Wow… is that a new post?

January 29, 2014more stories and reflections, work and lifebuild, caretaking, community, framing, freedom, lambs, lesson, relationship, sheepseedswithwings

We’re back! Sarah and I took a hiatus from blogging and building and are just now getting back into the swing of things. The last three months have been a whirlwind of blustery New York weather, Christmas trees, and baby lambs. Yes, baby lambs and don’t worry… I come bearing pictures!

Every year (for the past three years) a friend and I run a Christmas tree stand at St. Marks Church in the Bowery in Manhattan. It’s a month of preparation followed by a month of fourteen-hour days slinging conifers in the cold. The stand is open twenty-four hours a day from Black Friday until Christmas Eve, and is such a unique, enriching community-building experience. This year a highlight for me was having Sarah come work with us at the stand. She not only heaved Fraser firs over fences with the fellas, but also put her superb eye towards making wreaths for us.

Sarah Making Wreaths — Sarah making wreaths

Joseph and Sarah + Wreaths — Joseph + Sarah + wreaths

One of Sarah's Wreaths — beautiful wreath!

I also realized that as part of my work for the stand I’ve been building a “tiny house” on the street each year. It’s a 4x8x8 structure that can cozily hold three people making espresso (yes…there’s been an espresso machine). This year I upped the ante with my newly-acquired building skills, and framed this little house in panels, built in a loft, and salvaged and installed a real door (in the past the door was hinges on a warped piece of plywood). Next December…when our house is finished…who knows what new additions will be found in the tree stand shack? Sky-light? Running water? H-VAC? We’ll see.

Tree Riders 'Hobo Shack' — Tree Riders’ “Hobo Shack”

Christmas trees wrapped, we flew back to California for some R&R at Tassajara, then back to the sheep ranch,where we had forty new baby lambs to keep track of. Laaammmmbbbiiinnggg Speeeeed! Out of the pot and into the fire we go. Two of the new babies didn’t bond with their mothers (a pretty common occurrence with first-time ewe mothers) so we are feeding them twice-a-day by bottle.

So the last month has been spent catching up on work with the sheep and lambs and observing the cycle of birth and death (to be continued in another post I’m sure). We’ve also been tying up loose ends from 2013, and doing some all-important planning for 2014 – house planning, work planning, well-being and health intention-setting, financial planning, and more. We erased our window, re-categorized some things, and believe that we now have a plan that will take us at least until July of this year…if not Christmas 😉

The tiny house is back to being built nail-by-nail, and Sarah is studying to be a certified interpreter (English-Spanish), and we’ll be posting here as we go…

Now…some sheep.

Cupertino and Anne Bo-Lamb relaxing by the tiny house. — Cupertino and Annie relaxing by the tiny house.

Lullabies from Lamby-bies. — Lullabies from Lamby-pies.

Cuper grillin me, as Annie looks on approvingly. — Lambie yawn

Lifting Heavy Things

November 26, 2013framing, learning curve, tiny house build, tiny house thoughts, working togetherbeginner, build, caretaking, framing, gender, hacksseedswithwings

by Sarah

I’ve noticed, both with building and with sheep ranch work, that many of the materials and tools we use are designed for people larger and stronger than me. We bought the ultralight weed-whacker with the easy-pull string, and it’s hard for me to get it started. The tubs of nutritional molasses that we give to the sheep weigh more than me. And the impact driver twists my wrist, rather than twisting the five-eighths bit into the two-by-four. I have felt small and weak in my environment before, but never more so than now, when I am spending much of my time on building and ranch care, and am working side-by-side with Joseph.

These tools were designed, and standard material sizes were determined, with a man’s dimensions in mind. Like many things in our physical reality. Those are very different than my dimensions. Of course, many women are also strong enough to use the tools with ease, but I am not, and may never be.

Instead, I am figuring out how I need to use tools and move materials. Sometimes it’s a little different, and sometimes very different, than how Joseph would. I’ve gotten more playful about this. It feels more like a creative challenge than a roadblock. How can I “hack” these tools that were designed for people with larger hands, stronger arms, etc., and make them work for me?

In the following video, I convince a sheet of plywood and a six-by-six piece of lumber to cooperate with me.

Occasionally, it’s been useful to be small, as in the photo at the top of this post. Screwing the nut onto the anchor bolt inside the Simpson Strong Tie is work for tiny, tiny hands!

I wonder, have any of you felt that you are taking action in a physical space that was not designed with you in mind?

Building a Window Header

November 13, 2013design, framing, more stories and reflections, tiny house build, tiny house thoughts, work and lifebuild, caretaking, design, framing, how to, sheep, walls, windowsseedswithwings

A light rain was falling early this morning as Joseph and I drove to the airport. He will be in New York until the end of the year, and I’ll be joining him there soon. We left our tiny house behind, parked snug in the barn on the sheep ranch. We had a lot of sheep-related work in the past few weeks, which probably slowed down our housebuilding. But it all feels like part of the same life-building.

Yesterday while we were fixing and clearing the electrical wire that runs all around the sheep pastures and protects the sheepies from coyotes, I made up a new phrase, which will be quite useful in ranch life and building life. We were looking at a little plastic piece which snaps onto a fence post and holds a groove for the electrical wire. This little piece is perfectly designed to attach to the fence and to hold the wire the right distance, the right height. It’s “Just Right Tech.” It’s not high tech; it’s a simple plastic piece. It’s not low tech; it’s been manufactured to snap onto a fence post in just the right way. We’re calling it Just Right Tech, and looking forward to opportunities for adding more Just Right Tech to our tiny house.

While we are away, we’ll be updating a little less frequently but we do have some build videos all set for you and ready to send out. Today’s video shows the process of building a header. The header is the structural piece which distributes the weight of the roof down the studs, rather than that weight resting on your window. We’ve built a number of headers (for just about each of our windows), and we’ve gotten pretty good at it. Check out the video for the step-by-step process and Joseph’s explanation of headers.

And if you’re wondering about the photo at the top of the post… yes, we did bring our Lambie over to visit. Lambs are pretty dirty, so she won’t be able to visit once we’re further along. But we wanted her lovely lambie-ness to have been inside our home!