I’m so pleased to have a new Small Home Tour to share with you today. Taking the time to take photos of your home and share the personal details of how you make it work in your small space is an effort in normal circumstances….doing this during a pandemic is almost heroic! So thank you, Nucci of @our_simplestory. It’s an impressive feat to make under 500 square feet work for a family of four. I’ll leave it with her below to explain how they make it work.

Please meet Nucci and Family….

We are a family of four, choosing to live small and simple, so we can free up more time and money to focus on what we love, which in our family is making more memories. We just started a blog and YouTube channel, Our Simple Story, where we can share our memories with families and friends, and also any of the valuable tips and tricks we have learned along the way in our journey to simple living.

How big is your home and what is the layout?

Our home is a studio apartment that is 438 sq. ft. of indoor space and 124 sq. ft. of outdoor space.

Who lives there?

Myself, my name is Nucci (nice to meet you), my husband, Daniel, my daughter, Sophia who is three, and my son, Liam who is one.

Tell me about your choice to live small as a family. Was it a conscious decision or did it just evolve?

We originally purchased this place before we knew we were pregnant. And since we have lived small for over 15 years now this was nothing new to us. We lived in Toronto where in under 500 sq. ft., in Dubai we lived in a place that was just over 400 sq. ft. and when we moved into Vancouver the first studio we rented was just 300 sq. ft. Not sure if it was a fully conscious decision before when we were younger, but right now as a family of four in 400 sq ft. it definitely is a more conscious decision. 

We have been in our home now for almost four years and we moved in when my Sophia was still in my belly.  As our family grew with Sophia, I started to wonder if we needed more space, in the end we stayed put. 

Now with our second, the inevitable question was do we need more space and happily we are still here. I honestly wonder if we could do with even less space (I  have been dreaming of the van life). I would eventually love a small home on a piece of land that we can have our own garden. For now we've made a little makeshift urban garden on our balcony. We are currently growing herbs, fruits and veggies. 

I may be biased but I love living small as I can basically be as close to my kids as possible.

Is there a piece of furniture or accessory that you couldn't live without that makes living in your space easier?  

The dinner table is the physical heart of our home. My husband and father in law built it shortly after we moved in. In addition to sharing all our meals, it turns into an arts and crafts station, a doll house estate, a pizza station and so much more. 

We were looking for a circle table and it was hard to find a good quality wood one that wasn't so expensive and/or too big. In the end we went with an unfinished oak table that we were able to customize to the exact size we wanted. 

I love that on a nice sunny day we can bring out our table into our balcony and have an outdoor dining experience with the birds serenading our meal. My husband not too long ago put in a few bird feeders and we love watching and hearing them. 

Assuming you keep toys edited are there any you recommend that have survived many purges and provided entertainment?  

Right from the start I was very adamant about having toys that were made from the best quality and materials I could find. No just for our family, but also casting our vote with our dollars for ethically made and sustainable toys, 

We did invest in some handmade organic stuffed toys, and 3+ years later they are still looking as nice as when I first got them and thankfully my daughter still loves them. 

Another toy I do love is a silicone tea set, as this allows it for play, but is functional as well, as it is food grade silicone that can hold warmer beverages, there is also the added bonus of not shattering when it is inevitably dropped. 

In a small space some additional toys that are not really classified as toys, but are popular with my kids are regular household items like steel or bamboo bowls or muffin tins that they use as a car wash or for little science experiments.

We are a family that loves to read, so we are definitely not minimalists when it comes to books.

What is something you love about living small?  

Being so close to my family is something that I love and hate at the same time. If that makes sense at all. I love that we are always together, in each other's businesses so to speak. 

It is so fun to be able to be in the kitchen watching the kids play together anywhere in our home, and with the current stay at home situation, be able to look out to our patio and see my husband working and have most of our meals together.

What is something you hate?

