Projects and Waiting for Spring!

A big and warm hello to all of you blog friends out there!

Thank you for your kind and inspiring comments. Your support and suggestions have been wonderful and have encouraged me to keep moving forward. Thank you! I've greatly enjoy reading each and every comment. I've also enjoyed reading your blogs too. There are some terrific and creative projects going on with you all for sure. Yay!

It's been a busy few weeks as I try to finish a ton of projects with my real house. Amongst the painting and woodworking, we were blanketed with another snowstorm here in the Twin Cities earlier this week. Will spring ever come again? It seems light years away. The snowy weather has made the construction work on my house even more laborious. Hauling lumber through snowbanks and over icy sidewalks has not been fun, to say the least. If I have to shovel my walk and driveway one more time, I'll scream...right after I take some Ibuprofen for the pains in my back! Ha ha!

I haven't had much time to work on Barton Cottage, but I have included a few more photos of the different rooms. I know it's just a cardboard mock-up, so there's not a lot to look at during this time. But hopefully it will give some semblance of what the room dimensions and layout will be.

I've also posted a few photos from the latest meeting of our local miniatures guild. I joined the Midwest Miniatures Guild early this year. It's been a fun and rewarding experience, and the members are very welcoming and quick to share their knowledge. I took a couple of workshop classes at our February meeting. Barbara Nygaard taught classes featuring a hanging room box and a history vignette of a desk, books, letters, and newspapers.

My desk project in mid process and a tiny bundle of newspapers.

One of our February classes at the Midwest Miniatures Guild.

A cute box of maps and an atlas of Minnesota, of course.

Below are a few more pictures from my Barton Cottage. Again, I know it's not much to look at, but hopefully soon I'll will be able to get the actual lumber cut and get moving again.

I added a dressing room between the bathroom and bed chamber. There was a lot of space in the bathroom--too much actually. So I decided to divide the room in half and add a small room as a dressing space. I also noticed that there was a lot of space in the attic. So I made an opening in the dressing room ceiling for a stair ladder. I'm not sure what I'll put up in the attic, but I thought it would be good to have a way of getting up there. Any ideas? Sewing room? Dusty storage?

For the bathroom, I thought an arch doorway would tie the dressing room and the bathroom together. I also added a platform to raise up the bathtub. I thought this would highlight the tub and add some visual interest to the back of the room.

The kitchen area and stairway leading to the second floor.

A close up of the parlour with the opening for the window seat on the far wall.

A view looking to the dining area and the opening for the stairs.

Another view looking from the parlour to the dining and kitchen area.

A view from the bed chamber looking into the dressing room and stairwell.

The bed chamber.

The dressing room with an opening for a stair ladder to the attic.

The bathroom with arch doorway and platform for the tub.

I guess I have a lot of work ahead of me on both my real house and Barton Cottage. Lately my motto has been "slow and steady wins the race." So, step by step, little by little, I am moving forward. I hope to have some more pictures and updates on both my real house and the cottage very soon.

In the meantime, I wish you well and look forward to keeping up to date on all your beautiful projects. Keep the comments and suggestions coming. I promise to have some more interesting stuff soon!

All best,
Brad