Ashley LEFT for New Mexico - I'm Here ALONE Trying to Fix Our Adobe Mix

Try to do it all by myself. I have not driven for that long since college. Oh, yeah. I still feel like I'm losing my mind. Today, Ashley heads to New Mexico to a clay plaster workshop that leaves me here at home with my own clay issues with our adobe bricks. We've been dialing in our mix while dealing with record breaking heat and low humidity, which we're starting to think may be the cause of our problems. But either way, we have a lot of adobes to make and a lot of adobes to lay. So let's get started. I felt like we did something today. Good morning, friends. Today, I'm going to try to make a batch of adobe blocks all by myself. Why by myself, might you ask? Well, because Ashley is gone at an American clay plaster workshop. But that doesn't mean we can stop here in the homestead. So today I'm busy. I've got a lot going on. I'm going to make a batch of bricks this morning to go get some more of our washed concrete sand. I need to do some water runs. So here I have three of the buckets of clay that have been sitting for a couple of days in water. So it's nice and goopy and soft and all the chunks should be gone. We're going to add our sand to it. We're going to mix it up and then we're going to put it in the mold. I'm going to try to do it all by myself. We'll see how it goes. Helps turn the power off. This is a two to one. Still trying to nail down our ratio. If you're as confused as we are about this whole ratio situation, I'm going to try to take you through our process over the last few weeks. So first, we were here with Guru Das and we had the clay from Wilcox, Arkansas, which is a waste material. It's what they clean off of other material. And we also had some washed concrete sand. We were worried about the clay being too silty, so we added more clay into it. Weirdly enough, those bricks turned out OK, but that mix didn't work later. And I think it might just be because it got a lot hotter and it dried too fast and that clay started cracking. Just when we had it figured out that we needed more sand, we were doing like a two or a three to one, three sand, one clay. Ashley went and got more material, but she ended up getting something else. It's like a crusher finds type stuff where it was more like tiny, sharp rocks. And so then we ended up coming back to about a one to one. But then we realized we couldn't use that stuff for plaster because it had all these little like sharp rocks in it. We wanted to use the same material for everything. So we went back to the wash concrete sand. It takes about a week to really like see these problems start to develop. We made a bunch of bricks one morning. They looked great by a day or two later. They were completely cracked. This mix that I'm doing today is a full two to one back to two to one. I'm still unclear on if it's a not enough straw or if it's too hot and it's drying too fast or if we just never had enough sand in there to begin with. And the heat is really sort of making that problem more obvious. The variables are driving me crazy and I'm very frustrated with it. Thank you for bearing with us a little bit in real time here as we're working through this process. I know it can be a little frustrating. I can promise you it's more frustrating for us. But anyway, let's see if let's see if this guy can do a whole load of bricks all by himself. What do you think? OK, so all by myself, hour and a half, 14 bricks. Not bad. Not great. I think the goal would be to have maybe at least two to three people out here and try to get 30 in an hour. That feels like sustainable, right? If we can do that many that quick. It is good to know that you can go slower and take your time and do yourself. But yeah, so I'm going to go ahead and get this trough filled back up with at least three buckets of clay. I'm going to wet it all down, get it nice and goopy for the next load that we'll do probably later this afternoon. All these backbreaking Adobe making days are making us super thankful to climb into bed every night. Thanks to today's video sponsor, Birch Living, for giving us a soft place to land. We know a lot of you are concerned about the amount of work that we're putting into these Adobe blocks, and it is a lot of bending over. And yes, our backs are sore, but that comes with every new skill that we're doing. We get a different sore muscle. At least we have a nice place to sleep every night. Birch Living makes fiberglass free mattresses that are crafted with natural and organic materials. They are free from polyurethane foams, which cause harmful off gassing. And because it's made with premium materials, all of Birch mattresses support breathability. And if you are in your 40s like I am, you know that's a really great thing. The wool and natural latex materials allow for increased airflow, keeping you cool and comfortable at night. If you're in the process of searching for a mattress, maybe give Birch Living a try. They make it super easy to shop for mattresses. You can just go to their website, birchliving.com, tiny, shiny home, and you'll see that they have the Birch natural mattress, essential mattress, the Lux mattress and the elite mattress. They even have bed frames and sheets now, which is pretty cool. And one other thing to know, all these mattresses are made for you. Whether you're a side sleeper, a back sleeper or a stomach sleeper, you will find a mattress that works for you. Plus, you can rest easy knowing that you are sleeping on organic and natural materials made with your health in mind. Right now, Birch is having their Labor Day sale and you can save up to 30% on select mattresses. That is a really good deal. So make sure