Our latest house kit! ; ) Designed by my 5 year old!

My 5 year old just handed me this... just had to share... it's amazing what little ones soak up.

I have never directly had a detailed discussion with him regarding passive solar or our house kit technology or green roofs or any of that.




I am one proud momma!

 

Population Count

Sometimes I lean over the back fence and chat with my older neighbor. We share a love of gardening and I enjoy seeing him out there daily, always doing something... he gives me inspiration to really live well and fully, despite deadlines.

Today I was telling him more about the land we bought in central Virginia, the wonderful community, neat things to do, how the net zero house erection is going, the Amish there, and the town's small population.

"Population 299?
What's wrong with 'em they can't get one more?"

 

My Mom Can Tie A Bowline Faster Than Your Mom

While our contractor is on vacation, we headed down to the Chesapeake Bay.

There, I grew up sailing, fishing, crabbing, swimming, capsizing opponents boats, honing strategy in overtaking and turtling your enemy, hijacking, bribing, quick getaways, and out-navigating those that come after you... in other words, Pirating 101.

Last night, at dinner, my mom was showing some of the young'uns some skillz.

For you landlubbers, a bowline is a very valuable knot, and the more at ease and efficient you are at creating one, the better.

Here's my mom, showin' her bowline efficiency after a great day of teaching the next generation all manners of stealth and craftiness. ; )

(P.s. When she laughs at the end, what she's saying is, "Does anyone else want to see this?" and I replied, "Actually, more people than you would ever imagine are gonna see this..." ; ) )

 

Recurve... Camp Manakin

Thanks to all of you that have called, emailed, or mentioned your shared love of Camp Manakin after I mentioned it in a previous post.

It's nice to know I'm not the only one who thinks it's perfectly normal for a child to pursue in the course of a day: archery, riflery, survival swimming (Remember that? What a scream! We had to 1. tread water for 5 minutes and 2. blow up our jeans and shirts into floats, and no this was not some fundamentalist training camp!), riding, Hardyball (remember Hardy ball?), knife games and... oh yeah, crafts.

And the FOOD! Remember those long, long tables? They put Hogwarts to shame. Remember the butter and baloney fried sandwiches? I was always the kid everyone passed their pickled beets down to... and Evelyn scolding everyone? (She's in the picture above, I'm leaning against her... Gosh I loved that woman. Somehow I always ended up in the kitchen with her, where no one else was allowed to go, but she'd sit me on a stool and I'd "help" her and she called me "Little Kate" even that was not remotely close to my name.)

Long days spent fishing, walking through the woods to another activity, playing mumbly peg while we waited our turns... and we all had Indian names that indicated our tribe.

On rainy days we'd gather in the lodge to hear (very dramatic) TALL TALES... there was one Coach Hardy always told- Jack and the Beanstalk. Sure you've heard Jack and the Beanstalk. But NO ONE could tell a story like Coach Hardy. I don't think I ever heard that man NOT tell a tall tale. Then my uncle Fred would lean lazily on the porch & strum his guitar, playing Walbash Cannonball and '40s bluegrass on his banjo...

Those were days when summer was endless, days were long, and friendships were forever.

"Oh we like to ride the bus on the way to Manakin,
Oh we never make a fuss on the way to Manakin.
So we sing a merry song with a merry, merry tune-
On the waaaaaaay to Man-a-kin:
Oooooooooooooooohhhh!
Hooray, hooray for Mr. Hardy!
Hooray, hooray we're never taaaaaaaaaaaardy.
Hooray, hooray for where we're goin' and we've been, and Hooray For Man-a-kin! Hooray!"



So, it won't surprise those that have contacted me regarding our shared enthusiasm for Camp Manakin that I have decided to take up archery again.

I got the itch last year, and, when stepping in to the big sports stores, was completely put off by the compound & cross bows.

No, I wanted the old longbows I recalled from my childhood. No matter what my cousins said, I was determined.

But I also wanted to have the option to use it hunting eventually, as there is quite an overpopulation of deer in our area.

So, after much thought... I've gone recurve.

I bought a gorgeous old Fred Bear "black bear" recurve... and it sits to my left, next to the computer in my office... inspiration for a mom, business owner, wife- chained to her desk, her children, her life... to break free soon.

Just for a little while, to do something on my own, by myself, aiming at leaves as they blow across the field, gaging the wind, the distance, the speed, to slowly sharpen my aim and strength, to then teach my children the quiet, the concentration, the beauty of archery.


P.s. If this interests you, then here's some summer reading:
The Witchery of Archery, by Maurice Thompson, 1879.

P.p.s: So many people have emailed or sent comments on Camp Manakin that I dug up a few more pictures and added them... hope you enjoy.

 

Who I am not

Thinking back to New York... and who I am not.

The first clue was when we strode into one bar and the bartender announced,
"Aaaaaaand here comes Sex In The City!" which I thought was a clever reference to the fact that we were several girls walking in together.

And people looked at me funny. I attributed it to the fact that I have pastel, cotton candy pink hair.

But when, as we walked in to a design party, the stranger grasped my hand, flustered, and told me he loved my work, V. turned to me: "He thinks you're CYNTHIA NIXON!"

I didn't know who Cynthia Nixon is, but immediately understood: One of those Sex In The City girls, and not even the one I would want to be!

Ok this is bad: I just inserted the Cynthia Nixon image into this post and Amy, who works next to me, burst: "OHHHHH MY GOSH YOU DO LOOK LIKE HER!"

I DO NOT!

But for some reason, every decade I somehow become compared to a mass pop culture person, and never ones I admire!

