There was an art project today. I participated in about half of it, and then I had to split and go buy more supplies. This was all part of the on-going prep of the materials that go up to the mountain tiny cabin. Everything needs to be cut and shaped down here, where there is unlimited access to power, and where we can leave scraps of wood or metal without having to pack them back down the hill.
The entire tiny cabin will be wrapped in steel sheathing, to provide an additional layer of protection from water, fire, and bears. (Yes, bears. They destroyed the tent last year.) While none of us are looking forward to carrying the steel up the hill, and thankfully I will have very little responsibility for that, it is the best material for the job. As with much of the rest of this build, the steel sheets were purchased from the salvage yard. There are two different products--wide sheets that are painted green, and slightly narrower sheets that are painted dark brown. The green steel will go on the barn roof, and the brown will go on the sides of the exterior walls. While this structure isn't a giant secret (would I write about it here otherwise?), we have no intention of visually shouting about its existence. It's tucked into the trees, and we want it to make the smallest difference in the landscape as is possible. To that end, the Mr decided to camouflage it somewhat. It's not going to look like a piece out of a hunter's autumn wardrobe, but the big green lines are broken up a little with brown, black, gray, and red oxide paint. He clipped some branches off of the trees down here, the ones that needed a little trimming anyway (like the aspens that were blocking the sidewalk) and used them as stencils. We both took turns with all four colors, lightly misting the steel over the top of the branches. It wasn't an exact science, and we won't know until it's all constructed and in place whether it has the desired effect. But it was a fun experiment, and if it doesn't look good in the long run, it will probably end up flaking off anyway.
I still have spray paint in my nostrils, and for a while there, I was good and dizzy. At some point while the fumes were getting to me, the designs swirled in front of my eyes in a way that reminded me of the animation for the Disney movie Pocahontas. I don't think I ever actually watched the whole thing all the way through, but I know my kids had a VHS tape with the one song on it, and they played that over and over. I might not be remembering it exactly, but it seemed close enough for me.
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