When someone from Discovery Trekking contacted me through this blog, asking if I thought there was a tiny house market for ultralight "camp" towels, it was a forehead-smacking moment for me. Duh. Why were my compact, quick-drying camp towels delegated to the camping bin, when they could be my compact, quick-drying tiny house towels, or at the very least my backup tiny house towels?

Discovery Trekking offered to send me one of their Ultralight towels to test for tiny house use. I asked for the biggest, almost 5 feet by 3 feet when stretched out. My first question—what size would such a large towel compress to?—was answered the moment I opened the package. They take up almost no space folded and could be compressed smaller with a rubber band. Once I unfolded the towel, I had a new question: Could a towel this light and thin actually dry me? After a test shower I had my answer: Yes.

So, the towel requires little room to store. (Now, I keep an extra bath towel on the side of a shelf in my medicine cabinet.) It can dry me completely, straight from the shower. And, best of all, it dries in a fraction of the time my traditional, fluffy bath towel dries. 

Maybe, I'll become a total convert and go ultralight with all our towels, but I still like the feel of a plush towel. Our "camp" towels, however, have earned permanent placement in the tiny house. Taking up almost no space, they're handy when the bath towel is wet or in the wash and when we have guests.

Now, I find myself wondering what other items in that camping bin might find their way into the tiny house. And I started thinking that the camp towel could do extra duty as a tablecloth, dish towel or beach coverup. Thanks, Discovery Trekking, for nudging me to think outside the camping box.

Once we decided to build a tiny house, we hunted online for ideas. Video tours on YouTube were sometimes helpful (and sometimes frighteningly dark and claustrophobia-inducing). I found articles discussing the movement in general, and studied small pictures accompanying the text. Then I found Tiny House Swoon, a site devoted to sharing tiny house eye candy. There, I scrolled through full-screen photos of wee houses of all styles and configurations. It sparked ideas. 

And now we hope our house can spark a few ideas for people considering a smaller footprint. You'll find pictures of our house on Tiny House Swoon. 

I still love to go to the site, to see what the "tiny house nation" comes up with—from yurt to container home to micro cabin to THOWs like ours. If you're interested in tiny living, it's a must-visit. But if micro housing isn't for you (and your family), head for the companion site, Small House Swoon. I'm not looking to move from my tiny, but I love looking at great design. You'll find it there.

Here's one photo of our house shared on the site: