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If you are thinking and have been reading about
Alternative Building styles, this is one of those things that you see on
the ‘net and think to yourself, “Golly, that would be SO much fun.
We should go.” Then you see that it’s being held (insert somewhere
that’s clearly too far from home to be affordable or sensible). Deep
depressed sigh, and the conviction that SOMEDAY…
And then one comes up that’s tantalizingly near to home, and it’s sorely
tempting. Being a Grown-Up and all, the excuses NOT to go pop up
like Whack-a-Moles:
-It’s too expensive
-We’d have to take time off of work
-It’s too expensive
-It’s too hard to leave the farm for a weekend
-It’s too expensive
Here’s where the decision must be made to keep dreaming, or to go get
dirty.
The Natural Building Colloquium was held in Kerrville, Texas on a perfect
autumn weekend. We went, and we got dirty.
Having had a number of family challenges this past year that all involved
fistfuls of cash being thrown at them, our discretionary budget glowed as
red as Rudolph’s nose, so here’s what we decided: this weekend would be
our Christmas present to ourselves.
Once I put down on paper the stuff we’d be learning, the people we’d be
meeting and the helpful contacts we’d be making, even if we only learned
ONE thing that would save us time, energy and money, that ONE thing would
most likely cover the expense of the weekend.
And I didn’t have to gift wrap it. Sweet.
This is a totally factual account of the first weekend of the Natural
Building Colloquium as experienced by one tiny family. I am
confident that every other participant has a completely different story -
there was THAT much going on.
But if you’ve never been to one, it’ll give you an inkling of what to
expect.
Or not.
Because I’m sure they are all as different as snowflakes.
The setting was perfect: a 50-acre campground in the heart of the Central
Texas Hill Country. And the weather was outstanding: overcast to
keep it from getting uncomfortably hot during the day, and just chilly
enough at night to make for good snuggling in the outdoor theater during
the evening presentations. We were in a drought condition, so there
were no campfires. That was a disappointment to my seven-year-old
son Alec, who was looking forward to blazing marshmallows, but for most of
the tasks at hand, it was ideal.
The days began with food: wonderful, fresh food made on site and eaten in
the Great Outdoors - tasty, unique, colorful. Alec made it to the
end of the serving counter the first morning, stopped, turned to me
suspiciously and asked, “Where’s the MEAT???”
"Oh, yeah. Sorry, hon', this is a vegetarian shindig."
After the initial shock/panic attack, he managed to
find items that were not only ingestible, but also deemed “really not
bad." In case you have never had children, “really not bad” is as
high a compliment as you should expect when introducing something
"strange" into their diets.
After breakfast was Morning Circle in the amphitheatre set into the
hillside. Announcements, schedule affirmations and changes, along
with some songs and silliness to start the day.
Then on to talks, demonstrations, and projects.
This type of event really should be attended by multiple folks in each
group. There is so much going on at once; it’s the only way to glean
even a portion of knowledge. At any given moment, my husband would
be at a demonstration, I would be in a discussion group, and our son would
be wallowing in some sort of earth/straw/water concoction.
And that’s one of the first things that struck me about this gathering:
most of the time if you bring your child/children to workshops or
meetings, a good part of your energy is spent telling them to “Shhhhhhhhh”
and “Please sit still” and “YACKKKK! Don’t do/touch that!!!” From
the very first moments here - in the breakfast line Saturday morning -
Alec was looked on as an equal member of the gathering and he and the
woman in front of us were trying to out-do each other by bending various
body parts in directions they were clearly not designed to bend (he won,
but only by virtue of his age and the fact that his young bones and joints
aren’t completely "cemented in place" yet). Every project we
attended, the first thing he’d ask was “What can I do to help?” and every
single project leader gave him something that was clearly truly helpful -
not "something to amuse the kid while the grown-ups do the work."
Of course, building with natural materials is generally a messy,
non-exacting science, but that’s what attracts THIS grown-up to it anyhow.
I’m much better at getting messy and being non-exacting than being bent
over delicate precision work.
The Colloquium took place over a 10-day period, and we attended a mere
two. For information on the entire schedule and list of presenters,
check out
http://www.naturalbuildingtexas.org/
Here’s what this family saw and did:
A demonstration on cob building took place in the children’s play area of
the campground, where they built a wall/bench/thatched roof over the
sandbox. We were able to participate in the wall building, which was
great fun and attracted most of the children present to stomp the mixture
and slap it onto the pile-that-became-a-wall.
Continued
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