Making Hypertufa

Two weekends ago I headed to Tacoma for the 3-day holiday weekend to spend time with my mom & grammi - and make hypertufa! Hypertufa are concrete-like potting containers that are easy to make. My mom and I had been wanting to give this a try for a long time, and it ended up working out really well!

The basic ingredients: portland cement, pete moss, sand & water!

First step: Find molds for shaping your hypertufa. These can be anything from a square tupperware container, to a terracotta pot, to a kitty litter pan. What is important is that the opening at the top of your shape is not narrower than the base - or you'll never get your hypertufa out of your mold!
Line the mold with a plastic sack, and you're ready to move on to mixing your hypertufa mixture.

Our six shapes set up and ready to go.

Step 2: Mix up your hypertufa recipe! It's something like 3:1...mmm....like 3 parts peat moss to one part sand and one part cement....or maybe it's 3 parts cement to one part peat moss and one part sand? Plus water so that it all holds together. I had the instructions to scan in and include here, but I lost them. Really helpful, eh?

Me - mixing up the goods in the wheel barrow. We wore face masks so we didn't breathe in the cement dust.

Step 3: Press your mixture into the mold! You don't want it to be too thick or your piece will be super heavy - but too thin and it can crack. I think we were shooting for about a 1/2" - 3/4" thick wall, and that seemed to work pretty well.

Mom - putting the finishing touches on the hypertufa.

Step 4: Wait. oh - cover the hypertufa with wet newspaper so they stay damp - and then wait. For about a month. You want to give them plenty of time to dry, although you can turn them out of their molds after about 2 weeks or so. Once they've dried their full four weeks it's recommended that you rinse the insides with a mixture of vinegar & water to cut down on the lime - and then you can go ahead and plant!

A finished, planted hypertufa!

Sofia's New Hat!

Look at this smile! I delivered this hat to Sofia last night and was quite pleased that it actually fit her (I was convinced I'd started decreasing too early and it wouldn't fit on her head). Lucky Sofia - it's just long enough to fit her through the end of the winter. She's a lot bigger than she was when I knit her a hat almost two years ago!

The Most Exciting News of 2010!

Is that Kathryn & Brian are getting married!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is probably a silly post since everyone who reads this will probably already know about their engagement - but it's too exciting not to document! AND - nice job Brian for picking an easy date to remember: the 20th Anniversary of the Simpsons. Hah hah - Sweet!