Solo Female Minivan Tour Full Time Nomad -Fabulous Living Space Created.

you've been having a little bit of a giggle session this has actually been fun hello i have a very important person here yes and she's a new friend her name is lindy hello and she is going to give us a grand tour of her minivan so tell us a little bit about yourself lindsay sure um so i'm lindy living the life lindy on youtube lindy marie on facebook um i am a full-time nomad i am in a 2016 dodge grand caravan all the way from minnesota now in arizona and yeah just met lee and i'm very excited for the tour too we met on facebook yes and i asked her if i could do a tour of her van and she agreed to it thank you lindy so much very welcome and we've become friends already you know how this lifestyle is it goes very fast you have to get to know each other very quickly and i think as nomads we've learned how to maneuver that oh definitely so tell everybody lindy what uh what got you started in this sure um i've actually been nomadics for i think i'm going in my seventh year now um since i was 35 going to be 42 this year and i've only had the minivan since uh november of 2019 and prior to that i actually was in the original scion xb i called it my little toaster it was a little square box oh and i had all the seats out i didn't have any fanciness now with my upgrade i have many many items that i'm very much enjoying so where are you from uh originally from minnesota i've actually lived all over the u.s my background's hr but i've done gig work i've worked on some farms too so yeah but minnesota what what what what brought you to this this system here this lifestyle what who was there anybody that you know got you thinking about it or actually uh yes so i was in sticks and bricks working full-time and my aunt told me about an off-grid lifestyle of women in wisconsin and she thought you know you might enjoy this i don't know why but i feel like you might enjoy this i'm like you know i might i might so i actually went and checked them out i stayed with them for a while and i was hooked and from there i started little traveling jots i took a megabus to chicago stayed at a hostel there for a long weekend and then randomly i bought a ticket to turkey i kept two boxes in my scion sold all the rest of my things it was seven months out and i did a one way to turkey and pretty much haven't looked back i've stayed in sticks and bricks here and there but definitely i'm a nomad i don't have a home base besides my minivan but yeah i'd say my aunt my aunt was the one so thank you do you boondock most of the time or city life uh what's your style of being a no man so i actually do both depending on my needs i really like the balance of being in the city but i also really like being out in nature i'm not that keen on the desert i will be honest i prefer mountains i prefer oceans um and such so but yeah i definitely have done both i've worked in the city i've been very stealthy in the city i actually haven't done it with my minivan but in my scion prior i had lots of different gig jobs all over in different big cities so yep both very nice um do you travel alone or do you travel in a caravan or um so for many years i was alone i actually didn't even know about the nomadic community um and that all this was happening and once i found out i slowly kind of met a few people here and there i don't really have a tribe per se i enjoy the company of others definitely smaller groups more quality versus the quantity of people so i kind of do both and i enjoy both this is a dodge caravan anything else we should know about it um so this model and the reason i got it couple things first off it has all stone go seats so all rows are store and go a lot of the minivans don't have that feature so a lot of people have to take out the seats and i didn't take out any because i want to be able to sell it if i upgrade or something something happens and i change lifestyles so that's the first thing and then the other thing is there's a lot of electrical areas i can plug in my power sources but one of them in the front i actually don't have to have the minivan on for and i actually just uh possibly learned this just a couple months ago okay but so if you know the weather conditions aren't so for solar i can actually plug in and charge while i'm sitting oh okay yeah so those are the biggest things so of your entire setup uh what is the greatest strength of your particular setup that we can look for as you give us that three penny tour um i would say probably the biggest strength with the setup is comfort level i actually am a homebody at heart i like to be out and you know into nature and such and with other people but i really enjoy the comfort of being inside yes and i think with my bed upgrade i actually have um which is open is a bed now nobody's seen that yet okay but it can convert into a really good workout yes the first and the couch has actually a chase uh feature attached to it so i can fit quite a few people in here okay wow really okay so with weather conditions it's fun to have people in here watch a movie play cards i even have had a couple dogs in here at once okay so there's actually a lot of room it doesn't look like it when we get in here but i have a full-size bed now and okay i'm 5 11. so it's it's ideal but we can tell she's a bit taller than me i'm a bit taller than yes definitely that's fun to be taller yes it's nice that it definitely has its disadvantages but that's when you wear stretchy pants um because you have to bend in all sorts of weird ways yes yes yes um are there any weak links in your system that you'd like to maybe say it's about time um you know there's not specific things my setup is ever changing to my needs and i'm just very open to that i've already started to think about pulling something so maybe like even a we roll oh okay um and having that so i can actually set up somewhere and be able to leave and come back