Our New Start: May 2014

Sooo, since I just updated the blog on land progress, figured I'd fill everyone in with the yurt building! Throughout the past month, we've been informally talking with Hal (the yurt guy) about plans for designing and building out yurt. Hal says it's usually a pretty steady business and we shouldn't have a problem getting ours done in the near future.

Unfortunately, by the time we got back from visiting everyone for Easter, Hal got 4 more orders in! He says it's the busiest he's ever been and between the extra orders and a planned vacation for Hal, he wasn't going to be able to finish our yurt until August.

It was a stressful day when we heard the news, but it was not the first time things went differently than planned. As hard as it is to let go of the stress and control, we've slowly been learning to embrace the challenges that come up as new opportunities.

So far, throughout our whole adventure, everything has worked out in the best way (even if we didn't think so at the time!) It definitely seems like there's a larger force here that knows the big picture better than we do. Understanding this has really gotten us to slow down and look at everything from a new perspective. A big part of this adventure is us trying to live our lives in a way that is more harmonious and happy, but it's such a great feeling to actually see how well it's been working!

With this new encouragement, we decided to make a trip back to Hal and see if we could work something out. Hal's been one of our most influential connections since we got down to NC and has openly been there to help us whenever we need. We saw this as a chance to return the favor and help get him caught up with his yurt orders and work on our yurt at the same time!

Even better, but we're both getting paid $12 an hour which gets subtracted off the final price of our yurt! Between that and using discounted parts and our own labor, we've gotten the price of our yurt down to less than half of the original cost! yeah babyy

We just started helping out this week so thought we'd upload some pictures so far!

Here's Laurel Nest Yurts! Hal and his Wife, Asia have been so warming in inviting us into their home. They also have a cute little girl, Emilia who's always running about playing! They do some small homesteading so you can see the retention walls for all their blueberry bushes. And their website for anyone who's curious to see more about what we're doing! www.laurelnestyurts.com

Laurel Nest - Half business, half homesteading family!

Chickens and a bunch of different herbs and gardens.

This is where we'll be spending most of our time! The top is a 30' yurt (the same size we're building) and acts as the fabric preparation room. The bottom is actually a wood version of a yurt, but uses the top yurt as a roof! Talk about being efficient haha it may not be the prettiest thing, but they try conserving materials and everything on site is made with leftover parts.

Prep room and storage yurt on the bottom right.

Here's the inside of the 30' yurt! This is about the cleanest you'll ever see it haha the big white roll in the back is the insulation for the yurt. The insulation is basically bubble wrap which has pockets of air on one side and has a reflective foil on the other side. The reflective foil is similar to what spaceships use and acts as radiant barrier and essentially reflects the heat and sun off of the house to keep it cool on the inside cold.

Our job is measuring and cutting it to the right height and then taping it together so it can be used to line the inside of the walls. 800,000 panels later, we're finished!

The first day working, Hal showed us how to measure and cut the outside fabric for our yurt walls. That's the rolled up green bundles on the floor! The fabric is actually discounted fabric that Hal had left over, so we got it for a really good price. Best part, we can paint it whatever color we want!

Here's the bottom of the two story yurt which acts as the sewing room. Hal says about 80% of the yurt building is done in the sewing shop haha notice the green fabric on the table!? That's what we'll be working on next week =)

Because the fabric walls are so large, they require lots of table space and usually an extra person to help feed the fabric through the machine.

Just another picture of Laurel Nest!

We only worked a few days this week and commuted between our land and the yurt place. Since it's a long commute, Hal was super chill and even offered for us to camp or stay in an extra yurt while working here! Best part, it's free and allows us to bring Abby while we work! Not a bad way if you're looking to get out of the tent and camping for a couple days, huh!?

We'll keep you all updated next week on how everything goes!

Finally got back down to North Carolina. It was nice getting out of the wilderness for a while and getting to spend time with family and friends over Easter! It's amazing how much you take for granted the common luxuries such as a bed haha As much as we enjoyed our break with family, we were itching to get back down and starting working on the land again!

The last time we were down in Bryson City, the trees were just starting to bud. Now that we're back down south, it seems to have changed a little!

Another fun 8 hour drive and here's our exit! Right off of Smokey Mountain Expressway (Route 74). From here, it's only a 15 minute drive to the top of our lot. The gas station on the right is also where we have our storage locker. We have our own surplus of books, clothing, camping supplies and other random things. It's right on the way into town too, so we'll usually stop here throughout the week while running about town. Convenient, ayee?

Over the bridge and through the woods, to our mountain lot we gooo.

Long winding roads off the highway towards our lot. It's not so bad when we have to run around for things because driving down here is so scenic! Lots of forests, creeks, and cute little homesteads along the road.

Here's 2 horsies right across the creek at the bottom of our Community. We usually end up driving past them to say hello =) Might be a future place to network with if we ever decided to get a horse down here.. hmm

Driveway to bottom lot is nice and lush now! Would probably even look better if we wanted to put up some homemade trellises and have vines arching over the driveway.. hmmm

The weather is constantly changing in the mountains! The weathermen are pro's down here too. Any time there's a cloud in the sky, we have a 50% "chance" of rain.. everyyy time. haha That's mountain weather for yuh! Here's a picture from the top lot after we got a quick rain shower.

Clouds in the valley on the road down the community. Reminds me of cotton candy..

Here's another picture of the creek that runs right at the bottom of our community.

Fun play time at the creek! She's still such a puppy haha

It only took her about 10 secs before she was swimming around in the water. Definitely a big girl now. (Her last swim encounter was 6 inches of water in her baby pool.) She wasn't so sure about the deep water at first, but every time we turned around she's just swimming around again! Playing fetch with a moving current definitely threw in an extra dynamic haha

Playing with another "stick." She's progressively been grabbing bigger ones but at least it helps fuel the fire!

Late night breakfast dinner! Breakfast skillet compliments of Chef Allison.

We've really been working hard on presenting ourselves in our best Southern sense. I think we're pulling it off pretty well.

Abby 2 - Stick 0

Allison's working on her best "Bear Face"... Allison 1 - Bear 0. We like to have fun while we work down here =)

We've been getting lots of sun working on the lot! Anytime we get some free time, it usually ends with pulling weeds, raking leaves, thinning out the underbrush or otherwise preparing the lot!

Here's some before and after pics!

Before: The soon to be location of our yurt!