The rafters go up

Shots of the rafters and the ridgebeam being installed today. The ceiling/roof's coming soon.......

Building Matty's Bath House

The cobbers took a break from building our studio and headed up the road a few miles to the land of our good friend Matty, who's done quite a bit of carpentry work for us. He's in the process of building his own home, but he also needed help with the bath house -- installing the light straw/clay insulation. I wasn't able to make it up there, so I asked Ursula to take photos for me because I knew it was going to be amazing. The following two entries are the photos she took. Above: Harry mixing up the light straw/clay. Below: James jokingly beating the insulation into the building; Eden insulates in the background.
Below: a look at the insulation.

Above and below: L-R: Zack, Josh, Clint, Leslie and Jonathon.

Building Matty's Bath House II

Various perspectives, inside and outside of Matty's bath house/sauna.

Building the cement countertop

Jim Slate is contracted to build this. It took several days to set it up correctly and build the forms for the cement pour. The cement itself is colored. It's sitting now and curing slowly...

Cobbers' faces

Above: Tammy; Below: Clint sanding a pole that they harvested for our land, which will be one of the rafters for the roof of the studio.

Above: James, teacher extra-ordinaire; Below: Bobby, co-teacher.
Below: Jonathon.

The cob walls get taller

What can I say here? Just more work building up the walls to the proper height....

CSA bouquets

Above: My third round of bouquets for the Siskiyou Cooperative CSA. Every week I make seven bouquets for CSA members. I don't have a lot of variety at the moment, but every week something new blooms......

Bread & Chocolate

On the same day that Jo was baking bread, Avara came over with her daughter Sophia to make raw chocolate treats with Eden. Above, some of the ingredients; below, plotting the great chocolate conspiracy. (The treats were delicious)

Last three pix: Jo pulling out the last batch of bread (spelt). I believe the other two batches seen below are sourdough baguettes and sourdough bread. Things are really picking up for the bakery, and bake days are now Wednesdays and Fridays. Oh, the fresh bread! The cobbers (students here for the cob workshop) and the Full Bloomers went thru 7 loaves on the last bake day.

Building the walls of the Cob Studio

A look at the cob walls from a few different angles...


Below: an experiment in a slightly different mud building technique: adobe bricks.

Finally filling our newest pond

Our friend and neighbor Roarke recently patched up the leak in this pond with bentonite clay, and we finally have it filled. the two poles sticking up are going to be attached to a dock that we'll put in at some point, maybe with a diving board. This is the only pond of our 3 ponds that has shade; it should become a premo swim spot during the summer.