Rumi’s Dome

Well, here we are….the final blog post to report on the final chapter of the goat mud hut adventure in Rainier, WA, spring of 2014. And what an adventure it has been! I’ve been back in Winnipeg for 6 days now. As I sit here reflecting on these last few months in my quiet little studio apartment, part of me wonders if it really happened at all. It all seems a bit surreal at the moment.

The last few days after the last post was a valiant effort to finish as much of the outside plastering as possible before I had to leave on Sunday, June 8th, and I must say, last minute shotcrete job cancellation notwithstanding, we got pretty damned close!

Let me begin this post with a photo summary of those last 3 days of plastering so you can see where we officially got to by the time I left and what is left for Meggan to do over the next few days/weeks.

Once again, here we were, at the end of the solo plastering day last Wednesday, three days and counting before departure:

And after all was said and done, this is what we had produced by late afternoon on Saturday, June 7th:

Looking pretty round, pretty complete, more mushroom, less beehive….but still a hybrid of the two.

The structure will stand tall and proud like this for another week or so until Joseph, the Eco-building, Earth plaster expert from Olympia will come out for a day with his plaster pump to apply one more thin coat of plaster over the whole dome to smooth it out and finish it off. It will then stand as is to dry out for another week or two at which point there will most likely be a waterproof membrane painted on to protect the dome from rainwater penetrating the porous Superadobe material. Meggan and I will be in communication to confirm and finalize this last step so that we both feel good about this experimental goat dome’s readiness to take on the wet Washington winter. I trust Joseph and Meggan will discuss some good options in this regard when he comes out with the pump next week.

Here are a few photos of the last plastering days and the wonderful helpers we were fortunate to have come out and assist with their great energy!

Lanakila came by on Thursday for a few hours and we had a lovely sunny day to get a few sections mostly done.

Thank you for all of your help Lanakila, you are truly a gem and your positive support and enthusiasm was so very appreciated! I look forward to checking out one of his many books through Amazon (I got a preview of ‘A Journey From Present to Past’ by Lanakila Washington and it looks fascinating, check it on Amazon)!

Friday and Saturday consisted of more of the same, plastering and more plastering. Meggan had hired Roger to come out for the last two days so we could maximize our production while I was still here. Not Roger of foundation plan and carpentry fame from past posts, but Roger who had advertised plastering/painting services in Betty’s newsletter in Yelm. Roger is a down-to-Earth, ex-fellow Canadian from New Brunswick but has been living in Washington for 20 plus years now (still has that hard-to-place Maritime accent though!). He was a great help and on Friday, he also brought another wonderful helper with him, the lovely Anna from Germany, via Edmonton, now also living in Tenino which is a quaint town next to Rainier.

Friday was also the day that Joseph made the trek out to Rainier from Olympia to show us the milk paint/lime paint options he had for painting the inside of the dome. Joseph is an amazing wealth of knowledge of all things eco. He is also very realistic and honest about what can be expected and/or accomplished with this milk/lime paint medium within the context of our project. He was generous enough to stay and mix up a small batch of milk paint to test it on our Earthbag interior and gave us the pros and cons of both the milk paint and lime paint. We may actually go with the lime paint for the upper coils as it gives a nice white white finished look as opposed to the milk paint’s off-white color. I suppose again that he and Meggan may discuss this further next week and reach a decision for the interior finish. Whatever ends up on the inner walls just has to be breathable so the Superadobe has an avenue for water to escape, especially if there ends up being a waterproof membrane on the outside which is not breathable. I am certain an easy, inexpensive and effective solution will arise for the completion of the inside of the dome.

In the end, we accomplished a lot in those last two days. I enjoyed the plastering company, good conversation and learning about the natural paints and plasters. Here are some highlights from the last two work days with Roger and Anna and milk paint visit/consult with Joseph:

Joseph sunning himself on the buttress while Anna plasters:

Anna and Roger in deep plaster focus:

Roger testing the strength of the entry buttress; solid.

Mmmm, velvety!

Entryway is getting plump

And the crowning glory to place above the entrance was the necklace that I had worn almost everyday whilst building this very goat dome…Meggan had gifted this necklace to me shortly after my arrival deciding that it belonged to me. It became my dome-building necklace. This was a necklace that she had made with her own hands so we thought it would perfectly embody both of our combined energies as a symbolic gesture of the blood, sweat, tears and love that went into the building of this inaugural Cal-Earth goat dome structure.

Here is the ceremonial embedding of the necklace above the door:

Gotta admit, I was pretty proud that I got that sucker to stay on a pretty much vertical surface, nevermind that Roger had to coach me through the whole process, thank you Roger! Meggan was appropriately looking after the goats while this was playing out at the end of the day.

Hopefully it survives the final plastering round next week!

And in order to say I was officially finished working on this particular dome project, I had one more thing I had to do:

Oh yeah, MILLER TIME!! A job well done indeed.

