A Treehouse, a little you-and-me house

I'm ever amazed when couples book the treehouse knowing the temps will dip into the twenties. While I was in Louisville at Spalding's MFA in Writing residency, H hosted Mike and Ivania . Mike is from Minnesota and Ivania is San Salvadorian, and they met in Korea, where they taught English. They had just landed stateside and were looking for a bit of adventure before figuring out the next path to take. They arrived around dinner time on Thursday, which meant H had to miss hockey night with the guys. Mike felt so bad that he and Ivania took him out to dinner at the Bobcat. They slept soundly in the treehouse and in the morning Ivania padded up the forest trail in slippers and pajamas, her sleeping mask dangling around her neck. She helped H serve the continental breakfast, and afterward they cleaned up the dishes together. The second night was colder, and the couple hung out in the guest room until the wee hours before heading out to the treehouse with flashlights. H said the

A few love birds have nested in the Fern Forest Treehouse, beginning with Karrie and Isaac, who came up from Mystic CT to celebrate their third wedding anniversary. Karrie is a vegan, and in the morning we had a basket ready, decorated with anniversary ribbons and filled with vegan scones, vegan yogurt and fresh fruit. They took the basket back to the treehouse and had a picnic on the deck while they watched the sun rise over Mt. Abe. Newlyweds Ryan and English wife Jacqueline spent a night of their honeymoon with us and left us with wedding favors of British tea, which was delicious. H tried really hard to get the eggs soft-boiled just right for Jacqueline so that she could dip toast "soldiers" in the runny yolk, but, alas, his culinary skills where soft-boiling is concerned are in the embryonic stages. But he's practicing for Jacqueline's next visit. We didn't have egg cups, either, but Jacqueline taught us to perch the eggs in shotglasses, which we do have. Nee

Thought you'd like to meet a few of the folks who've visited Linc oln, Vermont, to stay in H's treehouse. It took three summers to build the treehouse with son Will: They picked a grove of tall maples and started with the platform. As you can see from the picture, there's a ramp to the building, but the property falls off so that the treehouse is 30 feet in the air. The sleeping loft is another nine feet over the living space. Thank goodness Will used a harness to hammer the metal roof on. The treehouse is insulat ed and has heat and electricity so that it's cozy even when the temp dips below freezing. And because it's in the trees, it stays cool in the summer. Our first gue sts came in June '09 from Germany. Frank is a doctoral student in comparative literature and his girlfriend Friederike studied in the states and works for an American company in Stuttgart. They speak impeccable English and Frank's 6'5" frame fit nicely in the treehouse lof