29 Wednesday May 2013
Tags
Aslan's Tent, Cair Paravel Library, Dawn Treader, Decor, Design, Narnia, Spare Oom, The Lodge, Wardrobe
My niece, who works in the computer field, just had a post on our Narnia project published on the Homeketeers blog. Be sure to check it out! (It’s published under her nom de plume.) For anyone who’s new to the story of how we turned our attic into Narnia, my niece’s account is clear and concise–and a good way to find out about it without reading through about 75 posts!
04 Thursday Apr 2013
Tags
This post is a bit different in that it is completely unrelated to Narnia. However, it is related to my children and grandchildren . . .
My future father-in-law and me in 1977. I already loved him dearly!
I loved my father-in-law dearly, and it was a terrible loss when he died at age 63 in 1979, just three years after he came into my life. When my husband, Herb, and his older half-brother Mike went through Dad’s stuff, they found an Army trunk containing everything that belonged to Dad’s first wife, and Mike’s mother, Barbara. In this trunk were ALL of the letters Dad and Barbara wrote to each other throughout the years of World War II when Dad was an officer in the U.S. Cavalry. Sadly, the decision of what to do with Barbara’s letters was out of our hands, and they were all burned. However, I won custody of a small stack of Dad’s letters to Barbara–and laid them in a box where they languished for over 30 years.
At the same time, we found files full of legal pads covered in Dad’s atrocious handwriting, and these were given to my husband and me. One folder was entitled “My Army Story.” Having heard a few stories from Dad, I was curious about his Army story, but I was busy raising our four children at the time. Like the letters, that story languished in the back of a file drawer for the next 30 years.
Capt. Ross Lea in uniform
Finally, two years ago I began the Herculean task of transcribing Dad’s handwritten Army story. Certain parts of it remained stubbornly indecipherable, and I put it away again. But toward the end of last year, looking ahead to Herb’s 60th birthday this March, I felt an urgency to finish “translating” Dad’s story. I turned to Google and spent hours figuring out some of Dad’s mystery phrases. Finally, after hundreds of hours of work, I signed in to Shutterfly and created Dad’s book.
Here is the book, as I gave it to Herb on his 60th birthday.
A V-Mail from Dad to Barbara
Once that book was done, I remembered the 33 letters that Dad had written to Barbara. By this time I was so “into Dad’s head” and so familiarized with the inscrutable ways of his handwriting that I was able to transcribe those letters. Along with a few letters from other friends and relatives, they helped me discover the story of Dad and Barbara’s love, their sacrifice, and their loss. Only one last piece was missing . . .
Barbara Hughes Lea’s wedding photo, 1942
Barbara was killed in a car accident when Mike was 18 months old–and that was all any living person knew. I couldn’t find the date of her death, although I knew the year based on Mike’s age. This time my genealogy subscription on Ancestry.com found me a date and a place. The place was Leesville, Louisiana, near Fort Polk where Dad’s III Corps had come back to be decommissioned. Was Barbara going to meet him? What was she doing there?
Google led me to the local paper, The Leesville Leader, and they sent me to their microfilm archives in the Vernon Parish Library. I emailed the library Director a request for someone to check the archives around the date of Barbara’s death on Sept. 11, 1945 to see if there might have been an article in the local paper.
A copy of the article on Barbara Lea’s death, Sept. 11, 1945 from the Leesville Leader
And thus began my correspondance with Mr. Howard L. Coy, Jr. and his kind staff at the Vernon Parish Library. In no time at all they had found an article, copied it and mailed it to me. It was the last piece of the puzzle! Unlike Dad’s Army Story, which he stopped writing before the end, Dad and Barbara’s story had an end. It was not a Hollywood ending by any means. I don’t think any living author would have chosen to end their story that way! And yet, 68 years later, we can read this heartbreaking story and see the goodness of God shining down through the years into the present.
Capt. Ross Lea in an undated photo, somewhere in Europe
With the last piece of the puzzle in place, I went to Blurb this time and created the second book about Dad’s life. Mr. Coy expressed a desire to purchase the book for his library if it was for sale. So I made the book public on Blurb and sent him a link.
Today I received a heart-warming email from Mr. Coy who said he could hardly put the book down and was reading it through his tears. I won’t call myself an author because all I did was compile the story that was there in a stack of letters. But what “compiler” could resist a letter like that? I certainly couldn’t! And what it made me realize was that “There’s Always Tomorrow to Hope For . . .” Letters to Barbara tells a timeless tale that tugs at the heartstrings of every reader who has ever known love or loss or sacrifice. It tells a story that belongs to the American people, because the sacrifice that Dad and Barbara made during the War was made to keep America free and to keep her good and honorable and true, like Dad and Barbara and their love.
