As the Dinesens Turn, Episode 2
Living in 300 square feet in Portugal, versus living in 3,000 square feet in the U.S. That is the topic of Episode 2 of As the Dinesens Turn.
Welcome to our back patio. This is where we spend a lot of time. I have to say that the outdoor space, when you live in 300 square feet, like literally on top of each other, outdoor space makes a big difference. We spend a lot of time out here. The bird loves it out here. He's out here every day. Because almost every day is exactly what you see, exactly like this.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, most days the low is like 45 to 50, and the high is 70 to 75. Sometimes it gets to the upper 70s. And when you look at the long-range forecast on weather apps, it never seems to change. I don't know. It's like this way through July.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Well, we'll see what happens. We'll see. I have to say the rain is something that we've kind of figured out now. So it does rain quite a bit, which is why it's so pretty and green back there. Um, but it I mean, it rains a couple of days every couple of weeks. Um, and it'll be torrential, torrential rain, and then it will stop. And then it will torrentially rain, and then it will stop. So it's not consistent.
SPEAKER_00So we're trying something new this time. Our first episode was just us recording audio, which is really okay for podcast purposes. But for those of you watching on YouTube or various other places, I guess, where this would get posted, and you have the ability to watch video, we're recording it at our back patio. So you might hear things. The bird is over that way and may chirp along, and cars drive by every now and then because there's you can't see it, but there's a road down the hill, and neighbors might walk by and the dogs go crazy. So you may you may hear things, but that just enhances, I guess, the natural feel of everything. We've we're working on the setup, it's not perfect. I'm kind of an audio snob, and so like the audio is never good enough. So the setup, I'm sure, will be changing, and I'm not quite sure how, but we'll try to make it so that there's not this microphone just sitting kind of here in the middle of us.
SPEAKER_01But well, okay, so 300 square feet from 3,000 square feet. I'd have to say the biggest thing that we learned was um if it fits inside of a suitcase, then it could come. Um, anything that was wearing out, anything that looked like it was um, I don't know, needed to be replaced because we hold on to things for a while. That was something that we went ahead and and got rid of. Anything we knew we could replace here, we went ahead and let go. Um, but it was all of the stuff that there were some things that were non-negotiable, um, like your sound equipment, um, the kids' video games and their video consoles. That was that was never gonna be something we could get rid of. My my chef's coat, my chef's knifes, like those types of things, um, are the things we brought. And the animals, yes, we did have to pare down animals, but we did bring both dogs and one of the cats. And I'm gonna sneak this this direction just to show the bird. There's our bird. Yeah, he's back there. He's very cute.
SPEAKER_00But on our blog, that was our first blog post, and the first video may not have been our first blog post, I guess, but it was our first video was the adventure of getting the bird, which was uh it as the dinosaurs turn type of moment where the day started with no intention of doing anything like that, and then suddenly we end up with a bird and spend hours searching around the town to get bird supplies. But I guess that's a different story for another day. If we talk about 3,000 square feet to 300 square feet, I mean, multiple times we got dumpsters over the last few months that we lived in Iowa.
SPEAKER_01We did sell quite a few things, even though we also had people who helped us out at the end. I mean, Dave and Amy came through and took care of a lot of our trash and all of that kind of stuff. Becky, God bless her. Um, she's wonderful and has been such a great backup for us, like selling things, donating things, making sure things went to appropriate places because we really did just run out of time. But we've learned a few things in moving to 300 square feet. Um, and to kind of give you the idea, I mean, in our old house, I had plenty of countertop space. Like I did, I didn't want for countertop space, I didn't want for storage, I didn't want for pantry storage. Um, now I have three cabinets, I have two shelves on the wall, I have a portable oven, which we bought three days in because I decided I could not live without one. We needed to have one. And we have a um what we would call in the USA dorm refrigerator. So um, but um, we've gotten a rolling cart from additional dry storage and those types of things. But I I think that you have to think about your life differently. Yeah, you just have to think about everything differently.
