We moved!!!!!
That's right, The Tiny Tack House has finally stretched her wheel wells, and moved for the first time since her completion in 2011. I'm not going to tell you that I was strong that day, that I didn't have a nervous bone in my body.... no no no... I was a wreck! I've done things in my life that warrant being nervous, and this blew them all out of the water. I know I may look happy in the photo, and I was, don't get me wrong, I was! But that might also have to do with the fact that we had just arrived at our new location, and we were just sitting in the turn lane, waiting to pull in. So we had already made it, and in one piece!
I want to take a moment and share with you the things that I had to do to get ready for this crazy ride. First thing I should note.... we bought a house.... yes... a house. That house has a small piece of property, enough space to place a few tiny houses in the backyard.... this is why we bought a house. Christopher and myself were in the process of looking for property, earlier this year, when we soon realized that we didn't have $100,000 to put down on property, and then spend the thousands it would take to get electrical, plumbing and water to said land. Our friend Bryan mentioned just getting property with a house already on it, that way we would at least have all our systems in place, and it's easier to finance then come up with over $100,000 in cash. And that's exactly what we decided to to! Over the summer, I had been keeping an eye on some properties that I liked, but it seemed by the next day... all the properties I liked were gone! Overnight the market jumped and everything that was being listed was off the market in days. We knew we were going to have to act fast, but we were still trying to figure out what we really wanted to do. Did we want to buy a house with a mortgage? After all, the whole point of the tiny house was to avoid a mortgage all together. Were we sure we didn't just want to buy a small piece of land, but wait years to be able to afford it? The location that the tiny house was built on, was supposed to be just that...where we built it. We had no idea that we would be there for 4 years, nor did our landlord. There was a lot of stress that had been building and we knew we overstayed our welcome. That's what drove us to look for other options, and this fall, we bought a house, then we went to Peru for two weeks.... haha. Then we came home and moved the house that same week. The last 2 months have been the craziest of my life... so many ups and down, does and don'ts, that it's getting hard to see straight.
So, at this point, we have our tiny house still out on the other property, and had just returned from Peru (I'll be posting on that trip as well). We only had one week to get the house ready to move, and I get that it sounds like a lot of time, but you have to remember, we have treated our tiny house like a home, not a movable rv. We have things that if we hooked up and went down the road, so would everything inside the house, except all over the floor along with broken glass and much more. We had to prep our house for moving day, which included securing our fridge, removing all the books from the bookcase, plants and other trinkets road in the car, we put the ladder in the bathroom (that way we knew for sure it wasn't going to break free and crash to the floor), removed all the lamps, took the glass out of the outside light...along with the bulb itself and everything off the small kitchen storage shelf, because that's a lot of mason jars that I would not want to clean up after a ride down the road. The biggest thing we had to do, was disconnect the solar for the tiny house, and this had to be done at night. If we were to disconnect during daylight hours, there's a really big chance that we could have electrocuted ourselves. Even if we pull the plug out of the wall, and the cord isn't hooked up to anything, the panels themselves are still generating electricity if it's daylight. So we had to do that at night, which ended up being at about 10pm in the rain....not a lot of fun. But we did it, and everything is fine, we are still alive! This was done the day before we had to move the house. Moving day we showed up about an hour before the move itself, and that was to drop her back on her wheels. We propped her up on her wheels about 3 years ago, so we were curious to see how the tires would react to the rocks again. Some squeaking and crackling sounds, but nothing too scary. The house definitely settled over the last 4+ years, but made it past this stage as well. Only thing left to do... move the tiny house. Which for some, like Jenna and Guillaume... is a piece of cake, since they have been traveling the last year with their house. So setup and teardown is like changing a pair of socks... no problem. Check out their awesome youtube channel to follow their adventures!
Our friend Brock, from Bob's Corn showed up with his truck to help us move the tiny house. The truck looks bigger than our tiny house, haha. I couldn't have asked a better person to do the job! Brock is a wonderful friend and an awesome tiny house mover. He also helped our friend Candice move her tiny house a few years ago.
