Inside Peter LaVaute's Howard county home is a story that took more than wood to build.

"For years, they hung tobacco on it to dry," said LaVaute.

It's not the antique tobacco pole fashioned into a handrail or the absent hallways, but what's inside that stands out.

"They're surprised this house looks so normal," said LaVaute.

And if these walls could talk, the first thing they would say is 'hey!'

"About 11 years ago, I read an article in the Sierra Club magazine about a straw bale building," said LaVaute.

Inside Peter's walls are bales of straw, about 250 of them.

"The straw isn't used to hold anything up. It's what they call infill."

Infill in this case is straw insulation held together with stucco.

"Then the stucco is sprayed on and it shoots in with such force that it goes into these interstitial spaces. In addition to coming out an inch or inch and a half. So it's an incredibly strong structure," said LaVaute.

The thickness of the walls in this straw bale home is about three times the width of a regular wall.

"The thickness of the wall is about 18 inches," said LaVaute.

"The walls are actually more fire resistant than wood frame walls because they have an inch to an inch and a half of concrete or stucco on the exterior and the interior which does not allow for oxygen to get in. "

In the seven years he and his wife have lived here, Peter's heard all the jokes about building a house made of straw. But perhaps we all need to be afraid of the big bad wolf when it comes to depleting the earth's resources.

"If we don't look at this as something that's essential to deal with then we're going to let our kids down," said LaVaute.

So for now in Howard county a house built of straw is no longer just a fairytale.

Peter tried to build a straw house in Columbia years ago but the city's codes wouldn't allow it, hence he tried in Howard County.