Feb. 26, 2008

walls are high

above photo: gabriel standing on the bench. also, the window shown is being built right into the house, its an old VW beetle window. this area will sleep a family of 3. how you ask? there will be a table to the left of where gabriel is standing. this table will lower down, motorhome style and become part of the bed. so 6 can eat here, and 3 can sleep later.


above photo: views of the sauna/shower. on the right, the 3 white tubes sticking out of the wall are for the kitchen.


above photo: this is the end of the week. the walls in some spots are higher than me!!!

end of the day

2 more days of mix on the walls. its really going fast. i built scaffolding at long last. we needed them bad.

bench, window

above you can see the cob bench in progress. it is close to the final shape, but when it is drier i will shape it more and put 2 final coats of clay/mud on it. the window will be cobbed into the wall. its from a VW beetle. my neighbor had a full door decomposing so he gladly let me take the glass off of his hands.

the end of the week

where we are at as of friday feb. 15. incredible in my mind. this is going up so fast with just 4 of us.

2 more days of hard work

Manuel arrived yesterday. he is a local man. hes 64 years old and will help us out for around 4 hours a day. he is a great cob mixer. he just lost his job sweeping the street of our neighborhood, the new mayor fired everyone and hired all his friends

later in the day

if you look at the photo below this one you will see (above) what we accomplished in about 6 hours, three of us working.

The foundation and stem wall are done. Floor levels are compacted and leveled and are about 1.5" below final grade. The Cob walls started going up on 2 days ago

tamping the dirt in the bags

bag stand

above photo: this is gordon upon completion of the bag stand with the bag in place. ready to fill with dirt