We Failed At Almost Everything Today | Korean Farm Hugelkultur & DIY Hot Tub

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:00]We are back at the farm. We missed two weekends here cuz Justin was away on a work trip. He was sailing. Wish I was making that up, but no, he sailed from Busan to Palao for for work. The plan today is to fill our raised beds using the huggle culture method. So, we'll get into that in the video, but we have those um namu that we cut down last last weekend at this point. So, we'll be using those. We have a person tree that needs planting and a fun little side project of a DIY hot tub in the backyard. This is Odo. Let's get to work.

[00:00:38]>> Update. We've been gone for the past week and a half or something cuz Justin was off on a shoot sailing. But the flowers that we planted are starting to come in. You can see tiny little things coming up here which is super cute.

[00:00:51]>> Mom, come here.

[00:00:52]>> And look at this. Come here, mom.

[00:00:56]>> Our clovers are also starting to grow [screaming] >> there, >> which is also pretty cute. Lee, you come here. Oh, I do also want to show you this thing. I think a couple weeks ago, I transplanted the strawberries from our road into this raised bed, thinking that it probably wasn't going to work. Nature has its way, >> but we should probably plant more.

[00:01:17]>> Wait, let's also show the cherry tree.

[00:01:19]>> Oh, >> this is a big deal for me, actually. Our blueberry bushes have also survived the winter.

[00:01:26]>> Looks like this part's dead.

[00:01:28]>> So, when we first bought this place, I definitely got a little bit overzealous and planted a bunch of trees and I planted a cherry tree over here that I thought pretty sure it died.

[00:01:41]>> Well, look at this. We have our very own cherry blossom.

[00:01:46]>> That's awesome.

[00:01:48]>> That's pretty exciting. And two. I think too.

[00:01:51]>> You can do it, little tree.

[00:01:53]>> Another guy.

[00:01:54]>> Mom, I can too.

[00:01:55]>> But these trees are look like they're actually dying now. I don't know what to do.

[00:02:03]Pretty sure that's dying. Dead.

[00:02:05]Basically dead. But we'll just wait and hope. But if you compare it to like that one over there, soil and water, this one looks alive still. All right.

[00:02:15]So >> Justin was gone for about 10 days. I got sick and we got lazy. So we bought our dirt online.

[00:02:25]>> We didn't measure our beds, but we just bought 10 for now. So that's 500 L of soil. And this soil is nice cuz it doesn't have it's not from any random place. They make the soil. There's no seeds in it. Doesn't matter. That's not why we bought it, but it's an interesting fact.

[00:02:45]I mean, maybe like you've also used it on the rooftop.

[00:02:49]>> Yeah, this is a soil I buy for the rooftop cuz we can't get it delivered.

[00:02:52]Probably would have been cheaper, but we basically spent 10 time like 90 bucks for 500 L.

[00:03:00]>> What do we have to do first?

[00:03:01]>> From what I've read online, when you do the hug culture method, you got to line the bottom of your raised beds with cardboard. So, I guess we'll break down boxes, do that, and then I think the next level is like sticks and wood that supposed to rot at the bottom to give nutrients back to the soil. You layer that with compost.

[00:03:21]>> Also, I think the wood holds water better.

[00:03:23]>> Yeah. And also takes up space in the raised bed.

[00:03:25]>> Yeah.

[00:03:26]>> And then you layer that with compost and put dirt on top of that. So, that's the plan.

[00:03:29]>> And we'll just use our compost, right?

[00:03:32]>> Yeah. I don't I don't think we did buy compost. We've had a compost. That was one of our first projects actually.

[00:03:36]Justin built a compost corral last right before winter.

[00:03:39]>> The video is pretty bad, but you [laughter] can watch it if you want.

[00:03:43]>> I mean, the pile has shrunk a ton.

[00:03:46]>> Yeah, it's wild, actually.

[00:03:48]>> That's all the food we didn't eat. And a bunch of grass and a bunch of leaves.

[00:03:52]>> So, I don't know. I actually don't even know if we have enough.

[00:03:54]>> We also have a little personal update.

[00:03:57]I don't know what's I mean, this will be out before the thing's done. But the Cohen's book she wrote got what was it?

[00:04:03]Selected on K.

