Forever House #13

Saturday 18^th May, 2013

Phew. Weary me. Have achieved most everything I set out to do today. After about eleven hours of sleep. So rare for me usually burning the candle at both ends – up late at night and then awake early for the gym most mornings. I’m lucky if I average about six hours a night in my normal life. I went to sleep about eight-thirty last night and woke this morning about seven thirty. Fresh and ready to go. I think it helps me to write down my plan, as I did last night.

There was a heavy fog this morning – couldn’t see out the caravan windows. But by the time I’d dressed and had my porridge most of that had lifted and the day was cloudless and blue, although a sharp wind if standing in the wrong spot. I need to get on to the paw paw cream for my lips this eve and rehydrate my body. I need to drink more during the day. Since dark fell I’ve had a bucket bath in the caravan over a tarp, and there is a dahl and brown rice simmering away on the stove. It’s cosy in here with both burners going. I got smart on this trip and only opened one window and made the bed up with the heavy doona with a second folded up beside me at the ready. I wore socks, trackies and a long sleeve d top – so was cosy all night. But there’s a wooden board between the mattress and the bed base and I’ve been meaning to remove that for ages. I did this morning, and hope the hardness of the bed is not replaced by a banana bed softness. I think the board was largely for when Jeff and I are here together – so we don’t roll into the middle. We’ll see how it goes with just me tonight.

Green dunny door - protection from weather

Today first up I dug and sifted six barrow loads of dirt. That should get me through the next two days mudding. Then I painted the toilet door with green paint found here in the shed. It must be at least ten years old. I added a good dose of water and stirred it briskly and the consistency was fine. But as I walked with the tin and brush out to the dunny I realised the paint was slowly oozing onto my self and then creating a puddle on the ground when I set it down. Without any container large enough to decant the paint into I just went on painting the first coat. And very smart it looks too. I found a small container and poured as much as would fit; the rest is still in the lidded  leaking tin. I’ll do another coat tomorrow and I guess that will be the end of that tin of paint.

Yum, I’ve now got a steaming bowl of dahl and brown rice, topped with yoghurt, next to me as I write. A feast. And there’s enough for tomorrow night. Good food for my circumstances here with an esky for refrigeration and simple means and space for preparing food. Camping food. I could almost invite the neighbours in it tastes so good. Fresh coriander is the key I think.

After painting the toilet door, and in an effort to use up more paint, I painted the raw timber window frame in the loo that will hold a small stained glass panel when I get around to making one.

Next job – carting water. I brought out a couple of extra buckets I found at home. The ones I have been using at the farm are getting brittle and not coping with carting water. As I came back up into the house from the water tank with the first couple of buckets full, Gab, Dave and their two sweet white dogs Zina and Lily arrived for our plan of attack chat. Always lovely to hang out with them; their age, attitude, energy, skills. A few more like them would be fantastic for Currawinya. There are currently a couple of improved shares, and also a couple of unimproved Company shares, for sale. We all hope these will bring more good people to our Currawinyan world.

Dave will get on with the metal framing that is needed above the block walls, to bring the house to lock up. I am coming out again for five days over the Queens Birthday Long weekend. I’ll lay four rows of mud which should bring the walls to the height of the door lintels. Jeff will come with me and we will make a plan of attack for the power, water, ceiling and insulation. There there’re ten days in early July when the Forever House will be a hive of activity with Jeff, Dave, me, and my sisters Peita and Danielle all beavering away on various parts of the project.

First coat of whitewash on the mud wall - OMG!

After Dave and Gab wandered off for lunch, I finished the water carting and then I too took a lunch break . In the afternoon, I trialled a whitewash, without the casein power or quark my internet recipe called for. I used PVC glue in its place. So the recipe was lime, boiled linseed oil, PVC glue and water. I brushed down a square metre of wall, then sprayed it with water, and on went my mixture. You’ve no idea how exciting it was to finally be trying this. And it looks amazing. I think. Probably whiter and more paint-like than whitewash. The recipe says three to five coats. I think two would be plenty unless I watered it down a lot more.



Prickly Pear on my block to make 'snot' for the whitewash


But I don’t want to use PVC glue, or bondcrete as the binder. I want the mud walls to be able to breath. So I went off with a bucket and a big sharp knife and chopped a bucketful of prickly pear off a bush along the road from my share. There are three really big plants there that I have left specifically to make ‘snot’ for my walls. My memory is that you soak the plant in water – so that’s what I’ve done. I now have two buckets full to the brim with chopped prickly pear and water soaking. And that is what I will trial next time I am out; lime, snot, boiled linseed oil and water if needed. I’ll google some more and find a recipe using snot.

Snot brewing in a bucket ready for next visit

My work clothes and skin, even after my bucket bath, have lots of fine prickles imbedded from the prickly pear. I’ll have to take much better care in future.

pairs of bottle bottoms taped together ready to mud into wall

And the final couple of jobs I got done this arv were to tape the matching bottle halves together ready for tomorrow’s mudding – and I went down to the river flat and collected two containers of course sand from a huge stash dumped by the last flood. The only thing I didn’t get done was to chop more straw – so I guess that’s first up in the morning.

Full belly, clean body, weary bones. 7.26pm! Maybe an Ecco, some paw paw cream on the lips, a little read and another big sleep for me.