SPEAKER_00We should probably do a video, I suppose, walking through the house if we get it to a state where it's clean.
SPEAKER_01Um it's everywhere. It's clean, but it's not always clean, uh like the entirety at one time.
SPEAKER_00There's still clutter. Yeah. And uh so when we get that squared up, maybe we'll walk through and do a little video of the living space. I mean, you get used to it though. I don't I mean sometimes with the kids, I think it would be nice to have separate rooms for them or for everybody to have doors that close and things like that. But I mean, overall, I think you get used to it, and I think it teaches you that I don't know, maybe you don't need as much stuff as you as you accumulated in the larger house.
SPEAKER_01But I also think we spend our time very differently than what we did. Um, I mean, of course, we were working all of the time and all of those things, and we're still working quite a bit of the time, but we're working in different spaces, like we're working out on the patio, um, which you can't do a lot of the time in Iowa just because of the real elements of what it's like. Um, I'd say also the kids are spending their time very differently. Like they are not consistently on um technology. Um, they are out laying in the hammock. Um, we drag them for our walk um around the neighborhood every now and again. Um they like to go down to the beach. Um, sometimes I wish they'd go down there more. But I'd have to say that we spend our time very differently.
SPEAKER_00And we spend, I don't know, our mornings are spent doing errands and things like that. And then afternoons is usually when I work, which would coincide with what would be morning, I guess, in in Iowa. And then I don't know, the days just seem to kind of go. They're not going as fast as they were in the beginning, I think just because maybe we've gotten used to it. But um, it's a it's a different pace of life, I guess.
SPEAKER_01Well, I would also say we don't have something that has to be accomplished every single day that we have to do in order to, you know, live in the country. And so I think that makes a big difference um as well. But I spend a lot of time going back and forth between our house and the school. Um, so the car was really important. Um, I think that was one of the things that we probably should have moved more quickly on instead of having long-term rentals and those things. But I'd have to say at the same time, that was the one thing that, you know, we really needed. Um we luckily were able to um get a place that was fully furnished um and had sheets and towels and everything, so we didn't have to get all of those things. We did buy more towels because the ones that came with this place are white and I have dirty children.
SPEAKER_00Someone's walking by as if you hear dogs arcing, that's why.
SPEAKER_01But I'd have to say that like so. We got we got some more towels. I miss I miss kitchen appliances. Um and I can only really use like I have a four-burner stove, but because there's no countertop space, you can really only use two of them. Um, because it's like the four-burner stove, there's their art. Oh well, there is our coffee pot, which we did a big splurge for our coffee, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, if we had to go buy buy a coffee pot. Actually, it's a coffee maker, I guess.
SPEAKER_01It's more than a coffee maker. It is a dream. It is a you can get one espresso shot, you can get a double shot, you can get a long coffee, you can get the equivalent of a really watered-down Americano that nobody would want to drink. It froths milk, it grinds its own beans. It's it's a miracle. Um, and that was something that we finally bought in realizing that we drink a lot of coffee here. Um, I drink a lot more coffee here than I would drink, probably in the States. But I there's also not a Starbucks for me to drive through and be like, oh, I'm gonna get another one of these today. Um, which is kind of sad. If I could transfer stars to people, I probably should. Um, but I'd have to say that we that that was a big that was a big expense next to the car. That's probably the most we've sent on anything. Um but it's already almost paid for itself.
SPEAKER_00That's true.
SPEAKER_01When you have five or six coffees a day, it goes it goes pretty quickly.
SPEAKER_00That's true. So when we moved out of 3,000 square feet, and we had two suitcases and two carry-on items, and that was it.
