Tag Archives: Backyard Project

New project and Ouch!

While we were having our carpets cleaned, I decided to go out and root around in the woods. I checked the pond and the overflow “pit” and decided to expand some.

I used branches and fallen trees to make a barrier and then piled leaves and dirt on top. I then used rotting and burnt boards to shore up the sides and packed more dirt against those parts for more resiliency.

I have a trench running down from the overflow connecting to this newly cleared land. When the rainy season arrives and the pond fills and overflows, I expect it will look nice.

During the bit with the boards, I stuck my thumb on a rusty nail.

Ouch!

So I am waiting at a clinic now to get a tetanus shot.

Firebox

Well, I decided to go ahead and build a fire in the firebox to harden up the clay.

Unfortunately, there are just too many impurities in the clay. I still need to process it quite a bit more before it will not break as it dries.

I also need to find some sort of fiber that I can mix into the clay to strengthen it so that it won’t break when it dries.

The part that broke is the cross beam that holds up the base layer to the kiln above the firebox. It is an elongated section of clay and so tends to break as I shape it.

Site pages

My site pages don’t seem to be visible from browsers, and so my last few updates haven’t been seen.

I am working on a new backyard project.

I’m building a small Kiln in the backyard that I will be using to fire some clay tiles to place in the ditch at the front of the house.

I’ve been chronicling this as a photo gallery on my site page however, the site page is not currently visible from the WordPress website for some reason.