11/18/13
Comparing the Tiny Green House's "Denali" and the 24' Tumbleweed Tiny Houses, I find myself preferring the Tumbleweed aesthetics very much over the Denali's almost non-existent aesthetic, but preferring the Tiny Green House building techniques and suitability to a fire-prone area very much over the Tumbleweed construction.
How can I combine them? Can I buy the Tumbleweed plans and have Tiny Green build it for me, then get involved by doing some of the interior finish work?
Jay Shafer, founder of Tumbleweed and designer of my favorite tiny homes from an aesthetic point of view, has left Tumbleweed and moved on to found Four Lights with some new tiny homes, all very pretty. But Tumbleweed still has the more practical designs on wheels.
Credit Jay Shafer and Four Lights with some pretty brilliant designs for DIY compact furniture, though! Tansu-style storage steps providing storage in a staircase would be ideal! While Jay/Four Lights shows one, I prefer the side-opening storage shown elsewhere. See http://www.homedesignfind.com/furniture-2/tansu-chests-practical-storage-stairs-from-ancient-japan/, especially the first model, with side-opening cupboards and drawers.
LATER:
Pat and Che have just shown me some very tempting Fleetwood models for significantly larger but still trailer-able Fleetwood homes that would be much simpler and cheaper to get. WHAT SHALL I DO? Cheaper and simpler calls to me! They've also set me up with their fellow agent Steve Marquette to meet tomorrow at 11 AM and go over what I'm looking for in Julian.
I'm worried that I'm moving too soon, too fast all of a sudden. Am I out of control?
Monday, November 18, 2013
Thursday, November 14, 2013
MORE EXCITEMENT!
11/14/13
I've been so preoccupied with looking up tiny house designs, tiny appliances, compact staircases that provide storage, and incinerating and composting toilets that I've forgotten to blog my ideas!
So far I'm really taken by the ideas of the Tiny Green House's "Denali" house as well as by the Tumbleweed's "Cypress" and "Elm," both probably in the Horizon configuration. Then there's the Tiny Home Builders' "Tiny Retirement." I've been a Tumbleweed fan for a while now.
Pat Forest, bless her, upon my telling her that I wanted to leave La Salina and move, probably to Julian, has been very helpful, as has Che. I'm not sure I've quite got across to them that what I'm looking for is not a modular unit like I have now but something on a more-normal trailer like the Tumbleweed House-To-Gos.
Shea and Ian have been so very encouraging and helpful, too! I'm thrilled to have such good, smart people interested in this project! Shea apparently saw the land today and says she'll "run a full soils and vegetation resource report."
I've been so preoccupied with looking up tiny house designs, tiny appliances, compact staircases that provide storage, and incinerating and composting toilets that I've forgotten to blog my ideas!
So far I'm really taken by the ideas of the Tiny Green House's "Denali" house as well as by the Tumbleweed's "Cypress" and "Elm," both probably in the Horizon configuration. Then there's the Tiny Home Builders' "Tiny Retirement." I've been a Tumbleweed fan for a while now.
Pat Forest, bless her, upon my telling her that I wanted to leave La Salina and move, probably to Julian, has been very helpful, as has Che. I'm not sure I've quite got across to them that what I'm looking for is not a modular unit like I have now but something on a more-normal trailer like the Tumbleweed House-To-Gos.
Shea and Ian have been so very encouraging and helpful, too! I'm thrilled to have such good, smart people interested in this project! Shea apparently saw the land today and says she'll "run a full soils and vegetation resource report."
11/10/13: FIRST STEPS?
Over at Ian and Shea's last night, enjoying some play time with Aidan plus an excellent meal, we got into a discussion of tiny homes. They were excited about my hopes of finding a place in Julian, as they are very fond of it!
Then we talked about a lot I've seen online, supposed to be in Julian. It looks to be the southeast corner of Knob Hill and Highland drives, which meet there after forming a sort of eye-shaped loop with a blue-green water tank on the northwest end. It looks as if there's at least some clear, fairly level land there with at least one pine tree on it, where I could build a tiny home. The Mica/Popomo expanded to 24 feet seems a possibility.