The nice thing about those final few days was that the panic potential had passed. No, the dome would not be ABSOLUTELY and COMPLETELY done by the time I left, but it would be ABSOLUTELY FUNCTIONAL with just a few small steps to say it was officially ‘goat ready’. It’s just us humans that like things to look ‘pretty’ or ‘orderly’ and yes, I had to surrender the part of me that was bothered by the mud stains still clinging to some of the upper coils on the inside that I couldn’t get to, or the ‘unclear’ edge of where the plaster would stop in the entryway as you enter the dome, or the glass windows that still needed to be scrubbed of cement plaster residue. Even the Earth plaster crumbs that lay waiting to be swept from the cylindrical trough of the pipe windows. No, I didn’t get my squeaky clean, perfectly finished Smurf hut photo-op before I left….but this ain’t Hollywood either. Perfection is a subjective perception at best (say that 5 times fast). We have to accept things as they are, not as our egos would like them to be. And when I remain in that beautiful heart space that brought me out here in the first place which Rumi so innocently reminded me of, I can’t see anything but the best damn goat mud hut this side of the Milky Way!

And speaking of Rumi and accepting things as they are, guess who came home for my last two nights after hanging with Dr. Sealy for a few days…..yes! I got to see Rumi one more time before heading back to Canada, what a treat! Now, to be sure, Rumi is still on the fence about which way he will ultimately decide to go in this Earthwalk but what an honour to have none other than this Divine goat, named by Meggan after the poet who inspired Nader Khalili, founder of this very style of Earth building in which we built this goat dome, return to this property, if only to be the very first goat to grace this goat dome proper! Now THAT’S perfection if you ask me, at least from my subjective perception!

Please enjoy this short video tour of the goat dome with our beloved Rumi infusing the whole structure and surrounding area with his pure love and awesomeness just by his PRESENCE!

I just heard from Meggan yesterday that Rumi has officially been adopted by Dr. Sealy and her daughter to carry him forth in the direction of his choosing. Bless them both for their love and dedication in caring for this precious goat.

On the morning of my departure, I got up early and went out to the dome with my djembe drum to sit and experience the energy inside the dome (it’s amazing) and play a few beats to feel the vibration of what we co-created together with all of the wonderful helpers, seen and unseen, who contributed some aspect of themSelves to be forever infused into the DNA of this structure. Wow, what a nice feeling that was. I won’t soon forget it. Nor will I soon forget all of the amazing folks I met out in Rainier. I feel as though I have a whole extended family in the Pacific Northwest now. There are some amazing things happening in this little corner of the Earth and I was honored and humbled to be witness to some of it.

Now what would a goat mud hut project conclusion be without having all of the goats check out their new digs? These were my final moments in Rainier, WA. Giselda and Ariel stopped by to say goodbye and we all walked out to the dome together for one last photo shoot. This time we left the gate open for the goats to join us.

Meggan, you’re a Warrior and I’d walk through the fire with you any day….back at ya Girl! WE DID IT!!!

Wayne, who had been a tremendous help in the earlier stages of the dome building stopped by to see the end product and to say goodbye as he will be off on his own adventures to Africa with his Biosand Filter/Friendly Water project soon and he asked me, “Tannis, now that you’ve gone through this process and built one of these, would you do it again?” And without a shadow of hesitation, my response was, “In a heartbeat.”

Dante, Vittoria, Lucy, Lily, Opal, Darwin and Rumi, in the flesh or in essence, we hope you enjoy your new dome.

It’s a BOY! Two, actually!

They’ve arrived! Two adorable baby boys delivered this morning around 10 AM and 10:30 AM respectively by Mama Opal, like a pro!

What an experience it was to witness such a sacred event such as this, I feel very blessed to have been present!

Everyone was on high alert since last night….Meggan noticed some pelvic tilting and sensed the time was nigh. We had baby monitors going and Meggan had her doula hat on her nightstand. However, Opal bless her, waited until the reasonable hour of 9:30 AM to start the delivery of her two beautiful and adorable little ones! She was incredible! Meggan was there on standby to help once the kids came out and was a dyno-myte goat doula! I handed doula Meggan a few items as she needed them but mostly I tried to keep a respectful distance, get a few photos, watch Cyrus until the going was good to meet the babies and just soak up the awesome of everyone’s focus. As an outside observer, I can say the whole scene was a humbling, awe-inspiring performance by all. Wow. Here are some pictures of this special moment….any comments I could try to sputter out cannot come close to doing justice to the beauty that clearly speaks for itself here.

What a week! 🙂

The other goats stayed right near the fence throughout the delivery for support, amazing.

Wow. That’s all I can say, is wow.

Hallelujah!

Three guesses, first two don’t count……THE FOUNDATION IS DONE!!! Yes!! And not only is it done, I feel very good about it.