So here, with love for Dad and Barbara, is their story.
Ross Lea’s law school graduation photo, 1938
Barbara Hughes’ law school graduation photo, 1938
29 Friday Mar 2013
Tags
Here’s a great post on Narnia Music for you Narnia fans. It’s from a group called Benjamin Dunn and the Animal Orchestra. Here is their YouTube video of the song “Eustace” from their new album “Fable,” the lyrics of which are in Pine Needles and Paper Trails’ post shared above.
04 Monday Mar 2013
I found this on Facebook today and thought it was a lovely image.
I hope Narnia and all the books in Cair Paravel will sprinkle lots of stardust over our grandchildren’s lives! I hope Aslan and Tumnus, Lucy and Peter, Billy and Blaze, Pod and Arrietty, Laura and Mary Ingalls–and a whole host of other characters–will be their childhood companions through countless imaginary adventures. I want them to look back on magical memories of pony rides on Julie, helping Didi feed the animals in the barnyard and making crafts with Mimi.
My family moved around so much that I rarely got to spend time with my grandmothers, and I only knew one grandfather, who spent his time in front of the TV. I loved my grandmothers, but I have so few memories of things we did together. My own children missed out on what having grandparents can be. My husband’s parents died before any of them were born, and my parents were so strict that spending time with them was more something to dread.
A few years ago I looked at our children’s book collection and said that some day I wanted to be the Book Grandma. When we moved here, I said I wanted to be the Farm Grandma. Then we built Narnia, and I would say I want to be the Narnia Grandma–but this quote says it so much better. I want to be the Stardust Grandma! I think that pretty much covers everything grandparents can be to their grandchildren!
07 Thursday Feb 2013
Tags
Aslan's Tent, Cair Paravel Library, Decor, Design, DIY, Grandkids, Kara, The Lodge
Sorry about the title, that’s my punning nature rearing its ugly head! 🙂
It’s been a little over a month since Narnia was ready to host guests, but the stairwell was still bare, bare, bare. First I was sick for 2 months, then I went to Dallas for 2 weeks.
But I came home from Dallas eager to get going on all the things that hadn’t gotten done yet. One of those was to re-hang my family portrait gallery.
As you can see, my husband and I have a lot of ancestors! His are on the left, mine on the right.
He has a couple on the landing, too, next to the antique mirror from the old Tivoli theater that Jim & Monique gave us one year. I’ve always loved it there, but now I love it even more because it hints at special things upstairs.
We have four kids, too, so they take up a whole wall. Their adult portraits used to hang right where the Gothic window is now, so they had to find a new home.
I like this wall–baby pictures with the kids’ mosaic self-portraits made in homeschool and finally their wedding (or single hood) photos. It will be fun for the grandkids to see their parents as they head into Narnia.
The placement of the wall is particularly appropriate, right next to Aslan’s Tent (the parents’ bedroom). While looking for light-blocking curtains at WalMart the other day, I found these and thought they might go in Spare Oom.
When I opened the package, the festoons of crinkly fabric and fringe cried, “Aslan’s Tent” as clear as day! I think they are perfect across the doorway as a hint to the extravagance inside.
I finished the walls of Aslan’s Tent some time ago, but just got around to taking pictures. After all the methods I researched for hanging fabric, the one I finally used was ridiculously simple: I put knots in rough hay twine and used upholstery tacks to “nail” the twine to the wall, then draped the fabric over the twine. The “hairiness” of the twine helps hold the fabric in place, and the twine doesn’t stretch at all so there’s little sagging. And my method is TONS cheaper than airplane cable!
I covered the metal door to the attic in a piece of red brocade Moroccan fabric and a yard of gold lace. Thanks to a metal cafe rod and cafe rod clips, these are no-sew curtains, the best kind!
We finally got the armoire moved up, so guests have plenty of room to move in.
On the opposite side of the room, the same colors in an opposite arrangement drape the glass doors to the balcony with more no-sew curtains. A batik reminiscent of “A Horse and His Boy” hangs beside the chairs. I bought this for Herb in Africa in 1985, and it’s been waiting for the perfect spot ever since it left his office there!