to that spot that's been something on my mind um but otherwise no not like one particular thing i really enjoy my setup there's a lot of quirks there's a lot of you'll see duct tape you'll see you know the reality likes like my tool chest you know yeah yeah exactly your tool chest as far as traveling places is there um any particular areas you tend to stick with um states that well i was in washington for a very long time i love the pacific northwest okay um it's beautiful there and the humidity tends to be low we have your days but it tends to be low and i enjoy that that's a big thing with moisture especially in a minivan um but i'd say pacific northwest i haven't actually explored the east yet and i really want to so i've been thinking about it for the spring trying to decide but arizona is really where it's at i mean the weather yeah the sun the little humidity snowmans are they do the arizona they end up for everybody no not everybody but national forests those are the best so we're just going to start in the front here just briefly for the side pockets of the door just an umbrella i have some car items um i have some of the fly traps bags who doesn't need bags velcro i use that a lot to put up pictures yes and then going into the driver's side not a lot going on here i try to keep this pretty clean if i can so right here just basically just carry my masks i have those lights up here in the front the motion lights i use at night so i'm just charging them now i also have a solar flashlight just some hats and then we'll see on the other side i have coverings for my windows too i'll talk about now your seats are all still in here right uh yes so all the stuff goes are just packed away and then i have both front seats neither swivel or do anything what do you keep in this bag right here yep that's my laundry okay obviously it's laundry time yes and then youtube middle part the console area um i have kind of a jack of all trades you know like that kitchen kitchen drawer that has everything here is the moisture thing right yes i actually what's it called i'm not sure the name okay but it's from dollar tree okay and i have another friend that uses them and so does it work yep okay haven't i mean you can see i didn't collect much here i'm in arizona but once i get to texas in the back um side doorway area i have my wipe container i just keep wipes for easy access this is my portable mr buddy they have the bigger one but i absolutely love this one haven't had any issues with it um back of the seats my toiletries this is actually a plastic shoe holder that i cut down to size and then i just keep all the things that i use on a regular basis and i have my microfiber towel i just have the one towel you do the curtain yes so the curtain looks a little wonky i i had it too tight um so it's not connected here but it's up with velcro and then i have an industrial glue as well and this is a blackout curtain i just think the glue is holding yes it's been great okay and no issues in the conditions with the heat okay humidity well we'll see i haven't really yet but um it's been wonderful i never take it down but i can if i wanted to um but i will tie it up in the middle if i want a little more light but it's been wonderful for privacy and then at night i actually take it and i put it through the oh crap door handle we'll say and they just they come in handy for certain things and everything yes for this and for getting up and down exactly so that's that okay well that's interesting i like that and then on the middle there's actually a really long drawer right here and i won't pull it out now for you okay not just part of the van but i keep a extra power bank and a battery jumper in there okay um i keep that charged all the time because we know what this is yes 500 watt jackery it's actually being charged right now from the minivan without it being on again one of those features i really liked about the dodge grand caravan the newer models um but i have my fridge charging right now and that and that's usually what i use this for and it looks like my phone is plugged in too okay okay now you mentioned fridge is that what this might be uh yes so this is my ostravic uh fridge it's an eco-friendly fridge it doesn't pull a lot of wattage for me i've i've really enjoyed it i'm not sure if they've made this model anymore okay um with the coloring and such but it's not that big of a fridge but it works for me considering before i barely had a cooler i recently purchased one of those hot logics so i keep organic frozen meals in there which i don't keep it on freezer setting i keep it on fridge setting so i keep those out of the box in there so lasagnas and enchiladas and stuff for big meals and then i have spinach and i have some drinks maybe some snacks like chocolate and then if you continue up on this show first shelving i carry any extra toiletries and also any you know basic kitchen household items like butane propane paper towels different sprays did you make this actually my friend has made every build i have so he had put this in it is not attached to the van at all okay so technically it's a build but some people say no build i guess if it's not attached this shelves all my dry good foods okay this shelf keeps all like undergarments t-shirts and i always have one thing of water back here okay and then the extra that i added is the closet so i put all my outfits together um as you can see i need to do laundry so this is attached to the wood it's attached to the wood um i didn't put the screws in all the way on the bottom because it sticks through on the other side i gotcha but it i've not had any issues and where did you get this little device here yeah i got that one off of amazon okay it took me a while to find that specific one okay um but it worked out great i have my passenger seat up all the way um so i can't utilize my passenger seat for actual people now okay but i wanted that closet this is