I Need A Long Vacation!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good Morning!

I have been waking up at three in the morning for the last year or two.  I start thinking at that time about what the blog is going to be about that day.

It doesn't make me happy or put me in a good mood for writing.

I have decided to take a LONG vacation!!!

The photos for today are just to give you something to look at.

I may do a bit of mini-ing here and there while I am vacating.  Probably not a lot.

I just need to relax and clean my real house for a change.

Tessie is not happy about it, but she is just going to have to live with it.

I am thinking that I will be back about the second of January 2019.

As you can see from the last photo, Tessie is not going to get her trailer anytime soon.  After the row yesterday about extra towers and birdcages, I threw in the towel!

She is off somewhere in a snit. Only Tessie can throw a snit like she can. Anybody else would look silly.

I for one am going to relax and enjoy cleaning my real house and my workroom in my time off.

I will check for comments or questions. I will try to answer anything that is there.

Back to work! See you January 2, 2019!!!!!

The Loco Weed Is In Bloom!

Jimson Weed, around here is known as Loco Weed.  The stuff is only around for a few weeks during the rainy season here...

It supposedly makes cows crazy when they snack on it.  Since I have no cows in my yard, I let them grow. The flowers only last a day and the plants only last a few weeks.  If you have cows, you don't want the weed. 

I let these grow every year. I don't have cows and I think that the plants are beautiful.

My kumquat tree is coming along nicely. After the set back, I was not sure that I was going to get any fruit. It seems now that I am going to have some after all. The little white blossoms are the start of new fruit.  Wish me luck!

OK. Now for what you really came to see.  I have the tower covered with rocks!!!

I still need to cover the top and put some fancy stuff around the edge of the top, but essentially the tower is covered. 

No. The Terrible Two didn't help.  They just sat there and watched K-Dramas and heckled me while I worked.

Anyway, I am almost finished with the tower as of this afternoon. Back to finishing it. See you tomorrow.

Going Downhill.....

OK. See the last line of rocks going around this side of the tower?  They are a bit slanted....

I didn't think much about it. So they go down hill a bit.

I went around to the other side and guess what? They are even more slanted on that side.

I wasn't paying attention to where I was going with the blocks.  Too much K-Drama playing in my head....

The terrible two were also watching it and none of us checked for level on the blocks.

I hate to say it, but I am going to have to fix this mess.  Maybe take out a couple of rows or plan a row or two that will go uphill to compensate.

I am setting here laughing at the mess. It doesn't do any good to cry about it. I think that I can fix it without tearing too much out.

Now if I can just get the glue unstuck.  Isn't I fun to see someone that has been doing this stuff for almost forty years, screw up? 

Oh well, there is always tomorrow.

I have just about got the back fence the way I want it to look, so I did do something right this morning.

I am going back to work now and start tearing off rocks.

See you tomorrow.

Missing the Terrible Two...

NO. I don't miss them... They are missing.  As soon as I start doing stone work... They disappear...

So. I didn't expect their company today... Yesterday afternoon, I made the mistake of telling them that I was going to finish the stone work today if I could.

I am doing pretty good, but I don't think that I will get much more than the tower finished.

 The two of them didn't even come in and say "Good morning" today.  I haven't seen hide nor hair of either of them.

Anyway, it was to be expected.  They do NOT like stone work.

Anyway, I have never gone through all of the steps for good stonework.  So I will just go through it photo by photo.

The first photo shows me measuring to cut another strip to finish a row.

The second photo shows the curve that I make in the pieces if they are going on something circular as in a tower. I simply bend the piece to a bit steeper curve than the wall. Then I lay it against the wall to see if it is going to lay right on the wall.

The third step is to start cutting the pieces and put them on, one at a time.

I do NOT spare on the glue.  I put on a good coat. It is going to have to hold for years!

Then I fit it into the next piece that I just laid.

The row with the blue tape is one that I just finished.  The one above it is just getting started.

That one will now have a piece of tape started to hold the stones in that row.

Usually one strip of masking tape will hold the tiles in place until they are dry.

I let them dry at least 24 hours before I start painting and shading the stones. 

I will continue with that part when I finish getting all of the stones glued and dry.

It may be a few days until we get to the next step.  Without the help of the Terrible Two, I may be able to finish a little faster.

I do think that it will take a few more days.  If they were coming along for the ride, it would be more like a week... or two.

Back to work.  See you tomorrow.

Rock'in It!

It helps to hire a supervisor before starting any project.

Kota volunteered, so he was hired on the spot!

Of course it didn't help that the other one that likes to boss me around  didn't show until much later.

I had a doctor's appointment this morning, so I got a late start on the rock work. Nothing to worry about, simply checking to see that everything is OK.

 Here is the method to my madness. I start at one of the doors and work around to the other side.

In this case I was starting at the side of the front door and working around to the side of the other door that goes into the living room. I have already done the space between the doors.

See all of that blue tape? That is what holds everything together until the glue dries.

I just keep putting new pieces of stone on and then running the tape over it.

When I get to the side of the second door, I simply wrap the tape to the inside and tear it off.

