing back when I was in the research stage, but I think I misunderstood them at the time. I think what they were saying wasn’t so much that you have to get rid of everything you own and become an instant minimalist, but that when you live tiny, you won’t want so much of what you don’t need around you.

Or that’s what it seems to be in my case anyhow. I mean, I actually cleaned my car. MY car, you know, the one that I just mentioned in my last post as being a complete and total crapshoot? Those tidy car types would still shudder at the sight of it, but I can even fit other people in there now. Passengers! What a concept.

To anyone considering a tiny house for two, I’d also like to note that inhabiting 120 square feet with another person is a total non-issue from my experience. As long as you both get it and get along it’s like nothing. Those folks who love to indicate that your tiny house will only work while you’re single are totally out to lunch. And on the subject of naysayers, they generally don’t understand how you want to live your life and what’s important to you. These days my house is sort of a friend filter because if you don’t get Little Yellow, you don’t get me. Sometimes I have the feeling that they think my tiny plans are just there to make them look bad, so don’t take it too seriously.

The negativity I received when I first began to share my idea surprised me and I found it extremely discouraging. Despite the fact that a lot of the people who thought I was a nutter before are all on-board now that I’ve actually built it, those who didn’t have faith in me to follow through with my dream have turned out to be people I don’t really want around. I’m not talking about a few initial concerns as you ramble through the plan in helicopter-mode, I’m talking about serious hating on something you care about enough to change your life for.

Of course you can build your own house from scratch even if you have basically no idea how! Of course you can find help to get you there, and of course you can make it work! Determination and vision are free things that you have only to make use of. Alright, there’s my rant over.

Job news! I no longer work as a restaurant hostess because I now work for Tumbleweed. TUMBLEWEED! Basically? I am actually going to get paid to go around and present at their workshops.

I.

Am going to get paid.

To talk about tiny houses.

I’m not quite sure there are enough ?!?!?! for this. The Berkeley, CA workshop this weekend will be my first go in conjunction with the lovely Pepper Clark. So If you happen to be attending you will see me, most likely bouncing around and speaking at 120 mph I will try to slow down, I promise.

I can’t believe how this all has changed my life. This house, my little side project so I could exist in tiny, artistic freedom, continues to form my future in remarkable ways. Wonderful!!!

Little Yellow life…

Life in Little Yellow is wonderful. It’s actually very much like normal, but without the things that used to bug me about living in other people’s spaces. In fact, most everything that pissed me off or stressed me out in previous living situations is no longer problematic. I’m not stepping on anyone’s toes, I can move or change whatever, whenever, and everything I love is organized all nice-like under one roof.

Basically? I love my house. I had planned on loving it so it’s not a surprise, but I feel so relieved that I genuinely do because this would be a very extensive experiment if I didn’t.

It’s like the whole thing is one big relief. It’s a relief to have a simpler life. It’s a relief to have less things. It’s a relief to be compact and contained. Like a hug, I like to think that my house is quite like a hug.

The timing of my move north has been so serendipitous it’s crazy. 3 days after arriving, I had a job, made an awesome friend, and met my awesome boyfriend who happens to think Little Yellow is as great as I do. He’s a do-er and a fix-it type who really gets things done, a wonderful presence to have around.

So! Here’s a breakdown of how it’s going. If I’ve missed something, ask away!

Living situation:

I live on a little ranch down the hill from my landlords’ house in a pretty wee field with a nice set of bushes and trees just beside; a perfectly adequate distance so as to be totally left on my own. I have decent cell reception in my house, but no internet. Not having it was sort of a shock at the start, but appears to be very good for me. I get way more done and am far more creative without it that with. I have family close by anyway, so it gives me a grand excuse to visit.

My boyfriend is a friend of my landlords’ son, so he comes and goes without bother and there’s plenty space to fit several cars comfortably. I pay rent each month and work off a little by cleaning stalls a few hours a week, which I actually kind of enjoy. There’s something vaguely reflective and therapeutic about shoveling horse shit.

Storage:

Storage and space in this house amaze me. I have many things inside, but I don’t feel cramped and don’t feel the need to fill it any further. Everything I’ve needed to find a spot for has one.  It sounds a bit ridiculous to write it out, but all I can say is that it feels big to me.

It feels so big that I can barely think of Little Yellow as being as small as she is, and certainly not tiny. There were 4 people eating dinner in here the other night (myself included) and it felt no different than having 3 people for dinner anywhere else.

