DATES: Positions run from Sept 24 2016-November 18 2016.

NOW HIRING food  access and conservation members for our 2016 Residential Leadership Crew!! Calling young adults between ages 18-26, who want an opportunity to live communally on our awesome homestead near Asheville NC, complete food access and conservation projects both in our local community and on public lands, and learn about sustainable agriculture.

Members will complete an AmeriCorps term of service working on food access projects and trail maintenance/restoration throughout the Southeast. Following a brief orientation, members will be working at SMC headquarters and with local community partners on projects supporting local gardens and food access in under-served communities. Members will also prepare educational programming relating to these topics for public presentations.

Subsequently, members will complete 4 weeks of habitat restoration and trail management projects in Chattahoochee Bend State Park in Georgia, working and camping for up to 8 days at a time. Projects may include habitat restoration, trail maintenance, and/or trail construction.  Members will receive additional trainings pertaining specifically to these projects. Between project “hitches,” the crew will return to SMC base where they will continue to receive room and board during off days.

While living at SMC headquarters in Western NC, members will also have opportunities throughout the season to learn about permaculture, engage in trainings and projects with local farms and organizations, and experience community living on a growing homestead. Members will engage in a weekly “community day” on site, which may consist of community meetings, chores, onsite agriculture projects, field trips, and additional trainings.

During some projects, the crew may camp for up to 8 days at a time. SMC provides tents and other group camping gear.

COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS:

• $90/week living stipend + full room and board for the duration of the program.
• Trainings and orientation with SMC and project partners (trainings may include: conservation work skills and tool use, construction and green design, gardening, permaculture and sustainable agriculture, food preservation, leave no trace camping, leadership, community building, teamwork, etc.)
• Experience living and working in a vibrant residential community.
• AmeriCorps educational scholarship upon completion of the program.
• Plenty of opportunities to explore the beautiful southeast!

DESIRED SKILLS AND INTERESTS:.

• Ability to hike for long distances carrying backpacks, tools, and equipment, completing repetitive motions, lifting heavy objects, and using machinery.
• Ability to live and work in a physically demanding, possibly remote environment for an uninterrupted period of up to eight days.
• Ability to work effectively as a member of a team despite potentially stressful and difficult conditions.
• Experience and/or strong interest in conservation and invasive species management, and a desire to learn related skills.
• Experience and/or strong interest in sustainable agriculture, gardening, and low impact living.
• Experience and/or strong interest in leave no trace camping and back-country living.
• Desire to live and work in a close knit residential community.
• Willingness and ability to complete all aspects of the program. Members must commit to participating in all crew/team activities.

Apply now to join our 2016 residential leadership corps!

TO APPLY:  Please send cover letter, resume, and three references to Heather Buckner at Hebuckner@gmail.com.  Use subject line “SMC food access.”  Members offered positions will be asked to fill out an additional application form.

You can also complete an online application at http://www.thesca.org/serve/position/smoky-mountain-corps-food-access-member/po-00703442

Applications will be accepted until August 31 or positions have been filled.

DATES: Positions run from August 5 2016-November 23 2016.

NOW HIRING members for our 2016 Residential Leadership Crew!! Calling young adults between ages 18-25, who want an opportunity to live communally on our awesome homestead near Asheville NC, complete conservation and habitat restoration projects on public lands, and learn about sustainable agriculture.

Members will complete an AmeriCorps term of service working on invasive species management, trail maintenance, and other conservation projects throughout the Southeast. Following a brief orientation, members will  be working with SMC partners to complete native plant management projects on sites near Asheville NC.  Additionally, the crew will travel to Georgia to complete trail maintenance and habitat restoration projects in Chattahoochee Bend State Park.

While living at SMC headquarters in Western NC, members will also have opportunities throughout the season to learn about permaculture, engage in trainings and projects with local farms and organizations, and experience community living on a growing homestead. Members will engage in a weekly “community day” on site, which may consist of community meetings, chores, onsite agriculture projects, field trips, and additional trainings.

During some projects, the crew may camp for up to 8 days at a time. SMC provides tents and other group camping gear.

COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS:

• $90/week living stipend + full room and board for the duration of the program.
• Trainings and orientation with SMC and project partners (trainings may include: conservation work skills and tool use, construction and green design, gardening, permaculture and sustainable agriculture, food preservation, leave no trace camping, leadership, community building, teamwork, etc.)
• Experience living and working in a vibrant residential community.
• AmeriCorps educational scholarship upon completion of the program.
• Plenty of opportunities to explore the beautiful southeast!

