A Cloud Palace Vacation

Filling The Gaps.....

Do you even Remember the Cloud Palace, Dear Readers? Well, last week I mentioned that I had worked on so many projects over my Vacation, that one Post was too short to show all of them to you. Well, one of those projects was the Cloud Palace upstairs doorway. You may recall that in order to add the Tower which houses the Kitchen, Library and Bedroom, to the main building of the Palace, I needed to cut a hole in the roof of the original "Buttercup" kit. It was easy enough to cut the hole where I wanted to have a connecting door to the Library in the Tower and the outer stairs which spiral up the outside of the Tower. It was another thing altogether to construct the doorway in that corner hole in the roof! Of course I couldn't quickly find any pictures with just the hole in the ceiling... so we have to make do with shots that show the beginnings of the door frame construction already under way.

I apologize for the dark picture... 

it was night and I was trying to figure out where to start 

the construction of this complicated corner addition!

I have made a wall that rises above the roof on the outside, 

and descends below the roof on the inside.

And started to make a frame for the inner doorway, 

all of which you can sort of see above.

And then I constructed the outer door-frame, 

which was going to need to have the actual door attached to it, 

so it needed to be sturdily connected, 

because I like my doors to actually open and close with hinges!

And every step required cutting and fitting 

and taping together and then testing for fit

and all the pieces falling down over and over again, 

because you don't want to glue any of it until you are sure it fits!

So it was slow progress.

In case you have forgotten, 

here below is a shot of how the Tower is situated 

in relation to the main part of the Palace.

The Tower is "notched" against the corner of the Palace,

and the stairs circle around to an entrance onto the upstairs at the corner.

Which you can see here with the beginnings 

of the wall and door frame under construction.

I had to make sure the door frame matched the edge of the Tower wall...

Here is a closer view of the "notched" placement of 

the Tower against the corner of the Main Palace.

And you can see the tight spacing of the roof-line 

under the Tower Bedroom floor.

And of course, Blue the Blue Fairy Beary 

had to come inspect the progress!

Each piece that was fitted needed to be painted too... 

because the interior was already painted.... 

and we needed to be sure the parts would all match...

And it would have been much harder to paint them 

once all the pieces were glued in place.

So I had to be very slow and patient, 

and while the paint was drying I worked on other projects!

(Which I will have to post about another time!)

Here you can see I am constructing the door....

attached to the front frame before it was glued in place.

And here you can see a view of the front of the Palace 

with the new door attached 

and me testing the roof-line fit against the Tower.

And here you can see I am fitting the pieces 

for the gabled side of the dormer addition....

It was necessary to make the roof peaked over the door 

or the entrance to the Library would be too low!

You have no idea, Dear Readers, 

how often the roof pieces slid off onto the floor!

There was no standard pattern to guide me here....

I was just making it up as I went!

And I spent days and Days working at it!!

Here you can see I added a ridgepole to support the dormer roof peak.

Here is a closer view of the side door to the Library,

This one is just open with no door.

Here you can see how it abuts the Library section of the Tower.

Here is the view from the inside looking into the Library.

The door to the outside stairs is closed.

And here you see the door from the outside 

as you approach at the top of the stairs...

And with the door open!

Come on in!

(These are the only stairs to the upper floor in the Palace main rooms.)

Another view of this completed little entryway at the Corner

without the Tower in place...

You can see I have also added the decorative trim to the roof ridges.

And I even added the Top Floor to the Tower....

The Lookout or the Star Gazer's Terrace!

Wow! It is Way up there!

But Blue doesn't mind.....

She rather likes the view from up at the top!

From here she can quickly spot any Visitors 

that might be arriving!

So you can see, Dear Readers, 

how I spent at least a Part of my Vacation...

Filling in the Gaps in the Cloud Palace!