[00:04:04]>> Selected. It got selected as a Kickstarter project. We love.

[00:04:08]>> Pretty cool. Congratulations.

[00:04:10]>> We have till the end of May to raise funds. So, if you're interested in a book about kimchi and farts, it's a children's book.

[00:04:16]>> Yeah, >> we should definitely think about supporting. Yes, excellence is a habit.

[00:04:21]>> It [laughter] is. Well, also practice and experience and all that doesn't happen overnight, that's for sure. Also, side note, it's sunny now.

[00:04:30]So, put sun lotion on. Koreans, they have these arm things you can put on, which are kind of nice. So, if you're wearing t-shirts, you can still cover and protect your arms from the sun.

[00:04:41]Anyways, first things first, got to unpack all this dirt and boxes and take the tape off so we can put them in the Actually, before we do that, I bought a tree. So, we're going to plant the tree first. It's a pimmon tree. Pimmens are like some of the easiest fruit trees to grow. Thankfully, that cherry tree is going, but I want more fruit trees. So, we're going to plant another one.

[00:05:02]The fun thing about spring is that everything is coming back to life, including things like ladybugs.

[00:05:09]Actually, I don't know if it's going to focus on there, but look at that. How fun is that?

[00:05:14]>> We got instructions on how to plant a tree.

[00:05:29]>> Yeah.

[00:05:33]All right, time to break down all these boxes.

[00:05:42]>> That one.

[00:05:50]>> I guess the point of this [laughter] method is to try to mimic a forest floor. At least based on what I've seen.

[00:05:57]We have those prickly caster trees that we cut down last week that I think we're going to put down next after the cardboard. So, in regards to it being poisonous, I guess the confusion comes from a name mixup. People often think that or you hear caster and you think it's talking about c the caster bean plant which is which does contain toxins. This is um Namu, which is the I don't know if this is pronounced right, but Calopanax September September is what it's called.

[00:06:32]A thorn in my boot earlier that got stuck in my finger.

[00:06:36]>> Will wants to push it. So, we're just going to do a little load.

[00:06:44]>> Huh? Mommy.

[00:06:45]>> Yeah. I'm going to Let's go.

[00:06:48]>> Dad, it's kind of heavy.

[00:06:50]>> Is it? Are you doing a good job?

[00:06:51]>> Yeah, buddy.

[00:06:55]>> Thank you.

[00:06:55]>> Moving, huh?

[00:06:56]>> Huh?

[00:06:56]>> You said it's kind of easier once you start moving, huh?

[00:06:59]>> Yeah.

[00:07:01]>> Yeah. A little bit more.

[00:07:10]>> Yeah.

[00:07:11]>> Okay.

[00:07:12]>> After we're done with this, right?

[00:07:13]>> Yeah. Once this tree is done, we can go to the store and take a break. Okay.

[00:07:17]>> I got to buy mommy some more scissors.

[00:07:19]Yeah. And you guys need snacks.

[00:07:24]>> All right, break time's over. We're back.

[00:07:27]>> There was some concern in our comment section about using the um namu because I had translated it to prickly castor oil trees. The official name for them are the calopan septumlabus. Maybe not to be confused with the caster bean plant which does contain toxins. So, we're not too bothered about that. But as some other folks mentioned, we will have to deal with the thorns for years to come, which I think we can mitigate by wearing gloves, which maybe you should do when you're gardening. Anyway, >> we just bought these these new shears.

[00:07:52]They are cut through anything.

[00:07:55]>> Watch this.

[00:07:57]>> That's a small one.

[00:08:00]>> The only other cause of concern is that we didn't let them dry out long enough and that the thorns can cause air bubbles in your raised beds. I think we're just going to have to cross our fingers and hope for the best here because I'm not sure where else we would have gotten this much wood for free.

[00:08:11]>> How you feeling about all this so far?

[00:08:13]>> I am so curious what's going to happen.

[00:08:16]Feel like this turned out better than I thought.

[00:08:22]>> Yeah, I'm glad we ended up just bringing them over and cut them here.

[00:08:25]>> Well, I'm also glad that we didn't have to like get wood from elsewhere. I guess we could have tried to find wood in the forest if maybe they needed it. I feel like we had just enough. I mean, thankfully the beds are kind of shallow.