Maybe it’s a magical house. Like that wacky carpet bag Mary Poppins had, where you could fill it far past it’s apparent capacity and still have room for your umbrella. Except my house isn’t made of carpet.

Food and water storage:

As you may know, I decided not to have a refrigerator in my house. Mostly because I didn’t feel I need one, but also because being without saves a goodly amount of electricity and makes you more creative with shopping lists and leftovers.

This is something that I didn’t experiment with before leaving the driveway, so my first attempt at fridge-free food cooling came after the first trip to the store. I had read good things about pot-in-pot (zeer) methods but unfortunately for me this did not work at all in my coastal climate. It failed spectacularly at keeping anything I put in there colder than house temperature and the terra cotta flower pot began to sprout some pretty disconcerting mold after a week or so. Conclusion? Nope.

So when my boyfriend came home one day with a standard cooler full of block ice, I begrudgingly went with it. It’s not the most beautiful thing I’ve ever laid eyes on, but it works and it aint molding.

I also didn’t think much about drinking water. The hoses I bought are potable, but what comes out tastes nothing like something you’d actually want to drink. After re-filling plastic bottles for a while, I now have a pitcher system filled periodically by a beautiful 3 gallon jug with a copper handle that my boyfriend made (he’s a metal fabricator).

Kitchen:

My kitchen is wonderous. Wonderful. Wonder…empty. Well, not empty. Thought there might be another ‘wonder’ word, guess not. Would wonder-empty be the opposite of wonderful? Everything about my kitchen suits me very well. I have never a lack of counterspace, all my things are nicely organized, my dishes drip directly from my hanging rack to the sink, and I can cook anything that can be made with 2 burners. In theory.

Actually I do cook a lot now that I have someone to cook for, and my stove does a very admirable job. It smells more than I’d like it to, I think that’d be my only complaint. My boyfriend has recently introduced me to the marvel of cast iron pans and I cook mostly everything in one these days. Seriously, a pan you don’t have to wash? Sign me right the hell up.

Shower:

That shower is pretty darn great. You just have to step a little higher and squeeze a little tighter than normal, but my yellow curtains are such a nice sight from in there I’ve barely used it since I go in the ocean every day, but it’s there for when I need it and still gets used for its bathroom sink function.

The only thing I might have done differently is to make the drain angle down somehow so the water would be better directed out. As it is now, the water ends up pooling a little on the sides.

Toilet:

Ah, my toilet. Such a lovely thing it is… It does look a little lovely, actually. I rebuilt the horrific hexagonal box around it the day before I left the driveway, out of nice 1x redwood left over from my fascia boards. I’ll have you know that wooden toilets can be quite sightly As far as function, it’s honestly not that bad. I really resented this part of my house for a while, but I have to say that it has become very ordinary to me now.

It don’t believe it to smell more than any other form of toilet would in so small a space; a little earthy if anything. Sawdust-y, you might say. I also have 3 windows at the hitch (bathroom) end of my house, and any whiffs one might want to waft away are gone within 10 minutes of their opening. Nifty, eh?

Sleeping loft:

I love my loft. I love it so much that if I have to sleep away for so much as a night I get at least a little sad. When it’s sunny in the mornings, my entire ceiling fills up with buttery yellow light that shines through the crystals in my windows and casts a thousand rainbow beads across my walls. Did I mention that there’s an ocean view from my window? It’s a small section of the ocean and there’s a house, a hill and a tree in the scene, but it’s still an ocean view and THAT is cool.

Cleaning:

I can honestly say that I’m not a very tidy person. It’s one of those things that’s followed me around my entire life and seemed to make everything I inhabit for any amount of time look like a freak hurricane passed through. Without fail, my spaces have ALWAYS been a tip. Which is why I’m so bemused that it’s not that way at all in my house. There is something about it that just makes me want to clean.

I sweep my floors, wash my dishes, scrub my counters, organize and tidy on a totally regular basis. I keep my clothes folded, I don’t throw things on the floor, and I fuss over the littlest things left out. My car? Total mess. Not likely ever to change, but my house? Golden. I’m actually quite the homemaker

Expansion and more expansion:

When my darling yellow door got made, I remember one of the selling points my neighbour mentioned about the wood we used being that it was extremely dry, and therefore unlikely to warp. In the exceptionally dry climate of Frazier Park, this was totally true. No warp-age whatsoever.

Of course then I move to a soggy, coastal climate and that’s the end of that. It started out that I just couldn’t close it quite right. Then the next day I could close it and then the day after that I couldn’t get it open again. By the time I stopped procrastinating and finally got around to it, we had to cut nearly an inch off the lock side because the tongue and groove boards had expanded so much.

