[Cob] Thank you for Cob Foundation weekend

[Quail Springs]

A HUGE THANK YOU to the folks who came out last weekend to help with the
Cob Foundation!  
We were deeply touched that you came from all the way from Utah, San
Diego, Carlsbad, Newport Beach, Oceano and Figueroa Mtn. areas to help
and learn at Quail Springs.  

We will be posting pictures of the foundation building process on our
website as soon as possible.  The next big step will happen during the
May 21-31 workshop out here.  My hope is to create a page just for this
cob building process so people can see the steps along the way, our joys
and challenges, to hopefully encourage as well as educate others.  

We had planned to use cement in our stemwall, and thankfully were
encouraged by Betty Seaman to try it without if we were willing...which
we are.  The size of our stemwall rocks are large enough to weigh
themselves down well, and as long as we can find proper in between rocks
and nothing moves when we walk over the top of it...we'll avoid using
cement.  If there are spots that we feel unsure about, we will use cob
mortar and potentially some cement.  It was uplifting to just have the
possibility of allowing the rock to work and show off its beauty and
capacity.  

Also it was encouraging to invite people from near and far to
participate, creating a good learning group.  I would suggest it to any
one who is building your own home or in a nonprofit setting...invite
others to help, it's so much better than grinding away on your own and
everyone gets a lot out of it.  

Best, Kolmi
Resident Caretaker
Quail Springs 
www.quailsprings.org