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Reid's BRK

 
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Coydon Wallham wrote:

Reid Robison wrote:here are a couple favorite quotes from One Straw Revolution:

"when it is understood that one loses joy and happiness in the effort to possess them, the essence of natural farming will be realized"

"nature is in constant transition, changing from moment to moment. people cannot grasp nature's true appearance. the face of nature is unknowable. trying to capture the unknowable in theories and formalized doctrines is like trying to catch the wind in a butterfly net."

definitely some words to grapple with. because the whole point of them is to see where they are pointing, and then let those words go. we cannot understand the unknowable through thinking.

this book is beyond farming. it's connecting Buddhist philosophy into farming. bringing the omniscient knowledge of nature into the way we live our lives.


Does Fukuoka talk about Buddhism directly anywhere? I'm not familiar with any Buddhist tracts specifically, but that second quote sounds like pure Daoism to me. Apart from Lao Tzu being as far from a farmer as is possible that is...



hi Coydon, in the One Straw Revolution he does directly mention his inspiration from Buddhist philosophy. There is much overlap between Buddhist and Daoist ideas. I also see the similarity in that quote
 
Reid Robison
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BRK #15

goooooood morning



last night, Black Spark had 5 kittens. in the cat house. it will be so exciting to watch them grow! i failed to capture any images but surely will in the coming weeks

this morning, i was tasked to take all of our seed balls out of the dehydrator. i cleared out some room in the library near the seeds. filled up egg cartons and 5 gallon buckets. and labeled them. many of the trays in the dehydrator were unlabeled, which caused some confusion. opening up seedballs was enough to identify some. a few mystery trays i combined into a "cover crop mix".... which could prove useful.

there are probably at least 400 cover crop seed balls ready to be cast out. i want to make sure this season we use a good amount of them out in the fields. improve the soil, and not just accumulate more seed balls.

the afternoon was firewood collection. today we accomplished a lot. right at the start we declared the gregorian woodshed to be "full." turns out this is a subjective measure, but it looks pretty full to me:



off to collect more wood, to fill up more wood storage containers.

today i cut down a tree, and it fell the direction that i wanted it to go. cutting the notch is more difficult than on paper, but im getting better at it.



right in the aisle. and hatchet in the stump for good measure.

after some classic firewood stuff, i attended taco tuesday/community business. and then after that, Stephen and I speed baked some cookies in preparation for pulley day tomorrow. if you want to see photos of that, check out his thread because im sure he will post some pictures of that deliciousness.

definitely a long (but good) day today, its time to logoff and take some time for myself.
 
Reid Robison
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BRK #16

happy. pulley day! im pretty sure this is the first ever pulley day. so...we will be attempting to use pulleys to make laundry drying racks.

this morning while some boots prepped pulley materials, i was working on Jeff's trap door for the library ceiling. more details on that in another post.

i failed to take a picture of anything i worked on today, but i did take a picture of cats:



in the middle is Black Spark, the mother who  transferred her litter over to the cat house 2.0. i consider this a sign that the cats have accepted our offering of the new cat house.

today i tried to eat lunch outside, but was unsuccessful due to approximately 8 cats swarming me trying to snag a bite of food. unlike most cats i know, these ones dont know much table manners. they were climbing up anything they could find. so i ate inside.

in the afternoon i helped Wesley construct his laundry rack and fiddle around with pulleys. we built the laundry rack using 100% wood sourced from Wheaton Labs. no fasteners or glue. we used tools such as table saw, drill press, mallets, and round files to accomplish this.

i am impressed with Wesleys design skills and also use of computer programs to visualise the design. i failed to photograph his laundry rack, but you will see it on some other boots threads. it is beautiful.

aaaaand pulley day dinner. was a hit! shoutout to the many hands that prepared this feast. we were so caught up in the spin of pulleys, its a miracle this meal came together.



last week we brainstormed pulley day dinner ideas, and i now admit to using ChatGPT to source ideas. wagon wheel pasta is pretty creative, right? turns out it was not creativity, it was Artificial Intelligence. welcome to the future.