this is um a good organized system okay if you can go into your past orders and maybe give us the link for that i believe some people i can look for i want you're probably gonna see people go i want that oh yeah probably i like it i like it thank you very much yes underneath i do keep a couple items you can't really see under there you can get the clothes it's just my gym bag and i keep my eggs under there i cut my eggs for a week and i just keep them cooled under there it stays really nice shoe organizer piece and you'll see the rest of that in a little while okay but in those pockets i keep all of my utensils i keep my bathroom items and just a few other miscellaneous things but i had the room so i wanted to utilize as much space as possible so i put that and then those mirrors are just a packet from walmart i think it was like five dollars just for a little something you know to make it more homey over here to the left we'll kind of make our way around i thought maybe that'd be the easiest you'll see some lights around those are those lucy string lights that's what i use in here for a power source you can't really tell right now but at night if i have it on i the highest setting i feel like i'm inside a hospital so it's and these lights are these from amazon also um i actually got these directly from the lucy uh lucy l-u-c-i right lucy yeah most people have those blow-up lights i had those for a while i really wanted something different because i can actually take these off and put them outside if i want okay um so that and i can wrap them up it just worked out really well and i put up pictures on the yes ceiling with pins that i collect i haven't collected enough pins yet so and we've got some on this side too oh and we got this is that a fan yep i have one on both sides i open this one up for you so you can see uh it's actually lights and a fan so i have lots of lights but these have three settings as well for the fan and i've noticed the cross breeze it has been wonderful especially if the hatch is open i can be in 80 degree 85 degree in dry conditions and have no problem be very comfortable in here so and then over here is just kind of another it's almost like a nightstand i guess i do uh have candles in my real candle but that little holder normally it's a cup holder it fits perfectly and i don't have any issues with anything burning and i usually just keep my phone there this little travel line container is actually for power cords my small ones okay that i use back here so i have another phone one my headphones my lights everything is kept in here plus a router or a what's it called a jetpack i use that too for internet and of course a headlamp everybody needs a headline it's through i got this one through verizon a lot of people on the road they like to have um two different types of connections okay for me both my phone and this jetpacker verizon right now okay but this is my internet source my if i and when i get a full-time remote job this is something that i will utilize it doesn't have any antennas or anything but it's an extra it's almost like a hot spot if you will like on your cell phone but you can buy these separately and have additional coverage then for wi-fi if you want to use your tablet or laptop so on this other side or the same side we were on i just want to point out i have reflectix on my windows it doesn't look like reflectix but i taped both sides i taped black of course for stealthiness on the back and then i taped this colored duct tape just because i like the color and then they're being held right now with velcro industrial velcro on the back again dry conditions i have not had issues well last in humanity i have no idea i'm hopeful and then the last thing i had a friend tell me about because i like to bend these uh to get light during the day is how the heck do i keep them up because they just want to stay bent and i was getting sick of taking them off the velcro trying to bend them to fit so my friend said just go to the dollar tree good old dollar tree get the large binder clips put them to the top and then what happens okay and they just go right into that hole the um weather stripping in between the window and bam they just stay it's genie the game changer that's probably one of the best things thus far because of privacy reasons especially if i'm in town being stealth i kind of need to have those up but and then i just put this hook here another dollar tree find because i wanted to put up my necklace it's a tree of life it's just very beautiful i think i like it just sitting there versus wearing it i like my homie decorations fred made this picture for me her little girl and then this side well let's just pull it all out hold up sorry it's dusty all right three things plus the rest that are in here is my trash it's one of those little foot pedal trashes but it fit perfectly the reason i had this board put up i guess before i had the couch made because the the bed upgrade came after but so i could put stuff back here and actually have storage so i have my trash behind that i have a light up makeup mirror then way behind that connected that's my wii boost i just have the little antenna you can get a really large antenna but it's just supposed to jump start your actual reception so let's say well there's different receptions there's one x there's three g there's four g or there's flat line so you don't have anything 1x is the worst you won't get anything 3g is what we used to have which you can still pull but it will buffer forever and of course 4g and now of course 5g which i don't have um but this is supposed to boost you up at least a few bars um so i use it for my phone i can actually in the cradle set my jetpack in there um and then i can get more signal from this too so it's just a little added bonus how much was that i'm sure you're gonna ask um i think it was maybe 125 but i got it refurbished on amazon so you can get used ones that