16th Posting - Adobe goes on the walls

With the walls up, it was time to put on the adobe. Some of the bags were showing stress from the sun - after all, it has been nearly 2 years since we laid the first bags!

On June 28, my sister Vaughn and I tackled the project. We mixed dirt, water, and straw in a portable cement mixer (powered by the generator) and made a nice sticky batch. We threw small handfuls on the walls, being careful to make sure rows and cracks were well filled in. It went surprisingly fast. That day Vaughn and I finished the entire exterior of the south (short) wall. Two weeks later an Amish family on tour with me spent one day working on the cabin (no photos of them!) and we finished the interior of the back (long) wall. The end of July Ruth, Bev, and Jacqui helped a couple days and we finished a couple more walls. Putting adobe on the walls goes much faster than building the walls, and it's a lot more fun!

Vaughn helps put on the first adobe on the southwest buttress.

The exterior of the south wall is finished the first day.

The buttress of the back wall before the Amish family tackles it with me.

This is how the mud goes on.

The completed back wall

Ruth and I work on the interior of the north wall.

Bev digs dirt and fills the buckets.

Reaching high to put the last mud on the interior of the north wall.

Ruth shows off the completed north wall.

Ruth takes down tarp so we can start on the front wall.

Pouring water into the cement mixer for the next batch

Jacqui likes digging in the dirt.

The south half of the front wall is the last part we finished.

That is the front door and the kitchen window.

The rest of the walls should get finished end of August.

15th Posting - The Walls are UP!!

The Walls are up..... and the rectangle wood frame (base for the roof) has also been built!

The beginning of May it was back to work on the cabin. Ruth from Indiana and Simon from Switzerland were here to get the last six rows of bags on the back wall. After Ruth went home, Simon and I spent a (hot) day building the frame around the top of the walls, which will later support the roof.

For now, the cabin is covered up again until I have a break between tours, hopefully a few days end of June. Top priority will be to get adobe mud on the walls, as some of the bags are finally showing signs of sun damage. It has, after all, been almost two years since the first bags were laid!

This much was left to do when we started on Monday, May 7.

Ruth and Simon are filling bags to go on the walls.

My niece Anne joined us for a day and quickly learned the art of being a bag lady!

After a long day, the sunlight was beautiful on my white cliffs.

The snow on the Tobacco Root Mountains gleam behind the Gallatin River.

My road is paved! I can't believe I have not yet mentioned that before, but last summer they paved the road  15 miles, all the way out to and through the valley. What an incredible difference it makes now in driving out to my land. You can actually enjoy the scenery instead of having to concentrate on a rough road!

This is the last row going on. You can see the bags are still rounded, before being tamped, and you can also see the barbed wire laid down to give the rows more tensile strength.

Here I am tamping down the last row of bags. Look at that blue sky!

Looking through the south window into the cabin. The last row is done and tamped down.

Simon did a lot of filling behind the back and side walls, and then tamped it down hard to prevent water from penetrating. It slopes away from the cabin. Eventually the dirt will be even with the top of the back row.

Ruth shows off the finished back wall. She wouldn't have dared miss placing the last bags.

On Mother's Day we enjoyed a barbecue at the cabin.

Even the dogs got to get in on the fun, cooling off in the stock tank and chasing the goldfish.

Tuesday, May 15, Simon and I built the wood frame around the top of the walls.

We used 2x10 lumber, two layers thick. The first layer was the most crucial, trying to square up the frame with right angles and the same distance across the diagonal corners. This was a special challenge considering the cabin walls are by no means square or even, considering the special nature of working with earth bags. 

After getting the first row framed, we added diagonal braces on each of the four corners, and then filled in the entire second row with another layer of 2x10's, fastening them solidly to the boards below. Also, down about 6 rows, we had laid wires on the walls numerous places, and these we now brought up to the top to tie down the lower layer to add stability. In addition we had long screws, about a foot long, which we drilled down through the lower layer deep into the bags. The wires and long screws prevent the frame from any movement in any direction.

We then put all the tarps and blankets back up to protect the bags until we can get the adobe on.

