Chris tells me that when we ran through our presentation the final time before heading into Kamloops last night he felt enormous relief.
He had been working quite steadily on the house plans, not only to get them closer to submission to the building authority, but apparently to get them into a form that would generate discussion at the presentation.
He says it was the closest he felt to being “stressed” since before we started to wind up our business last year!
Regardless, we very much enjoyed sharing our house project. It has been more than a decade since either one of us has presented to a group so we weren’t sure exactly how it would go. Fortunately, the people (about 40) who came to hear us talk were all enthusiastic about sustainable building. We didn’t get heckled once!
After we ran through our plans, goals and the the progress of our project, we opened the floor for discussion and this ran the gamut:
1) Building code
2) Greywater recovery
3) Septic requirements in the absence of a traditional waste system
4) Heating the floor
5) Tire sizes
6) Thermal mass
7) Worm composting
8) Use of cans and bottles
9) Inclusion of volunteers in the project
10) Books of interest: In Defense of Food
11) Websites of interest: www.ecosense.com and www.thispreciousplanet.com
13) Resources: Turtle Tank (company)
We’d like to thank everyone who came to hear us speak for their suggestions and experiences. I had a piece of paper next to me and I seemed to be constantly jotting down book titles, websites, names, facts and figures. Our house will be that much better because of the information we received.
Thanks also to Cheryl Kabloona who invited us to speak and who I am sure will become a great resource for us as we continue.
On the drive home to Darfield I tried to convince our friend, Henry, (who came with us as support) that it felt a little strange to be viewed as doing something unusual since I really did think we were pretty normal people. Henry didn’t stop laughing until we passed Heffley Creek…
Ahhh. The joys of good friends.