ADU, Travel, Community
Lina Menard
Maui, Hawaii

After A Week Long Send Off, My Round the World Trip kicked off with eight days in Maui visiting my sister Sarah who has split her time between Hawaii and Alaska for many years. What an epic way to start this adventure! There was mist falling when my sister greeted me at the Kahului airport on Maui a week ago, so she teased me about bringing the rain from the mainland. We headed straight for Paia where she presented me with a young coconut and a lei, accompanied by the chant for the gifting-of-a-lei.

Maui, Hawaii
Tiny House, Travel, Planning
Lina Menard
Lucky Penny Moves to Walla Walla

A number of circumstances collided recently to compel me to move the Lucky Penny to my property in Walla Walla where I have a ground bound small house called Valencia Cottage. So on Tuesday trusted tiny house movers Linh and Stephanie Pham helped me move the Lucky Penny safely from Portland to my place in Walla Walla.

Lucky Penny Moves to Walla Walla
Minimalism, Workshop
Lina Menard
Downsizing Tune Up

As I packed up recently in preparation to travel cross country in my Honda Fit, I did some downsizing… It was harder than it had been during my last couple of moves because this time I had more stuff. I’d been living in a bigger space…My apartment was a studio, but it was still about 6 times bigger than the Lucky Penny! I talked with several people about the experience and a handful of them said “oh my goodness, I need to do more of that!” So I’ve decided to offer a 6-week Downsizing Tune Up…

Downsizing Tune Up

rain

,

Here Comes the Rain Again

,

Portland has been experiencing an unusually long, warm, and dry autumn, but on Friday, after nearly two months of rain-free days, the dry spell was broken. For the first rainstorm of the season it was pretty impressive. All day long it poured buckets and people scrambled from building to building. As the ground became saturated and the leaves clogged up the gutters the puddles in the potholes became little lakes in the streets. I hadn’t brought my rain pants to school with me, so I was drenched by the time my bike and I made it home again. But once I was there I was delighted by the experience of rain on my Home, Sweet Yurt. The drumming of raindrops on the skylight is really a magical sound.

My dear friend Sarah arrived in town just as I got home and it was nice to share the rainy evening with her. We cooked up delicious burritos and then enjoyed tea and chocolate as we listened to the rain. Sarah is a hardy soul and she’s lived on a farm in a tent with an outdoor kitchen so I knew she would like my new abode. But she has a lower body fat ratio than I do so when she started shivering I decided it was time to get my Envi heater set up.

I hauled it out of the box and remembered that the Envi Heat doesn’t work unless it’s hung on a flat wall, 8 inches from the floor. I glanced around, remembering that in the yurt I don’t have any flat walls! So I decided to attach it to my dresser. With the help of a screwdriver and the included template it was installed, plugged in, and heating the house within 10 minutes. I’ve kept it on the lowest setting ever since plugging it in and it’s been very cozy.

On Saturday I spent a couple hours helping Derin build the walls of the gable ends of his UrbaNest tiny house. Then Sarah and I had a great time exploring Portland, including breakfast at Pine State Biscuits, wandering along Belmont, a pot of chai tea at Tao of Tea, a couple hours in the kids’ section at Powell’s, bacon maple Voodoo donuts, and a stroll along the waterfront. It was a lovely way to spend the first rainy weekend of the season!

,

Day 7: Roofing in the Rain

,

All week the weather forecast had predicted rain, but today it actually caught up to us. Jane's builder friends are heading home tomorrow, so we really wanted to get the roof sheathing and tar paper on today so that the house would be "blacked in" and weather tight before they left.

We set out this morning in full Gortex to see how far along we could get. We decided to unpeel the tarp from the house in 8 foot segments so we could get some of the sheathing up. We installed sheets of OSB onto two thirds of the top course of the roof and covered them in tar paper, since we realized it would be easier to cover now than it will be once the lower course is sheathed. But we weren't able to complete the whole top run because our roofing framer hadn't yet finished the outrigging support for one of the gambrel ends. Unfortunately he wasn't able to come out until the afternoon and by then the rain had picked up. We continued working through the afternoon, trying to keep things covered as much as possible. Meanwhile we continued with the plumbing and electrical. My friend Christian came to help out and he and I cut the framing for the walls at the gambrel ends, using cut requests from the roofer. It was interesting using the miter saw at several different angles and seeing the framing come together, but it was frustrating that there wasn't more we could do. With the tarp catching the wind every time we moved it the house felt like a sailboat. And with the rain pouring down I started having visions of the tiny house as an ark, floating away in the flood.

We hung around for a while since we anticipated having to work quickly to get the sheathing and tar paper up during a break in the rain. But a break never came. It continued to pour and the wind picked up so that we were afraid sheathing the roof would be too dangerous because of slipping hazards and wind gusts. Every gap in the tiny house's rain coat sent sheets of water into the house. Eventually we decided we'd be better off just getting the house as closed up as possible.

I suppose the bright side is that I was able to get a couple items checked off my to do list, enjoy a nice hot dinner, and visit with friends since I couldn't work on the house. However, it was a disappointing stopping point for a week's worth of hard work. If we had realized what a downpour we were going to get we probably would have just reenforced our tarps first thing in the morning and planned to return to the project during a break in the weather.