That meant taking out the plates, knob and lock, skilsawing the length, resetting all the hardware and putting it back up again. And sticking some seriously long screws at both ends to keep that thing from thinking it can change, ever again. Expansion sucks. The only plus side is that my floor used to squeak something terrible when you first walked in and now it’s silent as fully expanded wood with no freakin’ place to move

Working on this project through the build year, I got so bogged down in the process that I think I almost forgot that when it was done it would be my home. Every time I drive in and see the tiny little A frame smiling at me with its tiny little porch light I get all proud and fuzzy.

I’ve found my house to be an unusual crossroads of exactly what I wanted and exactly what I needed. Perhaps I’m still in the honeymoon phase with Little Yellow, but I wouldn’t live in anything else for the world.

Moving house…

The Sunday prior to let’s-move-the-house Monday was seriously intense. In keeping with our way, my dad and I left it till the very last minute to tighten the lag screws on the bottom of the trailer and get the house off its leveling blocks, then built a pretty questionable set of stairs in the dying light amid dazed rushing to get my shit together.

Somehow I guess I did get my shit together, and Monday morning rolled in before I was with it enough to make note of the ‘lasts’ of my life in Little Yellow’s at my parent’s. Last night with the kittens trying to eat my necklace as I tried to sleep, last waking to the view from my windows, and last time I could walk out my door and into my mother’s.

Jill arrived at 8:00 am. A close second to knowing folks that can build things is knowing folks with big ass trucks who are awesome enough to help you move, and Jill is just such a wonderful person. She drove all the way from Colorodo, then back again the next day, to move little Yellow and deserves a serious stack of gold medals for putting up with the sniffling, babbling, half panicked pile of nervous energy that was me for the entire move. Jill, you rock.

My house took the trip very well. She bounced and bumbled right down the 5, 166, and 101 behind Jill’s truck and didn’t give us a hint of trouble. Nothing broke. House and trailer stayed gratefully connected. I decided to leave my clothes on the pink room shelves and they pretty much chilled out there the whole time. One rouge sweater took a nosedive on the road to Santa Cruz, but that was it.

In fact, my house took it so well that I, in comparison, took it all very badly. I was a total wreck. I went through so many involuntary emotional changes in the days prior that I almost had to consider the subject of my sanity. I cried A LOT. I also got super jittery, ridiculously excited, and had more fear surrounding this move than anything I can ever remember being afraid of.

There were a few moments in which I seriously wondered what the hell I was doing. My beautiful house that had been so comfortable and stable was suddenly empty and totally imbalanced. It was far from level without the piles of cinder blocks that had held it up all year, and got jacked up to an extremely disconcerting angle to be high enough for the hitch ball. Walking inside for a last minute check felt awkwardly off, because nothing was as it should be.

And then the whole house moved. It was quite possibly the most bizarre feeling I’ve ever had or sight I’ve ever seen. I obviously knew I was building a mobile space, but all the thought and anticipation couldn’t quite prepare me for the reality of it. In the space of a few seconds, my house went from a (seemingly) permanent driveway fixture to a trailer hitched up and ready to roll. Just like that.

The open houses helped keep things grounded. Most everyone was super nice, and I love sharing something I’m so proud of. People drove real distances too, presumably on purpose, just to see Little Yellow .  We were a little late for the Frazier Park start time (actually we were late for everything except Santa Cruz; made it 2 minutes early. Way cool) and there were already 4 cars waiting for us, just amazing.

A few folks didn’t quite get it, but those ones are going to happen. Now that I have and live in my house I really don’t give a damn anymore One woman wanted to know how I did it. Not how I built it or how I got the resources, but how I could live in ‘that thing’. She brushed it off at my being young because I’d never be able to do that if I were her age, what with all of the furniture one accumulates. I respectfully (probably not, actually) told her that perhaps depends on what kind of choices a person makes. She didn’t see the logic.

My mom (who drove my car up behind whilst taking about 5000 pictures) cheerily convinced the man at the San Luis Obispo Travel Lodge to let us park Little Yellow in the lot so we stayed there for the night, half in a room half in the tiny house. ‘We’ meant me, Mum, Jill, her grandson Joseph (who made the trip with us, great sport) and my curtain-sewing sister. She had to work Monday and my mom had to work Tuesday preventing either from going the whole way, so they quick changed Monday night at our suave Travel Lodge rendezvous. It was kind of like a circus.