If I were to acquire the lot, then, I think the first steps would be to engage Shea's services (or those of someone she recommends) to assess the fire potential and the environmental impact of placing a tiny home-on-a-trailer her and to ask my insurance guy what the fire insurance would be on this quarter-acre of mixed chaparral-pine land.
If adequate solutions can be found to those questions, then it's on to bringing in utilities (water, electricity, sanitation, propane?, telephone, DSL), two of which are supposed to be at the street -- what do they do for sewage in Julian? -- and erecting a shed for tiny-home materials (will also include water heater, toilet, shower, and maybe a washer-dryer), plus a light carport-type structure. The shed will need a cat flap.
The cats and I will live in Maybelline while I'm building, definitely with the help of people stronger and more knowledgeable than I. That includes…just about everyone I know.
LATER ON
Maybe I should buy the cabin at 2760 Lakeview Drive and live in it while I'm building my tiny home. I think I may like the land there better. The two properties aren't that far apart. And a seasonal creek isn't all that bad. But $185,000 is INSANE.
Would it be more cost-effective to buy the cabin or to buy the land and then build (or have built) a tiny home? I need help to assess this. Also, if and when I build, whom shall I be displacing? Is there any way to help the critters find new homes?
Also, I have to remember that one of my goals is to have a House To Go so if I get sick and tired of one place, I can move it to another.
Over at Ian and Shea's last night, enjoying some play time with Aidan plus an excellent meal, we got into a discussion of tiny homes. They were excited about my hopes of finding a place in Julian, as they are very fond of it!
Then we talked about a lot I've seen online, supposed to be in Julian. It looks to be the southeast corner of Knob Hill and Highland drives, which meet there after forming a sort of eye-shaped loop with a blue-green water tank on the northwest end. It looks as if there's at least some clear, fairly level land there with at least one pine tree on it, where I could build a tiny home. The Mica/Popomo expanded to 24 feet seems a possibility.
If I were to acquire the lot, then, I think the first steps would be to engage Shea's services (or those of someone she recommends) to assess the fire potential and the environmental impact of placing a tiny home-on-a-trailer her and to ask my insurance guy what the fire insurance would be on this quarter-acre of mixed chaparral-pine land.
If adequate solutions can be found to those questions, then it's on to bringing in utilities (water, electricity, sanitation, propane?, telephone, DSL), two of which are supposed to be at the street -- what do they do for sewage in Julian? -- and erecting a shed for tiny-home materials (will also include water heater, toilet, shower, and maybe a washer-dryer), plus a light carport-type structure. The shed will need a cat flap.
The cats and I will live in Maybelline while I'm building, definitely with the help of people stronger and more knowledgeable than I. That includes…just about everyone I know.
LATER ON
Maybe I should buy the cabin at 2760 Lakeview Drive and live in it while I'm building my tiny home. I think I may like the land there better. The two properties aren't that far apart. And a seasonal creek isn't all that bad. But $185,000 is INSANE.
Would it be more cost-effective to buy the cabin or to buy the land and then build (or have built) a tiny home? I need help to assess this. Also, if and when I build, whom shall I be displacing? Is there any way to help the critters find new homes?
Also, I have to remember that one of my goals is to have a House To Go so if I get sick and tired of one place, I can move it to another.
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
No Desert or Beach for This Kid!
11/8/13: NO DESERT OR BEACH FOR THIS KID!
I long to live in the mountains once again but hesitate to leave family and top-notch medical services as far behind as I must in order to move back to Big Pine, CA. Not going back to Big Pine will mean giving up Eastern Sierra friends, though.