Tessie finally showed up after I had finished four rows.  I had already taken the bottom three rows of tape off.

I am not sure that she approves, but since she is not in charge of supervision, I don't think that it is going to make a whole lot of difference.

Kota approves. I gave him a handful of Kitty treats and he thinks everything is just dandy!

Back to work.  See you tomorrow.

Out to the Garden...

This morning, I spent time out in the yard...

What did the Terrible Two do?

They stayed inside and made more cracker crumbs for me to clean up...

I did a bit of planting and a lot of watering.

When I came back inside, I started rocking again... I may never get all of the rocks on this thing at this rate...


I thought you would rather see what the squirrels are up to, rather than more photographs of rocks.

This is one of the first batch of babies for this year.  He is almost as big as his parents. 

As you can see, he has his cheek pouches filled and is ready to go back to the tunnels and relax. He is going to be a big, big squirrel if he keeps it up!

Same squirrel... Different cheek to fill... He or she is going to be one BIG squirrel if he(or she) keeps filling those pouches and running back to the nest and to eat it all.

I had the tail end of a bag or ice and I put it in the water bowls this morning. They seem to like a little cool water whenever I do that. 

Anyway, I just looked out the window and there are still a bunch of squirrels running around the yard and laying in the shade relaxing. 

I do love looking out and seeing them.  They are very relaxing and entertaining when I get tired of typing. Back to work... More stoning to do.
See you tomorrow.

Wednesday and Witches...

I took the witches on a guided tour of Tessie's new Trailer.

They seemed to like it.

After they left, Kota tried to do some work on the bedroom... He was not successful. All he did was get his nose dirty.

The Terrible Two seem to be having a good time.  I am not.

Now I have to straighten up the mess that Tessie and Zar left on the roof....

Kota seems to have made a new friend.  He likes the dragon that keeps the tape.

I think that I have done everything that I am going to do today.

Tomorrow I will start over.  I am a tired witch!

See you tomorrow.

Thicker Walls....

The only trouble with using a pre made box is... Thin walls.

If we want the walls to appear thicker from the outside, we have to use a little bit of magic.

That's in the form or making the walls appear thicker when you look at them from an angle.  It also helps to make the stone blocks appear to be whole.

I took strips of the theater trays and cut them into a U shape, about a half inch wide..  Then I glued them around the edge of the door frames inside.

Then I made strips that would wrap around the edge of the doors. That makes the walls appear to be about twice as thick. 

I decided that, that would be thick enough for what I was doing.

There will be three doors involved too.

I have to make two curved top doors and one straight topped door.

One of the curved top doors will go in the doorway that Tessie is standing in, in the second photo. The other one is on the second floor at the head of the stairs. There will be a straight edged door in the opening behind her, on the bottom floor. 

I am thinking that for viewing purposes, the door behind her will open so that it is behind her.  The other door on the main floor will open in back of the first door.

That will make it so that the viewer can clearly see the stairway and how it goes up around the trunk of the tree from both sides.

If the clothespins weren't in the way, you would be seeing and open doorway.  It leads into the living room.

Now that I have you thoroughly confused, I am going back and try to finish some more of the walls.

I want to get the tower covered before Wednesday. I have witches here this week.

Back to work.

See you tomorrow.

A Little More to the Left!

I got the hair brained idea to put a tree trunk in the middle of the hallway.  After all, people need something to hang onto when climbing stairs.

Tessie liked the idea and told me that she and Zar would take care of putting it in.

I went out to the wood pile and found the perfect piece.

Zar kind of wanted me to stick around, but Tessie kept trying to get rid of me.

I snuck in a couple of times to see how things were going.

I still have to put the top layer of the stairs in.  That is the landing.  It covers about half of the area in a teardrop shape.

I wanted to make sure that the floor would fit around the tree. 

Tessie kept quiet while I measured where the tree would hit the floor and cut it out.

Then she told me to leave.

She said that I was "Dismissed!".  Then she totally ignored me.

I did keep my eye on things.  I pretended to read a book while watching what was going on.

She sat on the top step with her arms folded. Every once in a while, she would shout down to Zar, "A little more to the left,".

She was driving both Zar and I a little crazy.

He would get it a little more to the left and she would immediately want it back a little to the right.

She finally got to her feet and started pushing the tree back and forth.

I will not show you the part where Zar and I got together and locked her out of the bedroom where we were working.

We got the tree where we thought it looked best and then totally ignored her when she came back in and started making suggestions again.

I am going back and glue in the tree so that she can't move it around. Then I am going to put the top floor in, glue it in place and lock her out until it dries.

It's my tree and I will put it where I want it.  Glue it in place and let her just try to move it.  It's not going to happen. Zar and I put a ton of glue on it.  It is not going to move even if she gets a tow truck and tries to pull it out.

I am going now to put in the upper floor.  Then there will be no way for her to budge it even an inch! 

Back to work.  See you tomorrow.

Not As Much As I Thought...

I had other things to do today... Laundry and gardening got in the way. I am up to the sixth step and I got the floor finished.  That's about it...

