{can't,} it confirms. {spirit open door is only one thing.}

"Can you open it your usual way and then push on it until it opens farther?" And if not, is that because of weird action-permissions or because they're simply too small to exert the needed force, he wonders, but it would be rude to ask that out loud instead of trying to infer it from observation.

{can try!}

It tries.

It can sort of nudge the door open a little farther that way, but only with immense effort.

"Okay, thanks," he says the moment he's sure the door moved. "Looks like you can do it but the door is heavy." He checks whether the door can be switched repeatedly between "propped open" and "open but not quite that far" without closing it in between.

The spirit oofs a tiny oof made of forest noises and sits down on the ground.

The door cooperates with being switched in and out of the fully open state.

Okay, so checking whether the spirit can swap the door in and out of fully-open is a valid experiment to do when they're not so worn out. "Thanks for putting so much effort into that experiment! Do you want to take a break for a bit?" His own stomach rumbles. "And maybe eat something?"

{spirit not need food much. break maybe good though,} it admits. {science very tiring.}

Bruce does some quick mental math, realizes that what the spirit just did was the equivalent of him trying to open a a door fifty feet tall and proportionately wide and thick, and says, "Yeah, definitely time for a break. I'm going to go get some more apples." Unless the spirit has anything else to say, he heads out towards where he remembers an apple tree being yesterday.

The apple tree is right where he left it!

Score! He had been pretty sure of that, though still noticeably less confident than one usually is with trees. He breakfasts on coreless apples.

They're very tasty.

Did any new ones grow since the previous day? Bruce didn't see any immature ones yesterday, but he wouldn't be at all surprised if apples just popped into existence on tree branches when nobody was looking. 

Also, he notices that he's not craving protein the way he normally would if he had been eating nothing but fruit for a day. He wishes he had the equipment to draw some blood and investigate how these apples were interfacing with his biology. 

If he has been keeping close track of the number of apples on the tree he may notice that there are a couple more now, yes.

Spontaneous apples, yup, called it. Void, does he ever want a webcam so he can spy on this tree and learn all its spontaneous-apple-growing secrets. He eats a couple and brings one back for the forest spirit.

It's a small spirit and a big apple. The result is somewhat comical. The spirit seems to appreciate it, though.

"So, we've spent all of today so far doing what I wanted to do; what do you want to do?"

The spirit considers this question, swaying thoughtfully, and then toddles over to hug his leg.

Awwww but also oh no what do? Bruce pats the spirit awkwardly on the back.

It lets go of him and does a happy little bounce. {hugs are nice!}

"They are, aren't they?" This is not his usual opinion on spontaneous hugs, but it's hard to get introvert burnout when there are only two people around and it's even harder to feel threatened by a person with the size and temperament of a corgi.

"Hmm, what to do next? Maybe I'll build something."

{good plan!} the forest spirit says supportively. {build what?}

"Well, what can I build with the ingredients I've got?" He asks, more of his weird internal recipe-sense than the spirit. Maybe something that will help him get more ingredients. Can he make a shovel and get some dirt, or anything like that?

Shovels don't seem to be an available recipe with his current materials, but he does have that pickaxe, which is technically also a digging implement...

Sure, he can pop outside and try to get some dirt with the pickaxe! Not right next to his house, he doesn't want an inconveniently located pit. How about over there?

Bopping the dirt with the pickaxe a few times—a number of times that is wildly insufficient to actually dig up a significant amount of dirt—yields a cube-shaped hole in the ground with a wee little mini-cube of dirt in it, and if he gets close and reaches for the cube it leaps into his hand and now he is holding {1 dirt}. There don't seem to be a ton of handcrafted dirt recipes, although the recipe for Thick Wall seems to allow him to substitute dirt in for wood, if he'd like to build his walls in a different style.

He can repeat this operation as many times as he likes. If he goes near the crafting table, he'll discover that having both wood and dirt unlocks a new crafting table recipe requiring one of each.