Plasterin'

Today we decided to switch gears a bit and try plastering the logs a bit.  Home Depot didn't have cement and lime sold separately - maybe that's old-fashioned.  But they had ready-to-mix / just-add-water cement, and the same called mortar mix.  Not knowing the difference, we got mortar mix.

We added just enough water to make it lump together. Too much water and it would have oozed out. We mixed in some sawdust that had piled up from notching the corners together - just for the heck of it I guess. At first we tried to trowel it in, but it didn't stay very well. We found that if you hold it in place for a few seconds it starts to stick. Must be something to do with the water in the mix getting a chance to adhere to the wood logs.

Before putting in the mortar, we filled the gaps as much as possible with pieces of branches, wood wedges from when we notched the corners, a bit of moss (to add a bit of pioneer authenticity), and nailed just a couple of pieces in place.  It was a bit more time consuming than we had imagined - I think because of how it took a bit to get it to stick to the wood; plus every space was unique.

Rubber gloves are good, but hard to work with so we did it bare-handed.  The stuff really dries out your skin though.  Will probably need some good lotion to rehydrate our hands.

Still making progress!