Work continues on the northern cob wall.
We've decided to place some clear bottles in this wall to let light in and add interest. There will be shelves in front of the bottles and we plan to store coloured glassware on the shelves, and hope to have some interesting light coming through the layers of glass. Here Misake is taping two bottles together, making them airtight, then heavy grade aluminimum foil is wrapped around the bottle to ensure that the most light possible is reflected through the bottle from the outside.
Next the bottles are added to the wall at the correct height, and every effort is made to ensure they are level and straight. The engineer kept a very close eye on Dave - nothing was left to chance.
Nearly there.............
......and the last piece goes in.
Our son Win and Sarah his fiancée visited us with Grandbaby Lachlan, and Win was able to use his skills on the digger to help out with some trenching.
It seems our georgous grandbaby, Lachlan has a real way with the ladies. All the way from Thornhill in Scotland to London England and Cambridge NZ, he has a fan club of lovely ladies who hang on his every "goo". Here Aunty Linda, our neighbour sneeks a cuddle.
Wwoofer Jake from San Francisco has been a God send. We were wanting to put together a photo story chronicling our journey from mud to beautiful earth building. We wanted to use some music, preferably original, and have the whole thing reflect the collective project this has been, with people from all over the world joining in. Anyway, Jake has the musical and creative skills to pull this off, and during his 3 week stay he recorded 4 pieces of music, and put together 3 videos. Here he is in his mobile studio.
Winston and Sarah left their beautiful dog Indy with us while they visited family, and as is always the case, she has charmed her way into the hearts of the wwoofers and tradesmen alike. Misaki and Indy developed a real bond and spent hours playing and sitting together. They share a love of the fire, and spent much time cuddling in front of it.
Another very exciting development has been the purchase of a refractometer to test the sugar content and nutritional value of plants. We have been talking about buying one of these machines for sometime, and finally took the plunge. Our desire is to grow nutrient dense foods in our vegetable garden for us to eat, and produce high nutrient pasture for our animals to eat. High nutrient plants are disease resistant and encourage optimum health in those who consume them.
Here is the link that will give a bit more information if you are interested. http://www.environmental-fertilisers.co.nz/index.htm
In this photo Ali crushes some of the leaves from the celery in our vegetable garden. A couple of drops of the green juice are then placed on the viewing plate of the refractometer, and the reading can be taken.
And the great news is that our celery is rated at better than excellent in nutritional value, and at that level is considered to be disease free. We knew it would be high as I have never grown such an amazingly healthy crop of celery, without a bug or bacteria in sight.............
..................and it tastes delicious.
