Ohio

Rent a teardrop or Airstream from Mark Wahlberg’s Road Adventures

RVs, vans, and trailers are the heroes of this year’s summer vacation. Many vacations have been cancelled or delayed this year, but the idea of taking off safely in an RV is more popular than ever. According to Business Insider, RV dealers are actually having a difficult time keeping RVs … Read more

Single Story Homes and Shells from Small Spaces CLE

by Christina Nellemann

Small Spaces CLE owner, Carl Baldesare has already lived on a sailboat with a duffle bag and a box of DVDs. So he knows what its like to live in a tiny space. He founded the company to create innovative and luxurious tiny houses that are still affordable. Along the … Read more

Planning a “Simple House” with Old World Garden Farms

by Christina Nellemann

When building a homestead, most people build their home first. Jim and Mary of Old World Garden Farms are currently planning their 1,000 square foot small home way years after many other projects have been completed, including their beautiful barn, chicken coop and an abundant garden. The Old World Garden Farms … Read more

YahiniHomes: Tiny, mobile homes

by Christina Nellemann

Danny Yahini’s tiny house company, YahiniHomes, offers the best of both worlds in the small house industry. His various custom homes are not only small and portable, but they can also be set up on a trailer, or on your choice of foundation, and then added onto later to accommodate … Read more

2012 T@B Trailer

by Christina Nellemann

The T@B is back! Dutchmen, the original manufacturers of the T@B, discontinued the production and support of the colorful, stylish little trailer in 2009, much to the chagrin of die-hard T@B owners and fans. One reason for this might have been because of the high cost of the various parts of the trailer that came from Europe. The rights to the popular trailer has now been acquired by Little Guy Worldwide, a company that makes teardrop trailers. Little Guy has partnered with Pleasant Valley Teardrop Trailers (the people who built my teardrop) to build the T@Bs. The Ohio-based company was also considering acquiring the T@B name and business at the same time as Little Guy, but instead decided to partner with Little Guy and their large fan-base.

The new 15-foot long T@B has the same smart and sassy design, options and details as the original, but is still in the initial floor plan phase. Little Guy has added some additional amenities such as an outdoor shower with a 2.5 gallon heated tank, a 3-way refrigerator that can run off 12 volt, 110 or propane and a detachable screen door. The trailer is about 1,500 pounds fully loaded, contains a sink and a 2-burner LP stove, a propane tank and battery attached to the front and has a 5 gallon fresh water tank. The interior has birch cabinetry, storage under and over the seating/Queen bed combo, a small closet, a Port-a-Potty, an LP furnace/CoolCat air conditioner and several upholstery designs.

Ellen’s Tiny House

by Christina Nellemann

Ellen Dawson-Witt was recently featured in her local newspaper because of her tiny house and her downshifted life. Ellen’s 192 square foot house is located on her property in Yellow Springs, Ohio where she grows some of her own food and carries water from a well for washing, uses solar panels for a lamp, CD player and laptop and uses a composting toilet. She does her cooking on a gas range from 1934.

Dawson-Witt, a freelance editor and government contractor, has avoided television and fashion and wanted to live her life like that of Henry David Thoreau.

“I wanted to live deliberately and to not be on automatic pilot,” she said. “I wanted to be connected to the elements.”

However, she is not able to live in her tiny house full-time. The county in which the home is located does not allow full-time living in a home without indoor plumbing. She keeps another house close to her work.

Inside the tiny house, there are three chairs, one table, one desk, a kitchen cabinet from the 1920s, one bookcase, a loft with one bed and one small chest that contains an extra blanket. About 75 percent of all she owns fits in the tiny house. (Ironically, she has a whole shelf of books on voluntary simplicity, she said.) She has her clothes and a file drawer in her other house and her tools and camping gear in a nearby shed.

Dawson-Witt will be leading a seven-week discussion on sustainability at her tiny house. The sessions started on October 4, 2011. Her talks will cover simplicity, ecology, food, money and more for those who want to live more lightly on the earth.