A homeless man on a bicycle came by Tuesday morning while I was eating breakfast on my porch in the parking lot. He stopped dead in his tracks when he caught sight of Little Yellow and stared for a few seconds with his mouth open.

‘Woah, what…who made that?

‘I did’

(blank look)

‘Naw…you’re not man enough to build that thing’

‘Oh I’m more than man enough to build this thing, buddy’

(silence)

‘What do you call a deer with no eyes? No eyed-deer’

(rides off)

We stopped for gas twice, and weighed the trailer at the truck stop near my house. I’d been quietly freaking out the whole build that it’d be over the 7000lb Gross Vehicle Weight Rating but we came in just fine at 6020lbs and I was so happy I thought I might pass out.

Reaching our final destination and getting the house set up and unhitched was a massive relief. Or at least a relief from the fear I had of moving it…Once Jill drove away I was back to the fear of being somewhere new and therefore terrifying. That said, I’m extremely grateful to live close family again (mom and stepdad live down south, dad and stepmom live up here) so I haven’t felt alone.

My landlords are lovely, my spot is absolutely beautiful and a month later, I’m settled and completely in love with my life. I go to the ocean every day, work as a hostess in a restaurant in town and have met so many great people since I’ve been here. I’m so busy and happy that I hardly feel like I’m in my own reality. Like maybe I’ve just wandered into someone else’s perfect life.

A full post on living in Little Yellow is far overdue, but must continue to be so a little while longer. My handicapped camera (his name is Harold) has finally given up the fight as I found the other day. The zoom stopped functioning last year after I dropped him in some sand and he’d been acting a mite shitfy since a melted chocolate fiasco mucked up the viewfinder and most of the mechanisms, but he’d worked pretty diligently even so. Until the beautiful sunny day I decide to take pictures of my house…Go figure. Thanks a lot, Harold.

And here, as promised, are tons of pictures

Safe and sound…

Just wanted to let you all know that Little Yellow made it up without any trouble. The roof (and the house) did not fall off, nothing broke, nothing fell, and she’s a full 1000 pounds under the weight limit of my 7000lb trailer.

I have been ridiculously tired the last few days from the moving ordeal, but am unpacking and settling into the new spot. I’ve a feeling folks are dying for pictures (of which I have TONS) so I’ll put them soon!

Huge thanks to everyone who took the time to drive from however far to see my Little Yellow! The open houses made the whole trip so much more fun

Packing and getting ready of things…

I packed a lot yesterday. In fact, I packed mostly everything into 5 small boxes that sit in the pink room and make things feel not so homey and rather unsettled. I had to keep reminding myself as I went that I’m not leaving Little Yellow, just making her road worthy.

My neighbour was a saint helping me get things together today. He was available, installed the extended brake lights, put up my porch fixture, showed me how to take off the PVC drainage pipes under the trailer (they’re a little too low for road travel) detached the propane tank, and turned a bundle of electric wire into my 70′ extension cord. Day saver? Definitely.

I’m more than a little scattered right now. I feel like a chicken with its head cut off…But hey. I’ve got really clean windows. In fact I have 10 (now) glowing ones, which I laboriously washed from inside and out the other day.

I really don’t know what got on them. Well, I do, dried up Super Deck, tung oil, caulk, the manufacturer’s sticker residue, paint, and a bunch of water stains. My dad said he thought they were the dirtiest he’s ever cleaned. I’ve never properly washed windows before, so they were most definitely the dirtiest I’ve ever cleaned.

But clean the buggers I did, with razor blade, washer thing, scraper thing and towel. They’re pretty spectacular. My dad always talks about the glories of well washed windows and I always thought he was a bit out to lunch, but I have to say there is a certain glory to these windows right now. So clear it’s like there’s no glass at all, and the house looks so very polished. Low flying birds beware…

Open house locations:

Monday, Oct 8:
10-12 Frazier Park, CA across from the Coffee Cantina.
Address: 3011 Mount Pinos Way 93225

4-6 San Luis Obispo, CA Trader Joe’s parking lot.
Address: 3977 S Higuera St

Tuesday, Oct 9
1-2:30 Santa Cruz, CA Home Depot parking lot (Soquel)
Address: 2600 41st Ave 95073

One piece of sad news. At least for a while, I am not taking my darling kittens with me. This has been a difficult and rethought decision, but I believe it to be for the best for now as the place I’m moving to has 5 dogs that have pack mode going in full force. They pretty much chase anything that runs, as I witnessed when they bolted after and caught some kind of screaming wild animal in the 30 or so minutes I was there.

