Dirty Work...

Here we go with the desert...I drew an outline of where the house was going to be.  I changed the angle just a bit.  Picky. Picky. Picky.

I used part of the bag of sand that I got a couple of months ago at Walmart.  It worked like a charm.

Plain old Elmer's with a bit of water to thin it out and make it easy to brush on.(I have been known to put it in a spray bottle to cover a large area when there were no foundations involved.)

First I sanded down the top edges of the foundation with a block.  This stuff is soooo easy to sand.  It took a couple of minutes.

Then I Started on the edge. I used the old method that cake decorators use when they put nuts on the side of a cake.

Hold a paper plate full of nuts/sand under the edge of the cake/foundation and scoop up a handful of the sand and lay it against the edge of the foundation. What doesn't stick will fall back onto the plate for reuse.

When you get all the way around, start the flat part.  Paint glue on a 3 or 4 square inch section.

Sprinkle that with sand.

The easiest way I have found is one that I learned from watching hours of Navajo sand painting at the AZ State Fair, a long time ago.  Other kids were doing the rides and I was watching sand painting, pottery making and basket weaving...Perfectly normal for me....

They take a fist full of sand and let it run out of the bottom.  It takes a bit of practice, but the sand goes exactly where you want it to go, after a while.  The Navajos make the most beautiful designs with different colors of sand using this method.

After you have the base covered, let it dry a little and then tilt it on its side to let the excess roll off.  Do it on newspaper or outside... It's a messy process.

Then go back and check for bare spots.  There will be a few, no matter how careful you are.

Just dab a bit of white glue in the spot and sprinkle more sand.

There you have it....Instant(almost) desert.

April and Amare are coming over this morning to watch the garbage trucks.  Amare is crazy about any kind of dump trucks.  Our house is his favorite place to be on Tuesdays.

Anyway, I probably won't get to the greenery in the yard today...

I did dig out the makings of desert plants.  That's progress.

See you tomorrow.