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random Archives - Page 2 of 3 - The Year of Mud

Sep 13
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hardwood floor with natural oil finish

To Tamar

By Uncategorized

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Dearest friend and fellow Dancing Rabbit member, natural builder, gardener, fiddle player, yoga teacher, (hell, life teacher), and just simply an amazing human being, Tamar died on Sunday, September 12th. I’ve had the oh-too brief fortune to know Tamar for three years while living at Dancing Rabbit. Last fall, Tamar’s health took a sudden turn for the worst when she was diagnosed with cancer. Since that fateful autumn, she has been through much pain, as have those many family members and friends who have been witness to her suffering. It has been one hell of a journey, the difficult end of which has come on a incredibly sunny, breathtaking September afternoon, with Monarchs bringing fluttering, fleeting color and beauty to the prairie. How fitting a day for the death of such an amazing individual.

Tamar has left a mark on many of those people who have crossed paths with her, and I am no exception. She had been a big inspiration throughout the building of my home, and her colorful mosaics grace its cob walls. She has left behind many reminders of her beautiful (but too-short) life here at Dancing Rabbit, and for that I am extremely thankful, and I am indebted to have known such an amazing person and friend.

Here’s to you, Tamar. You are missed.

May 02
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My cob house featured in PARADE Magazine

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Haha. A few weeks ago, a woman from PARADE Magazine contacted me about the grain bin renovation here at Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage. With my email response, I included a link to this website, and the writer decided to feature GOBCOBATRON instead of the grain bin home.

So now 70 million people have read about me (‘Ziggy Liloia’ – I actually almost never use my nickname and last name together) and building my cob house here at Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage. Weird.

Unfortunately, they did not include either a link to The Year of Mud or Dancing Rabbit’s website. But here’s their story on it: Home, Strange Home.

Apr 13
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The Year of Mud expands

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The comments I received on my earlier post seemed to be enough to sway me towards combining this website with my kitchen construction blog, so except many (and more frequent) posts about building the bale-cob kitchen here in the future! For the sake of my own sanity and time, this seems to be the best option. I’ve imported all of the content (there isn’t that much yet), so you’ll see it throughout the existing posts.

You may notice a few other changes on The Year of Mud to accommodate this change, as well. I’ve reworked the About page to include a brief cob building overview, and moved my cob house timeline to its own page. And the kitchen construction project has its own page as well, which will surely be updated as progress on that building continues.

Stay tuned for more, and thanks for the feedback!

p.s. No new title yet. I gotta admit that I’m sorta attached to “The Year of Mud”, even though the name is kinda irrelevant now.

Apr 13
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Question for readers: Combining kitchen building blog with The Year of Mud?

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I’ve been pondering a possibility for the past week or so. Last year, I started up a new blog dedicated to my latest building project, a sub-community kitchen here at Dancing Rabbit that I’m working on with a few other folks. However, I’ve been finding it difficult to want to maintain two separate websites, although in theory I like the idea of the content for each website being devoted to each particular project. It just seems more organized, you know? But it’s really hard to want to upkeep two pretty regular blogs… well, regularly.

And so I ask you readers: do you think that I should combine The House That Millet Built with The Year of Mud, for the sake of simplicity? Or should I keep them separate, for the sake of organization?

It should be fairly straightforward to have a kitchen subsection on this website, with it’s own set of categories.

Well, what do you think? Would it detract from the straight aim of this blog to start talking about a whole new project?

Dec 21
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OT: My new blogging job

By Resources

Just a random and slightly off-topic post here to say that I am now blogging at sustainablog, an environmental news blog that’s been around for a number of years now. I have been freelance blogging for the past three years for a number of websites, but hopefully this will work out to be a longer term gig than the rest! My first post is about the excellent book, Goat Song, and small-scale food production.

Expect a fair bit of natural building entries there as well!

(p.s. Happy winter solstice, by the way – if I were home, I’d like to measure how far the sun penetrates into my house through the south window on this day…!)

Oct 14
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A brief update

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Crappy weather the past week – clouds and rain and minimal amounts of sunshine make for dreary days and little electricity in the Common House, hence a total lack of updates this week, even though there is news to tell.

Today I am headed out to Oregon for the annual Natural Building Colloquium, a regular gathering of natural builders. I’ve never been to one before and I’m greatly looking forward to it. I’ll be in OR for at least a week, if not more, because I’m hoping to meet up with folks and do some traveling around the area, perhaps touring all of the great cob and natural building happenings in the state.

We’ll see what happens. But don’t expect any updates for a while! Off I go…

Jul 07
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Days away from moving in

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Apologies for a recent lack of updates, but I’ve been away for over two weeks and recently returned home. But I am now days away from moving in after oiling my earthen floor over the weekend. 

Expect more updates very soon about finish earthen plaster, laying and oiling the finish earthen floor, and moving in!

 

gobcobatron

(p.s. The silly looking jugs in the garden in this photo? They are to detract voles and/or moles from eating up the vegetable plants. [Which is actually more important when the plants are very young.] It actually works, although it’s not the prettiest sight!)

May 18
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All that remains…

By Uncategorized, Earthen Floor

At this point, all that remains before I move into my new house is finishing and sealing the earthen floor, doing the interior final plaster work, and installing a skylight.

The plaster work will probably take the longest length of time among these three things, since I want to do a bunch of tile mosaics inside as I plaster. Those mosaics can take a while…

My skylight (a 60″x60″ piece of 1/4 in. clear polycarbonate) should be arriving at the end of the week, and I’ll probably start mixing my finish plaster tomorrow, as soon as I get some more cow manure.

Of course I’m tempted to estimate when I’ll move in… I figure I’ll give it a month. The floor and walls will need some time to dry before I can move my stuff in, so even if I finished in a week and a half, I can’t move in immediately.