Quisenberry for Boot Camp, Reporting In!

Log Entry #1
Hi I am Carissa Quisenberry.
I've been at Wheaton Labs for more than a week now. This is me! Howdy Y'all!
I decided to come to Wheaton Labs and be a Boot in the Permaculture Boot camp here in beautiful Montana. I've got myself a little tent but I'm gonna be here for a bit so I'm gonna upgrade to a big tent! OooooooOOOh, nice right?
Wrong!
My goal is to get the thing set up by the end of the week, but boy is there a lot of work to do. And it ain't on boot time! Wish me luck in my journey through an Authentic Wheaton Labs Permaculture Experience.
I've rolled up my sleeves and jumped in and I thought I'd share my time here with you all so expect more pictures, projects, and problems to solve, through my eyes, the one and only CQ.
Get ready for a beautiful summer every one!

Looking forward to reading your posts! I hope you have fun! :)

Welcome Carissa! I enjoy Boot posts because they show the inner workings of Wheaton Labs! Thanks for sharing!

Welcome, I'm excited to see your future updates.

This is Boot Carissa Quisenberry, Reporting in!
Log Entry #2
Happy Monday!
It was a wet and wild day today. All the rain brings back memories of hard times under the Seattle grey. But we persevered! And I got to go out into the woods and chop down my very own first tree. There was junk pole fencing to be gathered at the dog star site so off we went!

Boot Quisenberry Reporting in!
Log # 3
Dogs at Dogstar are in need of a shelter. STOP. Send in reinforcements. STOP. We must construct additional pylons. STOP

Today I learned to put round pegs in round holes. We had great fun with some really cool tools making a "mortis" and "tenon" to support some walls for the dog star dog shelter. We also learned how to do good tool care by sharpening up some of the tools we have been using when we had a little spare time!

Boot Quisenberry Reporting In!
Log #4
After the rain these last two days I had some seriously soaked bedding. I of course insisted on bringing a little old tent I've had for years and thought it would be fine to spend the season in it, just like I did camping in years past. But the poor old thing has lost much of its water resistance and if anything touches from the inside water will soak it through. Bahh!
Well, during the morning boot work of working on a junk pole - style fence at the Dog Star Location, the sun came back out and graced all of us hard workers with its sweet rays. Ah ha! I thought, now isn't this a great opportunity to practice some low tech solutions!
Ah, the classic clothes line. It's set up out back of the fisher price house between a few good trees that let in a lot of sunshine. I hauled all my wet blankets out and grabbed some clothes pins and set out to tackle this project.
What a calm feeling came over me as I hung up my stuff in the warm breeze. This! This feeling like I have everything I ever needed, right here in the midst of nature and the sky. Feels better than putting wet clothes in the dryer ever did. Feels better than I ever thought it would. I wish I could do this back home. Alas, no hope exists  back home in the city for many apartment dwellers like me. I'll just enjoy the freedoms of Wheaton Labs!
P.S. I try to work on my tent pad little by little every day. It's getting there!

Bootcamp log #5
Today's theme, power tools. We started off the day today by drilling more mortises into the baseboard of the dog shelter that is going to the new dog star bark Park. I got to use the big power drill. Not to mention using a basic power drill to drill screws into the board. I don't think I did too bad for my first time! Then we took the board to the bark Park and while we were there picked out some pretty good size trees. I got to use an electric chainsaw to really cut down my first actual "tree" sized tree. Timber! ( Sorry guys, I wasn't able to get any pictures of that part. Look forward to more soon!)
Later we got to use a tool called a "router" to drill holes into a board for signage around the property. Now that was cool. It was my first time doing something like that. Of course pretty much all the power tools I used today were the first time I've ever used them! What an awesome day.
P.S.
High Commander Steven gave the order that some of boot time today was to be used prepping the tent pads for the coming event. What ended up happening is that most of the boots used most of that time to help me with my tent pad. I can't thank them enough. I could have never gotten done what they got done with me today and I'm so so grateful. Thank you so much, Stephen, for allowing us to use boot time for this project! Big shout out to Ben; big shout out to Rio; and a big shout out to our Sepper, Roger who helped us out today. You guys are amazing!

Log Entry #6
Communication has been hard this weekend due to....
Kittens!
Bootcamper Rio had heard the siren call of some hungry kittens last week and had opted to take them home with her to Cooper Cabin. Harried by their baleful cries, I saw she might need a hand so I volunteered to watch over them over the weekend. Poor things!
Mother seems to have disappeared! But Rio had gone to town and picked up some kitten formula and so it went with a tablespoon of powder in two tablespoons of water and then one eye dropper full at a time, we got those starving babies their milk.
I knew I would be remiss in my boot duties if I kept it up so I told Rio to plan on taking them back after the weekend. This was more than both of us could handle, so, for the good of the kittens, Rio found them a good home that was more prepared to give them the time the love and the attention they deserved.
Good bye to Chaos, goodbye Disorder, and goodbye and good luck to Love!  Sorry you couldn't be here at Wheaton Labs Permaculture Technology Jamboree. But fear not, PTJ affiliates, there will be more!

Log Entry # 7
Carissa Quisenberry of the Wheaton Labs Bootcamp, reporting in. Ok folks here's the whole story from start to finish. We made signs! And boy do they look good. Or at least to me, they are BE-EEE-AY-YOU-TIFUL. probably cause I made it myself, huh?
First we routed them. Then we burned them with fire. Then we sent them through a planer!?
(P.S. To the beautiful souls who send things to us from our wishlist on "boot love" we send a whole hearted thank you! If you are thinking of sending us something but you haven't gotten around to it yet, no worries. But consider us next time you think about it... so much love in our hearts goes out to the one who answered our long-shot-of-a-plea for a planer. We bow to you oh great one.)
Look how good they turned out! Then we got to apply them to a post and stick them into the ground. Boot Brian was kind enough to walk me through drilling, so shout out to you Brian! You are awesome! And when the ground got tough, we got tougher by getting out the jackhammer. I got to go to town on that rock. Sweet!
Thanks for watching everyone and we'll see you real soon!

Log Entry #8
Boot Carissa Quisenberry Reporting in!
Today's fun project is one of many projects we have been working on to get ready for the Permaculture Technology Jamboree. We were building benches for the kiddie pool this year! Take a look!
Finished product pending!!!

Log Entry # 9
You guys look at this gate! It's amazing! What do you do when you have land where pine trees are just weeds? Make them into your new gate I suppose!
The lock for the log needed some adjusting for ease and comfort so we went there and tried to give it a little TLC.
It's perfectly weighted to allow a small person to swing it around with no trouble at all! What a fantastic design! I love this place.

Log Entry #10
I got my tent up .... FINALLY!