Small Living Journal

Making our tiny house dream come true has been challenging. We’ve faced a variety of obstacles and most of those have to do with city codes.

In Sacramento, our tiny house would be classified as a camping trailer. So we’ve struggled with the challenges presented by bureaucratic regulations and have talked about a variety of options to get around these rules.

1. Backyard possibilities.

Illegally park in someone’s backyard within the city limits. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind trying this option. If we found a homeowner willing to work with us and the neighbors were nice, I don’t think this would cause a problem. Many tiny home dwellers suggest building a cute home (people like beautiful things) and exploit municipal code technicalities such as defining your tiny home living as “recreating”.

2. Moving outside of the city.

If we parked on private land outside of the city limits (either in Davis or Sacramento) then we wouldn’t need a permit. All we need is written permission from the owner of the land to “recreate/camp”.

Logan grew up on a cattle ranch, near Mt. Shasta and we’ve talked about moving to the ranch. There wouldn’t be a problem with city codes and we would be near family.

3. Co-housing community

Finding a co-housing community that would let us park on their land or moving to a tiny house village would be a fantastic option. Hillary is working on an amazing project called the Tiny House Village Network and I think this has a lot of potential. Using our collective power to change perceptions and creating an intentional community is the way to go.

4. Purchasing land.

Purchasing a small piece of land for our tiny home is something we might consider doing in the future. But buying a habitable piece of land right now is not financially possible. The upfront costs are huge and we don’t want to be tied to a specific city at this time in our lives. Part of the draw to a tiny home on wheels is the ease of transport. Moving isn’t hard when you have a home on wheels.

5. Lease a space in an RV/trailer park.

Most Sacramento RV parks are expensive and not very attractive. The RV park’s we’ve explored have no space for gardening, are too far outside of the city and resemble WalMart parking lots. It’s not the kind of environment we want to live in. I’m sure there are many beautiful RV parks in the U.S., but I haven’t found many in my neck of the woods.

6. Moving?

We’ve considered moving to Portland because the city has embraced a variety of sustainability project’s. I think it’s possible to find a piece of land or someone’s backyard to park our tiny house. I’ve taken a few trips to Oregon recently and talked to a variety of folks who said local officials are receptive to alternative dwellings.

I don’t know if we will move but the Portland peeps have also given me a lot of creative ideas we can implement in Sacramento, like using the “recreating” strategy and lobbying public officials.

7. Lobbying public officials/bureaucrats.

Getting around city regulations seems to be a common problem for folks who live or want to live in a tiny home. The key to changing this problem might be lobbying and educating local politicians and city planners about the benefits of living small. The lobbying process is long and cumbersome but I think it would be a good starting place, regardless of your location.

Questions

I’m curious to hear from you. What strategies have you used to get around bureaucratic regulations? Do you have any options to add to the list?

Living with my partner and 2 cats in 400 square feet has been a learning experience. Moving to a smaller space has actually improved my marriage, health and overall quality of life. I’ve learned a lot by downscaling and wanted to share 7 essential rules for happy small space living.

1. Listen and communicate.

Living in a big or a small house requires communicating and listening to your partner and family. Don’t make assumptions. If problems arise ask open and non-accusatory questions. I’ve found this approach to be very helpful, especially when it comes to discussing finances and cleaning.

2. Make your home a clutter free zone.

One of my favorite bloggers, Leo Babauta from Zen Habits, recently wrote a great post on clutter-free counter space. I think the tips Leo offered in this article can be applied to all areas of the home. For instance, Leo talks about finding “a home” for each object in your house.

If you want to declutter and aren’t sure where to begin read: Zen Mind – How to Declutter. Some tips offered in this article include, decluttering in small chunks, setting aside the time to get it done, tackling one drawer at a time, being merciless, and creating a “maybe” box.

For more information on Decluttering, check out these posts:

• How to Eliminate Clutter, from Basic Instructions
• FlyLady: How to Declutter
• FlyLady: Declutter 15 Minutes a Day – 5 Great Tools That Make it Easy!
• What Is Clutter?

3. 100 Thing Challenge

If you want to try extreme decluttering, you can read more about The 100 Thing Challenge. I stumbled across Dave’s blog a months ago and learned that he is living with 100 personal possessions. Why?