have been remanufactured so you can get them cheaper too you might actually be able to get these jet packs or something similar on amazon also may be used and somebody has returned it for cheaper too so fyi on that but otherwise the other things i keep back there this is just my laptop in an amazon case this is my makeup bag don't even really need to see my makeup but i keep all my toiletries so if i go in the gym i use that too and this is what i was saying with my frozen meals this is my hot logic it's actually a little portable oven so it's kind of like a road pro can we see it yeah do you mind opening it this will actually compare to a pro will fit those frozen meals those road pros will not because they're taller this is wider and it has the heating source on the bottom okay so you can fit you can't fit like a hungry man meal in there but you can fit like a lean cuisine or something that size this has been a game changer for me especially in bad weather i can cook that it usually takes an hour to an hour and a half to cook a meal in it so it takes a while and it will take right around 15 percent of my charge in my i use my jackery 500 for that too when i use it um so that's another thing i've loved otherwise this is my bed it's uh in full size mode like i said it does convert to about how my mattress works to convert into a bed underneath you'll see it's made by regular wood pieces for platform it is hinged up all the way to the back of the bed and underneath there is separate just wood supports that i use for balance here's one of them and then this extra mattress what happens is i move this up i put the actual platform underneath the other mattress it's actually it seems difficult but it's not and then this mattress piece just goes on the back where that wood piece is and it turns into a couch it's very simple and then otherwise over here i do have another jack resource i didn't talk about i do have the 250 and i use um back here i have a plug-in uh so i have those three plug-ins this is my other one the other two are up front in my console but i'll charge this checker here and i charge my lucy lights on it i charge my speaker on it and what is the name of this speaker uh the speaker is black webb blackwell k-w-e-b and does it have any special features to it um just really super good sound so it seems like when i'm watching a movie it can connect to any type of device it sounds like surround sound and this top part lights up different colors so it's just kind of a fun little thing very nice and walmart right yep this was walmart okay and then i have headphones uh they're from sony directly just in case i'm at stealth mode and i want to still watch things but otherwise most of my electronics i just charge on my smaller jackery and also this is a backup source in case my big one runs out if i don't have any solar coming through so this is my other side so the rest of that shoe organizer is here for all of my shoes sorry it's dusty and dirty but i am in the desert and i have a couple things hanging a couple extra places to hang other stuff this is my water camelback for hiking my knife and i also um have like mace i have some other weaponry too but it's hidden keep your pants pots and pans this is my rock pals that's what i use for portable solar i have this hundred panel or excuse me 100 watt solar panel totally portable and i also have a 60 watt we'll pull that back let's see under there there's where the rest of her um yeah that's how deep that is we couldn't see it before but 24 inches deep so it's two feet deep these shelves so how do you like the rock um i love them i think they're great i like this material it's very easy to wash off is it lightweight too it's lightweight it's easy to set up i haven't had any issues with wind i bought two because i had the two jackery so 60 watt was for my 250 jackery this 100 watt was supposed to be for my 500 but once i learned i can charge off of my battery when my car or when my vans not running i don't use these as often but i keep them in case and then back here i have a bamboo mat you know an outdoor mat if i want to utilize that and i also have my yoga mat and lastly is my other side so you saw my laundry the only other things i keep down here is my water and then extra supplies so my paper towels and such if i want if i'm not sure if i'm going to be able to get to a store that would have what my needs i need pretty much every day i keep an extra set up there and then this is all my laundry stuff i keep in the door and i get all my laundry stuff from dollar tree because you can get the small little containers of soap there and i like those because they fit right in and this bag sits flat so then most of this is open then the minivan this one comes with two glove boxes which is really nice this one i keep all of my power cords that i don't use when i'm charging so these are all my ac ones that i would use if i was in sticks and bricks or somewhere with electric i don't normally use those and then underneath here is just car items that i keep i have a little rock collection this is my grandpa's rocks there's a story behind them but okay i'm gonna turn them into jewelry so i keep those just because i have room i keep them in there this is batteries i have batteries i think i only have one thing that uses batteries so i have some extras this way and then the last thing i guess i want to show you are these stick on these are from amazon i couldn't find them so i can't really share with you a link for them but they are the en nove e-n-o-v-o-e and those have been great i ripped this one so it's not because it you know it fell apart on me that was my own doing because i put the window down and it got stuck i forgot it was on but these i've been having up and i keep up usually all the time for uv blocking and also just to help with the heat and i have an emergency blanket not that easy to get to it's kind of like those you know the gray