Another quick update...

Here I am on a borrowed computer once again. The internet seems to be a rare bird in our neck of the woods - most people use air cards or satellite internet, so we're still trying to decide what kind of service would be best for us. I somehow got grout in my eye this morning, but I'm such a trouper that I'm going to post a quick update for ya'll anyway.

The bedroom, with it's bright bird and tree theme.

I painted the kitchen wall to match the smaller wall of the living room.

I added sticky vinyl floor tiles to the sink counter to further waterproof it.

BA building our Ikea kitchen cabinet, after assembling and mounting our fold-out table (on the wall in front of him).
Say what you like about Ikea, but they do know how to design for small spaces!

Smallest closet I've ever had (and I have to share it with BA!)

Living room

My carpet from Habitat.

The Ikea cabinet.

Used records from Half-Price Books. BA did this, and I love love love it!

Other side of cabinet.

My purple, black-out, insulated curtains.

The rug brings it all together!

And that's it for now! I'm logging off this borrowed computer - we're at a barbeque at my father-in-law's house, and I don't want to seem antisocial! I'll post more when I can...

We live here now!

Well, the most ironic thing about living full-time at BaHa Ranch is that I currently have very little time to blog about living full-time at BaHa Ranch! Here's a quick update on the work we've been doing since we moved down here on Saturday, May 12th:



Grey paint with sand texture added in. This is the living room wall.

Bright blue paint on the smallest wall of the bedroom.
Our old entertainment center has been re-purposed as a dresser!

I love this grey paint! It looks so soft...

The tiny fridge!
Also notice the wall behind it - OSB on top and tin roof below.

 

Wood flooring on top with tin roofing applied vertically.

We have a front door! Here is BA installing the doorknob.



Outside view of the door.

BA still has to finish upper part of wood panneling (which is actually wood flooring).

All the paint shown is either from the "oops paint" at Lowe's or from the Habitat store. The wood flooring that was used on the walls is also from Habitat, as is the front door. And the tiny fridge is a refurbished one from a Sear's outlet.

That's all for now! There is much much more to blog about, so I'll write more as soon as I can. Thanks for reading!

The Tiny Fridge (and other big adjustments)

Living full-time at BaHa Ranch is going to be quite an adjustment for both of us. Because of the small space, we bought a tiny refrigerator. I'd show you a picture, but it's already down there and I'm not. Basically, it's the kind of fridge that you probably had if you ever lived in a dorm. We're going to have to become wiser about buying groceries that need refrigeration, and that's a good thing! Probably half the things in our refrigerator right now have been there for much too long, and the other half doesn't even need to be in there.

Another thing we'll have to adjust to is the lack of light switches. I wonder how many times I'll walk into the bathroom in the middle of the night and swipe my hand against the wall next to the door? I've had years and years of being conditioned to the fact that that's what you do when you want a light to come on. Here's the lighting system at BaHa Ranch:

The three white solar lamps that you see in this picture are our current lighting system.
These three will soon be joined by the six additional lights that we recently purchased.
They operate by pulling a string at the bottom, and actually put out quite a bit of light!

And laundry. Oh dear, I think I have the most anxiety about the laundry! We have a washer and dryer, nothing fancy, but they work great and I am accustomed to using them. However, in the interest of using less electricity, I'm going to start using a solar-powered clothes dryer (AKA: a clothesline). And to wash the clothes? We may try to hook up the washer and use a water-conservation technique that utilizes the rinse water from one load to fill the wash cycle of the next load. If that doesn't work, I saw this on Amazon:

The Manual Washer Hand-washing machine

 And, I have a nice big plastic bucket that would work to manually wash clothes in. Plus, I've already bought some Octagon soap, which is supposedly great for manually washing clothes.