Dave is trying to remove himself from consumerism. Reading about this project inspired me to do the same! I’ve found that scaling down to under 100 personal things has enabled me to question what I need and has removed a tremendous amount of clutter from my life.

4. A clean home makes for happy people.

There is nothing worse that walking into a grimy home. Living with others requires cooperation and sharing chores. Always having one person clean the house isn’t fair. I’ve found that it’s important to split up cleaning responsibilities and share the load. All of us lead busy lives and it’s important to help out around the house.

5. Minimal furniture.

Get the big bulky furniture out of the house or minimize the amount of stuff you own. Keeping light and easy to move furniture makes cleaning and moving very easy. One strategy that has worked well for us is using big pillows as chairs.

6. Beautiful art and pictures.

Rather than displaying decorations on the counters, hanging beautiful photos of family, friends and art on the walls is perfect. Pictures give a small living space character and hanging art/photos is minimal and beautiful. Plus, photos are a portal to past memories and remind me of what is important in life. Not stuff, but people.

7. Keep the good stuff.

Stick with quality items. Keep stuff that you use everyday and love. For instance, we donated all of our big and heavy furniture and kept our favorite Ikea chair. We purchased it used and absolutely love it!

Questions…

I’m curious to hear from you. What strategies have you used to make living in a small space with others fun and easy? Would you add anything to the list?

You can learn more about small living by reading my blog, RowdyKittens or following me on Twitter.

A number of studies have shown the declining number of people involved in their communities. Some speculate that this is correlated to a growing sense of isolation and unhappiness in the United States. Living a small lifestyle promotes community involvement and offers a variety of solutions to the land of dissatisfied American consumers. How can a small lifestyle be a solution to this problem? Consider the suggestions below to reconnect with your community.

1) Reshape your worklife.

Rethinking Time, Photo by Tammy

A great way to find community is by reducing your working hours and volunteering with community groups representing issues you care about.

Its easy to see why many American’s feel isolated from their communities when they typically spend 8 hours a day alone in a cubicle, then drive home (alone) to a big house and partake in our favorite analgesic: watching TV. I don’t think any of these activities are inherently bad, but they don’t promote community involvement or a flexible lifestyle.

Your day job doesn’t have to be your only identity. You are more than your job, you are part of a community. So how can you become more active if you are still working 40 plus hours a week?

If you work in a cubicle forest, talk to your supervisor about working from home or reducing your work hours. A majority of office dwellers can complete their work remotely. People don’t need to be tied to their cubicle to produce stellar work and many corporations recognize the importance of community service. The internet has changed how organizations do business and view local and global communities.

Best Buy’s programs are an excellent example of reshaping work culture.

Carfree in Davis, Photo by Tammy

2) Rethink transportation.

Selling one or all of your cars is good for your wallet and community. One less car on the road means less smog and more friends. Selling a car will open up endless possibilities.

How can this be? Going carfree forces you to expand your network of friends and allies. For instance, instead of driving alone to the office you can carpool, take the shuttle or the bus. A few of my work colleagues live in a suburb outside of Sacramento and either carpool or take the bus. Both of these amazing women are extremely happy with the money and time they have saved in addition to the strong friendship they have developed by commuting together.

3) Start exercising.

Exercising is a great way to create community and spend time with your spouse or friends. Instead of working out at your home gym, sell the equipment and join a fitness group or look into joining a gym, local running club, or some kind of interactive class.

If you can’t afford the time or money a gym membership or class require, incorporate exercise into your errands. Start running, walking, or biking with your spouse or friends to the grocery store, post office, etc. This is an inexpensive activity that improves relationships and builds community.

4) Rethink time.

Downscaling and disconnecting from consumerism is one way to free up your time and reduce debt. Rather than working lots of hours to pay for a big house and recreational shopping, you can use that extra time to volunteer or connect with friends and family members.

5) Live small and think big.

Downscaling and living a small lifestyle is about more than cute homes. It’s a movement connected to broader social problems, like consumerism, cycles of debt, global warming and poor community services. It’s about re-examining our lives and how our daily choices effect local and global communities.

For more information about simple living, check out my blog: RowdyKittens or follow me on Twitter.