I’m pretty airy fairy about this sort of stuff, and tried to keep an ‘I’m sure it’ll all work out’ attitude, but sometimes you have to be realistic and not let the fact that things usually work out lead you to making stupid choices. If either one of my babies got hurt or (in my sister’s ever so delicate wording) ‘ripped to shreds while still alive’ because of an unsafe location I knowingly brought them to, it would be beyond terrible.

I’m thinking I will at least go up and suss out the situation until they get bigger or I can build a fence or someplace safe. I don’t know. I may well end up moving somewhere else that’s more small-fuzzy-animal friendly. But my parent’s are in love with them and I know they’ll be happy here where they already know the ropes. I’m sure I’ll miss them more than they’ll miss me.

I’m really going to miss them

Moving day set…

All things going right (please go right), I will be heading on my grand adventure 5 days from today on Monday, October 8 2012, house in tow.  Holy cow.

What makes cows so holy? Holy turkey. Holy goat.

I could say a bunch of things about being excited as heck and terrified beyond reason, but today I think I’ll hold it in. The list of to dos before then goes on and on…

Open house update (tentative plan):

Monday, October 8:

10-12 Frazier Park, CA

4-6 San Luis Obispo, CA

Tuesday, October 9:

1-2:30 Santa Cruz, CA

As I’m hoping to reach my final destination before it gets too dark, I’m afraid the Santa Cruz open house is probably only going be 1.5 hours instead of 2. I’m also not terribly familiar with that area, anyone have a good, open-house-type place to park in mind?

“The house that never ends…”

That is how I’d been referring to Little Yellow the last few months. Saying so sounds a bit more negative than I intend it to, but that was honestly how it felt. In fact, it felt almost impossible that the amount of work I contributed so very often seemed to take so very long and make so very little difference.

I remember starting last September. I remember looking at the lumber on the trailer and feeling totally out of my ball park. I remember thinking that the feeling would go away soon and I’d promptly skip out the door with hammer swinging conviction to work on my house every day. Well that thought was a good few miles off.

First, I certainly wasn’t able to work on it every day and, at least when I was alone, never started before 3:00 pm. Like, never. Probably not even once. Second, any attempted skipping in conjunction with the swinging of heavy, semi-hazardous metal objects was not to be in my future with a good ending.

But seriously; without fail, I would have that same overwhelming feeling at least once every single day for the entire build. Up to the last week, even. Like there was too much. There was just too much and I couldn’t do it. It’s too hard. It’ll never get done. How on earth will I possibly figure X out?

And it’s such a strong feeling. You’d think, seeing as I got it every jolly day, I’d figure out that as soon as I shut that part of myself the hell up, I’d almost always manage to get something concrete done. But that’s how it gets you. It has some terribly tricksy little fiendish way of convincing you that this is a different feeling than you’ve had before. All the other previous feelings of inadequacy were just tests, and this is the one that’ll get you. I can be pretty stupid for being relatively smart.

I wanted to talk about this because I’d like to make sure that those of you who have ever felt this way while building (or otherwise creating something that far surpasses your comfort level) know that you are not alone. You can do it, and it’s going to be great. Mentally pushing through can sometimes be your biggest obstacle, I’m pretty sure it was for me.

A little of the happy fuzzies before I go to bed in my lovely loft. My house is like something big that you really love compacted into something you can hold in your hand. Kind of like a snowglobe instead of Alaska. It is bright and warm and full of time, thoughts and cat hair. It is the very best thing I have ever had for keeps

Little Yellow…

Is done

I might just write that again, because it looks so very nice. And this time, I shall employ caps to convey the enthusiasm as effectively as type can: LITTLE YELLOW IS DONE!!!! Alright, I’m freakin’ excited. But after a year of planning, more than a year of building, and what felt like 5 or so years of anticipation, I have a house. A whole house I. Have. A. Home.

Can you believe it? I still can’t. I worked sporadically on little things here and there the last few weeks (mostly moulding and oiling of trim and moving my life in) until I began to run out of things to do. It started to look like more things were finished than not. Then I’d come up with something else to sort out, and then I’d see even more things finished then not. And then it finally happened…I’m actually done

About 90 some percent of my things are inside now. Somehow I managed to decrease my pile of clothes from one that could feed a flock of cloth-eating monsters for weeks to the size of a reasonable suitcase. And don’t scoff, I’m pretty sure there were more than a few cloth-eating monsters in closets I’ve had.

