Its all Wood

While I was at my Uncle's cabin in Eagle River, WI, I went about making my first 100% wood construction piece of furniture. I used only an old 20ft. pine 2x6 that I found above my uncles garage and Titebond II wood glue. To school myself, I read Peter Korn's Woodworking Basics book. 

Tenon, cut by hand with a dovetail saw

Gluing pine boards together for the tabletop

The legs, put together with mortise and tenon joinery

The view from our workshop over Sunset Lake.

The legs, with mortises drilled and chiseled out. 

The table! I want to paint the bottom...

Beautiful!

The Magic Bus

 My friend & housemate Rachel introduced me to four of the coolest, ambitious and dedicated kids I've met in a long time. Reid, Dylan, Eliza and Ellen are four friends who know each other from attending high school together in Durham, NC. For years they have been talking about taking a trip around the country together, and they were about to actualize their dream around their shared interest: farming. To make the trip happen, they approached several businesses in their towns and also ran a very successful Kickstarter campaign and purchased a old Dartmouth Outing Club bus that runs on veggie oil. They tricked out the bus with beds and a small kitchen and even put a greenhouse in the back! It wasn't too hard to get myself over to Fishtown to see their project in Philadelphia and to lend them a hand.

Little Berlin Artist Collective in Fishtown, and their abandoned lot ready to be transformed

The Finished Garden!

Everyone lent a hand!

Dylan, Reid, and some rascals. Notice the rainwater harvesting system in the background

Garden Update

Its amazing what one month will do! Check this shizz out

Planted 5/28

July 1st!

Kale fo' free

The Pine Barrens Suck

       I wanted to get out of the oppressively hot and uncomfortable city and head to more comfortable environs. I was to go it alone, as every friend wanted to stay inside and relish their air conditioners. Perhaps I should have followed suit.

       I set out from Philadelphia around 2p.m. on Saturday afternoon, in about 100 degree heat. The drive wasn't long or stressful, only about an hour by I-76 and US Rt. 206. 

Wharton State Forest is nowhere in the middle of somewhere

 I hit the flat, sandy Mullica River trail and started sweating immediately. The trail was unimpressive to start, and never really became more interesting.

The first part of the trail looked like this. As did the middle. And the end. 

Mullica River; a wide bog that smelly funky

         After about three miles, I got onto the Batsto trail. This trail runs for 50 miles. However, after seeing the trail, I wouldn't walk it for 10 miles. Please excuse my negativity. The bugs were brutal, as a swarm of nats, mosquitos and black fly s followed me every where I went.

The Batsto Trail

 The highlight of the trip was swimming in the Batsto river, just steps from my tent. The cold water was quite nice in the 100 degree heat. The river was stained red from the Atlantic cedar that skirt the slow moving river; a of the boy scouts I met said that the tannins have antimicrobial properties and make the water good for drinking. Nonetheless, I used my  Katadyn pump to make sure I wasn't going to get the giardia.

The Batsto River that ran past the Lower Forge campground

I'm glad I went to the Pine Barrens because it arrested my curiosity about the Pine Barrens, which encompasses over 1 million sq. acres of New Jersey (22% of the state).

Learning to Building in Steps

The first project that I got to work on start to finish with Daedalus Design/Build was a small, elegant deck in Swathmore, PA only a couple blocks away from Swathmore College. We demolished a existing and rotting set of stairs led from the kitchen to the backyard and started from scratch. Take a look at the pictures below.

More words to come...

First Vegetable Garden

We planted a garden! It was the first garden for each of us, and while we enjoyed it I think we were both glad that it only took a day!

The 20x15 ft' patch is in the backyard of Hannah's parents in Ambler, about 25 minutes from Philadelphia. It was a bit late in the spring to be planting (it was over ninety degrees on the day we planted), but that only meant that the plants we were putting in the ground were more developed. Aside from Richard and Moriah's kale seeds, every plant we put in the ground was fairly mature. Here are the steps, roughly:

1. Spread compost (manure and decomposed leaves) to fix nitrogen into the soil. Using a lawn fertilizer would add too much nitrogen to the lawn at once, and runoff from lawn fertilizer causes serious damages to waterways and lakes. 

 2. Till the soil. Tilling homogenizes the dirt, clay, and composted materials and also eradicate any weeds that would compete with our young cultivars.

 3. Spread plastic cover, which keeps weeds down throughout the garden. We used rocks to hold down the plastic and poked many tiny holes in the surface to allow water to seep through into the ground.

4. Plant! We planted about 20 tomato plants, 3 pepper plants, 3 small rows of kale, cucumber, 2 kinds of basil, tarragon, rosemary, oregano,radishes and asparagus. 