The Moroccan curtains are there for a purpose–to hide the ugly brown room-darkening curtains. As you can see, they do a pretty good job. This is a great place for parents to sleep late while Didi and Mimi feed the kids breakfast downstairs.
I took my hang-ups over into the Cair Paravel Library, too. A large ornate mirror throws back light that comes through the stained glass door. Next to it are two brass-rubbings I did in London many years ago, never thinking that Queen Anne Boleyn and St. George killing the dragon would bring a Narnian flavor to my decor. I’m probably the only one that knows they aren’t a King and Queen of Narnia!
About 15 years ago, I bought this painting from a street artist in Aix-en-Provence. We watched him do it entirely with spray paint. (Check out Urban Wallart for more things you can do with spray paint.) We gave it to my brother-in-law, a science fiction fan, because it was a science fiction subject. Some years later when he didn’t want it anymore, my sister sent it back to me, and I’m so glad she did! Kara and I think it looks just like the castle of Cair Paravel by the sea–and I think the sea looks like it’s about to spill over the frame into the room.
I found the big gold frame for $7 at Unclaimed Baggage, and it was a perfect fit. I love serendipitous surprises like that!
The Lodge got some attention, too. While I was in Dallas I was near a Hobby Lobby (as opposed to being an hour away here), and I found some leather bracelet kits which work perfectly to hang my special walking stick towel bar. What does it look like to you?
I think it looks exactly like a dragon with long squinty eyes, horns for ears, a little beard and a blunt nose. (If you can’t see it, he’s looking to the right.)
This is a very nice dragon, and he’s perfectly willing to hold the bathmat. I won’t have any mean dragons in our Narnia! It’s a hang-up of mine!
18 Friday Jan 2013
Tags
It’s taken awhile, but the Library is finally open for business!
This is the first glimpse of Cair Paravel as you come up the stairs and look through the Gothic window.
Just inside the window is this bookcase that I found in an out-of-the-way used furniture store that I popped into on a whim. With the corner trim and arched top, it adds an elegant touch to Cair Paravel. (I took this shot from across the room, inside the Wardrobe.)
Here’s the Reading Nook with its new Billy bookshelves (Ikea was out of extension shelves so we still need one for that low shelf in the middle). There’s a cushion on the floor for grandkids who want to read to themselves and a comfy, throne-like arm chair, well-lighted and ready for Mimi or Didi to hold a grandchild on their lap for story time.
Here’s another view showing most of the Wardrobe. The little step stool is a handy Ikea find to help the little ones climb through the Wardrobe. There’s a blue one inside for climbing into Narnia.
The OCD side of me loves alphabetizing books! And making lists! I have an almost complete list of all the kids’ books from when we lived in our Victorian house and I had my computer in the Library. I need to update it since I got rid of a few and have added a few. If you’re reading the titles, don’t worry, that empty space next to Little Men is for Little Women, temporarily taken down.
In case you were wondering how many books we have up here, I can tell you: There are 807! And that’s not counting my special favorites on the living room bookshelves right by my reading chair. If you count those, we have 870.
Of course, the question that arises is this: What is a “kid” book and what is an “grown-up” book? That line gets pretty blurry. There are a lot of books up here in Cair Paravel that dads and moms will want to read (like Lorna Doone, Ramona, Man-Eaters of Kumaon, The Three Musketeers, and the Bounty Trilogy. And I’m sure they’ll find plenty of their old childhood favorites to re-read and to read aloud to their children when they visit.
Let’s just say that no one will ever say in this house, “I’m bored! I can’t find anything good to read!”
09 Wednesday Jan 2013
Tags
We have LOTS of books. We have floor-to-ceiling shelves in our living room and a 30 foot-long wall of floor-to-ceiling shelves in our study. They are full of books–and I ordered more shelves for Herb for Christmas! We love our books and take good care of them. We even read some of them!
When our children were small, I collected 600 books (give or take a few) so that while we lived in the French-speaking world, the kids could enjoy reading in their mother language. These books traveled from New York to the Central African Republic, from there to France, and back across the ocean to Tennessee.
Ignore the tantalizing buffet and the beautiful birthday girl–just look at (half of) the shelves where the children’s books lived in the library of our Victorian house.
In our Tennessee Victorian house we built shelves in the library, and there the children’s books lived and were loved alongside my own books. Kara was still young enough to enjoy some of them, and I re-read my old favorites, too. Then four years ago we moved here, and the children’s books became homeless. They lived in boxes stacked in the hay barn because we had no place for them.
