Carousel Part 22-Sanded Floor also Photos from the Cabin and Folk Art Walking Sticks

I've made some incremental progress on the carousel.  The floor of the base has been sanded with 100 grit and 350 grit sand paper.  It is now much smoother than it was.  There are still a couple of spots I may go over one more time today.  The problem is that the thickness of the wood strips is not the same on all the strips.  On something this small, a millimeter is noticeable. However, overall I think the sanding went quite well.  The edges rounded out better than I expected also. 

A coat of gesso has been painted over the wood glue that I used to fill in the gouges the cutting blade made in the base.  It filled in nicely and sanded to a smooth finish.  I won't paint the trim until after I stain the floor.  I think that will get to that tomorrow.  This section is not as exciting as creating the menagerie animals, but taking the time to get it done right will yield good results in the finished piece.  I think that once the base is stained and varnished that it will change the look of the piece in an amazing way.

Just to keep the blog from being a bore to read I'm adding a couple of pictures from my last trip up to the cabin.  The forsythia was in bloom and it was beautiful.  Also, I've included a close up view of one of the walking sticks created by folk artist Ray Mabe.