you visit birchliving.com tiny, shiny home to start saving today. We love working with Birch and we love having them as a partner here on the tiny, shiny homestead. Visit birchliving.com tiny, shiny home to start saving today. And don't forget to mention our channel in the post-purchase survey. Now, let's get back to work. Good morning, I am on my way to Albuquerque. I have a six hour drive ahead of me, and I have not driven by myself for that long since college. So this will be interesting. I'm leaving in plenty of time. I'm going to make as many stops as I want and see like if there's any cool things to see on the way. And I'm going to a workshop. So I'm actually going to the American Clay Company Workshop. My goal this winter and fall is to get as many workshops under my belt as I can with lime plaster and clay plaster and just be ready for when we are ready for that step on the house. I know it's a long way away, but you know, can't hurt to get more practice in. So that's what we're doing. It will be interesting. I have no idea how this drive is going to go. I'm a little bit nervous. I have a whole bag of snacks, so hopefully I don't have to stop too much unless I just really, really want to, which I'm pretty sure I'm going to want to. Well, I still feel like I'm losing my mind. I did a whole batch this morning with two sands to one clay, and they still cracked like crazy. So I'm starting to think back of all the times when we had batches of blocks crack, and I think it might be a timing issue. I think that what might be going on is if we do bricks super early in the morning and then it's been it's been almost 100 degrees like every day this week. I feel like the heat and the sun are making them dry out too fast. It's like they get made and then immediately within the next hour or two, it's getting really hot and it's causing them to crack and pull apart. And I feel like the ones that we make in the evening. So this is late afternoon. So the sun is going down and then they're just going to be able to sit overnight all night without getting blasted by the sun. I think that will let them cure without cracking. It's all super fuzzy. You know, we made so many batches at so many different times with so many different mixes. I'm starting to lose my mind, but I feel like I really need to dial in on removing this variable. So I'm going to make another batch of two to one late afternoon. We're going to let it sit overnight. We're going to look at it tomorrow. If that is still cracked, that just means we need to go to a like a three to one, three sands to one clay mix. And that's OK if that's what we need to do. We actually just got a huge load of sand from Wilcox Rock and Sand today right behind the camera here. But I've got to remove these variables, man, because they are driving me up the wall. I just like we keep thinking, oh, we got it figured out and then we'll have a whole batch. It's just like, can we even use it? I don't know. Like, and what's crazy is, is this batch here, which I don't know if you can see, but it was made with a two to one and it did crack a little, but it's not nearly as bad as this one. And it's like, guys, I just feel like I'm losing my mind. Anyway, we're going to do another two to one just to make sure. The only problem is I have two large great Pyrenees right in my sand pile. I'm going to have to move them. OK, so two to one, which means, remember, I already put three buckets of clay and water in the bottom. So I'm going to do six buckets, three at a time, mix it in, then another three at a time, mix it in and start pre-wetting the form so it's ready when I'm ready. Keep these separate on purpose. I think that's part of the other problem is like we never fill the boards completely, and so we always end up putting some of one batch on the next board. Keep them separate. We're just going to make it easier on ourselves to remember. Notice I'm getting in tight places. I just changed the way I'm holding the trowel. So if I try to get back there like this, my knuckles are hitting the backside and it's a little bit awkward. So I just automatically switched. I thought I'd show why I switched. So how you hold the trowel is it's now can I switch to a smaller trowel and make it more of a trowel with a wider blade? All of those are yeses. But typically I find what I'm using is more efficient. And so I just figure out ways that I use my scissors. I found the American Clay Company about seven years ago when I first started digging into natural building. I've been so excited about this two day workshop and getting my hands on these materials. This was such a good way to see how the different clay materials work and the different types of finishes you can achieve. Whatever panel is the right light, that's the one we're working on. If you're coming around the corner, we're going to come around the corner for you. Because the material is not going to firm up. It's going to stay pliable. It's going to move with the trowel. That is part of why it's got a little bit more texture to it in the finish. Start with a slightly smoother finish over here. I'm just trying to work it in pretty quickly, get it nice and even. Over here, I'm going to worry a little bit less and make it a little bit rougher. Just to show the differences, we're going to trowel, compress, and expect to compress the marble mostly back. Croft was a great instructor and was happy to answer the many questions that we all had. All nine of us left feeling more confident in our application and techniques. Make sure to check out the American Clay Company. And if you get a chance to attend one of their workshops, you will not be disappointed. Hey, so speaking of events, our homestead