Tiny House – Page 2 – Beautiful Chaos

We need a new door in our Tiny House

Our Tiny House door is rotting and does not close any more

Despite the fact that our Tiny House is not finished jet we have already moved in, because we wanted to celebrate Christmas there and with the predicted very cold wetter the kids have more space to play inside of the Tiny House as they have in the caravan. We have finished up the walls and the floor and started building a kitchen, but I still owe you the posts on that. These will follow soon.

But first things first. We have a big problem whit our front door. It is a wooden door which we bought 2 years ago. At the moment we do not have the possibility to build our own door. We gave the outside a paint to give it some protection. When we build the door into the Tiny House it already was a problem fitting it. The door was warped from the beginning and did not close; we could not lock the door; etc. We reduced the door lock mechanism from a 5 point door lock to a 1 point door lock in order to get the door to shut and to be able to get locked. The doorframe also needed to be modified.

Now after 2 years of use the wood is starting to rot. And if that is not enough we had a few days of heavy frost. One night we had almost -20°C.

That gave our door the rest. Due to the door being build out of low quality and thin wood, moisture formed on the inside and drained the wood. As you can see on the picture above.

This caused the wood to expand. It expanded so much that we could not close the door properly any more. We can only smack the door and hope that it will just pop enough into the frame to keep it in place.

Locking the door is not possible any more. Luckily we have 4 big dogs, so we are not afraid anyone will break in.

The morning after the -20°C the door was actually frozen shut. We had difficulties getting it open. The wood is so very soaked in with moisture, that water runs out and froze on the door and inside of the frame.

**Ice under need of the door looking from the inside**

**Ice drops hanging from the doorframe**

We had already ordered a new door, because we did not trust this door anymore, but it came broken and it needed to be swapped. This new door kept us waiting longer then expected and we tried to somehow get the door to at least close again. We put a lashing strap around the door to press it together and then screwed a few planks to the door.

We hoped we could close the door again, but it did not help. After a few days where we could not close our door finally the new door came and we changed the door.

This time we bought a plastic door and it fits perfect. We can open and close it lightly. We do not like plastic, but for now we are very happy with this door. We just need to get a fitting lock and door fittings, but the store was closed on New Years Eve.

Renovating a dining table

From plant table to dining table for our Tiny House

I have used this nice table outside throughout the summer. It is a very sturdy table and we had made a new table top out of spruce wood for it this spring. I want to use this table in our Tiny House as a dining table. The metal frame is a bit rusty and the wood needs to be sanded and waxed, so the table can be cleaned after dinner, etc.

First we brought the metal frame inside the Tiny House, so I could lightly sand and then paint it. It is to cold outside to paint. The table top is brought into the shop for a thorough sanding.

After 2 coats of paint I was happy with the colour

Then the sanded table top was brought into the Tiny House.

I treaded the wood with a wax to give it some protection and to give it a nice shine.

This table is not very spectacular, but we like it and it only cost a bit of paint and some wax.

We love the appearance of the wood. After a season outside the wood is weathered and after sanding the saw marks from the milling appear clearly. The table top has a very rustic look which we love.

Our Tiny House. Part 3. Moving

Lifting the Tiny House by crane

As already mentioned we where not sure where to put the Tiny House when we started building it. We have made the construction so that we could lift it with a crane. As you might have noticed in previous pictures we have already moved the Tiny House once before, but not by crane. We used our Tractor with front end loader and our Telehandler to lift the Tiny House straight up and moved a trailer under neat it on which we sat it down gently. We moved it by trailer to a different spot where it was not in the way so much. After that we repeated the process with the Tractor and Telehandler and sat it down again. This method only allows the Tiny House to be lifted straight up and is not useful to put it on its foundation, so we used a 70 Ton crane this time.

**This is where the Tiny House will go**

On the final location we made a simple foundation for the Tiny House out of concrete and a stone slab. This foundation is more then enough since the Tiny House only needs a level service to sit on. The foundation is located on the old stable foundation which was leveled out with gravel.

In order to lift the Tiny House we put 2 Boat straps underneath the Tiny House. Those straps where then connected to lifting slings which where connected to chains. The chains where spread to minimize pressure on the Tiny House. We also put some temporary beams along the edge of the roof to help spread the pressure over the total roof construction.

Then we where ready to lift the Tiny House up. We did not lift the Tiny House very high and we moved it over very slowly. We let the pictures speak for themselves.

**Proof that a wooden structure is strong enough to be lifted**

We positioned the Tiny House above the foundation and arranged some asphalt paper between the stone slap and the beams to prevent moisture coming up from the foundation. After that we gently sat the Tiny House down.

Mission accomplished, so we removed the straps and everything from the crane could be packed away again. The hole operation only took 1,5 Hours and went very well.

Fun fact the crane weighted the Tiny House at 7 Tons. We expected it to be around 3.5 Tons, so we where very surprised. You must know that we could only lift around 4 Tons in total with the Tractor and the Telehandler.