Bill Maciejko anticipated the move to tiny houses before the concept began to explode in the U.S. and on Canada's West Coast at the start of this century.
In 1995, Maciejko purchased a large tract of land north of Gimli on which there was a homesteader's cabin with a dubious roof and an unlevel floor. At night while he slept, a population of rodents living in the walls and under the floor would emerge, disrupting his sleep by running over his bed and, at times, across his face. A nature lover, Maciejko would rouse himself to shoo the little animals away because he thought traps were cruel.
As the well-fed rodent population began to increase, he realized the time had come to find less-crowded shelter.
He decided to buy a narrow trailer, which he moved onto his property.
"The living area was about 300 square feet, so I was a little cramped, but the roof didn't leak and the floor was solid."
His plan was to add another 400 square feet to the building over a period of years, as allowed by his finances.
In retrospect, he wishes he had borrowed more money and completed the addition in a shorter time.
"If I'd done it that way, the renovation would have been completed long ago, saving me time and money."
As it is, he said he is still working on the plumbing, relying on a laundromat in Gimli to wash his clothes.
A meticulous woodworker and jack of many trades, Maciejko added a 100-amp service, running new wiring through the trailer and the addition.
He reconstructed the roofs of both sections with web trusses and framed the renovation with two-inch by six-inch wall studs and two-inch by 10-inch floor joists.
The outside of the 700-square-foot house is covered with OSB painted forest green; the trim is chocolate brown and the handmade window casings are white with a slightly arched top and side trims with an acorn detail at the bottom.
"To save money, I did most of the work myself, though I did have a concrete footing poured by a local contractor," he said.
The renovated space includes a box-out that serves as a small dining area with windows looking out over the wild flowers, grasses and maple trees that grow abundantly in his yard.
Maciejko used a router to create coved trims and rosette corner blocks on the interior window trims.
He also built much of the cabinetry and drywalled and taped the interior himself.
"Drywalling is odious work, but taping is torture," said Maciejko, adding at one point he was going to hire a professional but couldn't afford the extravagance.
A moderately sized deck, including double-glazed sliding doors, graces the south elevation and affords an exceptional view of an enormous flock of snowbuntings that gather in Maciejko's yard each winter.
An avid birder who co-operates with of the Canadian Snow Bunting Network, he feeds the lovely birds daily from their arrival in winter to their departure in spring.
With the exception of limited cupboard space, Maciejko said his single-bedroom house has sufficient area for his living purposes, including two large dogs.
His one regret is he didn't start with a square structure because this shape can be divided into four equal areas that accommodate furniture, countertops and cupboards more efficiently than elongated rooms.
On the upside, his well-insulated small house can be heated during the coldest winter days with a couple of armloads of firewood.
When Maciejko leaves for work at KC Enterprises Ltd. in Gimli in the morning, he loads his energy-efficient woodstove, which keeps the home toasty throughout the day. In the evening, he fills it again, maintaining a consistently comfortable temperature overnight.
Though the tiny-home movement is predominantly an American phenomenon at this point, it continues to gather adherents.
The idea to build small is related to the fact fossil fuels are becoming more precious, more expensive and, especially in the case of coal-generated power, more of a pollutant.
With this in mind, proponents of tiny houses find it odd people continue to create larger and large homes that may require 400-watt electrical panels and two or more gas furnaces to power and heat their juggernauts.
To paraphrase Sarah Susanka, author of The Not So Big House, does a family of four really require almost 3,000 square feet of living area, not including swimming pools, hottubs and other energy-consuming gadgets?
The answer for many people is no.
Susanka's alternative is to live smaller, building viable homes as small as 100 square feet to a maximum of about 700 square feet.
As tiny houses are much less expensive to build and to heat, they offer an escape from the cycle of debt that almost 70 per cent of homeowners are trapped in today, according to statistics from the tiny house movement in the U.S.
Local zoning regulations may require minimum square footage of 1,000 or more square feet for new construction.
On the pro side, tiny buildings can be built by a DIYer with minimal carpentry skills or plans can be ordered online from an organization such as the Tumbleweed Tiny House Company at www.tumbleweedhouses.com.
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