Building the club house

If Eric were not a doctor, I'm sure he would be a woodworker. If he were not a woodworker, I'm sure he would drive a bobcat. 

He rented a bobcat for the day and he was just giddy. He leveled the ground and dumped in all the gravel for the foundation.

Eric had been cutting and building pieces and assembling the framing in the garage all winter (2010). When he finally started putting his pieces together outside it was the rainy season so we had to keep it covered with huge tarps. It was quite a challenge to keep it covered when it got windy, but we did.

He was able to put the core of the house together fairly quickly (a few weeks) but the roof was a killer. There are so many angles and difficult roofing skills needed to roof this, Eric spent a lot of time on Youtube learning how. The roof took several hours and days to do. I was pretty sure he was going to fall and die so every day he was roofing was very nerve racking.

We paid a painter to come and spray the entire house inside and out with primer. He also sprayed the inside white, the front bright blue and the back the same color as out real house (so our neighbors would not complain). All the other painting the girls and I did.

Ruby and Lucy helped paint the inside and Haley helped paint the gingerbread on the outside.  There was so much painted and so many cans of paint I thought it would never be done.

The girls picked out the color scheme they wanted in side. Haley picked out all the fabric to cover all our mis-matched body pillows, bean bags and the futon. Ruby even sewed all the curtains.

We picked up several pieces of clubhouse sized furniture. This one we bought from a friend and painted it neon yellow. The other pieces Eric scored at a garage sale.

Most of the windows he ordered on line, but he made the bay window, front door window and windows on each side of the door.  

Eric put a lot of time and thought into everything. He wanted to make sure the kids would love it and use it. I'm sure they will.

To think that all this started with a 2 1/2 in stack of papers (the plans) and 5 pallets of supplies from Lowes.  Eric was able to negotiate a discount on the supplies by purchasing them all at the same time and having it delivered to our house. 

Since the clubhouse is all complete now, I will post the after photos soon!