So I went online to check out real estate in Alpine and Julian, CA. In Julian, there's a very small cabin for sale on a half-acre of wooded land! Built in 1930, it sports a big deck where I can see myself sleeping on warm summer nights. There'd be room to park Maybelline and Harriet, and the cats would love it! I feel so excited that I know I must go lie down and wait for the fit to pass before I leap once more into a situation I cannot bear, like the one I feel I'm in now.
Link: http://www.julianrealty.com/julian-homes/julian-real-estate.html. Guess which one it is.
I'm keeping a list of the things I must ask before committing any foolish moves. Julian was the first place I thought of moving to when I contemplated moving to San Diego County, but I chose instead to move as near my sister as possible. I can just see it now: I move in on a bunch of unhappy black widows and termites to an uninsulated house with single-pane windows and an outhouse.
And that would be ANOTHER (Not So) SMART MOVE FOR ANT KATHY!
11/10/13: FIRST STEPS?
Over at Ian and Shea's last night, enjoying some play time with Aidan plus an excellent meal, we got into a discussion of tiny homes. They were excited about my hopes of finding a place in Julian, as they are very fond of it!
Then we talked about a lot I've seen online, supposed to be in Julian. It looks to be the southeast corner of Knob Hill and Highland drives, which meet there after forming a sort of eye-shaped loop with a blue-green water tank on the northwest end. It looks as if there's at least some clear, fairly level land there with at least one pine tree on it, where I could build a tiny home. The Mica/Popomo expanded to 24 feet seems a possibility.
If I were to acquire the lot, then, I think the first steps would be to engage Shea's services (or those of someone she recommends) to assess the fire potential and the environmental impact of placing a tiny home-on-a-trailer her and to ask my insurance guy what the fire insurance would be on this quarter-acre of mixed chaparral-pine land.
If adequate solutions can be found to those questions, then it's on to bringing in utilities (water, electricity, sanitation, propane?, telephone, DSL), two of which are supposed to be at the street -- what do they do for sewage in Julian? -- and erecting a shed for tiny-home materials (will also include water heater, toilet, shower, and maybe a washer-dryer), plus a light carport-type structure. The shed will need a cat flap.
The cats and I will live in Maybelline while I'm building, definitely with the help of people stronger and more knowledgeable than I. That includes…just about everyone I know.
LATER ON
Maybe I should buy the cabin at 2760 Lakeview Drive and live in it while I'm building my tiny home. I think I may like the land there better. The two properties aren't that far apart. And a seasonal creek isn't all that bad. But $185,000 is INSANE.
Would it be more cost-effective to buy the cabin or to buy the land and then build (or have built) a tiny home? I need help to assess this. Also, if and when I build, whom shall I be displacing? Is there any way to help the critters find new homes?
Also, I have to remember that one of my goals is to have a House To Go so if I get sick and tired of one place, I can move it to another.
I long to live in the mountains once again but hesitate to leave family and top-notch medical services as far behind as I must in order to move back to Big Pine, CA. Not going back to Big Pine will mean giving up Eastern Sierra friends, though.
So I went online to check out real estate in Alpine and Julian, CA. In Julian, there's a very small cabin for sale on a half-acre of wooded land! Built in 1930, it sports a big deck where I can see myself sleeping on warm summer nights. There'd be room to park Maybelline and Harriet, and the cats would love it! I feel so excited that I know I must go lie down and wait for the fit to pass before I leap once more into a situation I cannot bear, like the one I feel I'm in now.
Link: http://www.julianrealty.com/julian-homes/julian-real-estate.html. Guess which one it is.
I'm keeping a list of the things I must ask before committing any foolish moves. Julian was the first place I thought of moving to when I contemplated moving to San Diego County, but I chose instead to move as near my sister as possible. I can just see it now: I move in on a bunch of unhappy black widows and termites to an uninsulated house with single-pane windows and an outhouse.
And that would be ANOTHER (Not So) SMART MOVE FOR ANT KATHY!
11/10/13: FIRST STEPS?
Over at Ian and Shea's last night, enjoying some play time with Aidan plus an excellent meal, we got into a discussion of tiny homes. They were excited about my hopes of finding a place in Julian, as they are very fond of it!
