bottom pasture - looking south

Tomorrow, April and I head east. I’ll be attending a PDC at Whole Systems Research Farm in Vermont for 10 days. I’ve been eagerly anticipating this trip since the spring, and the timing couldn’t be better. This fall, we’ll be moving onto our new land and the next year will be full of visioning and designing and making plans for the land and the future. I suspect a lot of the new knowledge I come home with after the PDC will be very helpful for our design process.

Needless to say, don’t expect many (or any) updates in the next two weeks. However, once April and I return in September, we’re going full blast on getting the house on the land ready for living in this winter. It’s going to be a crazy time, because in October we’re headed west to attend the Natural Building Colloquium. We have a small window of opportunity to pack in as much work as we can. I hope we can get everything we want to accomplish done on time so we can return to a cozy house for winter!

We’re going to try some alternative / natural renovation techniques in the new house, including milk paint over the existing drywall, replacing a stud wall with a timber frame bent, using a natural linseed oil finish on the oak floor we’re putting in… all very good fodder for this blog, and hopefully interesting and relevant to you too. Look out for all that in September, ya?

Here are some bonus photos of our new land… just because. Be sure to view them large by clicking on them.

middle hill - looking south

top of the hill - looking south

 

3 Comments

  • Scott H says:

    Attending that course is on my to-do list! Looking forward to seeing how it goes for you. Have a great time!

  • Johnathan Akers says:

    Hey Ziggy, long time no comment for me, but as always, I follow and enjoy your blog a great deal. When I first saw this post, in thinking about your natural renovation techniques, your post coincided with Chris Schwarz posting about a natural soap finish on furniture, and when describing its durability he also mentioned it was popular to use it on floors in Denmark. ?!?! It has been a couple weeks now, but he has posted a bunch more information on his testing of the finish, and it really does look like a wonderful natural option. In particular, it seems like a great option over oiled products for flooring, if for no other reason then it doesn’t impart any odor, or what odor is there is a “clean” smell. Just wanted to mention it, because I think it could work brilliantly in the natural building environment, and I’m surprised I haven’t heard much else about it in the US.
    Looking forward to hearing more about the PDC!

    • ziggy says:

      Good to hear from ya, @johnathanakers:disqus. Soap finish… very interesting tip there. I’m going to have to look into it. I’ve pretty much nearly decided to go the Heritage Natural Finishes route, but I’ll have to see this. I’m glad to keep hearing about alternatives… it’s been so hard to get good firsthand account info. from folks who have used linseed oil, tung oil, or any of the things I’ve been looking into.

      Check out my PDC writeup here, by the way: https://theyearofmud.com/2015/09/14/2015-pdc-highlights/