More Treasures!

The Collection Grows.....

Yes, Dear Readers, if you have not already guessed, I am the lucky recipient of Tony's most recent creation, an Amazing Little casket of wood and carved antique ivory and an even more amazing Medieval Book that fits inside! Father Alban is the caretaker of this Gorgeous Treasure, and he is even more speechless than I am when faced with the Beauty and Perfection of this creation!

Here, let me show you a closer view.....

And here you can see inside.....

He even added an Elizabethan coin as part of the Treasure!

And all the pages of the Manuscript are printed and readable....

 if you know how to read Late Antiquity script!

It is illuminated in the Style of a Manuscript from the era of Charlemagne....

So even for my Castle folk, this is a venerable Text several hundreds of years old!

And the chest has a false bottom with a hidden compartment!

I will have to discover what Treasures belong in there!

The Lord of the Castle has left this Treasure with Father Alban 

because he hopes Father Alban can make a copy of this manuscript....!

(Or at least a copy of the text and an approximation of the illuminations.)

It would be a Monumental undertaking to copy the entire Book....

There are numerous intricate illuminations....

And Father Alban is afraid his eyesight is not as good as it used to be.

But he is prepared to begin making the parchments necessary for the pages...

Perhaps it is time he took on an assistant to train in the arts....

A Youngster who can help him to scrape the skins 

and grind the pigments and mix the inks.

The work would go faster that way....

and the sooner begun, the sooner done!

Ah, a Treasure this Beautiful must be carefully tended!

(Thank you Tony, it is Magnificent!)

As for Myself, Dear Readers, I have been 

wrestling with an entirely different kind of Painting!

To begin with, I added a whole lot more Egg Carton Rocks to the Guard Tower...

I really want to get the interior work finished on the upper part of the Tower!

And I constructed the ceiling beams for the top ceiling....

And then I added a whole lot of pink builder's foam 

to the outside of the Tower to make the "buttresses" 

which support that wonderful rooftop garden!

It took quite a bit of "engineering" to get the chunks of foam 

to fit on the corners correctly and taper the right way!

Eventually they will be covered with Egg Carton Rocks too!

And once I had added all the interior "rocks" it was time to start the painting....

And how many (?) coats of paint later.....

(I apologize for the horrid picture!)

The paint is just Not cooperating!

First the Primer, then the first layer of gray paint... 

then a darker layer to fill in all the "cracks" between the "rocks"

(This takes Forever!)

And then some pure black to fill all the tiny "holes" between the "rocks"

where the paint won't reach, but the eye can see the unpainted spot!

And then another layer of the lighter gray to highlight the rock textures....

Which made too much of the "rock" outlines disappear!

As you can see... it is not cooperating!

So it looks to me as though I will be painting

 Rocks and more Rocks for quite some time!

Maybe I will go join Father Alban, Dear Readers,

And Dream of painting magnificent Tiny Miniatures....

More Tiny Treasures.....

for my Growing Collection!

Cutting Corners.....

The Tower Stairs......

It was another one of those Busy Spring Weekends, Dear Readers, where the RL Garden was needing nearly all of my Time and energy, so Very Little was accomplished in my Mini Worlds. But in spite of all odds, I did make some real progress in the Guard Tower for the Cloud Palace! In the picture above, you can see the basic configuration of the Towers in relation to the Main Palace rooms, this time from the "Front" side of the Palace! The Guard Tower is going to be square and not as tall as the Spiral Tower. In theory this would make it easier to construct, but I am not sure it is working out that way! For one thing, it also needs to "notch" up against the corner of the Main Palace building. And for another, it is also requiring Stairs to the upper levels! If you have not already figured it out about me, I like my houses to have stairs to the upper floors! Even though the Fairy Bears can easily Fly up and down.... Visitors, like Peregrine, would need to use stairs! And Stairs almost Always use up a lot of Space! In the Guard Tower I am placing the first set of stairs in the interior of the Tower.... naturally this would make access a little more defensible

(If one really needed to worry about such things... 

but it is A Palace... so I am trying to be authentic!) 

as you can see here....

The entire Tower structure is going to be built from foam core 

with paper (Most likely egg carton) stones added to both sides. 

I am trying to keep the structure as light as possible... 

(it being a Palace in the Clouds... we want it to Float easily!)

The difficulty I was having was with the stairs upward 

from the next level to the Tower Roof.

If I placed them inside the Tower, 

it left almost no room for the Beds needed for the Guy Bears.

So I decided to make them go up the outside of the Tower from this floor on....

Here you can see the way the Tower "notches" against the Main Building.

The progress I made this weekend was that I finally Cut the Corner 

off the roof of the bay window so the Tower Front wall could be fit in!

(There is no turning back once the Corner is Cut!)

I also cut the floor of the Sleeping level,

Which I am calling the Barracks, Dear Readers,

(Otherwise know as the Bear Racks, 

because they will be bunk beds stacked three high!)

and you can see the floor here....

You can see what I mean about limited Space with the stairs coming up

and a door needed on the side to access the outer stairs to the Roof!

There will also be an interior wall along the side of the stairwell,

It defines the sleeping area and keeps the stairway safe.

And you can sort of see the beginnings of

 the exterior stairs through the door to the right....

And here you can see them from the "Front" side of the Tower.

I haven't made many steps yet.... 

but they will have to go around the Corner, Dear Readers!

It will require a whole different kind of 

"Cutting Corners" to get these stairs built!

 The stairs will need to climb up the outer wall,

much like the stairs for the Spiral Tower, 

to reach the Tower Roof.

But while we are waiting for me to Find More Time....

The Beary Gang is Happily having their Sunny Morning "Kaffeeklatch"!

So as you can see, Dear Readers,

It's only a Little bit of Progress.....

But I have been Cutting Corners

In order to build the Tower Stairs!