Searching on line for a place to stay on our little mini vacation to the Black Hills of South Dakota, we came across this darling little tiny house only 5 miles away from Mt. Rushmore.  The pictures were perfect, just enough room for the three of us, providing us everything we needed.  Not fancy,  just cute and cozy.  Having been intrigued by the concept of tiny houses for years, now was our chance to check one out for real.

As we drove up to the house, our excitement grew – such a cute little house with a cute little porch!  It was brand new, so it still had that new wood smell to it.  We opened the door and stepped in to what we just knew would be our cozy little fairy land for the next few days.  Then we tried to get our stuff upstairs to the loft.

Everything is condensed and shrunk down in a tiny house.  The stairs, conveniently located next to the front door had to be entered sideways, just enough room for a person, but not necessarily enough room for a person AND their stuff.  Oh, and the steps were different heights, not the same distance between to fit better in the space, so stepping down was sometimes a bit of a surprise until we got used to it.  Creativity came into play in trying to figure out the best way to get up and down.  We eventually figured out it was better to almost crawl on all fours to get up and to go down sideways against the wall until you got to the bottom where you needed to go backward and step sideways off of the steps into the entryway, or bathroom, depending on how long your step was.  And I had never considered what it might be like to navigate the stairs at 3:00 a.m. when I need to get up and use the restroom while half asleep.  Let’s just say I was awake by the time I crawled back.

Upstairs, there was one place where we could actually stand up, but the rest of the time we had to stoop.   In the pictures, it looked like the bed was a king size, very wide with a nice headboard with two quaint little wood stump side tables.  Well, pictures can be deceiving. The bed was NOT king sized, but rather a double on its side, so that meant someone was right up against the wall and/or the other was falling off the edge of the bed.  Thank goodness the floor wasn’t very far!  Did I mention there was no storage?  Oops.  The cute little bed we thought was a twin that we had seen in the upstairs pics with the “king” bed was, you guessed it – a toddler bed.  So no, David’s 5’9″ frame was not going to fit there, although he did have a good laugh trying it out.

So it was downstairs to the futon  for him where he could take two steps to the kitchen if need be.  The little banquette reminded me of my seats at Husker football games – not large enough for actual adult behinds.  The three of us could fit on the futon to watch TV which worked fine, as we’re a close family.  The “chandelier” hanging in the middle of the room was ok for us because we’re short, but if you are 6′ tall, forget it. Again, no storage so our stuff was everywhere, making what little space we had even smaller.

Ah, but the best part of the tiny house was the bathroom.  It was very nice with all the necessities, just on a smaller scale.  The tiny shelf ran right below the regular (and only) outlet in the room where my hairdryer plug almost fit flat.  It worked.  The cute little floor rug was great when the door was open, but had to be moved if you actually wanted to get in and use the bathroom, so it was pushed into a corner.  The adorable little sink was so shallow that if you had any stream of water running it splashed out on you and everything else.  The toilet reminded of those Kindergarten toilets at school.  Ok, maybe not that small, but you get my drift.  And the shower.  Now I know what Katniss felt like going up in the tube to fight the Hunger Games.

So would I do this again?  We did have fun laughing at all the silly features of the house and maybe with some more square feet (this was 300) and a better floor plan which my son kept saying he could do, I would do it again.  In the meantime, I think I’ll stick to hotels and my king size beds and leave the tiny house to tinier people.