one like you have i have some under my seat so if force comes to worse and it's super hot i put those up and i put them up with these 25 pound earth magnets they're very heavy and they stick really well i have two on both sides so i can put one in the front and then i can put one in the back so those just stay up here and i can't go through the car washes with these just fyi to a lot of people if they use magnets outside on their vehicles you can't go through car washes because they will stick and you will break the car wash and it will be a nightmare i didn't well these are my coats back here this is a comfy i wear at the campfire it's like one of those snuggies okay my coats are under there too i think that's it unless you had a question what are the specs again so i can cut the wood yeah it's kind of just a design i came up you know with in my head and then when my friend said he would put it together we just kind of work together on it and the whole design you know it's just kind of thinking outside the box so once it's being built i'm like oh you know it would really be nice to have this back thing here so i could have storage on the other side and oh you know maybe if i do ever have a couch and i have cushions that would be nice to have up already which now i finally got the couch built and the couch build was not from any kind of specs it was just me thinking it out loud and i don't know just having it you know come to fruition i guess if you will so yeah so mike i know that you wouldn't be able to store anything on this side because you fold it up but do you have things stored on the other side because possibly can you because that is sort of static right on this side do you store things under there at all um i don't really have anything back here because it's harder to get to and like my stabilizers for this edition oh okay gotcha it's just my stove up front but i have my little garage here with just my tools and stuff so this is the back storage space i have i have extra stakes and supports for my bamboo mat i have a hatchet for wood i have a drill i have a brush because you know there's a little dust in the desert a little bit a little bit nice pillows yeah so these pillows ha everything has a story right and when you're a minimalist everything needs to have a story it has to have a purpose that's right like a love of it um but these pillows my friend actually gave me she wasn't using and it worked out good because the coverings uh which i actually haven't finished my friend made them for me but this was my grandma's material um i found it in a trunk in her attic that was cleaning out it's uh three generations i would consider it because it was my grandma grandpa's house and it was my uncle's house and i stayed there too so technically i'm a third but i found this randomly clean out her house last year and so my friend put together these pillowcases this is merrimack corduroy i think you can still get it but it's original with the patches too that were merrimack that she put together so i just get really excited about these things you know and that's what's so wonderful about living such a teeny lifestyle is everything you have you know really should bring you some joy it's really true i think and it really takes away that stress in your life a lot of people have this chair the reason i got it was that it's a director's back versus the regular camping chair so there's a lot more support okay and you can actually get out of it very easy a lot of those that dip yeah can't get out plus a table in the pocket so if i'm going to a fire i can put all of my basic needs snacks and phones and kleenex there you go whatever you got your little trash yep this is that it's affordable uh what is it but it's from walmart and it's foldable so i can but i have it's really heavy right now because i have rocks on the bottom okay because you don't want to blow away yeah i've been keeping the rocks in there because i've lost that almost in the water a few times i've seen these i actually use this not for dishes because i don't have a lot but i use it to wash my hair um that was kind of neat and then the infamous pea container this is your pea bottle this is my big big pea bottle and the reason it's so big is because i don't want to miss thank you so much lindy for this wonderful tour please tell everybody how they can find you okay um so i am on youtube under living the life lindy it's l-i-b-i-n the life l-i-n-d-y i'm also on facebook i don't usually open up my comments on my youtube i'd rather connect with me on facebook and i'm on there at lindsay marie lindy marie m-a-r-i-e yes lindy marie so yes go check her out on youtube her channel i know i know we we we've been we've been having a little bit of a giggle session this has actually been fun gee i wonder how you can tell that this is ben anyways so yes check her out and uh we better end this so you just you're just gonna keep hearing the giggling bye [Laughter] oh thank you so much lindy for this tour it is gorgeous she has the best build out let's do this again we're getting the giggles here oh my gosh so lenny um i would please tell everybody how they can find you okay um so i am on youtube under living the life lindy is l-i-b-i-n the life l-i-n-d-y i'm also on facebook i don't usually open up my comments on my youtube i'd rather you connect with me on facebook and i'm on there at lindy marie lindy marie m-a-r-i-e yes lindy marie so yes go check her out on youtube her channel i know i know we we we've been we've been having a little bit of a giggle session this has actually been fun [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Minivan Lee

Views: 67,833

Rating: 4.9022188 out of 5

Keywords: Minivan Lee, Van life, Livin the life Lindy, Van tour, Nomad land, Minivan Lee, Van life, Livin the life Lindy, Van tour, Nomad land

Id: IjiEGmv2fzs

Length: 33min 29sec (2009 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 08 2021