second day of our STRAWBALE BUILDING Workshop...

We're only on our second day of building, and we're ready to raise the walls tomorrow... it's incredible how fast this kind of building goes... I'll not say much as the pictures will speak for themselves :-)
We finished Lyna's Yurt on Sunday by the way... But my mind was already on the preparations for the workshop... that gave me time to do all the shopping for building material that we would need before thursday...

By the way this is the yurt's floor finished, I forgot to take a picture of the yurt set up... it's a really beautiful one !!!
Thursday morning we had some time to introduce ourselves to one another and Lesley gave us a little introduction about building with strawbales...

then...hands on work...first thing we had to do was to clear out the place for the building (it's behind the kitchen for those who know)

Then, determining the direction (south facing), and squared it properly... with a nice frame Jo built :-)

Edy and Zven making sure the guiding string was levelled...

we had to put some more dirt on the east part, to roughly level the ground before setting the tires... and to hold that dirt, we made a wall with tires filled with dirt... it worked perfectly !

then, Lesley thought it would be nice to make some steps with more tires... beautiful!!! Great idea !!!

here Nuno with Lesley...he came with his partner and kid, to help Lesley, and gain some more experience, cuz he is gonna start running courses himself...

Meanwhile, me, Jo, Zven and Xico went to the woods to chop some eucalyptus which would support the floor .... in the end, we all got to the conclusion, after the carpenters (Edy, Jo and Zven) tried all kinds of ideas to use them, that the best would be to get some straight ones... so I had to go to Fundao (city nearby) again and get that, together with the tin plates for the roof...

nice and functional steps... Kiara is passing by...she's Lua's daughter who came to spend some time with us and also help Marcia in the kitchen... they are doing a great job... there's Fatima also , who is actually from the village nearby, Povoa de Atalaia, who also comes to help in the kitchen... she's a funny one ...
And that was the first day...

First thing next day was to lay the tires which would be filled with gravel and would support the beams under the floor...

There are the beams... we still needed little adjustments to level it...it's really hard work to fill in these tires with gravel... it's literally makes us "tired" :-)

a wise patch from the carpenters... so we can use only 2 boards on a row... everything well supported... it's amazing the ideas we come up with when little unexpected "problems" come up :-)

And the floor starts to appear...

Checking if the bales would fit the floor or if we needed to do some cutting... no cuttings needed...perfect size!!! The floor it's 5x3m, by the way ... and we'll have a 2 meter "varanda" on the east side , where the earth oven will be...

next step was to prepare the place where the bales would be piled up... with huge nails up ...the board on top is just a safety measure till we start laying the bales tomorrow... the truck straps are on place so we can tight and compress the bales as much as possible before laying the roof...

So, this is just the end of the second day...and this morning we didn't do much because we couldn't use the eucalyptus logs and I had to go and buy the squared ones... tomorrow we will lift up the wall... probably in the morning, and we can start with the roof already ... Isn't this great ?!!!

It's taking a bit more expenses than I was expecting though, and we didn't have enough people to cover all the costs, so we'll be happy to receive any donations for this purpose as I had to borrow some money to buy all the material (around 1000E)...
Let me know if you can help us on that... little is much, so I'm not expecting big donations from only a few...
I'm still considering if we'll be able to put on the insulation or not... it's quite expensive, or a much longer hard work with sheep's wool or recycled coark...


Anyway, I'll try to post as regular as I can, to avoid a really loooooong post at the end... I hope you are enjoying this as much as we are :-) Be inspired !!!

New projects about to finish...

We've been having hard work weeks... mainly making a floor for Lyna's yurt, but also a wood shelter and a bit of gardening...
We had Lyna's friend, Aurelie visiting for few weeks and a couple from Czech Republic for a week...
But here goes some pictures of what we've been up to... this first one is the early beginnings of the yurt floor, with Aurelie helping out... she definitely went back to France with more muscles and a nice tan...




Nolan would always be around... he's in such a funny stage...

bricks layer... we were trying to use the least lime as possible, so we simply stuck them in the dirt...

Lyna and Aurelie had the hard work of carrying most of the gravel up with the wheel-barrow... me and Nolan were working on the wood shelter...yep, Nolan loves building and he loves the hammer :-)... he's a nice company too...well, when he's not whining :-/...

but he makes us laugh a lot...he is a little clown...

exhausted !!! siesta time :-)

our wood shed finally done... It was not a priority, but we did have rain again,so I guess it was good we did it...I had to go help in the yurt floor as we found out we have less time than we thought...it was a bit messy from the beginning all the yurt measures and date of arrival...a bit stressy, but well, we had to keep going...

Lyna treating the wood with Borax...

Preparing the lime...hard work I tell you...

I was using the lime to level the bricks, where the plywood will seat... the inside is already filled with gravel... it's going good...

and the Yurt arrived from France, together with all Lyna's stuff...she's happy and excited... but the rain came again, so we had to have a little break... some patience, trusting that the yurt material will be ok... I'm sure it will be fine...but Lyna got a bit nervous...

while it was raining I took a bunch of palette boards and other bits and got determined to literally make my bed... I moved from the upper bed more than a week ago, and stored there lots of winter stuff, like blankets and the many stuff that other people leave behind waiting for the day they might return...hmmm... I didn't manage to make a proper platform for the futon cuz there was not much time...I just put some pallets but it was not so well leveled, so I was not sleeping so well for a long while...