SPEAKER_01Well, and to be honest, our when we talk about suitcases, we're talking about 120-liter um duffel bags. So we're not talking small suitcases, we're talking giant, 120-liter, like the biggest duffel, rolling duffel bags you could find that you could then collapse. That was the idea. I found this online. I was like, oh, well, that's a brilliant tip. Um, I've seen people move in the soft-sided IKEA luggage, too, that you can buy. That was that we saw somebody at the airport that was pretty ingenious. Um, and then any suitcases we had. We did take our smaller suitcases that we couldn't take on the plane with us because we had animals. A calso is counted as checked luggage or carrions. Um, we did pack them inside of things. So we did that. Um, that also served for some of the more breakable items and the things that you were worried about getting here, like the microphones and all of that, or the video consoles, um, giving them a little more padding. We brought quilts that my mom had made for all of us. Those are definite, and my aunts like like those are things that we brought with us. We brought things that really mattered the most.
SPEAKER_00I think that the biggest eye-opening thing is just what do you really need and how much stuff you accumulate through the years. And obviously, you don't have to move out of the country to downsize. I mean, people downsize all the time, but just the act of downsizing. Um, whether it's something that you're doing on purpose. Well, everybody does it on purpose, I guess, but like you're moving like we did, or your kids have grown up and you're empty nesters and you don't need as much space, so you start getting rid of stuff, or whatever the reason is. Yeah, everybody that I've talked to talks about how cathartic it is to go through all of your stuff and throw stuff out or donate it and just keep the things that you really need.
SPEAKER_01And I would say that we're also very conscientious about now what comes into our small space if anything comes in. So it's always it's either a storage problem, like we're trying to solve, like where do you hang all of your wet coats and all of those things? Um, so you know, like where what are we doing? We're we're we're dealing with problems or issues or things that we're trying to solve. Um, or it's things that we're like, I love this. I have I I love this. This needs to be part of our house, like this needs to be part of our lives. And as you know, we have to acknowledge that this rental is a wonderful place for us to land. Um, we are trying to buy a place that is bigger. It's not as big as what we had, but we do have doors. Um, if the children share a room or not, I still we still haven't decided yet because we still need an office and all of those things. And so um, but I think that we're still very conscientious about we only want things that we really want um in that space.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So I think it might be more impactful when we get uh the video up of what the inside of the house really looks like and you know what is 300 square feet, and it's essentially a a loft, I guess.
SPEAKER_01It is. So we I mean, it sounds like we've got we've got a lower level, which is basically, you know, a decent sized room, which is the living room, dining room, kitchen, all in one. And when I say decent sized room, I'd say an average small bedroom in the US, right? Um, the bathroom, oh thank God for the bathroom. The shower in and of itself was just like, yes, I I will live there. It's a giant shower. But then upstairs, we have loft spaces and we're lofted up against. I mean, if you've lived in a like a story and a half, you know, you've got like the the pitched roofs and all of those things. And so um it's really we don't really have storage, so we've got one whole wall that's full of. I mean, I always feel like it's on my side of the bed. So I always feel like I'm drowning in things, but it's just empty suitcases. Um, because that's where we have that suit. So we have a bed up there, and then um on the other side of the loft, there's a bed right above the bathroom, and that's where the boys sleep. So um, you also have to think about here though, not just about solving problems and making sure you have storage, everything has to be waterproof.
SPEAKER_00That's true.
SPEAKER_01It has to be waterproof because you're in a stone home, right? So water's gonna see, it's just going to, there is going to be damp. Um, there's not central heating air, any of those things. I mean, you have to open windows, like we've got screens on our doors right now to try and keep bugs out as much as possible. But um, even they cleared the lot next to us, and I'm finding all kinds of bugs in the house now because they've flooded to our house to get away from you know, the environment now that's their living arrangements.
SPEAKER_00So I think that the point of this episode, uh I guess, is just downsize, just do it. I would say whatever your reason is, whether it's as extreme as what our reason was, or it's just you want to start going through your stuff. I think that downsizing is an excellent thing for people to do.
SPEAKER_01Well, and we can keep up with it now. That's the other piece of it. It's easy to keep up with because there's less of it, there's less space, and we spend our time doing other things.
SPEAKER_00So all right. Well, we'll get a video up of what the inside of our house looks like. And catch us again next time on another episode of the As the Dinosons Turn podcast.