About

Posted August 24th, 2009 by onedia
27 Comments

I'm an inde­pen­dent jour­nal­ist and author liv­ing her dream life in the Ozark Mountains with my hus­band and 4 dogs. We didn't intend on liv­ing in our 480-sq ft home full time, but have found that it is a more envi­ron­men­tally and finan­cially sus­tain­able way to live. As well, we've learned things about liv­ing our lives large while liv­ing here that we never imagined.

I hope you'll join me on my jour­ney as we declut­ter our lives phys­i­cally, men­tally and emo­tion­ally and rede­fine the word "home."  This process has also allowed me a find­ing of myself and a renew­ing of my rela­tion­ship with my hus­band (we've been together 30 years this sum­mer) and learn­ing things about each other after all this time. Hey, we really can share the remote!

27 Responses to “About”

  1. Sandra Passman says:
    April 14, 2010 at 4:20 pm

    When you say that your beau­ti­ful lit­tle home is 480 sq ft, does that include the deck/porch? How much heated space do you have? We con­sid­er­ing some­thing sim­i­lar for our 47 acres in Louisiana using our own tim­ber and doing most of the work our­selves. Actually, a bet­ter descrip­tion for us would be: how much A/C space would there be in your house plan?

    Reply
  2. Joseph Cappelluzzo says:
    March 1, 2010 at 7:15 pm

    Kerri, I live in a two/one in Hollywood, Florida with my wife and five chil­dren with one on the way. We have a 1/4 of acre with a small gar­den and we are feel­ing some­what boxed in, so we’ve decided to look for prop­erty in, believe it or not, Yellville. I‘m fly­ing in on Friday to walk 13 acres and see if things are right. Maybe when we relo­cate next year we’ll cross paths. Love your site.

    Reply
  3. Jiorgia says:
    January 7, 2010 at 11:46 pm

    My hus­band and I spent the first five years of our mar­riage in a 490 sq ft. cabin. We are in a way loop­ing back to that same idea of small home life. We cur­rently live in Bush Alaska and look for­ward to build­ing a small cabin of our own on 20 acres in Washington state, our home in the sum­mer months (thanks for the plan — it is has a great lay out). I loved the har­mony that a small space pro­vides. I love that you can share space and get along famously in the process. People who live in their gigan­tic homes lose the nec­es­sary inter­fac­ing that is vital to human inter­ac­tion. It is sad that mod­ern homes seem to iso­late peo­ple and destroy fam­ily inter­ac­tion.
    I look for­ward to read­ing more of your blog. This time around our small space will have to accom­mo­date my hus­band, daugh­ter, and me. I am look­ing for­ward to the chal­lenges and delights involved in rais­ing my babies in cozy spaces.
    Best of luck,
    Jiorgia

    Reply
    • Kerri Fivecoat-Campbell says:
      January 8, 2010 at 6:48 am

      Welcome to Living Large, Jiorgia! I agree that liv­ing in great big mon­ster houses seems to take away most inter­ac­tion between fam­ily. We don't always get along, but we try! ;)
      Good luck with your dream. Glad you found our plans use­ful. It would be easy to add a sec­ond bed­room for your daugh­ter on to them.

      Reply
  4. Emily on the Southern Prairie says:
    December 28, 2009 at 11:14 am

    Hello! A mutual inter­net friend, Lola B., sent me your way. We are kin­dred spir­its, as I shifted this May to liv­ing (and blog­ging about) the same sort of lifestyle. Great to dis­cover other folks opt­ing for less is more when it comes to con­sumer appetites and life view. Em

    Reply
  5. Ginny says:
    December 26, 2009 at 5:26 pm

    Hi Kerri,
    I was thrilled to read your arti­cle in Mother Earth News! You have done exactly what we are plan­ning on doing when we retire. We have 20 acres of land in north­ern NY on the west­ern edge of the Adirondack Mountains in an area known as the Tug Hill Plateau. It is beau­ti­ful and remote with lots of wildlife. I am really enjoy­ing your web­site and look for­ward to read­ing all of your archives. Also, your floor plan is very help­ful — very well laid out. So hope­fully, in another five years, my hus­band and our three won­der­ful dog­gies (two Cardigan Welsh Corgi's and a Collie/Spitz mix — all res­cues) will be liv­ing in our tiny remote Tug Hill cabin! I am sure we will learn a lot from read­ing your posts. Thank you.

    Reply
    • Kerri says:
      December 28, 2009 at 7:38 am

      Welcome, Ginny! I'm so glad you found the blog after read­ing the arti­cle in Mother Earth News! Congratulations on your goal to move to your land with your hus­band and dog­gies! Please keep com­ing back and let­ting us know when you get in there!

      Reply
  6. The Park Wife says:
    December 15, 2009 at 8:07 pm

    We live on a state park in Arkansas, but we are build­ing our getaway/retirement one day cabin right now. We are going to leave the small­est foot­print pos­si­ble. All solar, water catch­ment, and on and on. We just got our roof on, very excit­ing! I am so glad I found your blog, I am going to go look around now.
    The Park Wife

    Reply
  7. April says:
    December 7, 2009 at 10:28 pm

    Saw your house on the Tiny House Blog! Very cool! We live in a 12'x20' house. Will look around your site more.

