Tiny House Couch(es)

I am just wrapping up my latest project which is my couch.  Over time thise part of my house has shifted considerably, first it was just me, then me and a dog, then me, a partner and a dog and since then we’ve added two little kiddos.  You need space for as many buts as you have in your tiny house!

Here is where I started

I was thinking, ‘hey, this is going to be tough, where are all my friends going to sleep when they come over??’ So I made it a priority to have a guest bed and found a hide-a-bed loveseat on Craigslist, it was cheap, I was going to refinish it but this was ‘perfect’.  It actually was pretty comfy, it is a joke in hindsight that I felt I needed a ‘spare bed’. I don’t EVER entertain, let alone have sleep overs… AND my entire family lives in town, it’s likely I would only need it for a family member but all of my family has spare rooms, which would likely be a first choice for most of my family, really it came down to my cousin Sage coming to town, I’m not sure this would have even cut it for her and her husband… who would probably find it a little creepy :).

No bother, Denver chewed it up one day while I was at work!  It was probably ‘fixable’ but at that point I had come to my senses and figured a nice cozy chair would probably suit me better

I got this:

It was great, too little for the dog to goober up (wrong, Great Danes can make themselves remarkably small…), it reclined and seemed to have decent reviews (it was horribly uncomfortable…)

James moved in.  We got a seat for his butt:

This has been our constant.  This chair is very comfy, I never really thought it looked comfy but it is! and it’s impossible to make look ‘dirty’ because it’s already dirt colored!  I could move it around, it’s been a stool, an ottoman, it’s been rearranged so many times… it’s great.

Denver chewed up the grey chair arm (the day before the photoshoot).  I was secretly happy though his timing was bad!  We found out we would soon be adding a third butt to the tiny house, we got this:

A little two seater.  I purposefully picked one similar to the brown chair because it was cozy, it never quite translated over.  I love this little blue couch, James never quite did.  Really the dog preferred it to his bed and made it pretty gross pretty constantly… It hid dirt well, let me rearrange like I like, constantly.  I’ll admit though, Denver made it gross and eventually wore down the springs making it rickety… AND, we would soon be adding yet ANOTHER butt so we looked at other options.  We decided to go with this:

This is just two cheap pieces of foam ($15.00) from Fred Meyer’s outdoor section, usually used as sleep pads for camping. They are 30″ deep and 72″ wide, I love the size, I could curl up in the corner and the two babes could curl up on me for a nap while I read or watch TV… It was a super big PITA because the two pieces of foam would come apart any time Denver would step up there… Every morning I would have to re-situate the foam and at least once or twice through the day.  It was nice because, while we were testing out the size we just threw a blanket over it and it was removable and could be washed so it wasn’t always gross like the blue couch… It was too deep to sit comfortable as a couch even though it was great for lounging.  In the mean time, while building our deck I made this:

This is 25″ deep and 6′ long and has proved to be PERFECT.  Since making this I determined it was time to re-do the inside couch…  Now that the babies are a little older, napping more in their beds than on me it is time to reclaim the couch from a lounger to a sitter! Today, I made this:

It’s not quite done, I still have to sew the pillows together but it’s already a very good addition!  We have a fabric store going out of business so I took the opportunity to get a whole bunch of fabric, throw pillows and a great big foam pad (cost $150 normally for just the foam!), I got everything for well under $100 and could not be happier with it!  I probably wouldn’t have done it at full price but I feel lucky to have got the sale!

Here are some pictures of the build!

This is as much planning as I ever seem to do for projects, here is my couch plan... 🙂 Drives some people nuts but I don't seem to function any other way!

Figuring out the panels below

I never want to have to screw the underside of anything a footish off the ground again! man it was tough!

I ended up linking all of these panels together so they act as one and they flip up, they look like drawers but they aren't, they just act to keep the boy child from crawling below the couch, because he's an explorer!

While I was at it I used some of the material to redo Miles's co-sleeper and make it into a little bench seating. I used some foam from the old couch (the rest will go into the camper), padded the top, hinged it and looped some fabric inside to hold out extra sheets and towels.

I like the design and it could totally be used to tuck shoes under too while having storage space inside! It went back up in the laft and it's where they kids get to sleep if they make their way to our bed...

While I was sewing up the main couch cusion this little man was pulling himself up on the window and thinking he was the coolest thing... (he was)

As I sat there, my coffee behind me I no sooner had the thought that I need to put a protenctant on the cushion before too long when Miles grabbed my coffee cup handle and pulled it down on us (it was cold)... So I hosed it down before it was finished it was 'dirty'... this is just our life now with little kiddos.... one day we can have nice things again... 🙂

He's so worth it though and ultimately he approves of the new couch... 🙂

This one is moving on up to the top bunk too...