Tiny Home Tuesday ~ Out There

There are as many ways to own a tiny home as there are imaginations in their stations. The Shelter Blog brought a couple of these ways to my attention, one calling for intensive labor but very feasible from the money end. The other, there are some bucks involved. Big bucks. But tiny and small homes aren't just for those with little money, either trying to get out of debt or not incur it in the first place. There are plenty of folks, with plenty of money, who also see the sense of large living on a small scale.

First up, Morgan, from Asheville, North Carolina and his 5000.00 earth bag home. But first, long time readers will remember Jack's start on one in Texas a few years ago. His was more specifically sand bag than earth bag, because sand is what he had. Sand and plenty of rocks. When he found a piece of land he liked better, Jack left behind an incredible amount of work. So out there in the westernmost of West Texas, there is some real cheap land and the start of a sand bag home, complete with the diggings and stone base of an bath/outhouse, if you're looking that way...

Morgan on the other hand, did finish his earth bag home. The complete story with lots more photos can be found on the Alternative Homes website. Photo credits - unknown

Amazing what plaster can do!

I love the use of the bottles.

5000.00. Of course, there's the price of the land and accoutroments - solar panels and appliances come to mind. Plus a lot of bathing at the end of each day. But do-able. Very do-able.

David Coulson Design built the structure below as a home as well as a landscape design studio for their business. I don't think much expense was spared and it shows, in the good way. Plenty of money doesn't necessarily translate into good taste and the intelligence to make practical beautiful, but I think it happened with this post and beam beauty. Lots more photos and explanations of same can be found here.

More small than tiny and there is nothing wrong with that! By the way, have you subscribed to The Shelter Blog yet? You should.

In my not yet finished search for a class C motorhome on the U.S. mainland, I'm reading a LOT of road trip stories, off shoots of ads, the flotsam and jetsam of a different sort of lifestyle floating around the internet. One bit was a blog from a woman named Sue. In her 60's, she chose a trailer and van as her mode of travel life.  Selling her home and packing up a couple of dogs, she hit the road and hasn't looked back. Her posts have made me laugh and she gives a lot of practical info (seems these road life people have a lot of that to share) and that's enough to keep me interested for now. You might enjoy her as well. You can find RV Sue and her canine crew here.

Over on Cabin Porn there is this wonderful cabin from an ecological reserve in Masatepe, Nicaragua. I tried to find out exactly WHERE in Nicaragua, but there are a lot of them and I'd be posting this next week if I continue trying to track it down.

Contributed by Alex Schoemann

I fluctuate between liking the combination of materials and not being sure if I do or not, but the more I look at it, the more I like it. Wish there were interior shots, but I can't find any of those either.

So there's your grab bag of small and tiny homes for today. Be inspired.

Have a tactical Tuesday. Do something tantalizing.

p.s. There is a tropical depression out in our neck of the woods. The expectations aren't high for much to happen, but it is that time of year and a good reminder that if you aren't ready, get ready.

Outside the box

While the Corn Islands off of Nicaragua get torn up by Tropical Storm Ida, we had a dawn as subtle as the breeze barely moving leaves and water.


We've been incredibly fortunate this year as has the Caribbean as a whole, with seriously powerful storms being deflected by shear before they reached us. As isn't unusual for this point in the season, Ida formed to the west of us. But there are people there too, in Nicaragua and Honduras and their satellite islands, in conditions much like many of us in the island chain. Poorly built wooden homes that don't withstand much at all alongside well built homes and resort hotels and compounds.

When I first paid attention to the Corn Islands, I felt an affection for them as they sound much like the island I live on now. Like Culebra, they are jewels that are slowly being discovered, with small populations. Fifty miles offshore, they are as vulnerable as they are wonderfully isolated. While they have been through much worse than Ida, it just doesn't take much on small islands to make a mess. Keep the people of Central America in your thoughts today, Ida isn't done yet.

The moon this morning, while on the wane, was showing her potholes quite clearly.
I always have this urge to tip her up just a little bit more so I can see what I can't see.

One of the last of this batch of papayas, brighter than the sun

If you aren't familiar with M.F.K. Fisher, and you have any interest in food and reading and writing and life, you should get to know her. She wrapped a few dozen lives into one, but broadly, she was a culinary writer who considered food one facet of life's pleasures, one tine of the fork of a spaghetti twirl. I came across one of her quotes yesterday that brought me to word love anew. "Probably one of the most private things in the world is an egg before it is broken." As Gail used to do when hot on sharing a point of view, I must poke you hard in the arm and say, "Am I right? Am I right?" Does Ms. Fisher not nail it? I believe she does.

Start practicing; have a thankful Thursday.