Spirit Pine Sanctuary

We just spent the last two months in beautiful Central California with a beautiful and wonderful family! 

Thank you Spirit Pine!

Santa Ynez Valley view with the newly planted fruit orchard in the bottom right corner

Our lovely home

I took care of the horses and rode this one almost everyday!

Logan took care of the pregnant goats!

While we were there, our main project was to retrofit an old yurt into a permanent home for a family.  Logan and I started by doing some rugged carpentry and wrapping an earthen layer around the latticework on the inside (heavy straw/clay). 

We framed in this bank of windows and added the heavy straw/clay around them. The exterior vinyl will be removed.

We framed in a bedroom door - I cut it down to
size and replaced a glass pane with wood

The heavy straw/clay is almost dry here.

I framed in this little window for over the sink.
We used ALL reclaimed lumber for all of the projects in the yurt!

Logan framed out this sink table and I did the tile work.  It was all tile throw-aways from a nearby tile maker.
I'm pretty pleased with my first tiling project!

After all that, we helped with securing the yurt foundation into the ground with poured concrete  and block footers.  Then the workshop arrived and started building the rubble trench and serpentine stone stem wall for both the yurt and the bedroom addition.  That's where they were when we left.  It's going to be a whole new place in another couple of weeks.  Can't wait to see the updates!

The workshop is working to build a stone stem wall for the bedroom addition

B and T working on the yurt stairs

Here are a few other examples from their land of beautiful natural buildings... 

Grandma Jackie's home

Cassie's home

A duplex! Two houses in one

Jen's courtyard

An interior glimpse :)

A composting toilet with a gorgeous view!

The tiniest house! It has breeze through windows for hot summer days.