Right now I wish we could have one indoor closed room besides our bathroom. I'll be in the middle of trying to put our little one down for his nap and just as he's about to sleep my daughter will come running in or my husband will open the patio door. I tend to use our dryer as a sound machine for nap time. Also as it gets colder and wetter the patio is proving to be a less than ideal home office for my husband.

We are still in the process of working out the best sleeping arrangements, but as it stands we have two shikibuton mattresses and tatami mats in our bedroom, inspired by our time in Japan. This allows for us to be able to move one mattresses from the bedroom to the living room. The kids typically sleep in the bedroom, but inevitably we play musical mattresses throughout the night. I do love that I don't have to worry about the kids falling off the bed, and it allows for the montessori approach to sleeping. The one thing I hate is the set up before sleep and right after we wake up! Unlike the ryokan where the beds were made and put away for us, we now have to do it all ourselves. On the bright side it forces us to clean our floors more often.

What are your best ways to beat the rainy Vancouver blues and keep from going crazy with a baby and toddler indoors?  

Family dance parties, tea parties or movies projected in their tent or ceiling. We do a lot of arts and crafts and reading too. I was being ambitious for a couple of weeks where I did no screen time at all and that lasted about 5 weeks or so. Now we've gone down to about an hour per day, maybe a bit more on the weekends if we watch a movie as a family on a rainy day. 

I know for us, having walkable kid friendly places in the neighborhood really helps with small living. Would love to hear some of your favourite places to get outside with the kids in Vancouver (trickier right now, feel free to answer about where you go currently during Covid-19 or where you are hoping to get back to)? 

As we live on the North Shore we are so close to a lot of beautiful places, like Deep Cove, Lynn Canyon, Cleveland Dam, Cates Park, but recently with the relaxing of the rules we find that we are trying to find "hidden" trails, parks and places to allow our daughter to run without worrying about her unknowingly breaking the social distancing rules. Recently we found a nice trail that gave us a different view of Quarry Rock. The Bird Sanctuary is also a wonderful place to get lost in, and we recently happened upon a family of deer one early rainy morning.   

One of the reasons I started this blog was to have a positive space about living small with a family and hopefully have people let go of the shame associated with it. Thank you soooo much for being so open with your beautiful home and life. Is there anything you would want to say to someone who wants to stay in their small space with a child/baby but are nervous or feeling external pressure not to?  

I'm a firm believer in trying everything out, so I would say give it a few months, for example if you're expecting a baby and you realize they don't really need too much space at least in the beginning. One thing I would recommend is not buying too much into the baby stuff marketed to you as expecting or new parents. I tried my best to find things that could be used by more than one child (gender neutral things). Also when looking at pieces whether it be furniture or accessories look for ones that can perform more than one task and look timeless (and can be fixed - when your child or children will inevitably break it). Right now our credenza is our wardrobe, diaper caddy, diaper table and laptop charging station.

Obviously these past few months have particularly challenging for small space families. Wondering if there's anything in particular that has been working for you during this time?

Living small has also allowed me to stay home and as a one income household living in the greater Vancouver area that is such a gift! I guess that is the one thing I would recommend is to do some self reflection and see what your own personal values are, what your values are as a family and then decide what aligns the best for your family to live your best life. Also don't be afraid to experiment since something that might work for others might not work for you, but something not working for others may be the best thing for your family.

At the start of the pandemic, I originally wanted to have a schedule and thought that I would see what the first few weeks would feel like and then come up with a formal schedule. Months in and the schedule is still on my to do list, but I am not sure if it is a priority for now. I think the key is being flexible both with our space and our schedule. 

I think just being open to new things and continually learning has been key, whether it's finding new arts and crafts projects online to do with your kids or even just listening to a podcast about a topic you are interested in while they nap. For me, I started a YouTube channel to document our trip to Portugal last November, so I've been learning how to make better videos for our own memories. This has allowed me to stay creative and also a way for me to do something with all the photos and videos I am constantly taking!

Thanks again for opening your home to us Nucci! You can find more about her below…

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