A Garden and an Orchard!

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I found a flat sunny spot and paid a guy to build a 6 foot tall garden fence! The fenced area is 55 feet long and about 25 feet wide. I hope it will keep the deer out of my garden and orchard.

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Then I built a raised garden bed box in the corner of the fenced area. It is 10 x 4 feet, and built from old fencing, pipes, and lumber I found around my homestead. It is all held together with tie wire. So I up-cycled some junk into something useful.

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I bought seeds for cherry tomatoes, carrots, sugar peas and spinach. I started my cherry tomato seeds inside in pots.

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Then I ordered 9 fruit trees for my little orchard from Raintree Nursery in Morton, Washington. (www.raintreenursery.com) These “Home Orchard Packages” have trees that grow well in our climate and will pollinate each other. I ordered five “dwarf” fruit trees that will grow to about 8 or 9 feet tall:

#A581D Queen Cox Self Fertile Apple/M26
#B110    Harrow Delight European Pear/OHxF87
#B175   Onward European Pear OHxF87
#C180   Methley Plum/St Julian A
#C181A Mount Royal Plum/St Julian A

Plus four “mini-dwarf” apple trees that will be about 5 feet tall:

#A280T Evereste Crabapple/M27
#A700T William’s Pride Apple/M27
#A385T Greensleeves Apple/M27
#A185T Cherry Cox Apple/M27

 I can’t wait for the fruit trees to arrive!

Mortgage Freedom, Environmental Responsibility, and Love of Nature

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I saw this on Facebook. It is not just the Mortgage Freedom that makes Tiny House living attractive, it is knowing that you did not kill more trees than you needed to. You did not over-consume the world’s dwindling Natural Resources.

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Tiny, simple living means having time to enjoy the glow of a sunrise through the bare winter tree branches. Having time to listen to the sound of wind in the trees, the song of birds, the chatter of squirrels. Having time to notice the moon and the stars.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finished Tiny House!!! We Live Here!!!

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Dining Room window with my stained glass hummingbird artwork!

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My handmade “Cabin by a Lake” quilt on the wall above the stairs.

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I bought an antique secretary desk to fit in the corner of my Tiny House.

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Peel and stick vinyl flooring throughout house.

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Tile Bird Mural in kitchen!

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Finished kitchen!

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Upper kitchen cupboards with Tile Bird Mural!

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This is my daughter, Rachel, watching a DVD movie in her new downstairs Tiny House bedroom!

8 Inch Wide Cedar Siding On Our Tiny House!!!

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Ryan has started putting up the cedar siding!!! We are using Ace Wood Royal Waterproofing & Protector Deck & Siding Toner Transparent Oil Lightly Toned “Natural.”

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Back of house:

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Ends of house:

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I bought “Cranberry Red” paint for the front door for just the right amount of kick-in-the-pants attitude!!!

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We still need to take the blue painter’s tape off the window…..

Tiny House Windows!!!

 

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Our window order is ready, and the windows are going in!!! I ordered windows with tan colored vinyl. (Large dining room picture window with loft window above.)

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The 24 foot Cider Box plan called for 6 clerestory windows, but we expanded the plan for a 26 foot house. We put in 7 clerestory windows at the same size (30 x 18 inches). 

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We put brown trim around the windows, and here is our front door! (No door knob yet.)

 

 

A Covered Deck For Our Tiny House!

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The deck will be next to the Tiny House, but not attached to it. So the Tiny House will “dock” next to the deck, but can still be moved when needed.

UPDATE: New photos today.

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Deck railings are up! Roof is next!

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First roof panels are going up!

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Today Ryan built a wheelchair ramp to get onto the deck!

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Here is my beautiful daughter Anne in her wheelchair posing next to the new deck!

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Tiny House Roof!

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Ryan put on the brown standing seam metal roof on the upper roof first. The roofing pieces were 8 feet long so he did not have to cut them. The upper roof is 8 feet wide from front to back. He put on metal flashing that he painted the same color of brown as the roof.

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Here you can see the lower roof is almost finished. The metal pieces had to be cut to fit. I have not talked a lot about the costs of building my Tiny House, but it occurred to me some people might be interested. The roofing materials cost about $800 total.

I knew we needed to get the outside of the Tiny House finished and waterproof before winter. However, I was out of money. So I took out a credit card to buy the windows, cedar siding, and deck lumber. In case you are interested the total for all the windows was $1,672 and the total for 8 inch wide cedar lap siding was $1,664. The deck materials for an 18 x 8 foot deck, including cement pier post blocks was $506.