She Went Tiny After Her Husband Passed. Full Tour.

And what I would say to anyone who finds himself alone at a certain point in life when you didn't think you would be, is just go for it. I mean, live your life. You kind of go through phases when you're married or have someone that, you know, you kind of depend on them a lot. But one thing I've learned about myself is that I can do hard things. I can do things that I maybe didn't think that I could a few years back. I do a lot of praying, but I've absolutely found the courage and the strength to do whatever needs done. Don't think that you can't, because if you want to, you can. After my husband passed, I was looking for a place that was safe and comfortable and affordable, most of all. And I found it in Tiny House Living. I chose a ground floor bedroom for longevity. And then I opted for the loft because I wanted the extra space. I wanted my grandkids to have a place that they could call theirs. And if someone needed to stay, I had room for it. And let's start with the living room. As you can see, it is very spacious. This is about a 10 feet wide. And I believe the living room section is about eight feet long. And it is perfect. I absolutely had to have my big comfy couch. I know a lot of tiny houses. Have smaller furniture to accommodate the smaller spaces. But I absolutely wanted this couch. I wanted my big comfy couch because that's important to me. This is my space. I want to be comfortable in it. I also wanted my TV stand and my TV. So this living room is just awesome. I'm absolutely thrilled with it. I have all the space that I need. I even have a place for my Christmas tree at Christmastime, which was also very important to me. And all of the windows also help make this space feel even bigger. But as you can see, it is not tiny. I have tons of space here in my living room. And you know, back when me and my husband were looking at tiny houses, they were like the very small tiny houses. This is a part model, so it is a little bigger. But I feel like he would absolutely love it. I think he would love the layout. I think he would love it. And I think he would be very proud of it. And yes, I have conversations with him all the time. I even have a little end table over here. It's big enough for whatever would drink or whatever you need to put on it. And my dining room table is tucked away right there. My two little TV trays there. It's actually very spacious. I do not feel cramped in this space at all. Doesn't feel tiny to me. There's so many different models and whatever is important to you. If you want a bigger kitchen or if you want a model that really focuses on the living room or other areas of the house, there's just so many options. So you really can customize to what fits your life best. Overall, the size of my living room, I think it's perfect. This is my favorite place to be. Usually reclined here watching TV or reading a book. This is my solitude and I absolutely love it. Welcome to my galley kitchen. And as you can see, I've got plenty of space here. We're still, the walls are still 10 feet apart here. Approximately eight feet long still. This space does not feel like a tiny house kitchen. I've got tons of space. There's nothing tiny about this to me. And as you can see, I have full size appliances. This is an electric stove. It's all electric. I bought this mat to cover to protect that. It also gives me extra counter space. And I have this full size refrigerator, ice and water dispenser, full size, nothing tiny about it. And speaking of tiny, I have plenty of storage space here, plenty of counter space. This is kind of my catch all. So my person stuff goes there, but I have got plenty of counter space. And then I also have this here. Like I said, I have extra counter space there and lots of cubbies and cabinets and drawers. And when I saw this model, first off, it was not a question of, I wasn't going to have enough storage. This is more than enough. And on this side, again, I have plenty of storage all throughout. And luckily my cabinets are not super high. So I do not have any issue at all with reaching things, even though I'm kind of short. And I chose these countertops. Could have gone with granite, but I chose not to. I chose to go with something a little simpler. I do have obviously plenty of storage because I did opt out of the dishwasher. I just figured I can wash dishes. It's just me. I didn't need the dishwasher. I figured it would be better use of space to put storage drawers. I love the big sink because if you're going to be washing your own dishes, you need a big, nice sink to wash your dishes. So this has worked out very well for me. I do not miss the dishwasher at all. And I love having my storage. So after living here for almost a year in this space, I've had the grandkids over many times. I've had my oldest son come and stayed with me for a week. So I have had visitors. I've had, you know, tons of activity and we have managed very well. It's been very surprised. I will admit to being a little bit surprised at how easy it has been. It's been an amazing time and it has really worked out very well. Very well. Just because it says tiny house, it has been plenty big and we've really enjoyed this space. 2016 was when me and my husband really started looking at the tiny houses. We had lived in a big house. The kids had moved out, started their own lives, and we had downsized into an apartment, actually getting prepared to do travel nursing. And we just ran across the tiny house show and just fell in love with them. Started really, you know, thinking about it and looking into it. And then once we started travel nursing, we did that for several years and we moved back home in 2021. Kind of forgotten about it, actually, to be honest. And then we started kind of thinking about it again. But he was sick. He had some medical problems and he actually passed away in 2022. After he passed away, I rented a big house just because I just needed to get out of the apartment that I was in at the moment. But after a while, I was like, this is not sustainable. Plus I was renting. And so I started remembering all the things that we'd seen and talked about and really piqued my interest again. So I started down the tiny house rabbit hole again. And that's how I ended up here. Well, when I started looking for tiny houses around the area, I just Google, you know, Google and stuff. And I found Cowtown Cottages and drove out there one day and just wanted to look around and look at the tiny houses. And Kelly and her husband were so great with just educating on everything about it and just answering all the questions and just started the paperwork in the process. And it's been wild, but it was it was fun. I love my tiny house. It is a park model, so it is 399 square feet. It's perfect size for me. Downsizing to move to tiny was intense. I gave away so much stuff. I sold things, donated things. It was it was a long process, but I've actually enjoyed it. It's actually been liberating just to not have so much stuff. I think the base price was in the 70s, but I did do quite a few upgrades, a transport tax, title and license, all that. It ended up being like right at one hundred and