tiny house - Todawoods

This was our first official big move, other than purchasing the home and moving it to our original off grid spot. I don’t think I’ve mentioned that at our original off grid spot, we have two different lots on the land. We have a summer spot and a winter spot. Both spots over there have its perks, I will get into that in another post maybe one day.

This winter though, we really had the vision of moving to a mountain resort. We wanted to move here because we are both in love with the mountains and do many mountain activities. This mountain also happens to be only 30 miles from our original off grid spot. If we really enjoy this season we might plan to do this move every year! The reason we planned to move to a mountain resort is mainly because Adam loves to snowboard and I enjoy to ski. I also love to hike, so moving to a mountain resort was the perfect idea in our eyes

Over the summer Adam prepped the home. He added new tires, brakes, lights, insurance, registration and probably more I’m not even aware of. We both worked full-time over the summer so it took time to prep our tiny house. We also didn’t want to rush things so we can continue our more stress free lifestyle.

So in October we paid our rent to the resort and reserved our seasonal “campsite” for the winter. We were told no water but free electricity. So we are technically on the grid, but to reserve power we still have our off grid set up going on here.

In November the big move day came. I basically destroyed the place inside before the road did and Adam worked on the outside making sure everything was in check. I think it took about 3 hours to prep for our move. Hopefully with practice we can get faster at moving it.

We are very fortunate that Adam’s parents live right down the road from our original off grid spot, so Adam’s dad agreed to help us move to our new spot with his big Chevy pick up truck.

I was so scared before this thing went on the road. I was basically on the verge of a panic attack. I had visions of the thing breaking in half or windows exploding. The fear of the unknown was real that day.

Adam’s dad is used to towing a huge 38 foot camper that they own so this was no big deal to him. That was a huge relief in my mind. Our tiny home is 40 foot. The only difference is our home is a little bit taller. We made sure there were no bridges on our route. We were set to hit the road.

Our first stop was at Adam’s parents house, where they have a shop. They made sure the tires had enough air there and checked for more safety. Then we hit the road officially.

It looked a little bit more normal on the road than I expected. I was surprised actually. I drove behind them and had my camera in my lap so I snapped a few pictures. (I don’t recommend taking pictures while driving I mainly did it while I was at a stop.)

It took only 40 minutes to get to the mountain resort. Of course going in couldn’t be that simple. There is a gate at the entrance and the gate didn’t want to let us in! It kept crashing down so Adam lifted it up and forced it to stay open. (Shhhh) they eventually fixed it a few weeks later and we are still here, luckily.

So yea, it took a bit to settle in. I have to get used to the new surroundings. We have some full-time RVers in the park, so we have neighbors, which is very new to us. We are now learning to respect our neighbors and teaching our dog manners. (Because they enjoy barking)

It is much different coming from the woods into a little tiny house neighborhood. So far though, life is great.

We literally got here a day before the first snow storm and it has been snowing every week since the move. There are great things to be said about living in a campground at a mountain resort maybe I’ll write a new post about that.

Thanks for reading. I will keep you updated on some adventures at our new mountain resort spot! Thanks for reading. Now I’m going on a winter wonderland walk. See ya!

Basically, how we live without power.

Now I honestly shouldn’t say that we live with no power, we have plenty of power.
The difference here, is that we do not have an electric bill coming in the mail every month.

These are the tools we use for everyday power.

DeWalt rechargeable batteries
12 volt battery
Solar panel
Converter
Generator

Below I’ll explain our setup and how we use the above tools to work together for our off grid power.

Our off grid radio we use everyday. It uses the DeWalt rechargeable batteries. Click on the picture to purchase.

For the super off gridness “to da woods” experience, we try to use our DeWalt rechargeable batteries most. Everyday we use these batteries.

We listen to the radio all the time and use the batteries. Radio is the newest and oldest way for background noise and entertainment you know, everyone is doing it.

We charge our phones with these batteries.

My boyfriend has all kinds of tools he can use without being plugged in because of these DeWalt batteries.

We have a vacuum cleaner that uses these batteries. It really is just an awesome feeling not being plugged into a wall. These batteries last so long too.

Now for all our other power, my boyfriend has a little system going on here.

He has ceiling lights throughout the tiny house that he wires to the 12 volt battery. He labels these wires down by the battery with the name of the room they are in.

You have to make sure you know the difference between positive and negative so you don’t blow the battery.

You just touch the wire to the battery and boom you have lights.

Red, negative on the left. Black, positive on the right,

This 12 volt battery needs to charge and keep life so we can turn our lights on whenever we want. So he wired the battery to a solar panel that is outside in direct sunlight.

The solar panel will charge throughout the day when we have sunlight and this way the battery can charge without us even thinking about it. That’s how we get our lights.

We also use a converter that is wired to the 12 volt battery and the generator. When you turn the generator on the 12 volt battery charges.

We basically only turn the generator on when we watch tv. Yes we watch tv sometimes.

We actually use this awesome antenna he bought for a one time fee and it gives us 4 channels. These channels are awesome, they have documentaries, news, cooking, soap operas and more. We use a dvd player too.

When we use the antenna we like to call it “free TV” because we don’t get a bill on it every month and we enjoy it so much.

We can charge our phones with this piece on top of the battery

The generator is also our way to charge all the DeWalt batteries, the ebike batteries and we can charge our phones. (We mainly use the 12 volt or DeWalt batteries for the phones)

To me, his system is pretty awesome and easy. The parts were super inexpensive and we don’t have a light bill ever!

We look at the cost of our tools like you would an electric bill.

Our tools to help us stay off grid and have power is like a one time fee unless something breaks or you want even more power so you up your game.

It costs some money to get the things you need to unplug from your electric supplier but it’ll pay off quick when you stop paying a huge bill every month.

Take this post as adviser and an idea booster for you. Have fun and let your creative juices flow!

Remember to research a lot about these tools so you can find what works right for you.

Feel free to tell us about your setup, ask questions or tell us a story in the comment section or send us a message.

Fine Art by Holly Heath

Tag: tiny house

We moved the Tiny House!

How to Live Life Without an Electric Bill