It only took me 4 hours of thinking, sawing, nailing and checking if it was leveled to get it done...it seemed strong and nice... and it was, I slept like a baby...

I really enjoy building stuff :-)

I'm missing gardening a bit, specially in this season when most of things should be sown... we have lots of seedlings still to plant, but I haven't got the time to prepare a place for them...

but I did work a bit here... an experiment... our young nectarine tree was looking bad (every year the leafs got this illness people call "leper") and the lemon tree next to it doesn't look as healthy as it should... so I thought about improving the soil around with some things I learned from permaculture and forest gardens... so, I transplanted 2 rosemary bushes that needed to be transplanted, and 3 small Mimosa trees (acacia family)... I covered the soil with card-board so the weeds won't come back...I brought lots of compost from the shit pit, the kitchen compost, and mulched it on top with mimosa cuttings... on this nice mulch bed I planted lots of beans...and lets see what happens... my neighbors would probably think I'm crazy to plant Mimosas when they are such invasive trees (for them useless cuz they don't "give money")... but they have many good things as well... they are nitrogen fixers in first place, they grow fast, good for mulch, fairly good fire wood, good for building if they don't get wet, the flours have an amazing scent and we could even make soap, or even use the polen to eat...under the bark is filled with tannin, and the Aztecs even used it to heal wounds... it all sounds great to me...
but, in this experiment, I'm gonna control it so it doesn't invade that space (we have lots everywhere already)... my idea is to use them to fix nitrogen in the soil, and as they grow fast, I will use the cuttings to mulch the lemon and nectarine tree... we'll see what happens!!!

We need to finish Lyna's Yurt floor, and get ready for our Strawbale building workshop... I'm looking forward for it...
IT WOULD BE NICE TO HAVE SOME MORE ATTENDANTS, SO, PLEASE PASS IT ON TO THOSE WHO MIGHT BE INTERESTED
it will be from the 27th May to the 3rd June...and costs 200E, food and camping place included...

The seeds are sprouting out...

Just to keep my promise to the ones who participated on the last PDC...
Here´s a picture of the mulch bed you all made... with 2 weeks they are already quite big :-)... even though Muxima tried to sabotage it several times :-)
you might need to enlarge the picture to see it , eh, eh... I just took it with my phone from the washing dishes place...

It has been raining like crazy again... Tsss... but the sun will come soon !!!
Love to you all

Resume of the Permaculture Course in March

Finally I'm writing about the week of the Permaculture course...even though I did wrote a bit on my blog ...
sorry about that, but after all the work and preparations I needed a little break and I was not so fond of seating in front of a computer :-)

Anyway, once again the course was brilliant... the people whom I got to meet are amazing and we had really good times together...

either in the teachings,
around the table during meals,

chopping vegetables,watching mind-blowing documentaries and
hanging out around the fire place at nights...lots of talented musicians I have to say ...really nice !!!

I missed a bit of the social aspect because I was also running around doing other things, and in the evenings I was just ready for an early sleep :-)...

I also had to take Christian to the hospital...ups...he was swinging with a rope and hit a rock with his knee...he actually moved the rock out of its place...Ouch!!! he was more excited with it than disturbed... he wouldn't stop taking pictures in the hospital...the nurse was fun too...it looked painful though...
but I did had really good times with everyone... And it was lovely to be with Lesley again... the more I know her , the more I have to say - She's great !!!
It was nice to see the ones I already knew, but most of them I didn't know... so different and interesting people... It's encouraging to see how the portuguese are really interested and involved in permaculture projects, or simply awaking to see the world with different eyes...and willing to do something about it...

The weather was not so bad, but we did have some rain and one day the wind was really annoying...
But everyone was fine with it... at least I didn't hear many complaints...anyway, what could we do?!!

ok, now I will just post some pictures...I have to say that I was rubbish taking pictures... I just forget to take them...
and if those who were at the course would like to leave a comment with your perspective on it, it would be great...
Thank you all ... I really enjoyed it !!!


getting ready to make the design!!!

preparing the mulch bed... even when the rain was threatening ...

another group preparing for the design...

...and another group...

a nice capture while I was filling up the water containers... :-)

one of many nice evenings around the fire...which I missed most of them :-)


first group presenting their design... Kin, Filipa and Ana...

really cool structures...

second group...Christian, Hilko, Sonia and Nina...

Each one explaining different details...

after each group presented their design we would all give our opinion... one thing we liked, and one thing we would make different (no negative opinions here...I like that )

After lunch the sillyness came :-), eh, eh..really fun!!! the sun helped the good mood !!!


the third group...Silvia, Valter and Susi...

nice ideas... lots of recycling bins :-)

and the final group... Ulli, Catarina e Irene...

lots of ideas for the garden and all sorts of plant's names...nice !!!


sunday night, we all went to the village to have dinner... it was really fun...

Kin brought the guitar and played some nice tunes... we even had a dance hall :-)

Anyway, it was a real pleasant week for all of us I believe... more seeds spread... more hope to see what will come out of it ... I'm already looking forward for the next one in August... and the Strawbale workshop, very soon, from the 27th of MAY to the 3rd of June...