The beginning of our tiny living story

The start to our tiny living journey came late on a Sunday evening, I found myself emailing a guy 2800 miles away. I told him I wanted to buy his Airstream. 

I've always been impulsive and full of unbridled passion. For the most part that has lead to a lifetime of happiness and fulfillment. A few times it has gotten me into trouble. I live with very little regret because I tend to go for things even if it paints me as slightly crazy. 

When Josh and I moved to Charlotte in 2005, we quickly bought a house that was way too big for a couple and two dogs. After 10 years and a housing crash, we found ourselves living in the same home, now with three large dogs and two children. Our once big house, was now intimate and cozy. We had expected to move on to another home as our careers and life stages progressed. However, the longer we stayed, the more we knew that home had very little to do with size. It was about memories, experiences and relationships with our community. 

With two children now in school, we had no easy way to accommodate guests and grandparents. We considered expanding the house, but nothing felt right. At the end of summer 2015, we started googling vintage campers to use as a guest house and for our weekend adventures. Within two weeks we bought plane tickets to Portland, Oregon to blindly purchase a 1976 Airstream Argosy that came with the kind of story I couldn't ignore. 

We had never driven a trailer before and really had no clue what we were doing. I naively thought we could rent U-haul to pull it back to Charlotte. Apparently, U-haul frowns upon that idea and makes it almost impossible. It took us many hours, trips to Home Depot and trading in the truck a few times but we finally made it work. It wasn't perfect. Every time we made a hard turn the break light connection came undone and I had to jump out. 

We ended up making the entire trip back in 4 days. That was 8 states and 2800 miles to be precise. It wasn't the most relaxing road trip we've ever taken but we spent a lot of time together just noticing everything around us. It happened to be Labor Day weekend and we had to get back for deadlines at work (and to relieve my parents from watching all the kids and dogs). We learned a lot about sleeping in Wal-Mart parking lots and driving very long setups.