reflections on a year of tiny living

Photos from Lily's blog. 

A year ago this week, we were busy preparing to move our 130 square-foot tiny house from North Carolina to Florida. After $15.5K and nine months of manual labor, it was time for our investment to hit the road. Stress levels were high, but thankfully this crux move went off without a hitch. We could finally start living in our humble abode down in the Sunshine State… 

Fast-forward a year: Lily, Uwharrie and I still live tiny in Florida. Some people are curious about how these accommodations are working out for us. First, I must admit that it helps to have a partner who is more of a minimalist than myself! Since we’ve been downsizing our existence for several years, we haven’t noticed any substantial changes to our living habits other than a composting toilet.

Speaking of permaculture: that’s a most exciting lifestyle change. Recycling nutrients from our waste is really a no-brainer. Our chickens help to accelerate the breakdown of our food scraps. Within a year, we've successfully made 54 cubic-feet of nutrient-rich hummus. Half of that has already gone to fertilizing our garden. To cut to the chase: we try daily to close the loop and conserve what we have.

Because we don't pay rent and work as caretakers in exchange for living on this land, we've recouped half the cost of our house in the first year alone. As an added bonus, we have an 8,000-acre backyard! One drawback is that we live 10 miles from downtown. But since bike paths and public transportation come within five miles of our house, we consume about five gallons of gasoline each week.

The trip up to Virginia and North Carolina in July was our big summertime splurge. Otherwise, we limit our travel and try and live locally. As conscientious consumers, we use about fifteen gallons of water daily. Our entire house runs off of 20A of electricity and that includes a 6,000 BTU air conditioner. We don't have solar panels. Most of these tweaks in efficiency are quite easy and inexpensive.

The other day, I listened to a healthy discussion over carbon dioxide regulation on the NPR program “On Point.” Having crunched the numbers, some think tanks say that technology isn’t there yet to free us from the shackles of a carbon economy. But isn’t it funny how our society neglects to explore simple lifestyle changes, which in the aggregate could yield big results? Living tiny is truly living large.