Is It June Already?

Hi, everyone!

After my afternoon visiting my lilac friends at Highland Park, I went right back to helping Uncle Steven on the tree house!  The next job was putting in the windows! Aunt Kara helped get the first one in place, then Grandma and I held it tight against the frame while Uncle Steven fastened it from the outside.  It was a good thing he had the scaffolding to work from!  After both of the south windows were in place, I wanted to go out and sit on the scaffolding.  Of course, Grandma made sure I had the safety harness attached!

Thomas’ birthday was just four days after James’ birthday.  He wanted to have Grandma’s custom topping pizza for his birthday dinner, too!  Grandma had an appointment on Thomas’s birthday and wouldn’t be back in time to make and bake the pizzas.  I helped Grandma put together a kit of all the ingredients, so Uncle Steven could assemble and bake the pizzas at Thomas’ house.  Thomas got a geode kit and a butterfly garden for his birthday, and a hat to wear when he kayaks with Grandma!  He asked for cupcakes, instead of a birthday cake, and blew out his birthday candle with one breath!

The next morning, I was back at Thomas’ house to help Uncle Steven attach the trim boards on the tree house!  He nailed the corner trim pieces together to make them easier to attach.  He attached all the trim he could reach from the tree house deck or the scaffolding on the south side.  After that, he had to move the scaffolding to the west side of the tree house to reach the rest.  That was a big job!  Since there were tree branches nearby, he had to thread the scaffolding in between them!  The bottoms of the scaffolding pipes were clogged with dirt, so they wouldn’t slip over the tops of the other sections.  Uncle Steven and Grandma took turns banging on the pipes with a hammer to get the clods out!

In the afternoon, Grandma and Grandpa and I went out to the bay, because Joe-san and Nancy-san were bringing Moose-san and Tilly out to spend the weekend with me!  I was really glad they were coming when the azaleas were blooming!  We have a tradition of eating at least one meal on the porch next to the azalea when it is blooming!

Friday evening we all went to the Point to watch sunset.  Then on Saturday, I took Moose-san and Tilly for a walk in the woods to meet my May apple and Jack-in-the-pulpit friends. I always like to see the azaleas and enkianthus in full bloom!  The enkianthus gets more sun, now that the maple tree by the kitchen is gone!

Joe-san and Nancy-san took Moose-san and Tilly home on Sunday after lunch, but Grandma and Grandpa and I stayed at the bay until Monday.  There was a pretty sunrise on Monday!  Grandma went to the garden store and bought basil plants for the bay and impatiens for Fairport.  I helped her plant the basil before we went back to Fairport.  Then Grandma planted the impatiens in the window box in front of where I like to sit.  Last year, they grew so tall I needed to sit on a box to see over them!

On Tuesday, I caught up with the progress on the tree house!  Uncle Steven had installed the deck railings on the east and south sides of the deck.  The tree house door had a doorknob and lock!  I helped Uncle Steven mark the places each piece of siding would go with a story pole, marked to account for the overlap of the siding boards.  Then he used those marks to make measurements for the siding pieces.  Once he had cut them to length, Grandma and Aunt Kara painted them.  I made sure to stay out of the way of the wet paint!  I did help find places for all the freshly painted pieces to dry.  They were all over the garage!

While the paint was drying, Uncle Steven took more measurements for the siding pieces that would need notches or angled cuts to fit around windows or go on the gables.  Thomas climbed up on the scaffolding to inspect!  Then we had another inspector — a big toad!  Thomas made friends with him by tickling his belly.

On Wednesday,  Grandma and I stacked all the painted siding that was dry and ready to install.  Then Uncle Steven cut the rest of the angled and notched pieces so Aunt Kara could paint them later.  On Thursday, Uncle Steven set up the compressor for the pneumatic nail gun right under the tree house.  None of the notched or angled pieces had had their second coat of paint, so Uncle Steven couldn’t work on the west side of the tree house first.  I helped him attach all the siding we could on the east and north sides of the tree house.

Friday was cold and rainy all day!  Grandma and Grandpa both went out to lunch with friends.  I was happy to stay home!  Saturday was a nicer day!  Uncle Steven sided the west wall of the tree house.  He wanted to make sure that all the siding nails went into studs and none of them stuck out on the inside of the tree house.  James and I watched from the inside of the tree house as Uncle Steven used the nail gun from the outside.  There was only one nail that had to be replaced!  Thomas found yet another way to get up to the tree house!

On Sunday morning, Grandma went to church service in person for the first time since the pandemic started.  Then we went back out to the bay and Uncle Steven’s family decided to join us.  Because Monday was a Memorial Day and a school holiday, they could stay overnight.  Grandma let me wear Uncle Bill’s dog tags to remember him on Memorial Day weekend.  The white azalea was in full bloom and we had a pretty sunset.  Thomas had been watching the caterpillars in his butterfly garden become cocoons, so he made one for himself, too!  James got to stay up late playing a video game, and so did Uncle Steven.

Yesterday, I helped Uncle Steven put the balusters on the east side of the tree house.  Balusters are the upright pieces the fit between the top and bottom railings.  First, Uncle Steven cut all the balusters to the proper height, then he used a jig he’d made to drill the tops and bottoms in the proper places.  After that, he started all the screws so the balusters were ready to attach.

Once the ballusters were ready, it didn’t take long to attach them!  Uncle Steven had made a spacing board to move along as he attached the balusters.  Grandma and I were in charge of clamping each baluster in place, once it was spaced properly, so Uncle Steven could screw it in.

Uncle Steven was done with jobs we could help with by early afternoon.  Grandma took me to Highland Park to see my blooming rhododendron friends.  I liked all the colors!  I’m glad the gardeners at Highland Park don’t need to put up fences around all those plants to keep deer from eating the blossom buds!

This morning, Grandma and I helped Uncle Steven attach all the siding to the south side of the tree house!  Uncle Steven moved the scaffolding back to the south side after he was completely done caulking the siding on the west side.  I could help hold up siding pieces from the end of the deck while Uncle Steven leveled them and attached them from the scaffold.  Now the tree house has its permanent protection from rain.  That’s a good thing, because it’s supposed to rain again tonight and tomorrow!

Love,

Lion-san