14th Posting - Front walls roof-ready

We've made progress the last few days, but now I'm leaving for South Africa for almost 6 weeks, so the project will have to continue in the spring. This is the front view of the cabin before I covered it all up with tarps and blankets to protect the bags from the sun through the winter. My sister Gaylene helped me fill bags, and my sister Valerie built the five 'support ladders' that go above the doors and windows. The spray paint job is just for a bit of camouflage for areas that sometimes are visible from the road. That will all be covered eventually with 'northern adobe'.

A close-up shot of the front door and small window. Notice the buttresses go clear to the top of the walls, in order to stabilize them.

This is when the support ladder for the big picture window first went on. The window and door frames themselves cannot be weight-bearing so these very sturdy support ladders are placed over the top of each of them, resting on the bags of the walls themselves, and not weighing on the frames. 

This is the end of a support ladder. About 6 to 8 inches of 2x4 rests on the bags and another 6 to 8 inches of the underside plywood extends further out over the bags. The plywood is secured to the bag below with long nails (they really do hold!) and then I put several nails in part way so they can grab the bag that is tamped on top of the plywood.

Here you can see a bag on top of the plywood. The support ladder can now no longer move.

Looking through the small window in the completed front wall, with the support ladder clearly shown. I will use styrofoam insulation sheets to fill in the empty space between the ladders and the frames. The ladders themselves are stuffed with insulation.

The finished northwest corner from the top. On the left is the long support ladder. It is 8 feet long and each side consists of two 2x4's with crossbars every 12 inches. The diagonal 2x8 is a stabilizer connecting the front wall with the north wall. It just adds a little extra stability.

The southwest corner with south picture window and small front window and stabilizer.

The view from the back of the cabin. The front wall, and the front of both sides is roof-ready. The back wall is only 6 feet high and needs another six rows of bags next spring before I can put the roof trusses on. We have filled in dirt all along the back wall and the south side.

This is what it looks like all put to bed for the winter!

13th Posting - Front walls near the top

Well, I managed to get a little more work done on the walls a few days this week while I was home between tours. The pictures are colorful with the different tarps and blankets I have over the walls, but I use anything I can find to protect the bags from the sunlight. I took these three photos after I had the walls already covered up and ready for my absence for the next 6 weeks, when I have three tours back-to-back. 

I next plan on working on the cabin between October 22 and November 1. It would be nice to get the walls finished during that time, but that may be a bit overly optomistic. The weather would have to cooperate well and I'd have to have some help filling bags as well, but we will see.

View of the front wall. The next step is for the 'support ladders' to go on above the door and window frames. Then I'll just have one more row of bags on top of that!

This is the southwest corner - also ready for the support ladders over the frames.

And the north wall needs another row of bags before the support ladders can be put on. The back wall (no pic) will still need several rows of bags and that's the real question mark, whether we can get that done in October.

12th Posting - Work continues in August

Just in case anyone is interested in coming to inspect the project and help with the building, I plan on working on the cabin again the beginning of September, and again the end of October. All volunteers welcome!!

My friend Ruth Mark from Indiana came out for 9 days to help build the cabin and we were also joined for a couple days by Richard Sharp from DC. We got quite a bit of work done on the walls. Ruth and Richard packed a lot of bags, we strung barbed wire on the walls, and packed the bags into place. Now all walls have at least 13 or 14 rows of bags, or nearly two-thirds of the necessary height. Roger Brownson brought his bobcat out and moved a lot of dirt, backfilling the south and east walls up to the current height of the walls. The dirt hill behind the cabin will continue to rise with the walls so that eventually the hill comes to the roof level at the back of the cabin.

Ruth and Richard pack dirt into the bags.

Ruth has lots of bags ready to go on the walls.

Ruth demonstrates the height of the front wall.

Roger starts moving earth to backfill the east wall.

Richard catches me on camera, shoveling dirt down behind the back wall.

Tamping the bags into the wall.

Front wall after our last bag went on.

Richard standing in the picture window. Also note the earth piled behind the walls.

My white cliffs with ripening wheat fields in the foreground.

Another view of 'White Cliffs Ranch' over the grasslands and coulees.

Even with the grasses turning golden the abundant spring rains are evident!