Self-Reliance is about helping others

A large part of our homesteading goals have been focused on becoming as self-reliant as we can. Recently I have realized that this often means working with others. Self-reliance is not a solitary life, rather one in which we work as a community to survive. As we become more self-reliant we obtain more ways to contribute to our family's survival and that of our community. In this way building our skills and knowledge are extremely important and valuable. When we started our tiny house build our first focus was to get a home finished that would provide a shelter for our family. Since that time we have realized that helping others do the same is extremely valuable. I now look at our tiny house as a canvas for learning and sharing.

Progress we have made
Recently we were the recipients of a large amount of reclaimed wood. It has been a joy finding various ways to use this wood in our home. Here are some of our projects that we have been working on. Please keep in mind that most of our projects still need work to be completed. Almost everything in both of the pictures was built using reclaimed wood. The one exception is I cut out the city chair rail on the located on the right of the barn door and installed it before I got my reclaimed wood. However I would have loved to do that project with reclaimed wood. The bookshelf, the ceiling above the bed, the white painted wood on the walls in the bedroom, the barn door and the wall the barn door is installed on are all done with reclaimed wood. I have really enjoyed building these things for our home, and I enjoy coming up with fun solutions for our spaces in our tiny home. When I first started looking for wood that was free I saw many posts on using shipping pallets. Not only are these difficult to retrieve the wood from but most of the wood we found from these pallets was in terrible shape. I applaud anyone who is able to create beautiful furniture and builds from this wood. However I have yet to be able to do anything but build some really ugly enclosures for my animals from pallets. However, I was blessed to get some wood that was destined to be tossed after its use as an enclosure for some large signs that were installed. I felt really blessed to receive this wood, and I went to work as quickly as I could when I got the wood to use it in my home. I didn't want the sun or weather to damage the wood as much as possible. Although I love how my projects turned out, I feel that I have learned a lot; as I work on future projects I hope to refine my skills as a builder to make more beautiful pieces for my home.