Photos from Housebuilding Camp

This year, the Housebuilding camp lasted for two weeks and included fort building, working with cob, two field trips, and the creation of posters and models for a museum of houses from around the world! Here are the photos:

our shake jar to test the soil (mostly clay)

creating forts in the yard (this one is the rose garden)

carefully covering them with tarp roofs so that  

our future cob furniture pieces will stay dry in the rain

weeding to clear a spot for a fort in the 

vegetable garden... Zac wants his team

to be by the wild strawberries

setting up our cob mixing tarp

dancing a test batch

cob = clay, sand, straw, water

digging for more clay

we have plenty in my yard

building models with Teifoc brick kits

Jim comes in to explain the design & construction of the

staw bale house and timber frame house at Dayempur Farm

beginning to make batches of cob for furniture

digging more clay!

Becca designs and builds a lighthouse for a display

experimenting with building a table

this cob bench design is built on a framework of sticks

this cob bench is built directly on a concrete paver foundation

painting yourself with clay is also fun

fun at Dayempur Farm

our tour begins in the wood shop

then it's on to the timber frame house

board and batten siding

mortise and tenon joints

next we visited the straw bale cabin

work on forts continues (this is the magnolia tree)

adding another layer of cob

making a model of a Ndele decorated mud house

the Ocean biome exhibit

making mountain cave houses out of self-hardening clay

Zac helps too

Natalie draws a baobab tree for the desert exhibit

creating a brick wall that parents can add to

everyone wet felts a piece of wool for yurt model making

Ms. Sheila puts on some music to dance to

while making batches of cob

Zac helps me make the bone & skin hut model (Inuit)

the diagram for making a geodesic dome

find full instructions at desertdomes.com

after "A Place Mediation" from Morning Altars,

we gather nature materials

everyone works together to create a design

a tiny robin egg shell is nestled inside the heart

of the velvet soft magnolia flower

the design expands outward

we work hard on the geodesic dome but

aren't able to make it come together

baobab granola (to taste) and a bread bowl from Panera

(to hollow out, like the spongy texture of the baobab tree)

the Desert biome exhibit

our shake jar and a cob snowball

the Tropical Forest biome exhibit,

complete with stilt house model, plants, and

musical instruments for sound effects (frogs, rain)

the Biome Map of the World

we learned that your home's materials & design

are largely dependent on what biome you live in!

the Biome Jars

(even your backyard is its own little biome)

our Backyard Biome tapestry weaving

yarn and needles so parents can weave too

the Biome Puzzle Maps

the Continent Stencils

the Grasslands biome exhibit 

our model yurts

the Temperate Forest biome exhibit

the dogtrot log cabin

the Wetlands biome exhibit

the Mountains biome exhibit

the Polar Regions biome exhibit 

modern homes

each child's fantasy house

"Home" 

group Wordle

the Museum is open!

our culminating field trip:  the Cimatron

the geodesic dome at the Missouri Botanical Gardens

this huge dome holds a Tropical Forest biome exhibit

mangrove

rice

pineapple

cacao

arrowroot

sugar cane

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