Small Steps....

 

 Tree House and Leaves....

As I was finishing the windows for the Nanny's Room, Dear Readers, and the Dressing Room in the bath, I began to mentally count the windows still to be made for the topmost attic level of The Tree House. And that level was probably only going to need one or two at the most. Was I almost done with the windows? But then I remembered the stairs! On the bottom floors the stairs went up in the walls to each new level. But when it came to the bedroom level, I realized the inhabitants would want privacy, and so the stairs needed a different route upwards. Thus I built the little winding staircase on the back corner of the tree trunk... and realized that it would be invisible unless I added an opening door on the outside wall...

 Which you can see on the left at the bathroom level.

 

Here it is open and you can see the staircase is wallpapered too! 

But the window itself was not yet constructed... 

and in order to build it I was going to need to remove the door from its hinges...

 and in order to do that I needed to move the entire Tree House out of The Folly base

 because I could not reach the hinges with my screwdriver otherwise.

 

It is a very delicate and tricky operation 

to lift the Tree House out of the base... 

It has to tilt forward to bypass the living room window,

 but mustn't tilt too far.... 

and then it must stand alone... 

tall and just balanced enough that it won't fall...

unless bumped!

 But I was able to remove the staircase door from the hinges!

 

 It has a chevron shape to the wall 

in order to "curve" enough around the stairs...

 

And there is very little clearance on either side of the window for the frame.

 

 

 The window pieces were made the same as for the Nanny's Room...

 

 

Then the door needed to be balanced over another piece of wood

 so the window could be weighted while the glue dried.

 

 Here is the finished exterior...

 

 

 And the interior too! 

But this side still needs the frame attached...

 

Like so! 

The clearances are very tight! 

And then it needs to be reattached to the hinges...

 

Which you can see here.

 

 

And the open view!

 But I was nervous

 with the Tree House out of the base...

 so back it went!

 

Here you can see it is so close to The Folly

 that it is hard to see that it even opens!

  

 

 And it needs the flash to see inside...

 I might have to put a light in the stairwell... 

 

Because I still need to build the walls around the stairs

 as they go upwards to the top floor....

 the Attic level!

 

And as for those leaves I mentioned, Dear Readers,

 they are the final leaves of the Chinese Dragon Carpet central area.

 

If you recall, I had rearranged most of the kit pattern

 throughout the central area when I added the Dragons to the center.

 I stitched as much of the rest as I could according to the original design.

 But at the end I had to rearrange leaves on the ends too.

 Here I have begun the final leaves for this end...

 

And finished!

 (Except for the designs in the border... 

and the gold border... 

and the background....)

 but hey, the central section leaves are done!

 

So Step by step, Dear Readers, 

those Small Steps are

 making good Progress!

Extending The Framework

The Boring Bits....

It was a Beautiful, sunny, (if Cold!) Saturday morning, Dear Readers, just perfect for photographing the Tree House in its proper position on the base of "The Folly" to give you an idea of the relative scale of this House! And of course, you will want to see it with the doors open and the morning sun shining into the tiny rooms!

 I had Visions of accomplishing great amounts of decorative progress, but Alas, the Fun stuff had to be postponed in order to get the basic Framework of these newest Rooms completed. And here I refer in particular to the Dressing Room! I must confess that this Dressing Room is a complete "After thought" .... After I had decided that the stairs, which on all the other floors of the house were accessed by going Through the room, making it very public, on the Bedroom floor and subsequent floors the stairs would need to be accessed directly from the corridor leaving the Room itself more private. And so where the stairs were in the lower rooms suddenly became an "unused space" on the bedroom floor.... and That was when it occurred to me that I Could make it into a Dressing Room... with it's own little door opening on the other side of the Tree....!!! and so you see what Trouble I have gotten myself into....!

You can see in the above picture, the beginnings of adding the Dressing Room. It was easy enough to extend the floor a little way further than the other floors.... the idea is that there is a "Gnarly bump" on this side of the Tree........ But the difficulty comes in with the necessity of making the Door wall curved! The Hinged side of the door needs to attach to the same structural wooden "post" as all the other doors. But the interior of the room would be too small without the extended "bumped-out" floor... which is curved! So I built a Door with an angled surface.... you can see the beginnings below.....

Of course, I forgot to take a lot of pictures of me cutting and re-cutting and gluing and fitting and swearing when all the pieces fell down for the hundredth time and cutting some more..... 'cause the really hard part was fitting the Framework that the door rests against when closed... the outer edge of the Dressing Room wall....! Which you can sort of see mostly Completed below.... Oh and did I mention that I Found another one of my Marbles!!! It is now the Dressing Room Window!

And here the Dressing Room door is open....

I apologize for the blurry photo... by then it was Quite Late and Dark...!!!

And you must Not look at how rough and uneven my saw cuts are.... !

And another view of the Dressing Room "Bump" from the side.....

And Another view.... see I promised you some Boring Bits!

And since I have Detoured the stairs.... 

I thought I had better show you where they are going up now...

But brace yourself... they are Really rough and un-finished...!

The Plan is that they will twist in a Spiral Staircase up the back corner of the Tree House..... 

Starting off the corridor at the back of the Bedroom.... 

where the stairs come up from the floor below.....

and using the wire at that corner for the anchoring post.....

Of course, it will create a bit of a "bump out" on this corner of the Tree... 

but I will not have to build a Door to access them... 

they will be essentially hidden from sight... 

but I will know they are there!!

As for Progress on the Rest of the Bed Room..... 

I added the window in the wall beside the Fireplace...

And started the Framework for the Bed.... 

Really just so I could figure out the space it needs in this little room...

But Anna Maria had to come along and have a look.....

I think she was imagining something a little more Ornate.....

Perhaps it just needs some Decoration..... Like This!

But meanwhile.... while we are making up our minds....

 

It is good enough to give an idea of how it fits in the Room. 

 And even if we didn't get to any of the Fun Decorative Projects... 

I made good progress on the Boring but necessary 

Extending of the Framework!