My firewood shed and firewood

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Transcription from video:

NikiAnne: Oh my gosh, I love my firewood. Thanks to my partner Chris Farmer who built this!

This is under a plastic like greenhouse roofing corrugated that allows a lot of sun to get through. Keeps it dry and we have cut it to really short lengths so that it fits in our small stove.

I like to say that we judge our wealth by our firewood. How many years ahead have we seasoned the wood? So that it’s dry and not green. This is probably two years old and we have enough to have it be supplying for years obviously. Or just the little, teeny snow we have.

Bless the firewood, the ancient ones. Ancient sunlight, thank you, thank you.

The post NikiAnne and the Firewood Stack at Earthaven Ecovillage appeared first on Earthaven Ecovillage.

Johnny McLeod is our resident tree climber. He loves hanging out high in the canopies, often overlooking some amazing vistas here in our Blue Ridge Mountains.

He started his climbing career in Arkansas some ten years ago and brought his skills to our ecovillage. These skills are much needed around here where trees and houses sprout out of the ground side by side.

We need trees cut for so many reasons. The biggest reason is solar access. Most of our buildings have a passive solar design as well as a large photovoltaic system to support  electricity needs. Another reason to cut trees for sunlight is ever growing gardens. South facing slopes have been chosen for houses, photovoltaic systems and gardens. Of course we use wood to build structures; we aim to use as much of it from our land as we can.

Johnny also loves to cut firewood. It’s his obsession really. After a long day cutting trees he comes home in the evening to work at his hobby of cutting firewood! Luckily he got himself a hydraulic splitter some years ago and that makes it all go much faster.

The community has already been hard at work through this spring and summer to get enough firewood split and put up for our long and recently snowy winters.

So the next time you come to visit us, keep your eye out for a tree-climber. He has our one-year-old with him on some of these woodsy adventures. If only they made baby ear protection and little chainsaws!

Mana Vermeulen-Mcleod and her husband, Johnny, the Tree Climber, are raising a family at Earthaven. Mana says “Right now I’m a stay-in-the-woods mom and I’m so glad to raise my boy surrounded by all this natural beauty. When my kid(s) are a little older I’ll get back to what I love doing—creative carpentry.”

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Watermelon Love

Jenna, Marie, and Liz enjoy Sugar Baby Watermelon from the Village Terraces Cohousing Neighborhood garden.

“I never even liked watermelon before now” says Liz Diaz.

Small and sweet with a green rind, red flesh, and small seeds, Sugar Baby is a heritage variety and did well in our hot, dry, summer conditions.

“We must have gotten 40 watermelons from this 10’x75′ patch of garden” says Jonathan Swiftcreek, one of the neighborhood gardeners.

Firewood Workday NOT canceled due to rain!

In other news, our firewood workday had lots of rain, which didn’t seem to stop us or the dancing. We filled our firewood shed with wood from our 2008 agricultural clearing. Our boiler system heats our hot water as well as our homes.

Pictured above: Carmen, Bob, & Steve on the top level. Matthew, Lee, & Debbie on the ground.

Pictured right: Carmen and Steve dancing in the rain.

Creativity at Harvest-Time

In other news, our basil is going gangbusters and we’re trying to keep up with the pesto making.

And we’re able to incorporate blueberries into our lives on as many occasions as possible.

What a busy summer it has been! How did it get to be September? Now we’re into cool nights and changes afoot.

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