Then we talked about a lot I've seen online, supposed to be in Julian. It looks to be the southeast corner of Knob Hill and Highland drives, which meet there after forming a sort of eye-shaped loop with a blue-green water tank on the northwest end. It looks as if there's at least some clear, fairly level land there with at least one pine tree on it, where I could build a tiny home. The Mica/Popomo expanded to 24 feet seems a possibility.
If I were to acquire the lot, then, I think the first steps would be to engage Shea's services (or those of someone she recommends) to assess the fire potential and the environmental impact of placing a tiny home-on-a-trailer her and to ask my insurance guy what the fire insurance would be on this quarter-acre of mixed chaparral-pine land.
If adequate solutions can be found to those questions, then it's on to bringing in utilities (water, electricity, sanitation, propane?, telephone, DSL), two of which are supposed to be at the street -- what do they do for sewage in Julian? -- and erecting a shed for tiny-home materials (will also include water heater, toilet, shower, and maybe a washer-dryer), plus a light carport-type structure. The shed will need a cat flap.
The cats and I will live in Maybelline while I'm building, definitely with the help of people stronger and more knowledgeable than I. That includes…just about everyone I know.
LATER ON
Maybe I should buy the cabin at 2760 Lakeview Drive and live in it while I'm building my tiny home. I think I may like the land there better. The two properties aren't that far apart. And a seasonal creek isn't all that bad. But $185,000 is INSANE.
Would it be more cost-effective to buy the cabin or to buy the land and then build (or have built) a tiny home? I need help to assess this. Also, if and when I build, whom shall I be displacing? Is there any way to help the critters find new homes?
Also, I have to remember that one of my goals is to have a House To Go so if I get sick and tired of one place, I can move it to another.
Friday, November 8, 2013
Little cabin in the woods?
11/8/13: NO DESERT OR BEACH FOR THIS KID!
I long to live in the mountains once again but hesitate to leave family and top-notch medical services as far behind as I must in order to move back to Big Pine, CA.
So I went online to check out real estate in Alpine and Julian, CA. There's a very small cabin for sale on a half-acre of wooded land! Built in 1930, it sports a big deck where I can see myself sleeping on warm summer nights. There'd be room to park Maybelline and Harriet, and the cats would love it! I feel so excited that I know I must go lie down and wait for the fit to pass before I leap once more into a situation I cannot bear, like the one I feel I'm in now.
I'm keeping a list of the things I must ask before committing any foolish moves. Julian was the first place I thought of moving to when I contemplated moving to San Diego County, but I chose instead to move as near my sister as possible. I can just see it now: I move in on a bunch of unhappy black widows and termites to an uninsulated house with single-pane windows and an outhouse.
ANOTHER SMART MOVE FOR ANT KATHY!
I long to live in the mountains once again but hesitate to leave family and top-notch medical services as far behind as I must in order to move back to Big Pine, CA.
So I went online to check out real estate in Alpine and Julian, CA. There's a very small cabin for sale on a half-acre of wooded land! Built in 1930, it sports a big deck where I can see myself sleeping on warm summer nights. There'd be room to park Maybelline and Harriet, and the cats would love it! I feel so excited that I know I must go lie down and wait for the fit to pass before I leap once more into a situation I cannot bear, like the one I feel I'm in now.
I'm keeping a list of the things I must ask before committing any foolish moves. Julian was the first place I thought of moving to when I contemplated moving to San Diego County, but I chose instead to move as near my sister as possible. I can just see it now: I move in on a bunch of unhappy black widows and termites to an uninsulated house with single-pane windows and an outhouse.
ANOTHER SMART MOVE FOR ANT KATHY!
Wednesday, November 6, 2013
All Me Like Kings....
11/6/13
A few days ago, I awoke with lines from "Messiah" (Bible?) singing in my head, that went,
"All we like kings
"Have gone astray…."
