Our first week! We made it!

Our Tabula Rasa

This ladies and gentlemen is our starting point, our tabula rasa if you will. It looks beautiful and serene. Looks can be decieving! It was a brutal first week filled with 16 hour days but we came through it at the end empowered but what we accomplished.

First we learned in the high desert in June before you do anything you need shade. So we first added a bajillion tarp tents to further enhance the white trash appearance of our trailer gatherings.  

We gladly welcome child labor!

One shade shelter complete!

Once complete with furniture and swamp cooler it felt like the Ritz!

Then we learned that once cleared, our beautiful property really has a ton of dirt!  Bad for us, great for our workers!

Wide open spaces make great play areas, just ask the dachsund booking it in the background...

And indoor shelters, generators and swamp coolers have become our new best friends.

So what did we learn this week???  We'll brave high temps, challenging working conditions and put in really long, dusty and unpleasant days for this dream.  We've learned that we could care less what kind of bugs are good and bad...we kill them all (for all of you gasping at this concept try chigger bites and then tell us to be selective about what we kill); we've learned that peppermint oil and a diffuser can be our best friends; we've learned that a teapot of hot water poured over our heads at night can be the most luxurious feeling of all; we've learned that a close Starbucks is missed more than the family swimming pool (seriously!); we've learned that a call from the lab saying our well water is clear, drinkable and ready for use is more exciting than any other current world event and each day as our creature comforts are moved into place we've learned that family, hard work and a job well done make the world go round.

All our dreams can come true....if we have the courage to pursue them!

Walt Disney