tour is coming up in just about a month. That means you have one month to decide if you would like to come to the tiny, shiny homestead. Come see all the different buildings that we've built. Hang out with really cool people. Eat some delicious food. Get an up-close and personal look at our hyper adobe building, super adobe lava crete, our lava crete garden beds, our hyper adobe planters and benches, and of course, the hyper adobe roundhouse, which by the time you get here in October may look very, very different. I'm just saying. Or if you'd like to get your hands dirty, we do have some hands on workshops later in October and November. You can find all that stuff over at tinyshinyhome.com slash events. So we hope you'll sign up. We hope that we will see you there. Now we have got to get back to the adobes. OK, so let's check my hypothesis. The interesting thing is the ones that we did the other morning that looked really bad, it looked like they cracked all the way through. You know, now that they've really dried, you can still see those cracks, but they've almost become surface level like this. Brick is still really solid. Now, don't get me wrong. There's a couple. Yeah, that one, I can feel it moving that one. Yeah, definitely. Look how much it's not dried. Can you see that? A lot of these cracks that I was really worried about almost look like they're more surface level than I thought on this one. It was starting to crack again. The ones that we did last night, you can see there's a couple of them like this one in particular. It's got a huge crack in it. But then as the top dries back up, it's almost like they kind of like close back up a little bit. These bricks are still usable. We're not supporting anything with this wall that we're putting up here. It's not supporting the roof or anything like that. They just need to fill space. So if there's a few cracks in them, it's not going to be a big deal. But I don't like that they're cracking. But it's got a pretty significant crack in it. But it's still pretty solid. So I might still be overthinking it. But just to make sure, I'm going to do like one brick three to one. Apparently, the Pyrenees stepped on these last night. A couple of things that are really bad. Look at that. It's not one thing, it's another. All right. We're going to keep this simple. Just mix it here in the bucket. I've already got my pre-wet down clay here. So one, one clay. And then we'll do three sand. Actually, I'm going to go ahead and add some water to it. That's what I'm going to get. I'm going to mix this by hand. Really get that clay nice and mixed in. OK, so that's pretty good. But it feels a little wet to me. I did three shots of sand, so I'm going to do one more here. That should get us closer to three to one and it should dry it out. Hopefully it's the right way to make it too wet. I'm going to just pull over. OK, I'm going to put some straw in. OK, that has been soaked. So it's not that hard. You know, you just want to basically make sure you press it all the way into the corners. So you get a nice clean edge. And then kind of hear the air coming out of it. It's like little farts. I don't want any of the straw sticking out over the wooden form. We've been wetting our hands down and really like smoothing out the top and then just come in, clean off. So we had a little bit of straw there. Well, shoot, I got enough. Maybe a half brick. We'll call it a quarter brick. All right. I got to get this off. There we go. Fingers crossed this one's better. So I'm about to start day two of this workshop. I have not recorded nearly as much as I thought I would. Just too busy doing the work. This is an advanced finish plaster class, so I have so many questions and so many things that I want to bring up. But I'm just trying to like take it all in and save all my questions for the end. So hopefully we can get a better idea of how we're going to finish the plaster in the house. I know that's super long way away, but you know, we've got to be prepared. So let's go finish day two. That's dry enough? Yes. Well, no, I think leather hard is a little bit wetter. It's a little bit softer. So we press into it and... It dries so fast. It does. So here, so that's too soft, right? And now... It's OK. We're going to plaster again. You just have to know that you're going to do this. So you can push it back in. Press it back into the primer. Alright, that's how great it is. I'm starting to come to the point where I'm going to break the suction. Carefully, and then lift away as we break the suction. If you pull, what happens? Hopefully I won't say anything. Your law comes off. And look, I am now an officially trained applicator for the American Clay Company, so I can put clay on your walls. But hopefully I'll be putting clay on our walls in the near future or distant future. One of the two. Hey, real quick. Do you remember those greeting cards that Jax and Ada were making? Well, they're going to do one more round this fall. You don't know what I'm talking about. These are hand drawn by Jax and Ada. Jax uses colored markers. Ada uses colored pencils, and they're both so cool. I love how creative they are. We are trying to support them as they are trying to raise money. So Jax is trying to raise money for a car. Ada is trying to raise money to help take care of Ford, the horseshit she just got here recently. Remember, no two sets are the same. Every single one is drawn by hand. You can go to tinyshinyhome.com slash cards and grab yourself a set before they're gone. Now, let's get back to it. We've been doing a lot of tests over the last few days, and I am pretty sure that this three to one mix is what we want to do. So Ashley is still gone at