DESIRED SKILLS AND INTERESTS:.

• Ability to hike for long distances carrying backpacks, tools, and equipment, completing repetitive motions, lifting heavy objects, and using machinery.
• Ability to live and work in a physically demanding, possibly remote environment for an uninterrupted period of up to eight days.
• Ability to work effectively as a member of a team despite potentially stressful and difficult conditions.
• Experience and/or strong interest in conservation and invasive species management, and a desire to learn related skills.
• Experience and/or strong interest in sustainable agriculture, gardening, and low impact living.
• Experience and/or strong interest in leave no trace camping and back-country living.
• Desire to live and work in a close knit residential community.
• Willingness and ability to complete all aspects of the program. Members must commit to participating in all crew/team activities.
• Environmental science, biology, botany, resources management, or similar degree preferred but not required.

Apply now to join our 2016 residential leadership corps!

TO APPLY:  Please send cover letter, resume, and three references to Heather Buckner at Hebuckner@gmail.com

Applications will be accepted until July 15.

Applicants may also be asked to complete an additional online application which can be found at http://thesca.org/serve/position/smoky-mountain-corps/po-00699166.  Use code PO-00699166 when requested.

For questions or to request more information please contact Heather Buckner: Hebuckner@gmail.com

After a bustling summer and action packed fall here at Smoky Mountain Corps (the last of our 2015 corps members left us in November), it has been all peace and quiet here for the last several months. But the calm won’t last much longer…it is time to amp up preparations for our 2016 season!

SMC had an amazing first season in 2015. During 2015, we successfully launched our Residential Leadership Corps program which brought together a diverse group of young adults to receive hands on leadership training in conservation, sustainable agriculture, and community development while completing 14 weeks of service to the Southeast region.  SMC Native Plants Interns spent their days working at Mountain True to manage invasive species on lands with federally protected rare and endangered plants. Additionally, SMC hosted a Summer Associate VISTA member who coordinated a public Community Garden Festival in Knoxville, TN and organized projects and trainings for the SMC Residential Leadership Corps.

The crew was able to work in some incredible places completing a myriad of meaningful service projects; trail work the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, bald management and habitat restoration in Pisgah National Forest, and the Community Garden Festival at the Center for Urban Agriculture in Knoxville.

In 2015, SMC members performed 10,133 hours of service, improving over 22 miles of trail and managing over 30 acres for habitat improvement.  Members removed 27.5 acres of invasive species, cleared and planted 3000+ sq feet of gardens and assisted local community farms in projects for 100 hours.  At the Community Garden Festival at the Center for Urban Agriculture, Members led 8 free public workshops and activities for over 120 people.  In addition to all this service, SMC members received 20+ trainings in everything from trail construction, leadership development, and wilderness medicine to gardening, food preservation, and taking care of chickens.

Please see our annual report for a full overview of the 2015 season.

Indeed, it was a busy year.  And now it is time to start all over again! We are extremely excited to announce that this year, SMC will be working under fiscal sponsorship of the Student Conservation Association, the organization that gave us our introduction to the conservation world, to run our second season of corps programming. As members ourselves of SCA’s esteemed New Hampshire Corps program way back in 2011, we began dreaming of one day building our own program down here in the beautiful Southeast.  Now, with the support and guidance from SCA, Smoky Mountain Corps will have the opportunity to continue providing meaningful opportunities for young adults in the Southeast.

Please stay tuned for more updates and hiring announcements coming shortly!

Please consider making a donation Smoky Mountain Corps.  100% of contributions will be used to support and grow programs.

Gratitude: A List

By: Maddie Privott

We have been at this trail workin’ and community livin’ for nearly 3 months. Although we still have hard work ahead of us, the end is coming into view and I find myself having frequent moments of gratitude that have given me pause. In an effort to give others a glimpse into this experience and to articulate gratitude for our time here together, I want to list some of what I know I will miss as I recall my summer as an SMC crewmember. What words I find will undoubtedly be incomplete, but here are a few of the bits and the pieces:

1. Having a place at the table. Since leaving home for college time spent sharing a meal at a communal table has become a rarity. On hitch, “the table” might mean the crew perched on logs encircling a fire, or huddled beneath our kitchen tarp to escape the rain. Whether on hitch, or at the homestead, there is a warmth and magic to enjoying a meal with others whom you are in community with.