About to pull out and start our short journey. But first, we stopped out front of the neighbor's house for a little send off. :)
We only moved about 12 miles away, so it wasn't a long first journey. This made it easier on me and the house! I think Christopher was doing much better than me, and Brock was excited to be towing The Tiny Tack House on her first outing. I rode in the truck with Brock, and Christopher followed in the car. At one point, Brock looks at me and asks, "want to see how fast she'll go?" My instant response, without a single hesitation was... "NO!" I knew he was kidding, but I was not, haha. We took the back roads, so not to deal with the crazy Seattle traffic. This made for a relaxing ride... as relaxing as it could have been. I may have ducked down to view the top of my house, in the review mirror, every time we went under a tree. Once we made it through okay, I would yell, "Cleared it!" in total excitement. We actually built our house about half a foot shorter than it needed to be, just so we knew there would be no problems moving it down the road. This made for some nice peace of mind, to see her clear all the trees. Although, once we got the house to it's new location, Christopher informed us that, at one point along the way, there was a curve in the road and the power line was dropped over the curve and was hanging only about 10 or 12 feet off the ground. He said he had no idea how we missed hitting it. He had a moment of complete panic in the car, as he followed us. Brock was keeping me distracted in the truck, so I wouldn't focus on the house so much... apparently it worked, because I didn't see the cables at all.
We made it safe and sound! Brock even parked her right where we wanted her. Thank you again, Brock! You are awesome, amazing, wonderful and a great friend! Thank You!!!
Brock and Christopher getting The Tiny Tack House into position.
One of the biggest reasons for moving, and finding a place for ourselves.... wasn't to find a place for ourselves, it was in the hopes of building community! We bought a house (the common house) that has some space in the back... where people can "store" their trailers that have a really pretty load on them. :) Our friend Sean B. is renting a "room" from us and storing his container house here very soon. We do have a spare room in the large house, and you can find that for nightly rentals on airbnb (The Common House) . Also, for limited time (TBD) We are opening up our tiny house to the public as well. You can now book a stay in our tiny house! It's going to be difficult for us, since it's been our home for the last four years, but we want others to get a feel for tiny. So, we are opening our doors up, along with many others, and for a short time, we are listing our home for nightly rentals. You can find the listing on airbnb (The Tiny Tack House). There are also other tiny houses available in the great Seattle area, so don't just try one, try a few and see what you would do, what you wouldn't do, what you like or don't like. Be sure to check out your local areas, because chances are there's a tiny house nearby.... try it out!
Our long term goal is to find land, build a small 3-400 sqft house as our main house, use our tiny house as a backup rental or family and friends’ guest stay, and have enough land to invite other tiny house owners to stay there!
We are moving in the right direction and accepting Tiny as an option for living full-time. With the increased growth rate in most cities, it makes sense to add ADU's, backyard cottages and eco homes to help control the expanse of urban areas into rural zones. Since people are waiting to have children later in life, and the average family size decreasing, it makes sense to bring in more density to places that have the room to spare. Caravan “Tiny House Hotel” (https://tinyhousehotel.com) is a great example of how many households you can put in a small sized area and make it work. They placed 6 tiny houses within a very small footprint, without causing harm to the environment or creating a huge draw on resources because tiny house are so eco friendly and sustainable. If there has been one thing that I have gotten out of this experience, it would be my appreciation for all that we have. To be more conscious of the decisions we make and how much excess we consume. It has opened our eyes to community and communication with one another. A little bit goes a long way! We are trying to build community and live a little smarter.
To give you an idea of what we want to do. We hope to expand this over the next few years.
The space behind the common house will be food garden and fruit trees.
On the lower level will be the spot for the tiny houses, parking and hangout space.
It's a start!
Our ultimate goal is to motivate others to try out tiny and to one day create our own tiny house community and inspire others to do the same. A place where fellow like minded individuals can hang out and change the world. We hope to be able to create a small community of people within city limits and show how efficient this kind of living can be. Look for future updates and be sure to check out Jenna and Guillaume’s YouTube channel on the Portland Tiny House Community. (https://youtu.be/X5Blm3-PqkE) We are all about creating community and opening up the lines of communication across the public to develop a better way of living.
Thanks for stopping by, and maybe I'll see you around!