    Reply
  8. Sandra says:
    December 6, 2009 at 7:57 pm

    Loved yr arti­cle in Mother Earth. We also have land on Bull Shoals Arkansas side. Currently in East Tn. try­ing to sell house and land here to move there and build our lit­tle cabin!! Family lives in Hollister and Harrsion. Brother is land sur­veyor in Harrison. I can't wait to move there!

    Reply
    • Kerri says:
      December 7, 2009 at 7:35 am

      Welcome to Arkansas, Sandra. Thanks for read­ing the Mother Earth arti­cle and find­ing Living Large. There's so many peo­ple I've met through the blog that live around here. We'll have to have a get together one of these days! Here's hop­ing for a quick sale on your house!

      Reply
  9. Theresa says:
    December 4, 2009 at 9:04 pm

    Hello~

    I loved your website~As we are the "home-tenders" of our beloved Tindel Den Cottage(she is a 50 year old block walled cot­tage). We are the first ten­ders to have lived here full-time since she was orig­i­nally designed and built in 1959. 

    At 658 square feet, we are def­i­nitely learning(over 3 years now) how to live more with less. It's amaz­ing how joy­ful you can be "sim­ply abun­dant" as a favorite writer(Miz Sarah Ban Breathnach)extoles in her won­der­ous book~

    God Bless you B*I*G!!

    Mama T
    @ Tindel Den Cottage
    Lake Wales

    Reply
  10. Sarah @ Mum In Bloom says:
    November 30, 2009 at 9:33 am

    I stum­bled across your blog and am so glad I did! Great infor­ma­tion and links. I grew up liv­ing small and didn't know any dif­fer­ent. Now that I have the option of liv­ing "larger" I opt not to. I remem­ber when I was lit­tle lov­ing the "lit­tle house" I set up in my closet :)

    Reply
  11. Greg & Judy Eason says:
    November 29, 2009 at 8:06 pm

    We have also read the arti­cle in MEN,what's really
    neat, we also have land on Bull Shoals and think­ing smaller is bet­ter. We'll be head­ing up that way in a cou­ple of months, we full time RV in a 36ft. 5th. wheel work­ing in the power indus­try, alter­ative energy is a hobby of mine and we're plan­ing to be off the grid, we'll see you soon, Thanks, Greg & Judy Eason

    Reply
  12. Greg & Judy Eason says:
    November 29, 2009 at 8:05 pm

    We have also read the arti­cle in MEN,what's really
    neat, we also have land on Bull Shoals and think­ing smaller is bet­ter. We'll be head­ing up that way in a cou­ple of months, we full time RV in a 36ft. 5th. wheel work­ing in the power indus­try, alter­ative energy is a hbby of mine and we're plan­ing to be off the grid, we'll see you soon, Thanks, Greg & Judy Eason

    Reply
  13. GARRY ROBBINS says:
    November 24, 2009 at 2:20 pm

    I READ THE ARTICLE IN MOTHER EARTH NEWS ABOUT THE COUPLE RESIDING IN A SMALL HOUSE AND THE PICTURES LOOKED ALMOST LIKE SOMETHING I WOULD LIKE TO BUILD. BUT I HAVE TROUBLE WITH SQ FEET. EXAMPLE YOU SAID HOUSE WAS 400 SQ. FT. IS IT 10 FT BY 40 FT OR IS IT 16 FT BY 25 FT.???? COULD YOU POSSIBLY TELL ME THE SIZE AND POSSIBLY SOME PICTURES FROM DIFFERENT SIDES, AND POSSIBLY A FLOOR PLAN LAYOUT? WOULD REALEY APPRECIATE THAT VERY MUCH. I HAVE FOUND A 12 FT BY 34 FT FLOOR PLAN OF AN PARK HOUSE TRL. THAT I LIKE VERY MUCH BUT WOULD HAVE TO EXPAND THE SIZE TO OBTAIN THE PERMIT FOR YEAR ROUND OCCUPANCY. THANK YOU, ROCKY

    Reply
    • Kerri says:
      November 24, 2009 at 6:23 pm

      Hi, Rocky –

      I have my aunt, who did the design of our house on a com­puter pro­gram, look­ing for it. I hope to get it posted soon. The house is actu­ally 480 square feet — 20 x 24.
      Thanks for vis­it­ing the website.

      Reply
  14. Jan Moore says:
    November 21, 2009 at 11:37 am

    I read your arti­cle in the Dec/Jan. issue of Mother Earth. My hus­band and I just pur­chased 10+
    acres In WV with plans to one day build a small (400+) cabin. We are in the process of sim­pli­fy­ing and douwn­siz­ing our lives and the sense of free­dom it brings is amaz­ing. You just don't real­ize how much "stuff" you can accu­mu­late.
    Would love to see a floor­plan of your cabin or at least the dimen­sions, etc. Thanks!

    Reply
    • Kerri says:
      November 21, 2009 at 8:14 pm

      Hi, Jan,

      That's a good sug­ges­tion for a post. I'll see if I can find the floor plan and get it scanned. Thanks for vis­it­ing and I hope you'll post more about your lit­tle dream house!

      Reply

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