[00:08:37]>> Yeah. All right. [sighs] >> Next time, how do you feel?

[00:08:41]>> M feel like everything's dry right now.

[00:08:44]Really dry, which makes me a little concerned, but I know it's going to get humid later and wet. So, I mean, it's going to rain a ton this summer.

[00:08:54]Little sad that the trees, some of them look like they died, >> but I think that's just part of the process, unfortunately.

[00:09:01]>> I mean, some of our trees came alive, though. Yeah, >> blueberry bush in our cherry tree.

[00:09:06]>> I have a big hope that they'll some of them will come back alive, too. All right, compost. Should we put a wheelbarrow or >> I feel like wheelbarrow could make sense, but it's going to be stinky.

[00:09:18]>> Let's go take a look.

[00:09:20]>> We did also see a comment from someone though that prickly castor oil trees are good for nitrogen, which soils and plants need. So, there's that.

[00:09:46]Stinky.

[00:09:51]>> If you can imagine like the smell of an outhouse mixed with a little bit of like a sour stench. That's what this smells like.

[00:10:03]>> Maybe I should exhausting. I feel like it's hot. It's harder, too, cuz it's so hot out.

[00:10:13]>> It's the weather. I feel like if it was cool, it wouldn't be as tiring.

[00:10:17]>> So, so far we've What have we done? Cut up the trees.

[00:10:22]>> We have our cardboard and branches layer down. We're working on the compost, but I think we're going to run out of compost.

[00:10:30]>> Yeah, I guess let's just do as much as we can. I don't Maybe it's not even enough dirt to be honest.

[00:10:36]>> Dirt.

[00:10:37]>> Yeah, we might need more dirt.

[00:10:45]>> I think if the point is to look like the bottom of a forest floor, this might be what it looks like.

[00:10:56]That's all our compost.

[00:10:58]>> Is that it?

[00:10:59]>> Yeah.

[00:11:00]>> We're missing that last bin.

[00:11:01]>> The last bin. We got that bin filled.

[00:11:07]This raised bed filled. More kind of not really. Last one's empty. We couldn't just not enough compost. But we got we came here last year in the summer. Didn't really start composting until a couple months in. We realized, oh, we can take our food here. probably saved about $6 not paying to throw our food away. And now it's going to feed us again >> and turn into more compost.

[00:11:30]>> Yeah. Circle of life, baby. We got a lot of leaves. A lot of leaves in there from fall. But there's also a lot of food.

[00:11:41]All right. Which one do you want to do first? This one?

[00:11:43]>> Start here.

[00:11:46]>> All right. So, we didn't actually do any math before ordering the soil. Come to think of it, I'm not even sure we know how big our raised beds are. But as I mentioned, one of us was away on a work trip, meaning the other was solo parenting. And I also got sick. By the time Justin got back from his trip, we had two days to plan and prep for the weekend at the farm. We ended up buying some dirt online. And as you can see, it wasn't nearly enough. We'll need to source more dirt elsewhere, hopefully for cheaper, because we need to fill these beds in order to be able to plant anything in them. I think we're also just going to have to guesstimate a little bit. Based on how much dirt it's taken so far, we're estimating that we'll probably need at least 10 for the two rectangular raised beds and then and 20 maybe 30 for the U-shaped bed in the middle.

[00:12:25]>> All right, a little bit of a failure on our part. I think we just were like, what's the easiest way to get it? But we can't buy more dirt like this. Too expensive. So, we got to get a truck to deliver soil dirt. Fill dirt. Not masato, though.

[00:12:38]>> All right, I got to help Lee. Co's going to keep >> watering.

[00:12:44]Okay.

[00:12:46]>> All right. We're just going to water the rest of these and then reevaluate figure we're what next steps are.

[00:12:57]>> So, a couple months ago, I bought this I don't know what it's called. Hot coil kind of thing that you can use to make a hot tub. So, basically, you put a fire in the middle here.

[00:13:08]>> What?

[00:13:09]>> I'm going to try and make a hot tub.

[00:13:12]Where?

[00:13:13]>> In our pool.

[00:13:14]>> The hotel pool.

[00:13:16]>> Yeah.

