Double Decker Bus!

tBOY drove the bus!  We've moved it to the land.

Bus leaving its home beside our current cabin

2.5km down the dirt road

turning down into the driveway

It's here to stay for a while, so we pulled out the STOP sign!

We hired a new carpenter.  We are learning so much: what we need, our skills and our limitations.  We realized that the first tCarpenter needed direction from us that we did not know how to provide (since this is all new to us too). It turns out that we need someone with more project management experience which we hope we've found in our new tCarpenter.

So this new tCarpenter has given us this idea to go big!  What?!  Isn't that what we were avoiding?  Yes, yes.  But... we actually really like his idea and so we have made some modifications to the design :)!  Instead of a sleeping loft (with little head room that would be potentially claustrophobia-inducing) we are now building an actual second floor.  Yep.  A 7-foot-high ceiling so that tBOY can actually stand in it.  In fact, we are building a bedroom on one side and the living room on the other.  Which means that we are freeing up space downstairs so we can have a dining area (think dinner parties!)

We ordered and paid for (eeks!) the appliances (stove, fridge, washer/dryer) which gave us the size/dimensions information we needed to do the layout:

The appliances should be here by the weekend or early next week.  Then we can put them into the bus to really get a sense of how it will feel in the space.  I also ordered the wood stove which will take a little longer to arrive.  Today, I've been researching toilets.  It's the one thing I want new (!)  I would have been fine with secondhand appliances (if we had the time to drive around town checking them out) but a brand new toilet is my one request!  We need something compact, but a specialty toilet means more $$$.  So perhaps we will just enlarge the washroom to accommodate a smaller standard toilet.  We'll see.  Please share if you have tips about toilets in small spaces.

Since we now have a tall upstairs area, we will need windows.  We want to make the space feel as open and spacious as possible and we want windows on all sides.  I went to a home building recycling centre yesterday to check out what they have:

I went there thinking that I would come home with all the windows that we need.  But it turns out that there are too many to choose from (more than in the photo) and I became overwhelmed and realized that I don't know exactly what we want/need.  Sigh!  The same went for sinks and the front door (we will sadly replace the school bus door with a real one that we can lock)...

So this morning was about making more accurate measurements on the bus and drawing a little diagram for myself (it is less convenient having the bus 2.5km away vs. 100m).  Armed with that, I'll head back to the recycling store soon. A friend has offered to give me some windows for free (bonus!)  So I'm going to check those out tomorrow.

As for construction, tCarpenter is confirming his material list with the big box home building store as I type.  Phase one will be the second floor (how exciting!!)  tBOY and I will pay for the materials and make arrangements for delivery (apparently it will be delivered with a crane - Ooo!)  And then building time: probably this weekend (have to confirm with tCarpenter).  So... our bus could look very different by next week :)!

On another note... I went and got some books from the library about gardening:

Time for some reading. Until next time :)!