2. Eating our labors. If I let myself go, this whole list could center around the food we eat. I will simply say, vegetables taste better when they’re fresh from the garden.

3. Every meal ever prepared by the hands of Heather and/or Molly. Okay, okay I’m done.

4. Community meetings. They provide a space for direct communication, debriefing, thought provoking discussion, silly games, learning, and excessive coffee consumption.

5. Onsite projects. These have ranged from “Pickle It! 2015”, to constructing a cob oven, to planting veggies, and inoculating mushrooms. There have been myriad opportunities to learn skills and collaborate on projects.

6. The peculiar conversations we have on hitch. After you’ve been outside for days with a group of folks with little for entertainment but the company of one another, you may find that the conversation topics begin to depart from the norm. You reach down deep into the recesses of your mind and find the weird stuff. Hitch is a unique context in which to get to know someone. It accelerates the process of reciprocity and openness.

7. Remembering how to laugh like a little kid. See #1, #6, and #10.

8. The mountains and woods. I would be remiss not to mention how special it is to go to sleep to an insect choir singing to the constant exhale of a river, and then to wake up and go outside and simultaneously go to work.

9. The SMC team. Becki, Eliza, Heather, Jon, Michael, Molly, Natalie, Sean, Tuck, and Vincent are people I am thankful to have spent this summer living among. The work we do requires a good measure of grit, and jumping into a residential program with strangers requires a good measure of flexibility and graciousness. Each of these folks have demonstrated all three, and much more.

10. The whole crew singing/yelling Annie’s “Tomorrow” in unison the final night on hitch. This ritual started on the first hitch and has continued throughout the summer. In my opinion, we would all be capable of playing ourselves in a production chronicling the SMC pilot program. But I digress.

-Maddie

SMC goes to Whippoorwill Earth Skills Festival

By: Michael Mason

This past month, Smoky Mountain Center visited the fourth annual Whippoorwill earth skills Festival in Berea, Kentucky. This served as a great opportunity for us to learn many new skills as well as to gain insight on how we may want to lead our own own workshops, which we are currently preparing for a public gardening festival at the end of the summer.

The festival offered over 75 workshops this year covering a variety of topics, and we could choose to attend whatever we were most interested in learning. To name a few there was meditation, hugelkultur gardening, worm composting, leatherwork, and a few field trips to local farms.

Leatherworking workshop where you could learn to make your own moccasins or a handbag.

Camping area where SMC members and staff stayed during the festival

We also volunteered in the kitchen during the event helping with food prep, serving, and dishes.

During this festival we learned many knew skills and brushed up on some others.  We also left with a much better idea in mind for how to lead our own workshops in our *Community Garden Festival taking place at the end of August!

-Michael

*Smoky Mountain Center’s Community Garden Festival takes place in Knoxville, Tennessee at the Center for Urban Agriculture on Saturday, August 29th from 12-4pm. This event offers FREE workshops presented by the Smoky Mountain Center of North Carolina including: Composting with Worms, Appalachian Seasonal Cooking, DIY Solar Oven for Kids, and Scraps to Gardens – Upcycling. Participate in a juicy watermelon eating contest to get a chance to win a $25 gift certificate to the Three Rivers Market Co-op! Enjoy food, music, kids crafts, take a tour of the beautiful gardens, and meet some of your local non-profits in the Knoxville area. This family friendly event will include various hands-on activities for children and adults of all ages. We cannot wait to see you at the Center for Urban Agriculture on August 29th!

SMC JamBerry

By: Becki Linhart

July is just around the corner, and we have already completed two 8-day hitches in the Pisgah National Forest.  We have accomplished a lot during those days working on trails and maintaining mountain balds.  As a group, we have learned a lot of new skills and knowledge.

 

However, the great thing about this residential program is that there is a lot more to it than just the work we do during those hitches.  I am amazed that I am able to learn just as much on my days off at the site than I do at work.  Our place here in Burnsville is a living situation that is very different than what a lot of us are used to.   During the past several weeks at the Smoky Mountain Center,  the seven of us corps members have been making ourselves at home at the facility and are constantly learning what it means to live in a sustainably and healthy way, and as a member of a community.