ten. The community that I live in is Primrose RV and Tiny Home Park. It's in essentially Crowley, Texas, but we're at the Johnson County. We're right by Fort Worth. So essentially, I still kind of feel like I live in Fort Worth. But it is kind of out in the country. It is very nice and quiet out here. I love to sit on the porch and listen to the birds. It's very, very peaceful out here. It is secure. We actually have fenced in lots and a gate that actually locks. And everyone here is very nice and very pleasant. And the lot rent covers all the utilities except electric, even free Wi-Fi, which is amazing. So the only thing I pay is electric and my electric bill runs anywhere from fifty to seventy five dollars a month. So it's actually a pretty good deal. I went through 21st Century Mortgage Company. They do a twenty five year mortgages, but I'm going to have that paid off long before then. And my mortgage is a little over a thousand dollars, which to me isn't bad at all. I do still work. I am a nurse and I don't want to work till I'm 80. And when it does come time to retire, I'm assuming I'll still be here. But, you know, we don't know what life holds for us. This will be much easier way of living whenever the time comes and I do get to retire. And this is actually where my washer and dryer would go. I choose to use this as a space for my trash can and other storage. So this has come very handy, mops and stuff like that. So all of that has been a very good use of this space. But yes, someday I can have a washer and dryer if I choose to. Right now I use the little laundromat that's here on in the community. And once again, just because you have a tiny house does not mean you're going to have a tiny bathroom. My bathroom is plenty big. I have tons of space. I have tons of storage. I store my towels, all my extra toilet paper, shampoos, conditioners, all that, all my face stuff. And I even have a medicine cabinet here. So everything I possibly need for my bathroom, I am able to store in here. And it's not like everything's cram packed either. I have plenty of space in my tiny bathroom, which is not tiny. I love my little window. I put this covering on myself. Kind of provides a little bit of privacy. I also have a flushable toilet. We have sewer here. So I have a flushable toilet. It's not compost. Just because you live in a tiny house doesn't mean you're going to have a compost toilet. And also I have a full size bathtub. I don't have any trouble at all getting in and out of it for my shower. And it's, it's kind of, you know, it's short. It's not like real tall or anything, but it is something that you could always have. You could always trade out if you felt that that did not work for you and needed just a standing shower. Overall, I love my bathroom. It's perfect size. I'm not lacking anything in here. So I think it's perfect. Welcome to my bedroom. I chose a downstairs bedroom because I didn't want to be climbing stairs every day, every morning. This is my nightstand and my dresser, which I had to have. I wanted a full size dresser. This is a full size dresser. I have a queen size bed and there is plenty of room in here. I have plenty of room to walk around my, in my bedroom and my gri, which keeps me cool at night. And I love my windows. I, it brings in so much light into this room and I just love it. When I first saw this bedroom, I was doing some hardcore measuring of everything, but yes, everything ended up fitting perfectly. And I really love this space. It is small, but everything that I want fitted in to this space. The ceiling's a little low because of my loft, but that doesn't bother me at all. Like I said, it's a very cozy little bedroom and I absolutely love it. And I love the carpet also. I chose carpet because I like to step out onto carpet when I get out of bed in the morning. I was pleasantly surprised with the small, you know, a small bedroom. You don't figure you're going to have much of a closet, but this closet has been amazing and it is full size. It has shelves in it and tons of space, plenty of space for my clothes. My vacuum cleaner is even plugged up in there and charging. So that keeps that out of the way. So it has plenty of space for me. Another thing that is unique to tiny homes is the storage in the stairs, which I have four drawers here in my stairs and those come in handy. Again, you're not lacking for storage in a tiny house. Welcome to my loft. I actually love this space. It's huge, but it is short, but that's okay. We get around pretty well in here. My grandkids love it. This is a queen size bed and it would, it would very easily fit another queen size bed over there very easily. So it's, it's very nice space. Of course I have little couches for my grandkids and watch TV. That's my grandson's favorite place, his little racetrack. But yeah, my grandson, he's four. He's the only one who could stand up up here, but yeah, it's a great space. They absolutely love it. I love it too. I love the windows. I love to look out at the trees and I love my ceilings too. I would have done the loft anyway, because it's extra space. So to me, it doesn't take away from anything downstairs. I actually love the loft. I would absolutely choose the loft again, even if I didn't have grandkids, it would just be an extra room. And this is my very large porch. I did have it screened in, which was very important to me. I wanted this to be a usable space. And so without bees and bugs and all the things in this door, we can open this up and just kind of extend out here. I loved this model because I just thought it was pretty unique with the porch, the way it extends down the side. So space that I have, that I could use. I hope to eventually get things a little more decorative out here, but at the moment it's perfect. I love it. This is my chair. I sit in, in the mornings to drink my coffee, watch the sun come up and listen to the birds. It's so peaceful out here in the mornings. So it's a very pleasant space. I love it. And I love it a lot more since I got it screened in. It's really made a huge difference. When you're looking at tiny homes, if you start thinking you want to go that route, it is very important to look around, look around different places, different tiny houses. There's so many different models, so many different things you can do. And if you can find someone who lives in one, you know, they're the ones that are going to be able to give you, you know, the things to look for, the things not to look for. You know, there's just lots of questions that you could ask and find out, you know, depending on what you want, what you want, what's important to you about the tiny house. And that will kind of guide you along the way of picking the right one for you because everybody's different. Everybody wants different things. Some things are important to one person that's not going to be important to another. So yeah, just figure out which, what you're looking for in a tiny house and just look at as many as you can so that you can be sure whenever you do decide that you pick the right one for you. Thank y'all for watching. If you have any comments, drop them below and I will answer all of them that I see. Thank you for coming.