That is how the Library at Cair Paravel became a feature of our Narnian design. Of course, C. S. Lewis never wrote about a Library at Cair Paravel, but I’m sure there must have been one. So I let my imagination loose and thought up a regal setting for the books–a place that will make them feel like their four years of homelessness were worth enduring; a place that will bring joy to our grandchildren as they enjoy the same books their parents read; a place that will encourage us adults to pull old favorites off the shelves and enjoy them again.
Once Cair Paravel was ready, Herb hauled over 2 dozen boxes of books into the study, and I began unpacking. I got an unpleasant (if not completely unexpected) surprise: The books smelled awful! They were musty, and in some cases even mildewy! Thus began Operation De-mustification.
De-mustification required certain equipment:
Half a dozen bottles of 91% isopropyl alcohol (The pharmacist was worried the DEA would flag our purchase! It seems as if alcohol has replaced Iodine for cooking meth.)
A spray bottle (I put the pump mechanism into the bottles of alcohol rather than trying to pour alcohol into the spray bottle.)
Allergy masks and disposable gloves (optional–the masks tend to interfere with smelling the books.)
Clorox wipes
Paper towels
As I pulled each stack of books from a box, I used a fresh Clorox wipe to remove old dust from the top of the pages.
Next, each book got the “Smell Test” like Odysseus the Wanderer in the photo above. Books that passed the “Smell Test” got the “Lite” treatment, as follows.
I sprayed alcohol over the front of the book and wiped it with a paper towel. If the paper towel came away dirty, the book got further attention. Usually one spray and swipe was sufficient to be sure the book was clean.
I flipped the book over and repeated the same treatment on the back.
Paperbacks were propped open face down while hardbacks were fanned open to stand up. Since the 91% alcohol evaporates quickly, by the time I had treated two dozen or so books, I could go back to the first ones and stack them out of the way.
Any book that didn’t pass the “Smell Test” got the “Heavy Duty” treatment. And it goes without saying, that any book with visible mold or gray speckling got the same treatment!
Here’s one I didn’t have to smell! I quickly learned that these ex-library books with the heavy duty cloth covers were the worst for getting mildewed.
I think it has something to do with the glue that was used on their bindings.
The first step in the Heavy Duty treatment was to spray each cover heavily with alcohol and wipe vigorously. Although mold was visibly removed by wiping, I repeated the treatment with a clean paper towel to make sure no visible mold was left. One important tip to remember is that many times the sted design on the front covers of these ex-library books will run if sprayed with alcohol and wiped. If there’s visible mold to be removed, careful blotting will do the job without ruining the cover image. Otherwise, the cover can be left to air-dry.
The next step was to spray both inside covers.
After that, I fanned the pages with one hand while spraying them with the other.
Finally, I placed the book in a sunny windowsill to absorb some ultraviolet radiation on both the covers and the inside of the pages. When the book had adequately aired and no longer had any bad odor, it was rehabilitated and could join its friends. I ended up throwing away a couple of dust jackets, but I only found one book that was beyond de-mustification!
When I first started unpacking books, there was such a strong musty odor in our study that it wafted down the hall. By the time I finished treating all the books, the odor was gone. And best of all, when I had finished shelving all the books upstairs in Narnia, there was no odor at all! I’d say Project De-mustification was a success!
05 Saturday Jan 2013
This project ranks right up there with Aslan and the Wardrobe as one of my very favorite design details in Narnia. And even more clearly than either of them, it speaks to the reason at the heart of our project: Why Narnia?
I discovered eBuySigns.com while searching online for vinyl wall words. Reviews on their website say they are lots cheaper than all their competitors. Their “wall lettering” page claims to provide “Wall lettering made easy” and “Free shipping over $25.” Believe me, IT’S ALL TRUE! Once I had designed my wall words in a few easy steps with the design tool, I went to half a dozen other sites and put in the same parameters. EBuySigns’ price (under $40) was less than every other competitors’ price of $100 -$200.
The design tool lets you choose your own font, the number of lines you want, the height and width of your final product and your font color, as well as highlights and borders to tweak the appearance of your lettering. You can see your final product on a background color similar to your own wall color.
One tip I would offer is this: If you have a long quote (as I did), it works better if you copy and paste your quote in line by line. I tried pasting my entire quote, and it appeared smushed and impossible to read. When I called the helpline, a friendly tech told me to break the quote into lines, and it instantly appeared the way I wanted it. Once that was done, I was able to play with arranging the lines in different ways, as well as making the sign higher or wider until I got it exactly right.
