Chapter 49 - The Snail Shell House - part 2

Dec 27

September 18, 2008, Ryan first time helping to skin a log.

Chapter 49

The Snail Shell House - part 2

Working with my family was very rewarding; creating something together that was previously just an idea. Looking back, I appreciate how ready and willing my family was to create this space with me on the mountain. I can’t imagine how many husbands and children would willingly go into an adventure like this.

Each day we started working once the dew had dried, which was about 10am. We worked hard until about 2pm when everyone went on strike and refused to work any more for the day, so we went to the lake which was 5 minutes away by car. We would spend the afternoon at the lake cooling off, swimming, and relaxing while having our lunch.

At the lake there was a little park, a drinking fountain with a low water spigot for filling water containers, a bathroom, and a parking lot. That park, or a nearby rest area, is where we filled our 5 gallon water containers for drinking and washing dishes at the property. That was one chore I would loved to have done without, but hauling water was necessary since there was no running water at the property for my family of eight. Three of the children had already left the nest or there would have been more people to care for.

Being in the mountains, there were huge towering evergreen trees throughout the park, which made the place very beautiful. Although I was a bit of a work, work, work, boss lady while working on the building of the snail shell house, I reluctantly left our project to go to the lake with everyone. I always wanted to stay and work, but considering the “walk out” of my husband and children, I went along to the park to rest and eat.

At the property, the younger children spent their time running around, playing, taking pictures, making up games, and spending time with their aunt Cheryl, who was in the yurt nearby. Cheryl’s daughter and grandson were at the property too, by then, and they had a bunch of rabbits in rabbit hutches in a large covered area.

Cheryl and her family also had chickens. My youngest son, Ryan, loved the chickens, and there was one chicken in particular who would follow him around waiting for him to dig up worms for her.

Ryan was an enthusiastic kid and wanted to help skin the saplings and logs we were using (by removing the bark, the wood lasts longer since the bugs have less hiding places). The first year I let him use the draw knife and he spent a few minutes working on skinning a log. The following summer, he was stronger and more tenacious, and skinned an entire small log!

As we worked on the snail shell house, we planned for, and put in drainage pipes where the kitchen sink and bathroom would be. We made a rock retaining wall for one side of the kitchen that extended out of the house to hold up the dirt along the open air sitting area outside the kitchen door. The spiral roof extended way out over the top of the sitting area and kept us dry when it rained. We cooked our meals over a tiny little campfire in that open air porch, rain or shine.