Tiny Vintage Camper Part 1: The Before Tour

WE BOUGHT A CAMPER!!

You will mostly likely look at these pictures and think I'm crazy...

But, it has been a dream of mine for a few years now to "one day" own a tiny vintage travel trailer.

I have this Pinterest board, I'm a Happy Camper, with tons of tiny little travel trailers - a lot cuter than how this one looks, but believe it or not I have some pins that are this exact camper, just in a lot better condition. We kind of stumbled upon this ugly little thing and became campers owners a lot sooner than expected, but I am soooo excited to be! It is hard to find them this small you know. 

So... please take the before tour and I'll tell you the little that I know about it and my plans for improvement!

Here she is! Naming her Daisy because she's a Shasta...

Get it? Like "shasta daisy" ;) I know, I'm so creative. 

But apparently they have to have a name, and I just wasn't going for my husband's choice of

"The Love Shack". ;) So Daisy it is!

Yea, it scared me a little bit too with it's weird, pink rolled-on paint job and mold/fungus stuff growing all over it. But remember, I have a gift of seeing the "hidden potential". :)

As you can see these pictures are from very early spring...

I am forever behind on my posting, and we currently have this thing completely torn apart.

From my Pinterest research it is somewhere between a 1960 to 1965ish Shasta Compact. 

It's 10 ft long and 12 ft with the tongue.  

Matt found a nickel inside of the wall that was from 1964, so I was thinking maybe that's the year it was built. When I was a little girl and my dad was putting up a wood paneled wall in my room he told me to stick some coins back there with the year on them.

Is that a "thing"? Or is that just my dad being my dad and a coincidence that we found a nickel??

A true diamond in the rough.

So, my loving husband, knowing how badly I loved and wanted a tiny vintage travel trailer, spotted this one sitting in someone's yard. One Saturday he knocked on the guys door and asked him if he would be willing to sell it! haha! He obviously said yes, and we drove off with it thinking we got a steal for $250. You certainly can't find them on Craigslist for that price, but keep in mind that this needs to be completely rebuilt.

And, I have full confidence that we will be exceeding our $1,000 budget. ;)

Now that you've seen the charming exterior, come on in!

It was on it's way to becoming an ice shack, so luckily most of the stuff was torn out already.

See the wings? I'm so glad it still had those.

All the paneling had water damage and has been torn out.

It came with it's very own wasp nest!

It has been hard to find a window, reasonably priced, for where this chunk of wood was in place of the original window. We have decided to get a piece of Plexiglas to put in there - anything will look better than this. 

The source of all the water damage. :'( 

 I was pretty excited about this big stepping stone that was inside! 

It's now outside my garden door.

This was on both sides - it has been hard to remove! 

I'm still working on a few letters.

The dents will get banged out as best we can, and just one set of (working) lights will be there!

Here is a picture with all the junk cleaned out. 

This was the start to their bench for ice fishing.

We will have a full sized bed on this side of the camper, and in the middle of this back wall will be a cabinet area to hold all of our pots/pans. On the right side we may do a bench. 

Well there you have it! 

Glad you could meet Daisy. 

She already looks much prettier, I promise.

Part 2 is to come...hopefully soon. 

The trailer is currently still completely dissembled, but we have a big camping trip planned for the beginning of July, so Matt is working hard every night on it, and I am waiting patiently to paint!

Have a blessed week!

~Olivia 

Sharing at: Party in your PJ's, Feathered Nest Friday