True story. We have two snow days then a weekend. Monday on my way home from work my son calls me and tells me to pick up straw, rocks, glue, sticks, dirt, clay and sand. All of this is needed for his science fair project that is due Friday...yes 4 days from now. The project is to determine the effect of water on stick, rock and cob houses. Cob houses (just so you know) are the dirt and straw houses you see in Africa.
So I head to Michaels and fill the cart. We decide to build the popsicle stick houses first because that is the easiest. WRONG. I built 4 sides but how to connect them and then there is the issue of a roof. So we put those aside and work on the rock houses. I found river rocks you use in landscaping or in flower vases and started gluing them together with some sort of epoxy the woman at Michaels said would work. WRONG. The rocks kept sliding and I started using the popsicle sticks to try to straighten them. My son exclaims...mom you can't mix the sticks with the rocks. The cat, who wants to see what all the hullabaloo is about jumps on the table, I go to shoo him away and accidentially touch him with my gluey, stick and rock hands. You think that was a mess!
Wednesday night we made the cob slabs for our cob houses. Believe it or not there were recipes on the internet on how to make cob. My son and I took dirt, water, handmade silt (ashes from the fireplace and water-YUCK) and started mixing in a large tub. We added clay, sand and sprinkled in straw. We patted this mess into squares and laid them on a board on my dining room to dry. If I don't get a mother of the year award for this, then I don't know what to do!
Next post...the water test on these little houses...in my bathtub!
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