her workshop. She is headed back today. But I'm out early this morning. The kids are all here. We're going to make a bunch of Adobe bricks this morning. Like that is the goal. I'm hoping we can do at least two full batches, which should give us between 70 and 80 bricks. So they're going to come out here in a little bit. I'm going to try to get this sort of the base mix all set up, which means I need to add nine buckets of mortar sand to my three buckets of clay. I'm going to use the paddle mixer and get it all mixed up so that when they're ready to come out, we'll just throw the straw in and go. That's the plan this morning. So, yeah, you know, it feels a little cooler this morning. I don't think it's going to be cooler later, but it feels good right now. And I'm going to take advantage of it. So putting in that extra ratio of sand, it feels so different. It's like when you push it down in, you can feel like the whole thing moved together as one. It's so much easier to put the straw in. The question, though, is, is it easier to put in the brick mold? Definitely. Yeah? I don't have huge clumps of it stuck in my hand. It's definitely easier. All right, looks like we need a little bit more. All right, that was batch number one. It took us probably 30, 45 minutes. So now we've got to make a whole new batch. I think it's definitely going faster with the sanding mix because it doesn't get stuck in the forms as much, and the forms slide off faster. And so we can just keep that momentum going. So we've got to soak some clay, get some sand in, and get another look. We got a little overzealous with our water. We're just a little too wet. So we're going to do one whole bucket of sand and a third bucket of clay. And then I think that'll firm it up just enough. Is that a five gallon? That's not five gallons. So the whole thing is four. So you want to do like one and a half? What is a third? What's a third of four? Math whiz, tell me what it is. Yeah, one and a half-ish. I don't know, maybe. Yeah. You guys have computers in your pockets. Figure it out. Sure. At this point, I think one scoop of clay is going to make a difference. Before we go, can we get three more buckets of clay in the water? Obviously, it's going to dry out. He is a big guy. Well done. He's in there now. Oh, you're a real good boy. You found a happy little place in the tarp, didn't he? You're going to dry out. You got to go find some shade. OK, so we did almost 60 bricks in about two and a half hours. So we're getting closer to that 30 bricks an hour that I was shooting for, which is good. However, the ones that we did at 730 this morning, it's 10 now. Some of them are already starting to crack again, even with the three to one mix, with three parts sand to one part clay. So we've covered these up, and we're going to see if that helps slow down the cracking. Thinking back to our first bricks, it was a lot more humid, and it wasn't quite as warm during those first few weeks when we were making our bricks. And maybe the problem is our humidity has dropped back to normal levels, and it's getting really, really hot really fast in the day. And so maybe it's that kind of combination that even with smaller amounts of clay, it still is causing it to shrink up really fast as it dries. Now, but remember the other day when I picked up those ones that were cracked really bad, by the time they actually had cured, those cracks had shrunk back. And so I was thinking maybe it wasn't as big of a deal. But I don't like the cracks that go almost all the way through. That feels like a structural issue to me. So we've left these five. We're going to see if these crack way worse than covering these, and we're going to cover these until later this afternoon when the sun is starting to go down. And we'll just compare, and we'll try to figure it out, and just mark one more thing off of our list to measure and experiment with. Hey, look who's back. I'm back. I'm glad she's back. We missed you. Thanks for coming back. Yeah. So hey, we had a bit of a gusher last night, 3 quarters of an inch in like half an hour. So everything is soaked. We can't even get the tarp off right now. There's too much water on it. The bricks on the wall and that we have stacked up fared pretty well, mostly. There's like one weird spot we didn't think about that got a little melty. But we decided we are tired of making bricks. So we're going to lay some bricks this morning. We've got to get some of these up on the wall. We do. Yeah. We need to make it look like we've made progress. Well, you know, it's just you can only do something so many times over and over and over again before you start to lose your mind. So we've made a two-to-one mortar mix this morning. There was a bunch of water in here. So we had to add extra buckets because it was just too wet and we just had to make it up. But anyway, yeah, we haven't done this in a while. So we're going to go back over here. We're going to try to work on the blocks here. Laying bricks is a lot faster than making them. They've done almost 40 or 50 just here this morning and we already used up that entire batch of mortar. So I'm going to start whipping up another batch of mortar because it would be really cool if we could get that section at least halfway done today. It actually felt like we did something today. I know. I mean, I know we're doing stuff and we're making the bricks, but it feels good. It feels good to see the progress. Looks nice. I think we just need to make sure we schedule some brick time between making them. I mean, we almost have a whole living room. It's going to go faster once we get on the other circle too. Is it? Mm-hmm. Because the space between bar joists gets a lot smaller.