A Child-built Cordwood Clubhouse

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With that done, I was almost ready to turn Rohan and his friends loose. Before they could begin, though, a doorframe had to be built, plumbed, and anchored to the slab.

I chose old 2 X 6 planking for both the doorframe and the window frames (which were added later). The door opening is 16" wide and 54" high — child-size and in proportion to the building. The base of its frame was anchored to the slab by drilling 3/8"-diameter holes into the concrete with a masonry bit, and boring corresponding holes into the end grain of the bottom of the doorjambs; headless bolts served as anchoring pins. Next, I drove two stakes into the sand, each approximately 4 feet from the base of the doorposts, and joined these to the top of the frame with temporary diagonal bracings made of 1" lumber. Another 1" board was fastened, at a diagonal, to the top of and one side of the doorframe, assuring that the structure would remain plumb and square during construction.

A few days later, after school had closed for the afternoon, I carted a wheelbarrow load of our special mortar (see the accompanying sidebar) over to the clubhouse site, and Rohan and I began to work. The technique is easy to explain and almost as simple to perform!

To begin, I laid down a 1"-thick by 5"-wide layer of "mud," using the crayon marks as guides. Although a trowel may be employed for this job, it's faster and easier to do it by hand, using rubber gloves. Be sure to avoid handling the mortar with your bare hands, as doing so can cause nasty little "cement holes" in the skin, which are painful and slow to heal. This advice is particularly important for children! (Adults will likely find that heavy masonry gloves are best, although they take a while to get used to, while the smallest ladies' household gloves will provide a little one with an adequate, albeit loose, fit.)

Log-ends are set into the first course of mud with a gently vibrating motion. If pressed hard, they'll cause the mortar to crumble and ooze excessively. Split, hemispherical logends are good pieces to start with, since their flat sides correspond to the level mortar joint. The rest is easy! After a number of log-ends have been laid — perhaps the entire first course — a second course of mud is placed on the wall, following the hills and valleys defined by the shapes and sizes of the wood on the first course. After mudding, the builder simply surveys the space he or she wants to fill, takes a mental picture of the size and shape of log required, and looks to the nearby woodpile to find an appropriate piece. Practice speeds up the selection process, and with a little guidance in the beginning, even youngsters seem to pick up the knack quickly enough.

Ideally, when you're working on a building meant for habitation, it's good to surround each log-end with about 1 inch of mortar. This promotes strength and ease of pointing — or grouting — the mortar joint. Of course, we weren't very concerned about the quality of Littlewood's pointing or the consistency of its mortar joints. The idea was for the children to have fun and to end up with a sturdy little clubhouse. Still, we did show them how to do a rudimentary job of pointing mortar, both to improve the texture of the wall's surface and to fill any great gaping holes.

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