We’ve laid cordwood all day yesterday and today and we are making good progress. We had 8 people come out and help!! It’s so much more effective to have at least 4 people working at one time. That way, someone can be mixing mortar, two people can be laying the wood, and someone can be pointing the mortar that has hardened enough to ‘finish’. We are probably about half way done. So, if we can get a few more cordwood work days in before the weather is consistently cold, we may be good to go!!
Here we have laid ‘big bertha’ in her place in the wall. It is the only large round piece that we have. They tend to crack, so we didn’t want to risk it with too many large pieces. But she seems to be holding up well.
And here is ‘big birtha’ a few hours later. Kaia said it look like she has bottle hair :-) I love the way it turned out!
These are the kitchen walls. We worked on the left section today.
We did this section yesterday and today. On the inside there more bottles making a pattern up the wall.
This is the living room area. The 2 sections to the right of the triangle are almost finished now!
The cordwood work looks wonderful. I was wondering about the bottles though. Are you exposing the glass on both sides to let the light pass? and if you are what is your fix for the open end of the bottle?
peace
Hey Woody,
Yes, we put a clear bottle on the outside and a colored one on the inside. That lets the most light through to the color inside. The two bottles are placed open end to open end and then wrapped in aluminum printing plates (you can use house flashing, but we got the plates for free). This keeps the bottles in a tunnel so no insulation/sawdust falls in and blocks the light.
Wow! Looking good!
it’s looking great! i like big bertha! perhaps on the cold winter days, you can carve a face into her. 🙂
i came upon your blog when searching for sustainable living/homesteading blogs. i just love what you guys are doing. so beautiful. the bottles are awesome. your home will be dreamy.
That is just so great! I think cordwood is an excellent earth-friendly building technique. It’s really looking good!!
It’s starting to look like Home!
Wow! It’s been a while since I visited — You guys are moving right along! I can only imagine how warm and inviting that house will be. Would you like to adopt a slightly used couple in their fifties, please? 🙂
Do you like to garden and occasionally baby sit? We might be able to work something out 🙂
Honey, I am a gardening FOOL! And from what i’ve read about kaia, she seems a real joy to hang out with. I loved the comment about Big Bertha having bottle hair… It DOES look like bottle hair!! 🙂
Wish we did live close, I’d love to come help with the cordwood and get some first hand experience. I do stained glass, so you can imagine how much I’m loving the light thru the bottles…
Hope you have a productive wkend! Oh, you go ahead and get our room ready and I’ll be packing… Just give me a minute to break it to hubs that we’ll be moving…. heh