What a difference a door makes!

It's been quite a while since I gave an update on the studio, because even though we've been busy there wasn't much to see.  I have been painting, painting, painting until it seemed it would never end.  But there was nothing to show for it because it was all painting in preparation for future use.  I was becoming very discouraged and down about it, and quite frustrated (to put it very mildly indeed) about the lack of apparent progress.  We had reached the stage where it was difficult to progress much further until the ceiling was completed.  Peter and I couldn't do that by ourselves and my brother Terry has been so very busy that he has been unavailable. In spite of promising a couple of times to come and help it didn't eventuate.

Peter built a cabinet for the sink that will go into one corner.  It is ready to have the counter top put onto it.  I can't find a stain colour that I like though, they are all too red or too yellow, too dark or too light for the effect I want.  We haven't put a door on yet until we can get the two desks around here from storage and work out whether the placement I have worked out for them will in reality be okay.  And I can't get my old desk out and strip it off to re-finish it because it has a large dollhouse sitting on it and I have nowhere to put that until there's a suitable surface in the studio.  And I can't finish off the shelves until the ceiling is finished......And so it goes on and on and on in circles!  Can you see why I was so frustrated?

In the meantime I painted.  And painted.  And painted.  How can such a small building need so many parts to be painted?!! And because I am doing all the painting myself and by hand it takes forever.  The days start off at around anything from 3-4degC up to 7degC, many of them lately with a heavy frost.  By the time the frost melts or the heavy dew dries enough to work outside it is around 9am and I can go out and remove the tarpaulins that have covered things overnight.  Some days it has been windy - the cold westerly August winds came early and they are bitterly cold.  And when they blow the paint dries almost on the brush.  But by about 11 am the sun is pleasantly warm, with the temperatures in the teens and the day is lovely - unless the wind is blowing.  By 4pm though it is time to pack up and call it a day, and the sun sets around 5pm.  By then it is cold again.

Peter bought the composite wood covered with melamine that we are using for shelves across the back wall.  I wanted this because I've had my fill of painting.  They are cut to size and ready to assemble into the shelves and we were ready to do just that this Sunday but when we arrived home from a business meeting at the church on Saturday night my brother Terry was at our place, ready to help us for the next couple of days - whoo hoo!!

So on Sunday we got the rest of the ceiling installed. And with that step the room became a room instead of a shed.  It also means that once we do the trim around the edge of the ceiling to cover the join between the ceiling and the wall we can go ahead with putting up shelves.

On Monday he hung the door and installed the windows.  The door doesn't have the hardware on yet because we had the wrong tunnel lock for it but we've changed that today so it will soon have a working handle, and a security lock (deadlock) as well.  The windows will have their handles put on when we have done the interior stop pieces etc.

And here it is now.

The railings aren't fitted yet, Peter just put them there this morning to check the fit.  I want them to be lower than they are in this photo.  On the garden seat at the right you can see the fancy pickets, one of which will go in each section.  The rest of the pickets will be plain white ones.  The exterior trim on the windows and doors still has to be done too, obviously, as does the corner trim..

Peter and I can now go ahead and add the trim to cover the join between the wall and the ceiling.  I will give Peter the honour of punching in the nails in the ceiling and painting that - I'm not permitted up ladders because of my problem with dizziness.

We can add the architraves around the windows and doors.  I've already painted those, they'll just need touching up afterwards.  And we can add the skirting boards after I paint those too.  They will just be simple strip wood ones, nothing fancy.  Then finally we'll be able to lay the vinyl flooring and I'll be able to start moving things in there.

Things like finishing the gardens, bedding in the railway sleepers properly, doing more planting out, and finally landscaping with some sort of gravel or crushed granite for a path and area under the seat and around the garden beds will be ongoing projects, as will be the completion of the exterior.  Once I can get the furniture out of storage I will be working on re-furbishing that, then on moving my minis in there and getting them organized.