[00:13:17]>> But that I was like, what is this?

[00:13:21]>> That's how it sucks the water. It cool.

[00:13:23]>> Let me try.

[00:13:24]>> So yeah, basically I bought this thing.

[00:13:25]You put a fire in the middle.

[00:13:27]>> Fire.

[00:13:27]>> Yeah. It takes cold water from the pool and then the fire heats it up as it goes through here. And the hot because it's hot water, >> the hot water rises.

[00:13:39]>> Be careful with that. Make sure you don't get cut.

[00:13:42]>> Yeah, >> Dad.

[00:13:44]>> Yeah.

[00:13:45]>> Come.

[00:13:52]>> This is working better than I thought it would, but let's still got to wait and see if it actually works.

[00:13:56]>> Better than I thought it would.

[00:13:58]>> Yeah. All right, guys. Let's come back in 20 minutes and see if it works. Okay.

[00:14:02]All right. We do want to get a more permanent kind of pool set up at some point, but this will do for now. So, it's hot out, but not hot enough to swim in cold water. So, we're going to see if it works with this pool here. It's stainless steel, so hopefully you can stay out here.

[00:14:20]>> Maybe we'll cover it. Oh, and we got a little magician over here. But we're going to come back in 20 minutes. See, then start the fire. See how it's going.

[00:14:29]Okay. So, actually, I have a feeling I can start it now.

[00:14:33]Let's see if that's possible.

[00:14:41]All right, we can start a fire.

[00:14:54]>> What happened, Mar?

[00:14:59]I'm just going to let it fill up a little bit more and then let it do its let it do its thing. It's above the line.

[00:15:10]So that means we're turning this off.

[00:15:16]Opening this up. Oh, I feel hot water coming out.

[00:15:21]It's working. Oh yeah, baby. We're in business. had a it's a little bit different video this time because we didn't get too much farm work done but a little bit of farm work.

[00:15:32]>> It feels reminiscent of our wintertime videos >> when there was no farm work to be done.

[00:15:37]I feel like it was a lot of side projects.

[00:15:39]>> How do you feel about the pool though?

[00:15:40]Are you impressed?

[00:15:42]>> I will be impressed if it works.

[00:15:44]>> It's already working. I just the the water that's coming out is hot.

[00:15:48]>> Is it piping hot?

[00:15:49]>> It's piping hot. That's cool. Actually, we've been looking for a solution to get hot water in the pool for like ever since we got here cuz it's I mean it's obviously hot during the day in the summers, but the water is ground water, so it's extremely cold. And we tried to hook up a hose from our bathroom, but our heater only has like four showers worth of hot water. And what was I feel like you got a heating coil at some point last year that totally did not work or like it shorted our >> Yeah, it shorted out.

[00:16:20]>> It flipped our breakers.

[00:16:22]>> So, >> I want snacks.

[00:16:24]>> If this works, this is going to be pretty awesome.

[00:16:27]>> All right, it's been about an hour. It is warmer, but it's taking a lot longer than we thought. So, we're not going to grill on here. We're still going to use this. Hopefully, an hour. We're just going to grill as we wait.

[00:16:42]I'm beginning to think this pool >> hot coil thing is a scam. I mean, it's hot. Yeah, the water's coming out.

[00:16:49]Otherwise, >> it's just a lot of water.

[00:16:52]>> It's too much water.

[00:16:53]>> And we need a tiny pool. I got to go trampoline, though.

[00:17:09]>> [crying] >> You hear everyone take our sweet time getting in this lukewarm water.

[00:17:25]>> Luke >> clearly this amount of water probably takes >> a full day to heat up.

[00:17:31]>> A full day to heat up. Yeah. But it's working. It's working. Anyways, >> we failed at many things today. Our raised beds are partially filled. We'll have to come back to that probably on Monday, thankfully. It's a long weekend, so we'll be back. Um, this hot tub is not a success, [laughter] but I feel like >> our expectations were different.

[00:17:51]>> Yeah. But yes, this is still the worst.

[00:17:54]Oh, the pimentary. That's the verdict is still out. I think we're going to have to wait a few months on that one. But yeah, we'll be back next week for more.

[00:18:02]>> That was fun.

[00:18:04]>> [laughter]