Parking spot for the winter!

Ok, all of you guys are going to be insanely jealous when you see the view from where my porch will be starting October 15!  I'm renting a space in Hurricane, UT from a couple who are full-time RV-ers. They are going to Yuma for the winter. Hurricane must be where we are supposed to be for a handful of reasons. #1 It was effortless. #2 they had quite a few people inquire, but no takers (until me). #3 It feels like home. #4 there is grass (not just rocks). #5 it feels like the country, but I'm five minutes to everything. #6 the breeze just reminded me that Mom is watching out for me. #7 My new backyard and neighborhood are amazing! #8 It is right next to a place that does helicopter tours of Zion NP (added to the bucket list). And now for the jealousy section of this post. 

The future view from my porch will be this. 

My neighborhood looks like this. 

And this.

And this. (this is the campground I'm staying at, not my new home)

A choice is made!

The choice is (drumroll please) to stay the winter (and maybe longer) in St. George, UT.  After going back and reading through my journal entries and blog posts from the past 7 weeks...yes, Nellie and I have been on the road for 7 weeks...I realized that I actually did get that "home" feeling when we turned north after going through Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona.  But since I was expecting that "home" feeling to come while we were driving down the west coast, I didn't recognize it.  I figured that feeling was just a happy-to-be-back-on-familiar-ground feeling.  

So, I've made some calls today to find out about campground hosting positions and a couple of RV parks that allow longer stays (one even has a tiny house already staying).  We are headed that direction tomorrow to check out the area a bit more and to look at some spaces for staying.  If any of you have a place that I could park the tiny house and live in it in the St. George area, please get in touch with me.  I'm continuing to look for a piece of property to purchase, so we'll just see what comes up.  I know Nellie is ready to not get back in the Jeep, except for short rides.  :)  Once we have something set up in the next couple of days, we'll return to Ogden and retrieve Ticklebelly Bungalow and head south for the winter.

I've really been enjoying the fall colors so far.  I must admit that i feel like autumn happened over night.  Just a week ago we were in Ashland where it was 102 degrees, now it is getting quite chilly at night and Nellie needs her coat in the morning so she doesn't get the shivers.

PS.  This isn't Nellie's coat, it is mine, but I didn't have hers that morning.  Luckily, I put her coat where I knew I could find it in the Bungalow so it was easy to retrieve.  Now she looks much more dignified in her very own dog coat.

Ticklebelly Bungalow pics

If you are looking for pics of Ticklebelly Bungalow, you have to go WAY back in the blog!  So I decided to post a few here so you don't have to look so hard.  :D

Porch view (at the TV station in San Diego)

Port side

Kitchen view

From the sleeping loft looking down at the fantastic art of my friend Leslie Baylinson.

My closet

The bow.

And Finally, my FAVorite picture.

Steve and The Adventurer

 I haven't posted in ten days. No building progress on any projects. No progress on finding a place for Ticklebelly Bungalow to land more permanently...feeling a little discouraged about that.  

On the other hand, I finished my goal of driving down the West Coast of the US from Washington to San Diego.  What an amazing journey!  I highly recommend it.  Added a couple of items to the bucket list.

More on paragraph one.  My expectation was that I would drive into a place and it would feel like home and that would be the landing place of TB. I did my best to pay attention to my heart as I drove along. All through Washington, Oregon, Northern California I didn't get the "home" feeling I was waiting for.  So I figured maybe Southern California was it...San Diego, where I have a community of tiny housers already, a possible place to park, the beach, and weather conducive to year-round gardening.  I really wanted to get that "home" feeling there...but no, didn't feel it.  I drove back up I-5 through the Central Valley of California through orchards, vineyards, and farms (amazing btw). Still didn't feel it.  I had previously wanted to drive through southern Oregon, (Grant's Pass, Medford, Ashland), so now I've done that too...still not feeling the "home" feeling.  I'm currently camping in Ashland, OR, beautiful place, debating what is next.  As I see it the options are: keep driving and hope to find that "home"-ness, or find a parking place for the Bungalow wherever and make it work.  (Although, if we're going for the make it work option, I'm going back to San Diego! :D )  

A funny:

Driving along the coast in Northern California the road is cut into the cliffside. To my great surprise, I saw a cattle crossing sign.  I puzzled over the idea of cows crossing or being in the road in that particular location.  The hillside angled steeply on both sides of the road and I could imagine mountain goats, but cows?  Not likely.  Where would they come from...or go to?  In the midst of my cow contemplation, I went around an s-curve and on the embankment between the road and the drop toward the ocean sat five cows. Oh, how I wish I had a go-pro!  Completely baffled by the presence of cows on that road...still.

An adventure -er:

In Newport, OR there is a kite store, called The Kite Store, where I went in to buy a kite (imagine that).  I was looking for a unique kite that was just the right size, not too big, not too small, that I could fly at the beach.  I LOVE kites at the beach.  After looking at small kites, big kites, box kites, triangular kites, rectangular kites, plain kites, and plane kites, I found the perfect beach kite!  It is shaped like a ship complete with sails and oars.  We (Nellie and I) finally got to fly it just north of Santa Cruz, CA on a perfectly windy day in August or maybe September, where I named it "The Adventurer" and we met a new friend named Steve. (This is sounding like a children's story)  Here is The Adventurer. Really need to get a pic of it flying...amazing!