In this week's episode of tiny tours,
we take a look inside of another fantastic Schooley and this one belongs to
a Marine and supermom,
and what's even more unique about this particular bus conversion is that it also
functions as a non-profit art classroom for veterans.
All right, guys, let's take a tour.
I'm Jessica Rambo and I built the painted Buffalo traveling studio.
We've been living in the bus since
August 2nd, 2019. So we just hit our one year mark
Originally. I did 10 years in the Marine Corps and was medically retired.
And then I did art school during art school is when I
got into community-based arts and going out into your community,
teaching art classes and stuff like that.
And that's kind of how the bus started was, you know,
one building a home for ourselves,
but also traveling the country and being able to bring art to
veterans when they weren't able to come pass.
So I bought the bus in may of
2018. I started building right away.
I did just about every single thing in the bus myself.
I've had a few bus and van friends come help, um,
with plumbing and electric and stuff. But every piece on this bus,
I touched and learned how to fix if it broke down or whatever like that.
So I bought the bus for $5,000 and I've put probably about
15 or $20,000 into it.
I paid a lot more than other people I've noticed, paid for their buses, but one,
I bought it directly from the school.
And so I knew that because it carried children, they did all the maintenance,
all the work, everything, and I knew it was going to be pristine.
Bus life has changed not only my life,
but my children's lives. The people around me is lives. I spent,
you know, I, like I said, a long time in the military.
So I have a very military mindset when you aren't that way.
And you're sensitive and emotional and all of those kinds of things that causes
a lot of mental health issues and stuff like that.
So I struggled for a last few years of my Marine Corps career and
transitioning. I went on a Friday. I left the Pentagon.
As a Sergeant in the Marine Corps. And on Monday I started art school.
So this is, you know, I don't set an alarm clock.
I wake up when my body wakes up, though, you take it moment by moment.
And you're able to really soak it all in.
This is my son, Liam.
He lives on the bus full time doing some homework up here.
We have our Zen garden.
I like to do a lot of mindfulness and peacefulness and art practice that
helps with mental health.
So everything in the bus I've tried to put in here that makes me happier.
It makes me better. And so the Zen garden is one thing that really, uh,
brings a smile to our face on the bus. This is our desk.
So when Liam is doing school, he'll sit here.
If I'm doing some office work, answering emails, that kind of stuff.
It's hard when you live this adventurous life to make yourself have office
hours.
So this is a little space that we lock ourselves into concentrate for a little
while, do our work and get it over with. And then we can go and have some fun,
right? Is it easier to sit here and do your work?
Then watch all the animals and everybody go crazy outside having fun,
no, eight foot couch. It lifts up.
And there's two storage bins underneath. Cause that's where the wheel well is.
This opens up and we just remove the cushions here.
This one has extra blankets and winter
clothes and that kind of stuff.
And they stuff right back in
on this side, we have bench seating. We have breakfast, lunch and dinner here,
homework sessions, hanging out, playing games.
I cut up my old sea bags and turn them into benches
and I cut up some foam and they're pretty comfortable to hang out in, right?
So this is our 11 foot paddleboard.
We've used it probably in 15 of the 26 States we've
gone to, while we're driving and traveling,
it sits up here and it's just held up by a couple of
hooks up here.
I have a thing with random knickknacks and stuff like that from traveling
around the world. So I've kind of kept things that were my favorite,
just because you go small and minimal doesn't mean you need to get rid of
everything that makes you happy. Buffalo, salt, and pepper shakers
Or stove system is our full counter. And then when you want to cook,
you just lift it up, pull out the great,
and you're ready to go clean up, put down.
And now you're back to full counter space.
This is our coffee station, knife station,
art supplies station.
Anything that we use on the daily tends to go here.
This is just a going away box that I got when I got out of the Marine Corps.
And it houses just random stuff from overseas barring.
And you know, if you're a Marine, you know,
the birthday is really important and we all get gifts,
coins from jobs I've done an Easter egg.
I remember going to the white house for Easter and bringing my kids to the
Easter roll and hanging out with the president.
So those things I couldn't really get rid of. So I put them here.
All of this is our electrical panel and everything that kind of runs inside of
the bus to make the lights work and water pump and all that kind of stuff
is all tucked in here. I can see it. Anything goes wrong.
It's easy to get to. It's not built in and hidden away or anything,
which I like about it.
And we have a lazy Susan and that's pretty much just like, uh,
uh, pantry. We call her squeaky Susan, cause she squeaks.