When I was ten everyone compared me to Marcia Brady.
In the Nineties I was Brenda from 90210.
And now I'm some Sex In The City chick for the next ten years?

Dag it!

Can't people just look at me and think,
"Oh there goes some random weird girl who looks like... herself."

 

ICFF: Rambling OT overview of what I did during ICFF when no one was lookin'

My Nice Essay On How I Productively Spent My Time At The ICFF
by Copeland Casati

I will follow up with specific posts on specific companies' products, but let's cut to the chase:
The ICFF was gosh-darned good fun.

But if you want to know all the naughty things we did... well, then check back here. This post will grow over the next day... and...



I have pictures to prove it...

; )

Chapter 1

After taking a seven hour train ride feeling quite queasy (probably from my friend's book release party celebrations the night before) I hoofed it in brand new shoes from Penn Station, with a huge yellow knapsack on my back, to the ICFF at the Javitz Center.

After walking the aisles for hours, I then hopped the subway to Gansvoort Street to meet with my dear, beloved (I adore this girl!) college friend V. who, upon seeing me for the first time in years, suggested, "Let's get a drink."

I thought that was a fantastic idea.
But when the elevator doors opened to reveal the rooftop of the Soho House in full, Saturday late-afternoon play... I thought, "Well, I guess I shoulda brushed my hair- or at least my teeth first, huh?" What can you do except just keep goin'.

We settled into lounge chairs and I surveyed the scene.
This Manhattan I never knew: In the center, a pool, surrounded by lounge chairs and cocktail tables, and people just... laughing. Sometimes they didn't even laugh at anything or with anyone; they laughed at air. Turn slightly, laugh. Move slightly, laugh.

Here I was in New York, blistered heels and dumpy dress, finally sipping a nice cocktail, but feeling sooooo dirty from the train ride, the day-old makeup slidin' off my face, the sore spot between my shoulders from carrying immensely heavy knapsacks across subway platforms and up endless stairs; trudging blocks, a thin bag stuffed with ICFF cards, brochures, and...
Here I was, amidst crisp shirts and loafers, girls in short tulle dresses paired with high, high stillettos and overly pink lips and tousled blond hair... laughing.

All about, sunglassed faces all seemed to nod and laugh, nod and laugh- life was grand, and everyone agreed: "We are lucky."

Chapter 2
We had a lovely dinner in V.'s restaurant, and then decided to switch gears.

Maybe I had been on good behavior too long.
We popped in to Hogs & Heifers for a quick Pabst Blue Ribbon and that's when they started making fun of me because I wouldn't do shots with my beer. Started taunting me because I was from Virginia. Dared me to get up on that bar because everyone knew Virginia girls can't dance.
So what's a girl to do?

Join 'em.

I thought I looked cool and sexy.

I think they had a good laugh at my expense.

Weird how the pictures didn't turn out to show the cool person I *thought* I was at that moment but instead a total dork dancing really stupidly...

Oh well, it was fun!

And my dumpy hindquarters were soooooooore the next day from all that dancing!

Ah, but the evening was just starting.

There was champagne at Buddah Bar, then we headed over to Plum.

Because V. has a certain relationship with the club, we were led to an area that was more roomy, at least in the beginning.

Then these poor band boys came in and had to get stuck with us. They had a slew of people with them, enviously eyed our area, but honeychiles, we were soooooooooo not budging.

I mean, what's a housewife to do on a Saturday night?

In the end we all became friends. They were very nice cute young boys and put up with our dancing and silliness quite well. : )



This one I liked in particular, his name was DJ something-or-another but his mom once lived in Alabama and we talked about his grandmother and family. And southern food.




Finally we crawled into bed around 3, in anticipation of another day at ICFF!

That will be Part Two of Off Topic...

 

What I did for Valentine's Day

...In case any of you wonder whether I'm cool or a geek.

SO, I was emailing back & forth with my friend Justin about his (veddy popular) blog when suddenly, I ended it with:

"Oops I’m going to say goodbye now because Christoph just walked into the room and said he just did his first code in Java…
'Ooh! I want to do Java!' my eyes brightened... So I’m off! This is what geeks do on Valentines Day!"

I ambled over to his computer. There was his first code in Java, a typical admin page. "Type in your name into the text field..." so I did... He then explained about Java vs. .net's code-behind...

and then I looked at the source, smiled, and swooned as he hit "submit"... : )

public void doPost(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)
throws ServletException, IOException {

String firstName = request.getParameter("firstName").toString();

response.setContentType("text/html");
PrintWriter out = response.getWriter();
out
.println("");
out.println("");
Happy out.println(" ");
out.println(" ");

out.println("I love " + firstName);
out.println("

Happy Valentine's Day ") ;
//out.print(this.getClass());
//out.println(", using the POST method");
out.println(" ");
out.println("");
out.flush();
out.close();
}

 

Joke of the Day

This is my joke of the day.

You now know the casa ti has been enlarged from 1,000 to 1,200 square feet. We had so many people begging for more storage to use it as a primary home we conceded. I need to confirm with David that we will have two sizes (vs. just picking the larger one) but here is what I came up with:

casa ti: is now the 1,200 sq. ft. larger kit with more storage space.

So what do we call the original 1,000 sq. ft. kit?

The…

.

.

.

.

casa tini

Bwha-hahahahahahaha!
Phew, oh I crack myself up.

P.s. For more on our modern, green house kits please visit Green Modern Kits!

If you like cottage and traditional cabins, we launch Green Cottage Kits this spring.