I ordered the sign, and a few days later it arrived, safely packaged in a sturdy cardboard tube.
Jenny and Jean-Marc were already here for Christmas, so I pressed them into service as Official Photographer and Assistant Sign Applicator. One question I had wondered about was whether the size indicated online would be the size of the sheet or the actual size of the letters. If you’re working with a limited space, this question becomes very important. The design tool seemed to indicate that there would be a border of paper around the letters, so I ordered accordingly. As you can see from the photo above, this was indeed the case.
Applying the sign was just as easy as the tech and the website claimed, and the instruction sheet that came with the sign was simple and easy to follow. This post will illustrate in detail the steps we went through, beginning with (1) Position the sign on the wall, making sure it is level. While Jean-Marc held the sign, I got on a ladder and measured so that Jean-Marc could level the sign as needed.
(2) Apply a piece of (masking) tape as a hinge across the top of the sign. (At this stage, we double-checked our measurements.) Once we were sure the sign was level, Jean-Marc removed the corner pieces of tape.
(3) Lift the sign, holding it in place by the tape-hinge, and begin to remove the backing paper. I began loosening the backing paper at the top left corner.
(4) Steadily pull the backing paper loose while holding the sign away from the wall.
(5) Completely remove the backing paper, still holding the sign away from the wall. That’s the easy part done! The next part was easy, too, but a little scary–made less so by eBuySign’s guaranteed application!
(6) Lower the sign against the wall and begin to adhere it at the top center. (The letters themselves are the only adhesive part of the sign. They are held in place by the cover paper while the adhesive is protected by the backing paper.)
(7) Using a credit card (maybe the one you paid with!), begin to press the sign firmly against the wall, working outwards and downwards to smooth away any air pockets.
(8) At this point we added another step: Using your fingers, apply firm pressure to any areas that appear more opaque (indicating a lack of adhesion to the wall). We found that fingers could exert more concentrated pressure than the edge of a credit card, while being gentle enough not to tear the paper.
You may note the crescent of blue wall that appears at the top of the sign (left of my hand). I inadvertently left out the right-hand parenthesis and was dismayed to see only the left-hand parenthesis on my sign–despite careful proof-reading. The solution was as simple as cutting out the offending parenthesis with a scissors before beginning installation of the sign!
Now comes the fun part!
(9) Begin removing the cover paper from the lettering by pulling away the tape along with the attached cover paper. Our hints for this step are to GO SLOWLY and to WATCH CAREFULLY where you are pulling. There were a few spots where the sticky lettering had not been adequately adhered to the wall, and I could see them actually pulling off on the cover paper. It was very easy to stop pulling and apply extra pressure at those spots to make sure the lettering was stuck to the wall before proceeding.
(10) Continue removing the paper, working across the top of the sign from left to right.
(11) Once the top of the sign is free of the cover paper, continue pulling steadily downwards to remove the paper.
(12) Hold your breath in anticipation as your sign is nearly revealed in all its beauty! (Just try to skip this step!)
(13) Turn and face the camera so your Official Photographer can catch the triumphant grins you have applied to your faces at the same time you applied your beautiful eBuySign to the wall!
(14) Be sure your Official Photographer zooms in for a close-up of your amazing sign …
(15) … and don’t forget to have her zoom out to get the full effect of your quote.
That’s all there is to it! I promise you, it took me twice as long to write this tutorial as it took to apply my sign, and it will take you longer to read the tutorial than it will take you to follow these steps to your own customized, unbeatably-priced, unique wall words.
29 Saturday Dec 2012
Tags
Aslan, Aslan's Tent, Cair Paravel Library, Dawn Treader, Decor, Design, Grandkids, Jesus, Kara, Narnia, Spare Oom, The Lodge, Wardrobe
Here’s a glimpse upstairs after I finished getting Narnia ready for the first Royal Visit by the Grandkids.
(A word of explanation is in order about “Narnia.” We call the whole upstairs “Narnia” because all the different rooms were actually in the real Narnia, and they are part of our whole Narnia theme. We also call the Grandkids’ Dorm itself “Narnia” because you go through the Wardrobe to get there. Hopefully the meaning of my use of “Narnia” will be clear from the context.)
Aslan’s Tent is the parents’ bedroom. As you climb the red-carpeted stairs, Aslan’s Tent is on the right, across the hall from Cair Paravel. It’s the only room that already existed upstairs.