During our five days off, when we aren’t swimming in the pond, practicing our ukulele skills, or exploring the local area, we participate in projects for the facility.  In community meetings, which take place the day after we come back from each hitch, we all discuss these projects that we wish to complete as a group during these off days.  A lot of these things that we have discussed, such as rainwater catchment systems and canning, are great things for us all to learn so that we can apply them to our futures as conservation leaders and role models in our everyday lives or careers.  Other things, like painting the Bird’s Nest (our name for the girl’s cabin due to the avian visitors that it often gets) and the outhouse, are projects that just allow us to contribute to making the homestead a better and friendlier place.

This past break, we teamed up to make some homemade jam that we then canned for later use.  This made for a a fun Sunday afternoon in which we spread out around the property to gather as many blackberries, raspberries, and mulberries as possible.  In just a short period of time, we were able to get a total of 18 cups of berries.  We then proceeded to add the sugar and cook up the berry mixture, and then canned our end result.  Of course, we put aside some for us to enjoy right away with some toast.  Not only was this a fun day spent with good people and plenty of jam puns, but I learned a few valuable things and was excited to make something delicious from the food that is available here on the property.

Forming

By: Natalie Woodcock

As my old Volvo chugs it’s way up the steep, windy road of US-226, I begin to think back to my first year of college and the flurry of uncertainties that accompanied the transition. After acquiring the most expensive piece of paper of my life, I made the decision to join the pilot crew of the Smoky Mountain Center and experience these uncertainties all over again. I had learned all about conservation corps through my Outdoor Recreation degree at Indiana University (the CCC was likely mentioned at least once a week), but I could never realistically imagine what the experience of being a corps member would bring. I had built a vibrant, friendly, inspiring community at IU, and I was leaving it all to start from scratch in Western North Carolina.

A month after making it up the windy roads and settling into my small cabin at the Smoky Mountain Center, it has already become clear to me the ways in which people can constantly surprise you. Because the Smoky Mountain Center is a residential program, relationships seem to form ten times faster than normal. Living and working in the backcountry for 8 days at a time and then returning to the homestead to continue to share the realities of living together uncovers many joys as well as challenges. An extra dose of communication and openness is required in community living. I have learned that issues that go unaddressed will not simply “blow over”…you may be able to avoid confrontation for a small period of time, but conflict will inevitably arise.

Nonetheless, there is something rich and satisfying about working alongside the people you live with. Sharing experiences of struggle, exhaustion, success, and accomplishment peels back the layers of a person’s personality that too often remains closed. During my time studying Recreation, the psychology of group dynamics was often a topic of discussion. The phrase from Bruce Tuckman’s stages of group development, “Forming, Storming, Norming, and Performing”, was another common discussion topic within my field along with the CCC. The catchy rhyme rings in my head whenever I encounter a group experience. Storming is often the most sensational and overly discussed phase within group development, however Forming is often overlooked. The phenomena of strangers meeting and developing relationships is too often lost amidst the chaos of beginnings. These moments however, are when humans have the opportunity to exhibit a quality lacking in our culture: vulnerability.

In a society obsessed with being in control, the ability to be vulnerable has become a lost art. We all want to appear to have our lives figured out when the reality is (excuse the cliche) life is unpredictable. Living with complete strangers has the potential to be one of the most unpredictable experiences out there, but add on living with strangers in the woods and you’ve just conjured up a control freak’s worst nightmare. The illusion of control is removed by both literal and figurative forces of nature. You are forced to be vulnerable. Really amazing things can happen during the Forming stage of group development if people are open to vulnerability. Although it can be terrifying, vulnerability is the lens into who we are as a human being. It allows us to experience defeat, loss, hurt, and grief and discover that it is possible to overcome these feelings.

My first month with the Smoky Mountain Center has presented me with a plethora of opportunities to be vulnerable. I feel lucky to be surrounded by people willing to be open and risk being vulnerable to form relationships. I’m looking forward to what the rest of my time with a conservation corps will bring.

-Natalie

Planting season is underway here at Smoky Mountain Center. Each month we have a plethora of seeds to plant. Some seeds can be started right in the garden- outside in the elements. However, to extend the season and protect delicate seeds, many should be started indoors in a controlled environment.

First things first, we had to bring our greenhouse back from the dead.

To start seeds in a greenhouse, you need to plant in potting soil…

Unfortunately, potting soil is expensive and not exactly what you would call sustainable. Potting soil that you buy at the store is generally some combination of peat moss, perlite and vermiculite, all of which need to be mined, processed, packaged, and shipped long distances to get to your garden. Peat moss, for instance, is found in wetland bogs in Canada or Michigan. Peat bogs are rare ecosystems that are home to many endangered species of wildlife and native plants, many of which live only in peat bogs. Additionally, mass mining of peat bogs for horticultural purposes contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. Similar stories exist for both Perlite and Vermiculite extraction.

