When living in a small space, you sometimes have to get creative with solutions to problems. You start to think differently about space and how to best utilize it. It’s a never ending process, and we’re constantly making small tweaks that make a huge difference in how we thrive in our 80 square feet of mobile living space.
Two recent problems we had illustrate the concept.
Shoes
One of the annoyances of living full time in a small space such as the Oliver has been .. what to do with shoes??
We’ve obviously simplified our shoes to just a few pairs each – hiking/running shoes, sandals, slip-ons, semi-dressy. But even so, they add up and take up room. We originally tossed them in the bottom of our hanging closet – which was a constant hassle of playing ‘Find the matching shoe!’. And of course, if shoes were wet, muddy or otherwise dirty, we endangered our hanging clothes too. Even with the best of intentions of putting away shoes, we’d always end up with a pile of shoes somewhere.
Organization was needed.. so off to the Container Store we went. I had an idea of cutting an over-the-door shoe organizer in half, and hanging it below our 2-person dinette. Chris was a bit skeptical of my idea, but he’s learned to trust me when I have crazy ideas.
We opted for the Container Store’s most expensive shoe hanger. On a full size door, it can store 30 pairs of shoes. When I had a traditional house, this was my solution and I loved it. It’s well built, and really honestly does hold 30 pairs of (women’s) shoes while taking up a minimum of space.
Next step was to measure and cut it to length to fit nicely under the table. Which left enough bins to store 12 or 14 pairs of shoes (more than we own). The remaining half is still usable as an over-the-door solution for a regular door… or be creative elsewhere with it.
We at first attempted a suction cup mounting solution – which failed while in motion.
So Chris drilled holes and mounts into the lip of the back of the table – and the solution has been working perfectly for us for several months now. It does take up a bit of space under the table, but not enough to make sitting at the table uncomfortable. And the organization has been so wonderful!
Kiki approves!
Flowers & Plants
Chris and I have recently taken up running (go us!), and he’s gotten into the very sweet habit of bringing me back wildflowers from his run. The problem was, with a small space we hadn’t kept any flower vases. Heck, we don’t even really have much counter space, so even keeping flowers in one of our few drinking glasses wasn’t the best solution.
I had the vision of a suction cup mounted flower vase to solve the problem. Living in what is essentially a huge fiberglass bathtub, we rely on using suction cup everything to mount to our walls – photo frames, organizing bins, hooks, room dividers and even our speakers!
A vase mounted on the wall would allow us to take advantage of space that is otherwise unused and out of the way. I figured if one wasn’t already on the market, I could likely construct something.
Thankfully all it took was me posting the idea on Facebook, and immediately we had a solution.
It’s part of a 3-piece set at QVC that has the vase and two small planters that also mount via suction cup… for just $10.97 plus shipping!
Bonus to my flower dilemma, I’m looking forward to having a little mobile suction cup garden.
Any suggestions for 2 or 3 useful, easy to grow, cat-friendly cooking herbs that I should try to grow?
I’ve done the cut the transparent shoe rack in half my self. but I cheated (and didn’t use it for shoes) I used them for all my cables (nice and rolled up with magic-ties/one-wrap-straps.
I’ve been wondering about the Ipad for books. I tried the Kindle and the Nook and didn’t like them – dark gray text on light gray background – hard on the eyes and not enough options to customize contrast and typography. I will always prefer a real book, but space and weight are real issues. When I upgraded my tow vehicle to a Nissan Titan pickup truck with a cap on the bed, it gave me room to bring those books I wished I had on my first trip. yay. But I still think it’d be handy to have an e-reader for cookbooks, reference books and newspapers especially. I’m looking forward to the Ipad coming down in price and working out the first-generation kinks.
definitely great for cook books! Especially if you have a stand you can put on the counter and work right off it. I’ve done that several times and love it! And the Epicurious app is a constantly-updating cookbook 🙂
When I moved onto the bus with Ben, one of my biggest dilemmas was which books to bring. Books and magazines took up SOOOO much shelf and table space (it even annoyed me in my non-mobile lifestyle). Now that the iPad came out, I’m searching for all those things as iBooks and iPad magazines. It might be a spendy tool at first, but as more and more things start transferring into iBooks, I think it could be priceless in the end! Plus when you’re traveling you dont have to decide what reading material to bring with you – you can bring it all! I’m sure the same goes for the Kindle and the Barnes & Noble equivalent. I just haven’t tried those. Just a thought 🙂
Also, this is kind of a cute little thing for making ice cubes: Fusionbrands Ice Orb (amazon has it). It takes a little getting used to, but it opens up space in my little freezer.
Ok.. that is totally awesome. Just Amazon Primed that sucker in.. looks like it will perfectly fit in our little freezer too! Thank you!
yeah, it’s pretty cool….but be forwarned – it’s not so easy to just pop a couple of cubes when you want ’em (it takes a bit of effort to get ’em all loose)….and you can use up the cubes pretty fast if you shake a lot of martinis 🙂 Still, it wins a lot of form/function design points.
I love my ISO soda siphon for soda water without having to deal with the waste and space of plastic bottles.
Cool.. we’ve been loving our SodaStream for the same purpose. And helps us avoid HFHCs and buying energy drinks. Only downside so far has been arranging for delivery of replacement carburetors, but there are options for in person exchange too.
BTW – how much water can you make per-cartridge with your ISO Soda Siphon?
I love the brushed metal look – and it might be more small-space friendly than the giant plastic Soda Stream we have…
Yeah – I think it might be a little more space-friendly, ….and you can get a nice brushed red one too, but I’m not sure how economical it is. It makes a quart. The cartridges are nice and small, but it takes one cartridge per fill-up, so I buy them in bulk and get them for about $.50 each. You can probably get them even cheaper, I think, if you buy off-brand.
My cat loved Apple Mint, but he also took to Chocolate Mint and just Mint Mint. He also quite enjoyed rosemary and basil. I don’t know if he had regular tastes or not, but he tended to favour the more fragrand herbs in our window box. Good luck with your indoor garden.