We have a double sink here,
one for obviously dirty dishes and one for cleaned issues. I do a lot of art,
um, washing paint, brushes and stuff like that.
And I didn't want all of those chemicals from art supplies to be on our
clean dishes. So I did a pretty large sink for a bus.
We have a full-size fridge.
I lifted it up off of the ground so that it would be, you know,
more eye level instead of squatting down.
And I also didn't use a little fridge like some rigs do one cause we eat a
lot. And two,
we wanted to disappear out into the wilderness for more than a couple of days at
a time. And you need, uh, a big fridge to do that in the Marine Corps.
I had quite a few Marines passed away in combat and overseas.
And so this is a Memorial for them bathroom.
We have the one door style for the toilet room in here.
We have the nature head, a painting on the other side, litter box,
hot water heater.
And the vacuum on the side is Liam's whole area.
It's about seven feet with bookshelves.
His bed lifts all the way up and there's some extra storage inside there.
Here we have a four foot tub.
It's a horse trot from tractor supply, $89.
I just cut a hole into it and plumbed it to a gray water tank.
We put a shelf,
there's a painting of a bison in here as well that a friend made for me.
And you know, when I want to take a bath,
I can prop up a computer and watch a show or candles or anything like
that. Just to make it a little bit more homey on this side,
I have my closet and sweatshirt storage,
some extra blankets.
And then in here is my bed storage that can get from
here or from the back door. And then underneath,
I have a hundred gallon water tank.
It's like the most undone part of the whole bus, but I like it.
It's like a little Cove back here. I blacked out to the windows,
but left the door open just so I had some light back here.
We have our book collection,
my flag from my service because I was medically retired.
Each wall has little cubbies and storage, you know, random stuff.
And it's a full sized bed. It gets kind of small cause two dogs,
two cats. And I sleep in it here every night.
I built the bus so that without any walls kind of blocking
in so that I could be able to sit in my bed and see the
entire bus. That was important to me, for my safety and my mental health.
Bolted to the inside of the bus. We make our it out here.
I have an extra barbecue grill. I can sit down here, make food, hang out,
enjoy the view
under here I repurposed a diesel door from another bus and
that's just our propane that runs the whole bus.
We have 29.3 gallons inside there.
So that runs us about six months for $55.
Not too bad on this side of the bus.
This locker is for my ammo cans.
I fill ammo cans with art supplies and different merchandise and hand them out
to veterans, uh, to be able to tell their story through art.
And so that's just a storage bin that I keep those guys.
So they're outside and they get kind of dirty, but you know,
that's the veteran way. All of those are ready to meet a veteran on the road.
We've been on the road for a little while with a no bath.
Actually I think I've only given my bus a bath one time in a year,
but this is the back uh, garage.
We have a generator that sits right here. Some skateboards,
extra fans, some seating backpacks back here. I can see my water tank.
I don't have a sensor.
So I'm able to see how full it is from inside or outside
that way I know when it's time to go and fill up,
everybody thinks it's funny and thinks that I picked my license plate number,
but in the military, PME is primary military education.
So any class that you take and it's funny,
cause I'm an art class bus and my license plate is PME
on this side is our kind of utility closet,
extra gas for the propane tank, hoses,
electrical lines.
I spray painted my bus when I get a scratch or a ding or someone
graffitis it. I can cover it up the best I can,
but everything kind of just runs in here.
And these are just $50 wall lockers I got on Facebook marketplace.
So our roof deck up here is 10 feet by nine feet
across. I have four energy solar panels,
160 each. And then in the middle,
we kind of made a cross of wood decking so you can clean each
panel,
but you can also sit up there and enjoy the gorgeous views that we end up in.
So on top of bus life and raising my children,
I started a nonprofit that provides art education,
art supplies and mentorship to veterans and veteran artists that
want to do this lifestyle or, um,
want to come into the bus and have an art class and kind of tell their own
veteran story through art.
And so through Patreon or go fund me or other stuff we have listed
on our website at paintedbuffalostudio.com to help more veterans
tell their story and get out of the rut of their mental health symptoms.
The thing I enjoyed the most is the least cleaning.
I hate cleaning. I hate being domestic. I hate doing the dishes,
but the best part about, you know, the bus is,
just getting rid of all the stuff that really doesn't give you joy and just kind
of holding onto the things that do.
And you realize it's not the materialistic things that kind of give you joy.
It's my animals, it's my children. It's outside. It's going on hikes.
It's meeting the people in every community we visit and then also the veteran
and, and bus life, community, and those people.
Those all are the best parts of the bus life.
Thanks for watching this week's video.
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