Tiny House Update: The Outdoor Kitchen, Compost Toilet and Rainwater Harvesting

Robin Greenfield sitting on the window of his tiny house.
Alternative HomesEnvironmentFloridaOff the GridSustainable LivingTiny Home Living

UPDATE: 
The house is complete!
Take a tour via this video:


The tiny house is still a work in progress, but it’s coming together more and more every day!
The work is no longer feeling like a chore. Instead I’m putting really good energy and love into each task and really enjoying it.
Plus, we just dropped from day time highs of 90 degrees to about 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Fall is finally here it seems!
I wanted to share some photos of the outside of my house, since none of you have seen it yet.

I have an outdoor kitchen, currently cooking with propane but I am getting a bio digester soon which will convert food waste into gas for cooking. I also have a solar oven that I’ll begin using more soon. Plus, I’ll make a rocket stove for cooking with wood that I collect from the neighborhood. My favorite thing about the outdoor kitchen is that it’s so easy to clean. Spill on the ground? No problem! It’ll just soak into the soil.


I have rainwater set up on Lisa’s house. That’s the big white totes. I can store 550 gallons of water there. I also have 110 gallons of rainwater storage on my tiny house in the blue barrels. I purify the rainwater with a @berkey_filters for drinking. Rainwater is also used for showering, washing dishes, and growing food. Cool rainwater showers are the life for me! No water goes down a drain to become someone else’s burden here. Instead it nourishes the land I am a steward to and grows me nourishing food.

I have an outdoor compost toilet (still need to put on walls). The finished product is called Humanure, which will be used on fruit trees to grow healthy, organic fruit. Bokashi is used as an effective microorganism to speed up the breakdown process. Plus, it smells great (the Bokashi that is, my poop of course smells like poop), but you’d be amazed at how effectively a compost toilet works. You can stick your nose right up to it and have no clue your face is a foot from poop. My guests test it, so it’s not just me!
Oh and I grow my own toilet paper! See the soft green leaves below.


That’s just a little glimpse of my outdoor living space. It’s not complete, but I wanted to give you all an update. I will put out a video tour sometime soon, once I’ve got the place in full working order!
Health and happiness to you all!
Robin
Photos by Sierra Ford Photography
For more watch: How I Built my Tiny House for Under $1,500 with 100% Repurposed Materials and Near Zero Waste
and read the guide that I created on my tiny house build.

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