earth cellar progress and medieval days prep
The past few days have been a nice mix of relaxing and productive. We have put in 2 to 4 hours a day on the earth cellar. Adding such large stones to the walls means rapid progress in height with not so much time needed, and, assuming that we do a bit more today, we can easily get the wall on the up-hill side pretty much done before we depart for the local Medieval Days tomorrow. This is a good thing, since there had been a fair bit of erosion this spring with dirt falling into the hole from the sides, and I would prefer that we don't lose enough to put the flag pole into danger of falling before we finish this project.
Luckily, we were smart enough last autumn to cover the walls and the band of gravel fill behind the wall and before the dirt with plastic tarps. This means that all of the dirt that fell landed on the tarp, and has not worked its way into the gravel. We have decided to keep the tarp--it will remain as a divider between the gravel and dirt all the way up. This makes working on it easy--we fold the tarp back over the dirt as we add more stones to the walls, and as soon as a layer of stone is in place we add gravel between the stone and the tarp, and dirt between the tarp and the part of the ground that wasn't disturbed when we dug the hole.
Granted, there is no guarantee we will work on that project today, since we also need to finish preparing for the Medieval days. I baked buttermilk flatbread (starting with churning butter from cream) the other day, and today I want to make some hais, so that I have snacks to eat at the event. I also need to print the forms for the A&S display/contest as well as pack garb and projects for the event. At least the event is close enough (4 km by way of the forest trail, or 7 if we take the car, which we will, since we have so much to carry), that we don't have to worry about packing--we just take one load over, set up the pavilion, then go back for the next load...
I plan to keep my phone on airplane mode the whole week, so that the battery lasts and I can keep using the log program and consult the calender as to when I should be where. But this means that not only will I not see email or other internet messages till I get home, I also won't get text messages or phone calls. But then, no one ever calls me anyway, save for people who will be on site, so it should be fine.
Luckily, we were smart enough last autumn to cover the walls and the band of gravel fill behind the wall and before the dirt with plastic tarps. This means that all of the dirt that fell landed on the tarp, and has not worked its way into the gravel. We have decided to keep the tarp--it will remain as a divider between the gravel and dirt all the way up. This makes working on it easy--we fold the tarp back over the dirt as we add more stones to the walls, and as soon as a layer of stone is in place we add gravel between the stone and the tarp, and dirt between the tarp and the part of the ground that wasn't disturbed when we dug the hole.
Granted, there is no guarantee we will work on that project today, since we also need to finish preparing for the Medieval days. I baked buttermilk flatbread (starting with churning butter from cream) the other day, and today I want to make some hais, so that I have snacks to eat at the event. I also need to print the forms for the A&S display/contest as well as pack garb and projects for the event. At least the event is close enough (4 km by way of the forest trail, or 7 if we take the car, which we will, since we have so much to carry), that we don't have to worry about packing--we just take one load over, set up the pavilion, then go back for the next load...
I plan to keep my phone on airplane mode the whole week, so that the battery lasts and I can keep using the log program and consult the calender as to when I should be where. But this means that not only will I not see email or other internet messages till I get home, I also won't get text messages or phone calls. But then, no one ever calls me anyway, save for people who will be on site, so it should be fine.