With all this in mind already, I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the idea of paying $8 for just one 16 quart bag of potting soil (up to $20 a bag for organic). We need A LOT of potting soil and this would break the bank pretty quickly. Luckily, it so happens that there is another way. It is not only possible, but pretty dang easy to make your own potting soil with just a few ingredients you have lying around your yards. Below is a quick guide to making your own potting soil, for those of you who, like me, would prefer not to unnecessarily spend big bucks on the store bought stuff.

How to make your own potting soil:

Ingredients/materials:

Finished compost/aged manure

Plan old soil

Sand (if available)

Glass baking pans

Tin Foil

Meat or candy thermometer

1. Gather materials. In my work area, I put out a bucket of compost, a bucket of aged manure (ours was left on the property from previous owners, but you can easily find manure on from farmers in your area, on craigslist, even at a local zoo), a bucket of soil, and a bucket of sand. You do not need all of these things if you don’t have them. Soil and some garden compost should work just fine if that is what you have.

2. Preheat oven to 200 degrees

3. Fill each baking pan with a combination of ingredients. I went about ½ soil, ¼ compost, ¼ manure, and a handful or two of sand.

4. Sprinkle a couple of drops of water on the soil to make it slightly moist (but not wet)

5. Cover each pan tightly with foil, stick a meat/candy thermometer in one of the pans and place all of the pans you can fit in preheated oven.

6. After 20 min or so begin checking on the soil. Once the temperature of the thermometer reads 150 degrees turn the oven off but leave the soil in for about 30 min more. If the temperature of the soil goes above 180 degrees at any point, remove from the oven. What you are doing in this process is sterilizing the soil to kill off any bacteria, etc. that could hurt your tiny plants. If the soil gets too hot, however, it could kill off good things too. You will know if it got too hot because it will smell very strongly. In general, it should fill your kitchen with an earthy smell, but nothing too potent.

7. Let cool and place in bucket/bin/holding container.

8. Get Planting

Next Blog: Planting Outside!

Spring has (sort of) sprung here at Smoky Mountain Center!

The snow has melted, the birds are singing, and the buds are sprouting. After a long winter the Smoky Mountain Center’s facilities are undergoing a bit of spring cleaning to get ready for the Summer 2015 Residential Corps Program. Practically every square foot of our 11 acre homestead is being spruced up, scrubbed down, and polished. It is a huge undertaking, but a stroke of good weather has allowed us to get an early start on a ton of exciting projects.

First, as a work of curiosity as much as necessity, we took a crack at giving one of our yurts a little bit of love.

We call this yurt by a lot of names (the other yurt, the Septa-Yome, the corps member’s cabin, etc.), but from now on we’ll call it the Hexahome. The alliteration is great and it rolls of the tongue nicely. Unfortunately, upon closer inspection it was well in need of some freshening up!

A little information on our Yurt.

• The hexahome is the smaller of our two yurts. Here is an image of the other.
• They are made by a local Asheville company called Red Sky Shelters.
• The yurt design has been used for over 3000 years, originating from the steppes of Mongolia.
• This particular model is called a SeptaYome (Septa = Seven Sides, Yome = Yurt Home).
• Here is a schematic of the exact design.
• They are (when properly upkept) totally waterproof and insulated, making them excellent semi-permanent cabin-esque dwellings.
• The hexahome has electricity and even Wifi!

  

At first, we believed the hexahome only needed a deep clean and a few minor repairs. That is, until we peeled back the interior roof canvas (bottom layer) as well as the insulated space-blanket roofing material (middle layer) and noticed the poly-carbonate exterior roofing material (outer layer) had a massive 8 foot long tear down the length of it.

A simple patch was not going to hold a tear this big. Drastic measures needed to be taken.

Roof Patching Steps:

1. Remove the interior roof canvas and insulating strips to expose the polycarbonate roof.
2. Unfasten the exterior roofing material from the yurt structure.
3. Peel the roofing material to the crest and reach over to unscrew the vent-dome from wooden circle.
4. Remove the roofing material and spread it out on the ground for easy access.
5. Clean and dry material adjacent to the tear with damp, soapy rag.
6. Tape ripped edges together using large amounts of Waterproofing Repair Tape.
7. Cut polycarbonate strip (acquired from Red Sky Shelters) to custom size to completely cover tear in roofing material- approximately 8′ by 1′.
8. Sew patch onto the out-facing side with sinew and a heavy-duty curved needle.
9. Repeat steps 1-4 in reverse order.