There’s room for a sitting area in the corner of Aslan’s Tent near the French doors to the balcony. (The large mirror is only here temporarily.) I have plans to make Aslan’s Tent more Rococo-Morocco, but all in good time.
Step across the hall into Cair Paravel, soon to become the Library. The doorway at left leads to The Lodge; the one on the right, to the landing between Cair Paravel and Aslan’s Tent.
The other side of Cair Paravel will soon hold bookcases, and the reading area will move over next to the Wardrobe.
The stained glass door that leads into Spare Oom contributes to the castle ambience of Cair Paravel.
Let’s peek into The Lodge as we call the bathroom (in honor of the furry friends who led the Pevensies to Aslan).
I was delighted to find this Amish-made towel tree in a local furniture shop. I was also excited to find the Bed, Bath & Beyond shower curtain that ties in the colors of the river rock floor, the Brazilian cherry vanity, and the log walls. Who knew furnishing a bathroom could be so much fun?
Every bathroom in our house has to be set up for reading, so an antique hook and a Victorian-era hanger were pressed into service as a magazine rack.
Kara found this reproduction sampler (made in China) at a local antique store, and we laughed so hard I had to buy it. That’s one of the best $10 I’ve ever spent! Kara thought hanging it across from the shower would be the perfect touch. In case you can’t figure out why, here’s what the motto says: “When this you see remember me, and bare me in your mind. Let all the world say what they will, speak of me as you find.” (The answer appears at the end of this post.)
I had fun making this toilet paper holder from: a lion’s head pull I spray-painted bronze; a key chain ring; a piece of leather rein; a curtain rod hook; and a piece of an old broomstick that Herb cut down for me. The rein is permanently screwed to the dowel on the right while the curtain rod hook fits through an existing hole in the rein for changing rolls of TP.
Let’s take a quick peek into Spare Oom as we call my craft room. It’s a great place to read by a window with a view or to stick an extra guest, as long as they don’t mind a crafty mess!
And finally–on to Narnia proper!
Aslan waits beside the miniature Christmas tree Kara decorated as a gift for her niece and nephew.
If you look behind you after you enter Narnia, this is what you see. Some of the decorative features are (from left) a cross-stitch of Jesus and the children rescued from a junk shop along with the lion mirror (Aslan, of course!); an antique hunt cabinet with a dragon that we purchased from Kara; and next to the lion corbel, the quote that sums up our whole project, taken from C. S. Lewis’ The Voyage of the Dawn Treader:
“I am [in your world],” said Aslan. “But there I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name. That was the very reason you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.”
(A future post will cover this vinyl wall words project.)
The berths on the boys’ side have fur throws for blankets and red velour spreads which can double as dress-up capes.
The dress-up capes on the girls’ side are purple.
At the foot of each bed is a crown hook for hanging pajamas or robes. (A future DIY post will feature the hooks.)
As we turn out the lights, all is ready for the arrival of Charis and Kol, Daughter of Eve and Son of Adam, Queen and King of Narnia.
11 Thursday Oct 2012
Here are photos from Days 22 through 24 of construction. Three days, three good things . . .
Sheetrock going up in the craft room, thanks to stilts! I asked how he gets down, and learned that he jumps. I guess I won’t be borrowing those when I do the faux painting!
About half of the hall was done on Monday (here’s the Book Nook) and all of the craft room.
Of course, there’s still taping and bedding, sanding, priming, etc. so there’s still a long way to go. But we can definitely see what it’s going to look like when it’s done.
This morning Junior’s Building Materials delivered the D-siding for The Lodge.
I just ordered it Monday, so I was surprised that it came so quickly. The driver didn’t have anyone to help him unload, so I pitched in. That’s my workout for today!
A close-up of the stacked siding gives a tantalizing glimpse of how it will look on the bathroom walls. Now I better get busy and make a decision on the exterior toner I plan to use to protect the logs from the humidity.
That’s two good things, and I saved the best for last!
Ben and Todd have been busy with bead board, and the Dawn Treader berths are taking shape. Kara helped out by holding up one of the portholes. What you can’t see is how cool it looks with Stuart’s clever metal lining inside the wall between the two portholes. It looks very ship-shape!
simple words dedicated to my little sister
Adventures in Modeling
Finding treasures in books
A Beginning Farmer
Life As Chiaroscuro
Through the Wardrobe 