Portland Cottage Heaven, Photo by Tammy

Our future plans aren’t set in stone and that is perfectly okay with us. The world is changing quickly and flexibility is an important quality. Especially, in a time of economic woes. Being able to move or change plans quickly can open the door to unforeseen opportunities.

Since our plans are loose and flexible, we’ve crafted a few guidelines for a bright future:

1. Living Small. Since downsizing, we’ve discovered that less is more. Rather than devoting large sums of life energy and money toward a traditional home or huge apartment, we will purchase a tiny house in the next year or two. In the meantime, we will continue our downsizing process and living in small apartments. Taking a pass on the traditional American dream and creating our own beautiful home is the best option for us. Living small will propel us toward financial independence and free up our time to spend with friends and family.

2. Staying Carfree & Debt Free. For us, a large part of living small means staying carfree and debt free. Ever since we sold our car and paid off our debt, a huge burden has been lifted from our shoulders. Without debt we are free to make choices that bring us happiness.

3. New Opportunities & Growth. I’ve been thinking about starting my own tiny business for the last few months and have been working on a master plan. Within the next year, I hope to launch a tiny business that will bring in a small supplemental income. Any extra money that is made in this venture will be put in savings. There are many goals I’d like to work on, like growing as a writer and photographer, spending quality time with friends/family and enjoying the outdoors.

Portland Cottage Heaven Flowers, Photo by Tammy

4. Loving Life. Finally, I want to live life to the fullest. I know this sounds cheesy, but I think a lot of people engage in activities that don’t make them happy. As Gary Vanderchuck pointed out, during South by South West:

Live your life and do what you love. People worry about stupid shit.

Gary’s comment made me laugh out loud and reflect on the number of times I’ve fretted away about trivial things. Changing my perspective and devoting my life energy toward projects that make a difference in the world have changed me for the better.

During his talk, Gary emphasized the importance of loving yourself, embracing what you do well, and not waiting to make things happen. For me this message is about simplicity. Pursuing your passion shouldn’t be so difficult. But so many people are stuck in jobs they hate and are incredibility unhappy.

Our time on the planet is limited and I want my future choices and plans to be good ones. Above all, we want to pursue happiness; not more stuff.

What about you? Has downsizing affected how you foresee the future?

For more information about simple living, check out my blog: RowdyKittens or follow me on Twitter.

Tortoise Shell Home Under Construction

Last year,  during our vacation, we met with Bill Kastrinos and toured his Tortoise Shell Nursery. Bill’s unique approach, using steel as a strong, lightweight framing material appealed to us and we were thoroughly impressed with Bill’s sincerity and the quality of his team’s work. So at that time we decided to have him build our tiny home.

If Bill built us a basic model, it would cost around $20,000. But, the model we want with all the additional options would cost about $30,000.

Why so much?

Because we requested a lot of extra goodies in our home like: 2 skylights, pine interior, bamboo flooring, a wood stove, as well as custom cabinets, a stainless steel counter-top, along with a few other items.

Building our own tiny home?

Logan and I have considered diverging from our original plan. For the last few months we have been tossing around the idea of building our own tiny home. We didn’t start talking about this option seriously until my folks came to visit us last month.

Naked Galapagos

My parents seemed really excited by the idea. They even offered their front yard as a building location. Unfortunately, they live 2 hours away. Building our tiny home in Red Bluff would be difficult to manage (especially since we don’t have a car); however, if we could get a team of people together to help build the little home, it wouldn’t take too long. This idea is attractive because we could save a significant amount of money with our own cheap labor.

If we end up going ahead with this option we would purchase the Naked Galapagos from Bill. As stated on the Tiny House Blog: It is “the perfect answer for the do-it-yourself tiny house builder. Bill has constructed a 128 sq ft 2500 pound home built from Codding Steel with a built in full size shower already plumbed and ready to use.”

I’d love to save the extra money and build our own tiny home, but I’m hesitant. Right now we don’t have a place to build our tiny home or the building knowledge.

What do you think?

I’m curious to get feedback from you. Should we build our own tiny home? Or do we stick to the original plan?

For more information about simple living, check out my blog: RowdyKittens or follow me on Twitter.