The Log Cabin

When I was 8 or 9 I entered a log cabin that my dad and I had built into the county fair. It won first place! And then, at the state fair, it placed 10th (dead last). I didn't care--I was pretty proud of my 10th place ribbon!

I can't be 100% sure about this, but I am guessing it was my dad's idea to build a miniature log cabin. We went down to Red River and picked out the perfect sized tree branches to use as the "logs." We constructed it onto a small piece of plywood, drilling each log into its perfect place. I remember doing about half of it by myself, but then Dad got tired of me breaking all of his drill bits. This little cabin was so thought out--it had a door that opened and closed, two windows (plexiglass!), and a roof that you could take off in order to look inside! That inspired me build furniture for my little cabin. All by myself, using tools that no 9 year old should ever use without supervision, I built a table, 4 chairs, a bed, a bookcase (equipped with about 15 books!), and a "bear" rug. I even used fabric to make a tablecloth, and made a quilt AND pillow for the bed.

After my 10th place cabin came back from the state fair, I refused to play with it. It was NOT a toy--it was a work of art. So it sat at my parents' house for about 15 years, occasionally getting picked up and moved just to get it out of the way. A few weeks ago my parents came to visit us and they brought my log cabin with them! It still had the 10th place ribbon inside, too! Some of the chairs were missing legs but I was able to glue them back on pretty easily. Other than that it hadn't changed a bit. I looked through the "books" and died laughing. I had forgotten that I had painted them and given most of them [misspelled] titles!

This little cabin is the perfect sized dollhouse, and, after all these years, I decided I was ready to let someone get some enjoyment out of it. Ali.

She was so excited and asked if she could repaint the furniture. My instinct was to say "NO!" because it didn't want anything about it to change. I mean... those original pieces of furniture are my memories, right!? How silly! They're just earthly things and someday they'll get broken, lost, and will even rot away, so I decided I might as well let her have some fun. So she painted all the furniture. The bed is now red and purple. The table is black and brown with brown chairs. And the bookcase is is white, blue, and orange (I think!). She repainted some of the books too. Her barbies have quite a colorful house, now! It's so surreal to see her playing with these things that I made with my own hands when I was just a year or so older than she is now! It's so weird to think that when I was 9 years old I was building a toy that I would someday give to my daughter. Whoa!!!

Painting one of the books =)

So here it is, my 10th place prize winning log cabin:

See, the door actually works!