Grey left the bootcamp, he is off to another chapter in life. Grey's presence is definitely missed here.

while he is away I am doing him a favor in taking care of his kombucha culture. at least i thought i was doing him a favor. but after learning a bit, i think he is doing me a favor by letting me experiment and play with his scobys. they can pretty much fend for themselves.

here is one of the blobs:



ive always wanted to make kombucha. so next week i will be doing some second ferments, and even attempting a batch of hard kombucha.

im trying to find balance in my life here at Wheaton Labs. (arent we all always finding balance?) i feel particularly out of balance currently, and experimenting with different ways of doing things. this may be just a blog post, but i want to depict an accurate picture of my experience.

have a great day yall! im sure ill be posting tomorrow.
 
Reid Robison
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BRK #17

good morning



starting the day off right with hanging.

i learned this practice from Ido Portal. i like to think of him as developing the "permaculture" of moving our bodies. his holistic approach considers human anatomy and evolution.

Ido recommends hanging to everyone. he likens it to the "cat stretch" for humans. and it makes sense to me! we have gravity compressing our spines all day, and hanging reverses the gravity to decompress it.

considering we evolved from animals that lived in trees, hanging and climbing were once part of daily life.

what are the benefits of passive hanging?
   - improved grip strength
   - strengthens the tendons of the shoulder
   - spinal decompression

but i dont need to just list things off -- try it! it feels good.

Ido recommends hanging for short periods throughout the day. the length of your hang will likely be limited by grip strength. if you cant grip it, try with part of your weight, using feet on the ground for support.

thats all there is to it. grip, and relax your body completely. let your shoulders elevate, allow your pelvis and head to remain neutral.



at work this morning, i added handles to the trap door for the library ceiling. creating a trap door is easier in minecraft.

here is what the door looks like:



the handles cannot stick out beyond the sides, or else the door will not fit through the opening. because this is a door that wont be opened frequently, i didnt worry about an ergonomic design.

the first problem i ran into was wood splitting.



even though i was using a countersink, the wood was still too small. i was able to get it to work after a few different pieces.

i made the next handles differently to prevent the wood from splitting.



these supports are longer, reducing their chance of splitting. no wood was split using this method.

here is the trap door, finally installed and insulated.



all in all, the handles are functional. one problem is they are too close to the side of the door, so when using the trap door my knuckles scrape against the frame. i did consider this issue before installing the handles, but did not make any changes to remediate it. the way i was thinking, this door will be used once in a blue moon, and it wasnt worth the extra design and material.

the handles are also not pleasing to the eye.

in this scenario i chose to use a fast solution without extensive planning. i considered other options, but since this trapdoor was limiting our progress on the library paneling i didnt go for a more time consuming, beautiful design.

overall the handles work but im not pleased with how they turned out.

since im new to this kind of thing, im thinking of it as a learning experience. this was a lesson to observe and plan before acting. i was trying to finish this project quickly which detracted from its quality.

anyways, this evening i may be starting another fermenting project, more info on that later! have a good one
 
Reid Robison
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BRK #18

excited to share my newest project...which is kraut-chi. basically making sauerkraut but using kimchi ingredients. so last night i cut up some cabbage and wrangled it for an hour until all of its succulent cabbage puddle juice came out.

then i mixed in other ingredients - daikon, carrot, ginger, onion, Korean chili flakes.

i used just over 2% salt by weight.

then handful by handful, i stuffed the vegetables into a jar, making sure that they are below the puddle to create anaerobic conditions. its so cool that there is enough liquid drawn out from the vegetables to eventually submerge everything - though it does take some effort.

to top it off, we have some glass weights available specifically for this purpose. that will keep most of everything submerged.

here she is, wearing a bridal veil.



i am excited to witness this evolution.

when i tasted this, it did not taste overly salty. so now im thinking back on my blueberries.... maybe i made an error and used 20% salt intead of 2%? though i think i would have noticed that when adding it. but, they do taste extremely salty. still a mystery to this day....