Tessie and Zar are mostly getting in the way and taking way to many breaks.  So far today, they have had coffee, bug beer, cookie and rest breaks.  I am not sure why they need rest breaks. I am the one doing the work.

At one point, I started watching TV and fell asleep.  That is not helpful when doing stone work.  It takes a lot of time.

Tessie and Zar are going someplace else to spend the day tomorrow.  Maybe I will lock them in the hall closet for a change. 

If I throw the two of them in there, maybe they will get bored and clean instead of interfering  with what I am doing.

At least, so far they are approving of the stone stairs. The trouble is, they both take the break part of the day seriously and then they can't figure out why I am not further along in the process.

After I finished the floor, they even had to sit on that and try it out...

They are NOT helping!!!

I am taking the rest of the day off.  Let them work on the stones. 

I QUIT!!!!!

See you tomorrow...

Another Break... And Another...

Tessie won. She is getting the stone steps.

It is very hard to get anything done with the Terrible Two involved.  They are insisting that "we" take a break after every layer of steps. 

They have to test them every time I get a new layer done.

After the first layer, all that they could do is sit down on the first step.

As I go up, it will get better.

Mind you, I am not complaining. That just means that I get to take a break about every fifteen or twenty minutes...

The second layer.  Here you can see that I am building up the back of the steps with scraps. A whole sheet of the stuff is not needed.

I am using Styrofoam for a filler.  One half inch thick.  then I am covering it with the theatre trays.

I still have to cut them one rock at a time, but it goes pretty fast.

And with all of the breaks that we are taking, it's pretty easy.

ON the third step, they had to try it out before I got it covered.

If they keep it up, I am going to be taking a break after each stone.

Maybe I should let them be in charge more often.

Oops! They are demanding that I go back and do the rest of this layer.  Only about ten more layers to go.

Back to work! See you tomorrow.

Everything's A Blank!!!

This morning I did a bit more to the trailer/castle.... Then I had to get ready and go to Wednesday Witches...

It really doesn't look a lot different than yesterday, but I did do more to the inside of the tower and the bathroom.   

 While I worked on it, the terrible two sat on the table and watched TV.

No help at all!

About two o'clock, while I was still at Witches,  it started pouring. We Witches were doing our thing.  Eating, talking and generally having a good time. At 3:30 when I was coming home, it was pouring.  Raining cats and dogs.

I just now stepped out on the back porch.  I didn't get further than the doormat.

Water is now coming up on the porch.

It looks like this is going to last most of the night.

If it does, I will have an excuse to stay at home and work on Tessie's Trailer tomorrow.

I am going to ignore the rain tonight and start over in the morning.

See you then!

Getting Stoned...

Well, not really.  Not the way you think!

I went back to adding stones to the outside of the trailer this morning.

It is a slow process.  One stone cut at a time and then trimmed to fit beside the next couple of stones.

I have news.  Letty has given notice.  She is going back to her crooked cottage and wants clothes to match... She is going to have to wear what she has on for now.

 Tessie told her on no uncertain terms, that she was not to ever change bodies with me if she didn't want to die!  

With that, both Letty and I decided that we were not ever going to switch.  Not safe to do so...

I am just going to plug along with my work on the trailer and Letty is going back to embroidery for a living.

I have to change saw blades before I can do the stairs. So, I figured that doing rock work would keep me busy for quite some time.

With Tessie back to her usual contrary self, I am going to keep working.

Zar is back since Letty left.  They didn't seem to get along too well.

At least, with Zar around, Tessie seems to stay calm and collected most of the time...

She has been amusing herself by sliding down the back end of the trailer, over and over.

She ended up in a heap on the floor a couple of times. Then she just zaps herself back to the starting position on the roof.

Zar talked her into just sitting and watching the building process. I think that things are kind of getting back to normal.  The two of them have had their heads together all afternoon...

The last I saw of them, they slid off of the end of the trailer and informed me that they were going to look for Spike. 

If the three of them get their heads together, I will be right back where I started before I started the trailer...

I do believe that I am in trouble again!  See you tomorrow.

Never Trust a Lable!

  I am doing the staircase by stumbling my way through it. 

I put a couple of the steps together this morning. 

I read the labels on my strips of wood.  Several of them were labeled "Stair Risers".

Evidently my interpretation is different than the manufacturer's.

I first noticed that they really weren't the right height when they were just sitting on my lap desk next to Kota...

I then put them in the tower... Nope Not right at all.  Tessie would have to crawl up them and hang on for dear life! They were about up to her knee! Yes, she's short. But not that short!

I am going to have to cut my own risers and start over. Rats!

They just aren't right height wise.  So much for reading labels!

 Tessie is not much help.  She was all for putting Mini Wax on her feet and walking up them.

I don't wish to be sued by a mini witch for injuries received whilst climbing my stairs!

She would win!

I am going to quit for today and start over tomorrow. It is just NOT my day.

Tomorrow I will start over and cut my own risers

Yes. I have another idea.  Probably more hair brained than todays effort.  I am going to have to make a run to the lumber yard tomorrow.

See you after my next try!