Hi, I'm Erin!

It's my pleasure to meet you all.

I'm totally normal.

My hobbies are wood block printing, listening to music, cooking, and clothes shopping.

I have a cat, a dog, and a girlfriend.

I speak 2.5 languages.

I followed the trend and got a stuffed shark.

Hi Erin,

Welcome to Permies.

Hello, welcome

Thanks for the warm welcome!

I would like to live in a smaller town with a good community and public transit.

Kind of my ideal place is a multipurpose building and a garden. I want a bakery of my own... and a garden in the back. And my house up top. Ideally, I'd buy an older building and remodel it. Especially since I need a 110 outlet on the floor in the dining room (the heater on a kotatsu requires 110v ac.), and I have some ideas about sustainable architecture (and I know 2 draftsmen and an architect that can get me past the red tape.)

I definitely want 2 ume trees in my garden....
And to put also some bamboo and pine there. Pine needle tea is very pleasant. And if I grow the bamboo with big leaves, it will support my hobbies. Plus the 3 plants together are a common grouping in old gardens. I figure there's a reason, like companions or something.

As for the more intense agriculture, I don't think I am cut out for that. But if there is a community garden, then maybe I would be involved. I like having greens and herbs available all summer.

Not everyone can live in the country, and city live has its perks.

Welcome Erin! You'll find a number of us here in urbanish locations- small gardens, but lots and lots of things packed in there. Maybe not bamboo, since that tends to take over (that's on my list for when we pack up and get slightly more land, hopefully in a bit).
Also on my list for that next house is a kotatsu, current house is on a concrete pad and that didn't work so well last time i tried it....
You'll find a lot of us have plenty to say about cooking, baking, clothes, music, art.... everything except for stuffed sharks (you might have to start a thread on that one). Look forward to seeing what you're doing!

Tereza Okava wrote:Welcome Erin! You'll find a number of us here in urbanish locations- small gardens, but lots and lots of things packed in there. Maybe not bamboo, since that tends to take over (that's on my list for when we pack up and get slightly more land, hopefully in a bit).
Also on my list for that next house is a kotatsu, current house is on a concrete pad and that didn't work so well last time i tried it....
You'll find a lot of us have plenty to say about cooking, baking, clothes, music, art.... everything except for stuffed sharks (you might have to start a thread on that one). Look forward to seeing what you're doing!

Oh, if you want a temporary nihonheiya (Japanese room), you can make a false floor on top of an existing concrete pad.
You'd use 2x6 boards as joists, 2x8 ft osb subfloor panels or tongue and groove boards, and put the tatami on top. Tatami come in a few standard sizes including a 3 x 6 shaku and also a metric standard size.

The nominal 6 inch space could have drawers under it, or be used to run wiring for the kotatsu. You can cover the lumber with a nicer reclaimed hardwood as well.
For more privacy, its not super hard to make shoji or fusuna doors. But the simplest way is to remove the western door from the frame and install a noren. It's a split curtain. I had a really nice one with a fat sleeping cat on it. It's good for between the kitchen and dining room since it will keep the steam or smoke in the kitchen but let you walk through easily carrying food with both hands.

Lovely!
We built one just like you explained in an apartment I had once in Japan--- it's definitely not hard, assuming you can get tatami. Sadly, in the corner of South America I live in now, that's not happening! (I make a lot of things but tatami would involve crossing the line from "cool and crafty" to "bloody mental").
This house will hopefully be sold in the next few years, when the kid graduates college. The next house, with any luck, will be too warm to need a kotatsu, as we move few hours north of here and become officially "tropical", but we're hoping to incorporate the old Japanese house style with breezeways, shoji doors, and nice raised porches into wherever we end up: I'm hoping to rehab an old house. The norens, well, we have plenty of them and they'll be coming with!!

Ohh, I envy that.

One of these days I'm going to ramen crawl like frat boys do bars...

But until then I have to be satisfied with my trips to Little Tokyo or other large cities with Japanese neighborhoods.

It can't be helped.