Another issue we ran into was how to clean the exterior canvas sidewalls which were in decent shape, but extremely dirty. Since it is located at the top of a small valley, the hexahome takes quite a beating from the elements. On the sides which received the most light (south-facing) the canvas was very dusty and some lichen had grown in some spots. On the sides which received the least direct sunlight (north-facing) the canvas was muddy and had algae growing on certain portions. We had to develop our own method for giving the canvas a deep clean without removing the material from the structure (it is fastened with at least 100 screws).

Cleaning Yurt Canvas:

1. Scrape off lichen and excess dirt with a soft-bristle cleaning brush.
2. Wet the canvas with a hose (we used a backpack garden sprayer) and scrub down with the brush to remove as much of the grim as possible. This is tedious and can be strenuous depending on the amount of dirt. It may seem like you are simply spreading the dirt around and making the stain worse- this is okay, there is a method for removing it.
3. Wet the canvas down again without scrubbing until the water runs clear.
4. Mix up a gallon of Mold and Mildew Stain Remover for canvas. Red Sky Shelters also makes a brand of this stuff called “Fab-Clean”

   

5. Scrub down the canvas with the mixture and allow it to sit overnight. Be sure to cover every inch of the canvas with a little of the mixture; it literally “eats” away the stains at a microbiotic level.
6. The next day, scrub down the canvas once again with water mixed with a little vinegar.
7. Let it sit for about 15 minutes, then spray with plain water until it runs clear.
8. Allow the canvas to dry. You will be amazed how much cleaner it is!

Lastly, once the majority of our cleaning and repairs were complete, it was time to install a floor into the hexahome. Yurts are built on custom foundations that resemble decks. The foundation is equipped with a vapor barrier which helps with insulation. Flooring can be any variety found in a home.

For the hexahome, we were going for economical comfort, therefore, we settled on carpet flooring. The cheapest carpet you can buy in stores is about $0.41 a square foot. After debating in a Home Depot for the better part of an hour, we decided to forgo the store-bought carpet and look for “carpet scraps”. Carpet scraps are the ends of the long rolls they sell in stores or other custom pieces that are marked down from original retail price and are excellent for Do-It-Yourselfers. We checked craigslist for a few days and found the perfect piece, a 16’x12′ roll of high-quality carpet. The Hexahome is 16′ at its widest point and approximately 200′ square total. This roll was 192′ square and the exact length of the Hexahome’s widest point (16′), making it nearly perfect for the job.

However, I soon learned installing a rectangular carpet into a 7-sided room was not the most straight-forward task, especially when your material is very, very limited (in fact, 8′ square less than needed).

Installing Carpet Flooring (and landing) in a Yurt:

1. Remove everything from the yurt.
2. Clean the floor extensively, all dirt left on the floor will remain there forever.
3. Cut carpet pad to size with a utility knife and fasten the underside to the floor along edges with a small amount of doubled-sided carpet tape.
4. Align the long side of the carpet parallel to the door, leaving the space closest to the door without carpet to allow for a landing.
5. Bring the carpet into the yurt and lay it on the floor as it will rest. Using a pencil, draw an approximate line of the cuts adding 2-3 inches to be safe.
6. Cut the excess flaps of carpet to align with the shape of the floor.
7. The carpet should be a few inches too large all the way around. Carefully trim the excess until the carpet fits perfectly.
8. Take the largest sections of trimmed carpet and cut them to fit into the corners by the door, allowing for as much of a landing as desired.
9. Put double-sided carpet tape along the edges of the topside of the carpet pad.
10. Place the carpet onto the tape making sure the carpet aligns with walls correctly and walk on the edges so the tape adheres to the underside of the carpet.
11. If desired, nail along the perimeter every 2-4 feet about two inches from the end of the carpet.
12. To install vinyl flooring as a landing, remove carpet pad in that area.
13. Cut particle board or plywood to fit beneath vinyl flooring. This creates a smooth surface for the flooring to adhere to and minimizes the level between the landing and the carpet.
14. Cut vinyl planks to size to fit into landing shape.
15. Install planks in the method described by the manufacturer. Some planks use adhesive, others are inter-locking

Now our restoration in complete!

The hexahome is ready for the season. Are you?

Yurt Floor Before

Yurt Floor After