Finally, I have taken the time to lower the outdoor kitchen. It was about 8 inches to high when I originally built it and I just put up with it, because I thought it would be a huge task to adjust it because of the heavy marble top.
Turns out it was easy. Took about a half hour or maybe an hour to do the whole thing.
Today, I made a pasta salad on it and I did not get a pain in my shoulders. Woot!
Near Tiny House Ontario lives a survivor. She witnessed, and survived unspeakable things during WWII in what is now the Czech Republic. The experiences have left her with haunting stories that she often shares… her stories make me shudder.
These experiences have left her with what I believe is PTSD. She is both a pacifist and vegetarian, and very unusual. She walks around in rags for clothes, rarely bathes, and keeps as many animals as can fit in her home.
She is somewhat famous in the community for keeping her animals in her home with her. Close to 30 cats, goats, chickens, dogs and she also feeds the wild life. Last year she lost some trees near her house and the racoon family who lived there had to relocate. She asked everyone to keep their eyes open for the lost racoons who we would know, because of the mask they wear. I found this totally hilarious. She is always looking for missing cats too. Even those that have been “missing” for years.
At first, I have to admit, I could not get away from her quick enough. She smells a lot like cat urine and makes my allergies go crazy, plus she is always looking for missing critters. The truth is that you cannot get away from her when she starts to talk, no matter how busy you are or whatever, she comes across as quite a weirdo. She is known in the neighbourhood and avoided.
This year, my thoughts on her have shifted greatly. I am busy at Tiny House Ontario, but not insanely so. I have a little time to stop and say hello and to listen to her and this shift in myself also forced me to change my opinion about her. I learned that she saw Louis Armstrong play live in Belgium, that she has traveled the world, that she is smart and interesting and passive and beautiful. I think she is lonely and isolated. I think she just wants to live and love and laugh. I think she is working to forget, but finds this very hard to do.
A few days ago, she was upset. Very, very distraught really, because one of her hens got out and was in the forest, and she was so concerned that a mink or a fisher would catch her. I helped her look and tried to shoo the chicken to her own land and I brought my camera because I hoped that I would catch a photo for this blog.
The pacifist walked the woods for two days clapping gently and singing soft words in a language that I do not know. She spent day and night trying to urge the chicken to come home. Finally, last evening, the chicken found its way into her gentle hands.
Beautiful isn’t she?
At 6:45 am, the sun filters into the bedroom window at Tiny House Ontario. Many birds are singing and the grouse thumps, the temperature is warm but not yet uncomfortable. The breeze rustles the canopy around us.
“I had a crazy dream last night”, I tell my husband. I won’t bore you with the detail of it, but the long dream involves rescuing a miniature ape from a helicopter and finding out that it is a very important animal whose hospital wings around the world, are ready for him should anything happen. Oddly, the ape belongs to my brother and sister in laws who live in Germany, but I don’t know that this animal exists until now. There is a long snake who tries to bite me but misses and the crash is on my home farm, which is a place which I choose not to be a part of. It is convoluted. Still it fills the peace of the forest with a detail of life, no matter how off the mark of reality it is.
We climb down the ladder stairs and I start the propane element on the BBQ for bodum coffee and pat the dogs with my husband while we wait for the kettle to boil. We settle on yogurt and granola for breakfast, feed the dogs and listen to rustling in the forest.
It is a typical morning at Tiny House Ontario. There are no electronic interruptions. There is no news from the outside world. We know nothing of the last 12 hours as we quietly sit and eat breakfast, chatting. We pat the dogs some more, laugh at the silly Bad Little Wolf who is harassing his sister and jumping around. I break the pattern to record this Sunday morning at Tiny House Ontario for you.
I took a clip on this morning from the top of the BBQ with my computer, but I do not know how to upload videos. Sorry!
Here is a photo of our cloth porch breakfast.
Could you get used to this?
It is warm and beautiful today in the Kingston Area. I woke up late at Tiny House Ontario sat and had a quiet cuppa and a granola bar then I did some work around the house. Before I did this, I took a moment to notice the woods around me.
The outdoor kitchen in the cloth porch is much too high so I took it apart and shortened it 8 inches.
I also moved the left over lumber pile. I only have about 10 boards there now so I no longer required the huge tarps and I also wanted to move it behind the house so that one does not see them when you drive up. It helps to make it look tidy.
I also picked up a lot of bits of tiny lumber ends and put them into the former home for the privy. I taped this closed so that they will not fall our the door and it held a surprising amount.
My husband put some boards up inside of the cloth porch and this makes the interior of the cloth porch much tidier and complete looking.
It has been a busy spring and because there are so many small things to do, I still have not been painting or writing much.
I am so busy that I have hardly noticed the big changes in the forest.
It is lush now… only the prickly canes have yet to fill in.
I still do not know what these are, knowing them only by the local name of prickly pear. If you happen to be a botanist, I would really like to know the real name of these ferocious, non-blooming canes that look somewhere between rose and blackberry plants.
I am still waiting for my soil delivery so that I can plant my garden and I have a lot still to do, but even so, if Baby does not get back from the shop, I will be forced to go back to Hamilton again for the week. I simply cannot stay at Tiny House Ontario without wheels.
I bought a Separett Privy kit a few months ago and installed it at first into a small second hand cupboard that I bought for 7 bucks at a junk store. I thought at the time that this was very ideal because I could open it at the side to remove soil. This did not work due to the size of my Tiny in-house. But with the urine drain coming down so low and being right in the front, it is IMPOSSIBLE to remove soil from the front if you build it as they show in the diagram below. You must remove the top and disconnect the urine unit from the exit – even time. I did not like lifting the lid… while there is no smell the gross out factor is HUGE for me. I had to redesign and this was not great so I decided on a different option. Industrial pipe.
The thing about the Separett, is that while is works for the function it was intended for, it was NOT well designed. I think for the cost they could have done a significantly better job with this aspect, but, then I suppose that people would not buy the more expensive units if the cheapies are great.
I think differently, I think that a good product compels brand loyalty. For example, I always buy Arm and Hammer baking soda. I think that most people are the same.
I don’t know anything about their ecological toilets. Maybe they are the very greatest? Still,when and if I eventually go that route, I do not feel compelled to look at them first, nor to recommend them, even though the Canadian rep is very nice and my order came promptly with no errors.
So, I made some changes again to the system and will probably do it over again once I see if it works because with the industrial pipe (I) made to fit (what a pain in the ass that was – pun intended) I need a little less space for the top and can regain about 3.5 inches of floor space (by 27 inches). I think this is ~3/4 of a square foot and this is a huge recovery when once has a 14 square feet of floor space with a sink and toilet in it.
After the pipe was fitted, I had to figure out where the joists were, miss them, cut a hole in the floor with an absurdly dull new $16.00 keyhole saw (which claims to do the job fast). I also custom fit the catch bucket to the bottom, so the until is full enclosed in and under the Tiny, tiny bathroom.
The good thing is that there is NO SMELL… Honestly. The coconut husks do exactly what they are supposed to do!
If this functions better well I will change the outside surfaces to a nicer counter top type of surface. If it does not, I am not sure what I will do since I already cut a 10.5 inch hole in the subfloor…
Tiny House Ontario 