Even with everything in, Little Yellow still feels open and airy with a surplus of storage. I honestly didn’t see that coming. I thought I’d have every nook and cranny squished to the brim with things I just couldn’t part with (that’s kind of what I usually do) and I’m so relieved that I don’t this time around.

Living in my tiny space feels ordinarily easy. I’m still not completely full time out here, but the transition has been the least amount of bother I could wish for. My shower is inches from my clothes which are inches from my shoes which are inches from my door. From waking up to dressed and ready takes about 15 minutes, just because there are so few distractions from one to other.

Except for the kittens, that is. Pìseag, the calico tabby girl (meaning little cat, I call her Pee-sha for short) and Sionnag my silver tabby boy (little fox, shun-a) are all over the place. Playing attack cats in the grass, bouncing from the floor to the bench, doing leaps over each other and going whole hog at that suspicious rug in the kitchen that they are sure is out to get them. Yesterday they learned how to climb the ladder and spent the whole of last night assaulting me with their happy (really loud) purring, one curled under each arm.

Guess what?? I’m moving up by San Francisco in 2 weeks! House and all, down the road I go Or at least, that’s the plan. Nightmares of falling houses and flying roofs bumble around my head on a far too regular basis, but what can you do? Hope for the best, and remember the shit tons of screws I stuck into that thing.

Open house announcement:

I’ll be stopping a few places along the way for tiny open houses if any of you happen to be near! The thought for the time being is 1. in my town (about 1.5 hours out of LA) 2. San Luis Obispo, 3. Santa Cruz. Not sure if any others might creep up, but those are what make most sense. More information to follow!

Ok, one more time. Little Yellow is done! You might just call me a happy camper

Counters and mortise locks and dish racks and coat racks and porch posts and…

Oh my. Gad zooks I’ve been a while! Things are doing very well, and I’m at the point when I can almost say my house is done It’s not, exactly, but it’s so darn close that most people probably wouldn’t know to look at it. Ideally, I would delve into each section of progress in individual posts, but life is running away with me so I hope this picture laden compilation will do.

Firstly, a bit on the kitchen. The counter is attached (with little, 4 screw angle irons), I’ve gotten all the shelves in, the sink installed and the stove set up nice on top. It’s a denatured alcohol version by Origo where one pours said fuel directly into the unit, and since it doesn’t really need to get cut into my counters to work, I decided that it was fine just as it is. I’m quite please with it actually, because now I can put it elsewhere if I need more counterspace, then bring it back again when I don’t. I could also use it outside or take it camping, or just keep it in my car so I could cook wherever I go Less likely, but it is good to have options…

The finishing of Flemming’s priceless counters was an annoying puzzlement that spanned many attempts, reattempts and re-reattempts plus that ‘this is never going to work’ feeling that can do a number on one’s perseverance. But work it did, by cracky, after much ado. Essentially, this particular wood took very poorly to water. By poorly, I mean that each time any amount of water got left on the surface for any amount of time, the grain would raise and the wood would turn white, leaving an entirely displeasing trail of bumpy ugliness.

I’m sure this all could have been quickly solved by a layer or however-many of polyurethane-type counter finish, but that would have been too easy. I hate that stuff, probably for no good reason, but I’m an advocate for easily re-doable finishes and was dead set on oiling it. Boy howdy did I oil that thing. I put over 3 pints of oil on it (butcher’s block oil, i.e. mineral oil) thinking that the waterproofness would improve when it was saturated. I was wrong of course, and no amount of oil, different oil, beeswax or anything I thought of could keep this grain from raising.

With the advice of a few clever neighbours and a slow return of some good sense on my part, I finally stopped trying to keep the grain from raising and and started trying to get it to raise. I covered the whole thing in water. I literally poured cups onto it for several days until every little piddly section was grain-raised to the max. After it dried, I sanded everything down and there you go! Simple as that. Grain raising white spots of doom? No longer an issue.  I then oiled it again and now my counter is ready for anything. Well, at least water.

My cats live with me in and out of Little Yellow now, and they are the most delightfully entertaining, boot chewing, and lap warming little jumping beans. They are all curled up innocent-like on my knees right now, purring their tiny hearts out.

I spent the last 2 weeks scouting somewhere to put my house up by San Francisco. I haven’t got anything definite yet, but I have a few thoughts for the short term, and I plan to move by this time next month. It’s terribly exciting. It’s also terribly terrifying, but that’s the path I chose, and if my life didn’t have a reasonable balance of the two, I doubt I’d be very happy