Whimsy's Complete-ish

The lower windows were a breeze to put in, even if the windows on the north required some tetris-like puzzle solving. After that, we had to put in the upper windows. We'd designed a rather dramatic pitch to the roof so that the snow could slide off, but that left us with triangle shaped gaps on the east and west side of Whimsy that needed windows installed.

The mounting block served double duty as my stepstool.

Jay and I had found these amazing hinged windows that I wanted to install for air movement. Even without all of the windows in, Whimsy was holding a lot of heat during the day. Mom and I hung the first window, and built the frame around it. As you can see from the ratchet strap securing the window, that didn't work out so well.

Back to the drawing board. We took out the window and built a frame that would fit the space and hold all of the windows. Who knew doing it the correct way would be easiest?

The frame secured the hinged windows much better - no ratchet straps required!

I hung curtains in an attempt to keep the heat down.

We were left with odd shapes that would need to be filled in with something. Mom did some research and learned how to cut glass. It's stupidly simple, but also stupidly easy to break the glass when you get too cocky. I thought stained glass windows would look gorgeous on Whimsy, but the cost, plus the odd sizes meant that stained glass wasn't going to be an option. Bionic Cowgirl to the rescue again! While picking up the pieces of glass from the craft store, she happened upon some stencils and picked them up.

We measured the openings carefully, drew out what we needed on graph paper, and went to town on making our own windows. It was fun.

When it came time to put the windows up, I realized that even though we measured carefully, we didn't take into account the fact that we'd need some "wiggle room" to seat the windows without breaking them. Cutting glass is easy. Trimming already cut glass by 1/4" is not and I broke more than one window trying.

You can see where I scored the glass, and then it broke as I was trying to snap it off.

Dang it! Back to the craft store for more glass.

Eventually, I managed to get all of the east and west side windows in. It was definitely the most difficult part of the whole build.

I accidentally painted on the wrong side of the window,
so I slapped some Mod-Podge on it to protect it from the weather.

I broke the big window, so I just cut off the broken part,
cut a new end piece and framed it in.

Whimsy had complete windows in three sides, but I needed to do something with the upper windows on her south side. It was evident that in the summer, she gathered a lot of heat, and I didn't think that adding more glass was going to be a great idea. Instead, above each large window, I stretched some screen material across and installed solar-powered fans. The fans were smaller than I expected, but they've worked beautifully for moving air. They worked well enough that I bought a third one to use in our bedroom window during the summer.

Whimsy had everything except a door.

I had been stalling when it came to a door for Whimsy. I figured at worst, I could make one out of plywood (gross). I had a few windows left that we hadn't been able to find a home for, but I was in love with two of them and had to figure out how to use them.

I played around with the idea of turning them into a Dutch door. The more I thought about it, the more I fell in love with the idea. 

Did I have any clue whatsoever of how to build a Dutch door? Nope.

Had I any clue how to build a greenhouse when we started? Nope.

Why would I let a little thing like not knowing how to do something stop me? So I set about hanging the windows, one above the other to make my door.

I still needed to build up the frame on the right.

If you look closely, you can see the pomegranates.

Since not a thing on Whimsy is square, her door frame is more of a Franken-frame, but it works. I'll probably spend some time this summer fixing the frame so that it looks better. It was October before we got her door installed, and cold weather was right around the corner. I couldn't get my idea for the Dutch door to work the way I wanted it to, and we were running out of good weather. Jay and I just put a piece of wood across the inside of the door to join the two windows together and called it good.

The window above the door was the very last one of what we'd picked up at the beginning of the project and was the perfect size for above the door. With the big screens on each side of the door, I didn't feel bad about putting in more glass. But ... Whimsy needed something to finish her off (besides finishing the paint job). I had an idea for just the thing!

Mrs. Deejo has every craft tool known to (wo)man and I drew on her expertise to make Whimsy and the pomegranate girls signs.

I hung heavy duty plastic over the screens and all of the big windows, added a thick layer of mulch to the girls' tires, and covered it with black trash bags. Whismy and the girls were as ready for Winter 2023 as they could be.