Rows of Kale Sprouts & Seeds

3 kinds of peppers

Tomatoes!

All in all, the entire garden only took us a few hours. This is something I would definitely do more of too, as it was quite enjoyable especially when you surround yourself with pleasant people. When everything starts growing I will update the blog with our successes (and failures too). Hoping it will be a bountiful harvest. 

So I got some kale seeds from Richard and Moriah. I was inspired It is a super food  according to the guy that that sells those 'Eat More Kales' t-shirts and a bevy of other herbivores, it is a superfood.According to a bushel of nutritionists, the isothiocyanates lower the risk of developing cancer. It is also suggested that these molecules play a hand in detoxification at the genetic level. While the latter seems incredulous, there have been some researchers who have suggested that organic compounds have a hand in epigenetic. However, the largest health benefit derived from kale would surely be it;s antioxidant and anti-inflammatory benefits. 

Anyways, I put the seeds between two moist paper towels and let em' rip! This method of seed sprouting is akin to the first science experiment everyone does in grade school with bean sprouts. After only a day, tiny shoots poke out of the seed, and by day three leaves had appeared! I then put the sprouts three inches below some potting soil and water them (probably too much!). 

Then, into the back of the Subaru and down to Philadelphia they went! 

Prawan A, Saw CL, Khor TO et. al. Anti-NF-kappaB and anti-inflammatory activities of synthetic isothiocyanates: effect of chemical structures and cellular signlaing. Chem Biol Interact. 2009 May 15; 179 (2-3): 202-211

A few sprouts two days after they had been put in the paper towel

Sprouts after 5 days

Memorial Day, into the ground

One week later...

Two weeks later...

One month later!

Check this out:

Prawan A, Saw CL, Khor TO et. al. Anti-NF-kappaB and anti-inflammatory activities of synthetic isothiocyanates: effect of chemical structures and cellular signlaing. Chem Biol Interact. 2009 May 15; 179 (2-3): 202-211

Productive Days @ ReTreeUs; Upcycling Pallets and Crafting Signs

Friends & Founders of ReTreeU           

After spending a few days at home in Connecticut celebrating a belated Mothers day with the fam, it was off to ReTreeUS in Durham, ME to visit Richard and Moriah. ReTreeUS is their budding non-profit, started only about a year ago, that aims to educate their community on the possibility of self-sufficiency and sustainability through permaculture. Their mission statement (from retreeus.org):
          Our mission is to promote an environmentally sustainable, socially just food system by providing education, practical resources, and mentorship.

         We plant educational orchards in schools, where we lead hands-on programming for students, teachers, families and community members. We inspire a new generation of children to take care of the earth, and we mentor families who want to grow and cook their own nutritious produce at home. We foster healthy ecosystems and make healthy, organic food more accessible to everyone.

    They've had quite a successful year, and have planted four orchards in schools this spring and are working on a nursery, orchard, and vegetable garden on their home base, a delightful and fertile 11 acres near the coast of Maine. My goal for the week was to build some benches out of waste-wood from shipping pallets that I had harvested from the construction site of the two new dorms at Haverford (my college). Although I did get quite distracted in the process, I did end up making three benches to complement the one I had made last week. The process went something like this:

1. Repurpose Wood from Pallets

2. Cut wood & construction frames, legs and tops for easy assembly

3. Sand the living hell out of the benches; pallet wood is mostly pine that has been ravaged by pine beetles, a real problem in the United States and sat untreated in nasty weather for sometime. I really wanted a nice finish on them...

4. Finish with Tung Oil; this stuff is amazing

And here is the finished product! I did make that sign for ReTreeUs and attached it to the bench. I used a router to do the job. All the benches came out pretty well!

Behind the benches, you can see the newly-planted orchard (containing plum, peach, and apple trees) and the nursery (with post for a future deer fence) on the far left. 

In addition to the benches, I constructed a few signs for ReTreeUS. The one I am most proud of is above, and will be placed on the ReTreeUS 'Fruit Shack' which will sell fruit from the orchard on a sliding scale! Social Justice for realz! Lastly, I made two bridges to span the wetlands that sit between Richard and Moriah's pleasant colonial home and the orchard. Used the most knotted and poorest quality pallet wood and logs from the property to construct them! 

Twas a great couple of days and I really enjoyed my time with Richard and Moriah, as well as Chamomile, their puppy! Looking forward to going back soon and building some more swag!

*Check out their blog post about the productive week here:ReTreeUS: Growing a Non-Profit: Recipe for Success: