A Milestone

The oven is still not quite finished yet, it still needs insulation and a roof, but today was the day we fired it for real. I'm getting good at splitting wood with the axe, and Anne is now a veteran firestarter, and we got the thing up and roaring in no time: first a small "starter" fire in the morning, then a bigger one, the first real one, this afternoon. Apart from one mishap -- the chimney flue cracked under the thermal load of the big fire, but apparently that's common and not a big deal -- things went swimmingly, and we now have bread baking in the oven!!

Seven loaves, to be exact, as well as two potatoes and two sweet potatoes roasting in the ash bucket, and we'll also probably make a couple of pizzas before the evening's over.

There are a number of bugs to be worked out of the system, and more infrastructure we need to put in place (plus the roof, hardware for which we bought today), but we now have a fully functional oven in the backyard.