No, that's not right…, I thought. All we like kings, chings, bings, queens, chimps, chumps,…? All morning as I lay in bed — yes, I have been lying abed all day, some days — these words rattled around, desperately looking for their correct mate. Kings, queens, dukes, duchesses, …, we all do go astray, but none of these is right. Finally, the rattling quit.
Some time in the afternoon, the words were there: All we like sheep….
Who went astray?
I did.
I realized I had fled to Oceanside to rebuild my life by tacking it onto my sister's, and when she collapsed and died, my lean-to life crumbled, too. All me like sheep….
Where do I rebuild, and how? Where start? Realization is good, but it's not a start, so far. Did I get sick Sunday so I could turn away from the search for a start? Who starts anything at nearly 72? I'm not lamb, I'm superannuated mutton.
I've come unstuck, unglued, my magnet has failed and I've fallen off the refrigerator door and onto the floor, into the sea, into the nasty cold stinking death-filled ocean which I hate, and I'm floating away, away, away, with no land in sight. (At the end of days, when the "oceans yield up their dead," there will be no room left to stand on land.)
I am so angry I could heat the whole damned festering stew to boiling!
LATER…
Finally, I got my act together enough to go to Rite Aid for a much-needed prescription (the SSRI, strangely enough). It was just after sunset as I left, and looking seaward to get out of the parking lot, I admired the band of sunset pinks hovering over that turquoise-painted seawall down where Oceanside Boulevard ends above the beach.
Except there isn't any seawall down there. It was the ocean its own damn self, as exquisite a shade of light turquoise as I have ever seen. So I had to be a little less angry.
Then I went to Primo's for cinnamon and a burrito.
Back home, I got out with my bags and glanced up at the deep blue sky to see it wearing a beauty mark on its cheek and winking at me: Venus glimmering near a brilliantly silver sliver of new moon.
At this rate, for tonight, at least, I can't hate Oceanside as much as I usually do.
A few days ago, I awoke with lines from "Messiah" (Bible?) singing in my head, that went,
"All we like kings
"Have gone astray…."
No, that's not right…, I thought. All we like kings, chings, bings, queens, chimps, chumps,…? All morning as I lay in bed — yes, I have been lying abed all day, some days — these words rattled around, desperately looking for their correct mate. Kings, queens, dukes, duchesses, …, we all do go astray, but none of these is right. Finally, the rattling quit.
Some time in the afternoon, the words were there: All we like sheep….
Who went astray?
I did.
I realized I had fled to Oceanside to rebuild my life by tacking it onto my sister's, and when she collapsed and died, my lean-to life crumbled, too. All me like sheep….
Where do I rebuild, and how? Where start? Realization is good, but it's not a start, so far. Did I get sick Sunday so I could turn away from the search for a start? Who starts anything at nearly 72? I'm not lamb, I'm superannuated mutton.
I've come unstuck, unglued, my magnet has failed and I've fallen off the refrigerator door and onto the floor, into the sea, into the nasty cold stinking death-filled ocean which I hate, and I'm floating away, away, away, with no land in sight. (At the end of days, when the "oceans yield up their dead," there will be no room left to stand on land.)
I am so angry I could heat the whole damned festering stew to boiling!
LATER…
Finally, I got my act together enough to go to Rite Aid for a much-needed prescription (the SSRI, strangely enough). It was just after sunset as I left, and looking seaward to get out of the parking lot, I admired the band of sunset pinks hovering over that turquoise-painted seawall down where Oceanside Boulevard ends above the beach.
Except there isn't any seawall down there. It was the ocean its own damn self, as exquisite a shade of light turquoise as I have ever seen. So I had to be a little less angry.
Then I went to Primo's for cinnamon and a burrito.
Back home, I got out with my bags and glanced up at the deep blue sky to see it wearing a beauty mark on its cheek and winking at me: Venus glimmering near a brilliantly silver sliver of new moon.
At this rate, for tonight, at least, I can't hate Oceanside as much as I usually do.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)