5 days... and we've had enough...

We had planned on spending 6 full days on the property getting stuff done, but after only 5, we're tapped out.  We're trying not to spend much money until the wife finds a new job, so we're doing it on the "Cheaper."  We are already pretty frugal, but we've pared down a bunch more and we aren't eating out, staying at the KOA or buying any building materials that aren't absolutely essential.

So we've been sleeping on the property, in the new Subaru -that we paid cash for ( it's more comfy than anticipated) and eating stuff brought with us.  Kinda like camping out, only with 12 hour days of digging and other assorted infrastructure projects. 

It's been around 100 degrees by 10am when the wind isn't blowing and the bugs are at their worst at this time as well.  I never thought I'd wish for the crazy ass Wyoming wind early in the morning.  Around 2-3pm the clouds gather in the distance and we get wind, sporadic rain and usually lightning.

Like the sign says:

 Prickly Pear Flower - we dug up a cactus in April and put in it on our balcony (which gets constant sunshine and can reach temps of 100+) and it was flowering when we got home!)  Come fall, hopefully we'll be able to harvest us some prickly pears.

 Clouds, shortly before a rainstorm hit.

Adirondack Chair and table built by husband using recycled pallet wood and oops paint.

 We dug up a bunch more scrub and sagebrush and we used the dirt to fill in the berm some more.  We're also digging down and leveling out the ground so we've got more room to work with.  (Also, more room to turn the cars around without doing a million-point turn.)

Love the desert

View of the berm from the dome.  That's a lot of diggin' 

We also started the circle for the homedome that we'll be digging out later.   The purple circle is the future toilet room and the orange pallet is the future shower room.

Front side of the berm with dirt fill  (The berm is 4 to 6 feet high in places!)

More front fill on the berm 

Both botanical cells are now installed and ready for top soil and plants 

Pentayurt test with extra plywood.  Success. 

So after 5 days of being dirty, buggy, sweaty and physically exhausted, we called it good for now and decided to come home a day early.  We got the berm up to level (and forgot to take pics) so we're out of "easy" stuff to work on until we can start building more.  There's always plenty of digging to do, but our bodies will only co-operate for so long before we have to rest. 

The worst part is that even though we know how much we've done, there's little visual impact and there's still so much to do that it's easy to get discouraged. 

GANBATE!  HWAITING! 

(look it up)