Handiwork

Ten years ago, I cocked an eyebrow when Dancemakers would go on tour and the dancers would knit their way across the continent. I looked askance at my roommate when she would knit away the evenings and moments between classes. But now it seems that everyone is knitting. Everywhere I look, young hip things are knocking needles together, following patterns or creating their own designs as they go. There are even folks who are spinning and dyeing their own wool.

I understand the desire to make things with your own hands; before I learned to build, I satisfied that urge by sewing. It seems to me that we're all trying to scratch a deep itch to contribute to our own shelter in some way. Despite my earlier bias against knitting, I now feel heartened when I see the kids down at the local craft sale exhibiting their funky handmade wares; I think we are connecting to the same thing when we take materials in hand and start making something.

My mother-in-law and I are going to The Knit Café on Friday, where I am going to purchase some hand-dyed wool and some bamboo knitting needles. We are going to sit at a sunny table, and she is going to show me how to knit. Finally.

Full moon

The other night my husband and I were sitting outside looking at the full moon, and I realized that it was one month since I'd been in Texas. How far I am from where I was, but here I am, looking at the same full moon.

One early morning in Texas, a friend was up and watching the sunrise while the moon set in the east, and he told me that he had the sudden, staggering understanding of the earth's place in space, and of us just standing on the side of this immense ball (I'm paraphrasing here). When he told me the story, I felt unsteady on my feet; just hearing about his experience connected me to it in a way that I experienced physically.

I'll try to stay connected to those feelings as I go forward.

Pictures

I've spent some time going through the myriad photos I took at the colloquium, and have posted them here. I have organized them by project so that you can see how they progressed, and what state of completion we left them in. Make sure to see the Threadgill Stage and the Chapel Hill albums. Gorgeous!

Busy busy

The rest of the week zoomed by, as we tried to finish the myriad projects that had been started at the Colloquium. At one point we ran out of prepared clay, so the organizers were scrambling to dig more and pulverize it in a hammer mill for use in plastering. My new red made-for-women construction boots and tool belt got a bit of a workout, but the speed of work was enjoyable and filled with laughter and conversation, as we compared techniques and traded skills.

More music ensued, and some nights of drumming and dancing. (It was so freaking cold in the evenings that it was the only way to keep warm!) Joe Jenkins gave his Humanure talk on Friday night, and he was hilarious, as usual. I guess when you are constantly talking about crap, you find a way to make it funny.

Saturday was a day of finishing up projects as much as possible. Nothing got completely done; a crew will be back this week to prepare projects for winter. But the Kerrville Folk Festival site is now blessed with a cob/adobe/earthbag welcoming booth, a strawbale staff building, a timberframe bucket toilet facility, a spiffed-up-with-earthen-plaster auditorium, and a mind-blowingly-beautiful and artful ceremonial stage for its open air church.

Saturday night after the closing ceremony, we had a talent show, and I performed a song I wrote while I was there, with the help of Pete and James who played guitar and sang back-up. It was terribly hard to leave on Sunday, but it was time for Pete to get Sun Ray and I to the airport.

Sunny again

Well, last evening was full of music, with attendees regaling us with their voices and instruments. There was one thing that filled some of us with dread, however: the impending night of frost. Two of us (I will not name names), knowing our rated to 10-degrees-celsius sleeping bags were waiting for us in our tents, bailed from the ranch for a night at the cozy Comfort Inn. A hot shower and heated room was what we needed to recover from the chill visited upon us by the previous 24 hours.

Having learned our lesson, we made a trek (again to Walmart) and got us some sleeping bags that we hope stop our incessant complaining about the cold.

Doni and Kaki, of earthbagging fame, arrived yesterday and I spent some time chatting with them this morning, and thanking them for all their help with the composting toilet project at Dufferin Grove Park. I am looking forward to working with them here as they teach us earthtubes, a faster version of earthbagging.

Bale pics

Compressing bales for use in a straw bale wall

Adobes

Sitting and soaking

It's been a busy couple of days. On Saturday, we started some projects, but then sat on our butts all afternoon and the next day listening to some seriously inspirational presenters. We've heard about:

• Radical plumbing and alternative grey and black water management (some people think my CSA-approved composting project is over the top, they would probably faint dead away to hear some of this stuff)
• Adobe restoration in New Mexico
• Getting the building codes to to expand their understanding of what's worth protecting. (ie, it's good to make sure buildings don't fall on people's heads, but it's every bit as important to make sure we are not wrecking the earth in the process)
• Intentional communities and how they work in the real world
• "Turning Drains into Sponges and Water Scarcity into Water Abundance"
• Placemaking par excellence in Portland, Oregon
• Cob in British Columbia and the world
• Mud, stories and art

These folks really connected mud and life; pretty mind blowing.

Last night, they said we might be having a storm in the night, so I moved my clothes out to my colleague's car. The water dripping through my tent at 3am put the lie to my valiant tent waterproofing efforts, though once the water got in, the waterproofing on the tent's bottom seemed to be retaining water nicely. Fortunately, I was able to divert most of the drips off of my (rather skimpy and not meant to handle sub-zero temperatures) sleeping bag, so that I could at least get through the night.

Today has been around 10 C, though now the clouds are gone. Tonight will be cold, and then it will apparently warm up. Fingers crossed, 'cause I left my winter parka at home, against my better judgement.

I've arrived

Well, I met Janet, a fellow Colloquium-goer, this morning at our hotel. My luggage arrived on the first flight from Memphis, none the worse for wear. We stocked up on supplies at Walmart, and then drove her rented SUV to Quiet Valley Ranch, all the while chatting about sustainability. Then we set up our petrochemical-derived tents and unpacked our plastic canvas knapsacks and folding chairs. Long live sustainability!

Tonight, Penny Livingston-Stark opens the Colloquium with a talk about "natural building, permaculture and regenerative design". Off I go!

Oh, and a guy in a Utilikilt just walked by; so cool.

In San Antonio

We left Toronto a half hour late, so that left me running about a mile in the Memphis airport in order to make it onto my connecting flight with one minute to spare. In San Antonio, i discovered that my luggage wasn't so lucky; it will apparently arrive tomorrow. I am scheduled to leave at 10am, while my luggage will fly in for 11am. Not sure how I'll sort that out.

Supper was a microwaved pizza pocket and a Snickers bar. Getting geared up for 10 days of vegan fare, I guess. Well, off to bed; looks like a busy day tomorrow.

In Toronto

Getting ready to go

I am finalizing my packing, and getting ready to go to the Natural Building Colloquium in Kerrville, Texas: www.naturalbuildingtexas.org. Alan tells me that I might consider taking fewer socks; we'll see what finally makes the cut.

Thank you for Centre for Local Research into Public Space for their generous sponsorship, and for the staff at Dufferin Grove Park, for donating the proceeds of a recent Friday night supper to help pay for my trip.