anyways... this afternoon we were thinking about the next holiday. roundwood furniture day next week. Paul has challenged us to make a kitchen chair with 100% wood. no fasteners, no glue. i am super on board with this idea, similar to the laundry racks.

there was lots of discussion about how to make this work. the main idea is to take advantage of wood shrinkage as it dries to strengthen the joinery. which means, we needed some fresh wood. luckily, we have an abundance.



of course, ill be here on the front line keeping you all updated on this project. i can tell these trees are going to enjoy their future as beautiful sturdy homemade chairs.

taking from the land can sometimes feel wrong, but its refreshing to remember that human intervention can benefit the land when done right. we made sure to search for trees that were clumped together. our harvest reduced competition, allowing nearby trees to grow larger. harvesting in this way promotes abundance for the future.

and, the weekend. heating up this beautiful little shack so i can stay warm while the snow piles up. i dont know how the deer do it.

thanks to Jeff's suggestion, i have rocks piled on the stovetop to increase the heat stored.



have a good one Permies!


 
Reid Robison
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Reid Robison wrote: i am fermenting some blueberries.



to everyone that is emotionally invested in my blueberry fermenting journey. tonight i have confirmed i accidentally used a 20% salt concentration in my blueberries, rendering them inedible. i just didnt move the decimal over enough times.
 
steward
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I'm told you took this video, Reid.  Thanks for taking the time.  It's good to see the timber tool in action.

https://youtu.be/MWENKIPUXdU

 
Reid Robison
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Beau Davidson wrote:I'm told you took this video, Reid.  Thanks for taking the time.  It's good to see the timber tool in action.

https://youtu.be/MWENKIPUXdU




for sure! hoping to have more videos coming down the pipeline.
 
Reid Robison
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BRK #19

today has been a good one. i decided to start my day off in the forest at basecamp. just eating snow and stuff. when i came back, Jeff was making pancakes.

i took on a project ive been excited about. ive received this beautiful fabric. at the edges, its beginning to fray. the gifter of this fabric suggested i could do some sewing to prevent further fraying.

here it is:



all i know is that every time i hand sew something, it falls apart. so to take on all this by hand? would be good practice, but im sure it would fall apart.

so after some conversation with chatGPT, i decided to hem the fabric using a sewing machine. now the last time i used a sewing machine was in middle school... i made a pillow case.

what could go wrong? 30 minutes of youtube tutorials later, i was folding my 1/2" hem.



i couldnt find a clothing iron around, so i hand pressed the fold to help it stay in place.

sewing machines, like power tools, can make things faster. but first you have to fidget with their...buttons and stuff. so after piddling around with the bobbin and all the other components for like 29 minutes, i was sewing!

the fun part. aaaand i sewed it in like 5 minutes.

i used a zig zag pattern to help prevent fraying.

so...check out my hem!







surely a satisying project.

after finishing, i noticed that i did the whole thing with the elbow piece detached...probably wouldve made things easier.



the corners were difficult and they dont look great. luckily you dont really see them. in a future project i would consider something fancier to make them look neat.


its a blessing that Wheaton Labs has many resources like the sewing machine. im definitely inspired by the do-it-yourself energy all around me.

now that i remember how to use a sewing machine, im excited to try more sewing projects.

have a good one yall!

 
Reid Robison
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BRK #20

wow, already 1/5 to the magical 100.

this morning before the cleaning blitz, i added some tasteful art to the willow bank for future customers.



if you dont like it, the eraser is right above the chalkboard

other than that, just been piddling around and stuff.



its fun to see how the cats interact with one another. playing, hissing, making more cats, all that kind of stuff! i am glad they have companions.

and ive been too excited about the sewing machine, so i decided to patch the knee of my work pants! i ripped them roller blading. i did an iron on patch a few months ago, but the hole was slightly bigger than the patch so the hole was growing.

since the sewing machine was all set up, this was a quick project. the most difficult part was shoving all the pant leg to the side, while trying to sew in a half circle. it is far from perfect.

cant wait to see how the washing machine likes my handy work.





in my opinion, this is the peak of fashion right here. some well worn pants, patched with some random fabric that i found.

have a wonderful day Permies!
 
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