Yesterday, I came across a journal I started January 1st, two years ago. At the time, we had built the shell of our house, but had stopped work on the house in December. It was just too cold to enjoy the build.

So, we stayed warm inside a rented studio space—and researched and shopped and sketched out interior plans. We ordered our Kimberly woodstove, Dometic alcohol-burning stove, Eco-Privy kit and our SolSolutions solar generator. We resumed our tiny house build in April of 2015, and it took just three months to finish the interior space. We moved in that August.

This New Year marked our 18th month of living in the house. I'm happy to report we love it even more than the day we moved in. Yes, there are some things we would do differently (see below), but there's so much that makes living here better than any of our previous houses. We've learned it's absolutely possible for two adults to live comfortably in an intentionally designed, 250-square-foot space. 

Now, a list of the first ten why-I-love-my-house reasons that come to mind: 

1. Cleaning and upkeep. In a half-hour I can vacuum, dust, wash dishes and do any general tidy-ing up needed. No stairs to run up and down (as in our previous houses), no unused space to maintain. 

2. Climate control. When it's hot, our many windows (including six clerestory windows) plus three ceiling fans keep us compfortable. It doesn't hurt that we're on the side of a mountain with trees for partial shade. In the winter, the clerestory windows let the warmth of the sun into our space. For cold winter nights, our wood stove keeps things cozy. The rest of the time an oil-filled, radiant heater is enough to keep things at a base temperature. (More soon on the new heater we're installing.)

3. Light. With three glass doors and 11 windows, our space is light-filled even in winter. And I'm someone who needs sunlight! 

4. Seamless indoor/outdoor space. The windows also make the forest feel like an extention of our living space. Having three exterior doors means we can be outside in a second from anywhere in the house. And with a deck wrapping around three sides of the house, we walk out the doors to rocking chairs, an herb garden and spaces to grill and eat. 

5. Ground-level sleeping. Yes, our bed takes up significant floor space, but I'm happy we don't climb a ladder to get to bed. And Bill is especially happy not to sleep in a confined space. Lofts work wonderfully for many people; they're just not for us.

6. A spacious kitchen. We have a giant sink, which we use all the time whether doing the dishes, washing things out, soaking labels off beer bottles (for homebrewing!), etc. We can put butcher block inserts over the sink for more counter space, but even without the inserts we have abundant open counter space, because our dining table doubles as an extension of the counter. With more than four feet of space between the counter and the opposite wall, nothing feels cramped in the kitchen area.

7. Extending over the sides of the trailer. For people not planning on moving a house much (or at all), it makes such a difference going wider than the 8.5-foot width of a trailer. Tiny houses that stay inside the wheel wells, are even narrower, with about 7 feet of interior width. Our house is more than 11-feet wide inside. Yes, we'd need a "wide load" permit to move this house, but we'll deal with that if/when the need arises.

8. Shower elbow room. We could have saved space in the bathroom by going with a smaller shower, but we're happy we didn't. Our 54" x 24" stall feels just right, and we're generally happy with the corrugated metal walls in the shower.

9. High shelves. I kept a lot more things than true minimalists do. I have my grandmothers' china and silver, my uncle's old books, souveneirs from our travel, beautiful artwork by my sister Jill Jensen and much, much more. Some of these "treasures" sit on shelves over the bedroom windows. More on shelves over the kitchen windows and more still on shelves over the TV and sofa. Though we have a lot packed into this house, we have sufficient storage for non-decorative items, and we work to keep the house uncluttered otherwise.

10. Our screen house. OK, techinically this isn't part of the house, but our 160-square-foot, freestanding screen porch is a big part of why our house doesn't feel small. In good weather, we spend much of the day in this open-air space. Built partially out of reclaimed materials and left primitive (no electricity, no running water), it was cheap and quick to build. It feels as though we're sitting in the middle of the forest—just without the bugs or rain.

Are there things we would do differently? Yes! And that will be the subject of a future blog...

Please click on the pictures below for more details.

One of the questions I'm often asked about our tiny house journey is:  "How hard has it been to get rid of all your things?" 

My immediate answer: Look around our house, and you'll see an awful lot of things. Our old sofa. Bill's parents' old magazine rack. The rug we bought in Turkey. My grandmother's set of Blue Onion china. My great-aunt's baby mug and my grandfather's old coronet. The vintage boxes we bought at auction. The books I love the most. The rooster and heron prints by my sister. I could go on and on and on. 

How can we have this many things in a tiny house? Shelves play a big part. The shelf that runs along the top of our kitchen windows holds a lot of the china we don't need every day. The shelf along the top of one bedroom window holds old books, family pictures and a plate and bowl we bought in Tuscany. Shelves over the TV hold that coronet, more books, my grandmother's silver and Waterford pieces we bought in Ireland.

Building in as much storage as possible into our design gives us room for things. One of our ottoman/coffee table/seats serves as our linen closet; the other houses our printer, plus office and art supplies. Under our bed, four giant drawers have room for many of our clothes, with enough extra space for backpacks and a small vacuum cleaner. Our pantry makes good use of space with full-slide-out drawers that hold food, everyday dishes and cleaning supplies. Even the space behind the oven gives us more storage for cutting boards, a pizza peel and stone, sink inserts, cooling racks and pans.

That said, we have "gotten rid of" a lot of things we used to own when we had a big home. Most of it wasn't too hard to part with. Generic furniture, unworn clothes, boxes of Christmas decor I no longer put out for the holidays, CDs, crates of pictures. The CDs and pictures we digitized. The things we didn't use or care much about, we "shared," as my husband calls it. Some of it we gave to family or friends, some we donated, some we sold. 

What helped me sell some of our items of value was knowing that the money earned was going to help us change our lives. Yes, we liked the grandfather clock we'd bought. But we didn't need to keep it, and the $750 someone paid us for it added to the $700 we got for our farm table and the $400 for the bedroom furniture joined the profits from selling our house. It all became part of being able to leave our jobs and build this house. And this has been an experience worth infinitely more than all the things we've parted with.

Sorting through what we keep and what we "share" has made me value even more what I choose to keep. It's helped me recognize what's important to me and allowed me to focus on that. I've kept things from our travels, artwork that speaks to me, silver handed down to me. And I'm much more intentional about what I bring into my home now that space is limited. A new acqusition has to be extremely useful and/or remarkably beautiful to me--ideally both.

In this process, "things" have become less important to me. Sharing what I have has become easier and even pleasurable. I am more focused on how I live now, rather than what I possess. That's quite a gift.

Please click on the pictures below for more details.