Now, this may shock you to know, but in the end, we went with the 6 mil black plastic sheeting….haha! True story. With some modifications I might add, so the plastic doing and undoing was still necessary but after the initial debacle played out, I received sound and concise advice from the Director of the Cal-Earth Institute (thank you Ian!) and we had a forward moving plan in place that I could ACTUALLY wrap my head around for real this time. It was essentially the same as Roger’s initial foundation plan only with a layer of drain rock underneath and a slightly shallower trench to deal with the now less daunting bunching plastic. It was mentioned by a few people that thicker plastic is the way to go if you’re going to use it. Many in the Cal-Earth community felt the 6 mil plastic sheeting would break down over time but I was told by local conventional construction foundation experts that around here and generally throughout the US (possibly beyond, who knows) the 6 mil variety is typically used for foundations without incident. I was ok with that answer. Can you imagine how I would be with even thicker plastic given my aversion to things that bunch?

OK, moving on from that topic, a recap from the ending of the last post…We’d finished laying our first Superadobe bag in our two foot trench directly on the tamped Washington Earth, here it is again:

Well, as awesome as it is, this bag has become the proverbial ‘sacrificial bag’ as we needed to create a vapour barrier so the groundwater could not creep up the structure through the porous surface of the Superadobe bag which was in direct contact with the Earth. Got it. In fact, I will never not get that again. Therein lies the value of the sacrificial bag. Perfect.

Next order of business was to order 6 yds of drain rock. We went with 1 1/4″ drain rock as was recommended by the folks at Teddy Bear Hauling in Yelm. ‘River wash’ as my Dad informed me when he and my Mom came for a lovely two-day visit on their way home from their warm winter excursion in AZ. They drove up the coast from San Diego and stopped to say hello before heading East back to Winnipeg. It was wonderful to see them and so comforting and grounding to hang with them for two days. No accident that they arrived just in time to help us kick start the SOLID foundation, thanks Ma and Pa!

Here they are helping us lay drain rock in the mist for the bulk of their one full day in Rainier, WA. I have to say, it was so inspiring to be doing hard labour with my parents (at their insistence, I swear), both in their mid-70’s, ever ready and willing to help out in any way they can. And I always love watching my Dad’s old ‘farm boy’ ingenuity at play! Hallelujah to strong foundations!

The finished drain rock-filled trench. RIP sacrificial bag, I’ll never forget you! You’ll always be my first!

See, the great thing about coming into this adventure with no experience save for the one week workshop at Cal-Earth under my belt is the fact that I had decided to go with 3 rows of below-grade foundation bags rather than the standard 2 rows normally used for this size of dome just to be safe. So unbeknownst to me, I had worked a ‘bonus bag’ into the plan. And what a learning opportunity that bonus bag turned out to be (see last post)!

Next up, (drumroll please) the plastic laying!! I think there was a silent agreement between Meggan and I that I would complete this step solo. It seemed right what with our history and all (the plastic and I that is). So I set out Monday morning, April 7th, the day after my parents left Rainier for home, with the neatly folded segments of plastic and proceeded to shear off some width from each piece as we were only going to be wrapping 2 rows of bag instead of 3, and lay them in the trench that was half as deep as the last time I attempted this feat. And wouldn’t you know, narrower plastic, a shallower trench and an attitude shift actually made for a positive and not too bunchy plastic-laying experience! Check it!

We were ready to lay our second first Superadobe bag!

These are the two spool supports I rigged up from scrap wood and rebar from Meggans barn to ease our sandbag and barbed wire measuring. They have since collapsed under the weight but were fun while they lasted.

The completed first row at the end of the day!

And this is what we had to look forward to all week after days upon weeks of sketchy weather. Does weather influence us or do we influence it I wonder…. Nevermind, we were definitely off and running, FINALLY!!

‘Wrangling’ the buttress wall:

Meggan and Cyrus pleased with their tamping efforts, rightfully so:

9th round…almost done the second row, mentally preparing for the pending wrapping job to ‘go the distance’ with this foundation once and for all!

Second row complete…..wait for it……..

YEAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

For the record…the wrapping (which was again silently agreed to be done solo) took one full day and was actually a very peaceful and almost enjoyable experience in the end. A big shout out goes to the inventor(s) of duct tape.

And after meticulously poking the barbs of the barbed wire through the plastic as I wrapped it, I can officially say I have put my blood, sweat and tears into this project! (Is that a dolphin?)

Next step is back-filling the trench and although this would still be categorized as part of the foundation work, in my opinion the moment I tucked and taped that last tuck of the tucker, I had conquered my fear of the foundation and had never felt more deserving of a Selfie in my life! Hallelujah!

Stay tuned for Part II of our progress to date!

Goat Mud Hut

Maiden attempt at a Cal-Earth mud hut for goats

mud hut

Rumi’s Dome

It’s a BOY! Two, actually!

Hallelujah!