April Photo Album

Even with some rain, we accomplished quite a bit, including putting up trusses and sheathing on the house, and finishing putting up the bales for the studio.

Springtime in the desert! For those of you not acquainted with our desert flora, this is a hedgehog cactus flower.

With the bales up, the rain could come (of course), and so we put up plastic sheeting all over the tops of the bale walls.

We finished putting up bales for the studio, a 400 square foot structure that will be primarily for my composing and music-making space.

The premanufactured trusses went on this month. They sit directly on the double 2x6 roof plate that runs along the tops of the bale walls. Through the walls runs vertical all-thread coupled to j-bolts in the footer, and tied to the top of the plate via a cross-plate. The trusses then sit on the top plate, according to the Tucson/Pima County Strawbale Building Code. I love the shadow pattern that the trusses make. It's almost a shame to keep building. Almost...

We also sheathed above the house, with help from our friends Roger Dondero and Allen Breckenridge. What a difference some shade makes!