224 slats floating in the air

Hello all wonderful Flackett-Levin Family Treehouse blog enthusiasts!  Here are some pictures.

224 Slats!

The rope bridge wood was completed only moments ago. 224 slats 360 feet of cable slung across the valley and countless hours of Josh and Jamin's tireless work has brought us to the point where we can begin assembling the rope bridge. Today we will also tighten the cables between the diamond plates in preparation to hoist the rope bridge floor.




















Were getting really excited to get the bridge up. The netting is on order and were in good standing. We are going to be pouring concrete footing soon for the zip line platform and entry stairs into the Frequency 0.



















We will try to post more often as we are now getting into the final steps of the project. Bridge, frq. 0 steps, rope ladder into the sphere, and finishing details!

Zip Zip Hooray!

We've been making some great progress the last few days. We are happy to say that our first ever frq. 0 is hanging happily in the majestic woods back of the mountain house. The floor is quite large and we are imagining a large game of twister being played on it in the future...

We also had some trial runs on the zipline. It wasn't quite exciting enough so we have it nice and tight now. Jen was a thoughtful mother as she reminded us all that we are creating the zipline for the kids and not ourselves, we wish it was for us but we want to quell any jitters so the kids can have a zooming time!

We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of Josh who will be replacing Corey who had to return home about a week and a half ago due to the loss of a close friend. We are excited to have a full team again so we can keep on track!

We had some arborists come this week to take out all of the dead branches throughout the backyard and now there is a full, green, bright canopy enveloping all of the treehouse goodness!

All of the wood for the rope bridge is here and we have the long task of staining, sealing, cutting and drilling it all this week. It is the most exciting part of the build though, getting ready to install the bridge, seeing it all come together to create a forest hideaway.

So far we are all fairly unscathed. Dustin has had a bad bought of Poison Oak and is suffering quite badly from it. He has also received a couple spider bites, but they didn't turn out anywhere near as bad as Corey's which brought him to the hospital. Elyse had bronchitis for a while and had a bit of a scare today as a large metal clamp was unintentionally launched at her face, cutting above her eye. Jamin and Wade have been fine... so far (cross your fingers). 

So... can you picture it? We can. This will be the trajectory of the main connecting rope bridge. Today was an exciting day as we now have two free floating platforms to stand in. All that wood you saw in the last posting is transforming into the frequency O platform. Its a lot of wood to haul to the back of the valley but Elyses' strong back is getting the job done.





























There is a new development regarding the entry into the treehouse world. Instead of a rope bridge entry into the treehouse there will be a swirling staircase that will intercept the main ropebridge at the entry into the spherical treehouse. This will give the treehouse goer many options upon entering the treehouse fantasy. Go left to the diamond shaped treehouse or go right to the spherical treehouse or decide you don't like treehouses because you remember your afraid of heights and you'ed rather be standing on the ground.















Were all looking forward to getting started on the rope bridges and connecting the two structures. After the completion of the frq. O deck this will be the next mission. So stay tuned in.

Home Sweet Home

So we haven't posted in a while and, unbeknownst to us, Mark has alerted us to the fact that he has 'legions of people' around the country reading the blog! This is wonderful, we had no idea anyone outside of the family was checking up on us...

The Flackett-Levin family journeyed back to the Beverly abode last week looking very rested from their East Coast escapades. We are very happy to have them back and it was refreshing to have some new faces around as its been our team here alone and we needed some revitalizing. Finn and Franny have been very loyal to offering their help, though it is hard to find tasks safe and satisfying for them. Their enthusiasm has been more help then they know, according to Finn when you see the treehouse you 'just might be amazed'! We were recently told that the treehouse has a tall order to fill as we must be ready to roll for Franny's birthday, but we'er excited about the idea of a bunch of kids exploring our creation. Mark and Jen have been wonderful about offering up new ideas and it has been great how interested all of their visiting friends have been (can't wait till you all get to see it finished!)

As far as the treehouse we have been concentrating on finishing the frq.2 so it probably doesn't look like we've made much progress in the pictures but their are a lot of little tweaks to make it perfect. We purchased and stained all of the wood for the frq.0 and will be starting on cabling the second treehouse and installing the floor this week. There have been much ideation this week with Mark and we have made some changes. A new entry system for the frq. 2 is being developed and we're entertaining some new zipline locations.