Back in the woods.

The kids seem to be very happy to be back at the cabin.  We woke up to a rainy Monday morning, or rather I woke up on the screen porch and listened to the rain for a while, then grabbed a pillow and some books and went into the loft to curl up with the kids.  This was them, AFTER 8 AM!

Nuts.  

After a leisurely morning of cuddling and reading in bed, (I've rediscovered the Magic Schoolbus books, courtesy of a.Caitlin; they're interesting and very well put together, at least those that were written before Fox made the tv show, and started publishing cheap knock-offs,) followed by a pancake breakfast and some big bang theory.  (We're just re-watching the second season, I really need to find a dvd store.)


We then suited up and headed out into the drizzle.  Today's project was our fountain, something that the  gravity water system can run out into constantly, without depleting the hot water from the solar system. At first I was envisioning a horse-trough ala old west, but it changed a bit in the making.


Anyway, step one was rock-picking.  The kids headed out before I was ready, and came back to fetch me at top speed.

After rock picking for a while, which included going through the nearest sections of rock wall and tossing the big flat ones over to the road, we headed out to collect them with the truck.  (Our property, which used to be a section of the poor farm, is crisscrossed with massive stone walls, some 8 ft wide and 6 ft tall, where generations of people cleared the fields and pastures by hand and piled the stones at the edges.  It's neat to see the skeleton of the pastures and fields, hidden now in the new growth of forest.)


Caspian found an inch worm.

Everyone was in fine spirits.  It warmed up, and the rain came and went, but was never especially heavy.

Annaliese was feeling particularly spunky.  

One that fell out of the truck on our way back.  I wasn't going to lift it into the back of the truck twice, so we used the sled.  They gave it a good effort.

We picked our spot, set a drain line in the ground, and got to it.

Nothing makes these kids happier than helping, with real tasks.  Make-work does not cut it.  It can slow a project down, but they're so enthusiastic and chipper it's easier in the long run, and far more pleasant.

After lunch the kids took their nap, and I headed out for another load of rocks.  If you look in the background at the wood pile you can also see I grabbed a medium sized oak tree with a bad lean at the same time, and split/stacked it, all before the kids woke up.  Not so much to my credit as the kids slept for over 2 hours.  Nothing like a rainy day, and I think the cabin has established itself as another home in their minds.


The second truck load of rocks was a bit more aggressive on size, as I didn't have the kids to juggle; there was some dismantling and rebuilding after the larger foundational stones were available.

Finished, interior joints packed with cement.  We'll see how it looks when that dries. The stone is stable dry-laid, but needed the cement for water-sealing.  I had one bag of cement, (6 years old in the jobox, left over from the original foundation work for the cabin,) and that did everything I planned, except the skim coat for the floor.  We'll figure that out tomorrow.  As it is, water will fall from above, (how will be determined tomorrow as well,  I like the constant sound of running water, but I also have in my mind a noise-making option, similar to the knocking of the bamboo water feature in the japanese garden in one of the Kill Bill movies,) and will flow out the back, through the stones of the shower, and off into the woods. 

This picture is from Friday night, Natalie's house, me and my kids watching the fire.  Thank you for sending this Natalie.