Building
6

Change in Plans…Again…

We have been hard at work on the cordwood house for a couple a months now.  Although it appears to me as though we have hardly been working.  Everything is moving painfully slowly and outside situations keep putting a hold on the the build for one annoying reason or another.  …

Building
1

Getting Going Again

It has been a crazy winter and I have been slacking on the blog.  We have been working on game making projects, resting before we start building again. Once the build gets going, there will be plenty on the blog to check out.  No promises as to how often I …

Cooking
1

Cob Rocket Stove DIY: # 2

The cob rocket stoves we built last year were our first try with the cob. They worked pretty well, but we wanted to try and make them even better this year. Here goes: The rocket stove that we built out of fire bricks worked wonderfully.  It cost $60 though.  In …

Building
3

Mini Cordwood House Plans: Build into the Landscape

One of the many benefits of natural building is that they are highly customizable.  You can build any shape or size home that you could possibly want.  Since you can build any shape or size, this allows you to stick a house in any old awkward place you have on …

Building

Mini Cordwood House Plans: Kids Building

One of the most important reasons we changed our lives so drastically was that we felt living off grid out in the woods would be better for our children than living in town.  One of the ways it is better is that it provides opportunities  for children to learn hands …

Building
4

Mini Cordwood House Plans: The Layout

Here it is, my favorite part of planning a house, the floorplans!  I coudn’t get it all in one piece.  It hasn’t been sunny enough to charge my laptop that has the photo editing software on it. Here is the quick breakdown:  We will be off grid completely.  Up is …

Planning and Goals

Mini Cordwood House: No Waste

Building a house and living in a house both produce large amounts of waste.  Not our house!  This will be as close to a no waste as possible and our finished house will produce no where near what a conventional home might produce. Since we are using almost all natural …

Materials
1

Mini Cordwood House Plans: Why Natural Building

One of the more commonly seen natural homes out there is the Hobbit House.  Thank you to Being Somewhere for the photos. Natural homes, in my opinion, are the most beautiful homes you coud build.  When our house is done, it will be beautiful just because it is a natural …

Off Grid Utilities
1

Mini Cordwood House Plans: Energy Efficiency

Being energy efficient is a must for us here on the homestead.  We don’t have the time to waste energy.  This is going to be very important to keep in mind when we build our cordwood house this spring. The most important energy in our home build is heat.  We …

Planning and Goals
1

Mini Cordwood House Planning: Gathering Materials

The last post I did was about observing and interacting with your environment and I talked a lot about finding free resources on our land to do various projects.  The greatest project so far is going to be salvaging materials to build a cordwood house.  Here’s the story of the …