This week the window trim and door trim goes in. The floors will be sanded, and there will be another layer of marine coat applied to much of exterior and part of the interior.

The marine coat is essential because it is so very wet here. It is difficult to appreciate how the wetness permeates everything, coats everything. Condensation like what happens on a cocktail glass can happen on cloth and furniture and walls. With marine varnish, it will not get into the wood or bamboo – and bamboo is a grass. It is more like paper than wood in some ways, even though it is very strong.

When we made some alterations in the two doors we bought for the shower and bathroom with the fancy glass inserts, we discovered they are paper thin veneer over particle board. Our carpenter found them and apparently didn’t think to ask about their composition. He knew they were veneer but not the rest. Particle board will disintegrate here. We cannot return the doors, and spent far too much money on them to consider another option at this time. So we will coat them with so much marine varnish they will be fossilized and perhaps they will survive.

Robert is over there now planing boards for the trim, and Andy and Mark are ripping them and sealing up the window and door frames. I tend the dogs and work on the web site. The dogs now go up the stairs at the treehouse, but cannot quite make it down, and try anyway. So, mom here has to manage the perilous adventures of the pups. They follow me wherever I go, so my time at the treehouse is limited for now.