So I installed the 2nd floor foyer flooring:

I'll put cherry-stained trim here. I finished trimming the staircases, so they are ready to install:

I used some decorative ribbon that I had bought in a Christmas sale a few years back; it was wired along the sides but I pulled the wires out and it worked pretty well. I used 1/8" dowel to form the body of the stair rods, with small beads strung on the clipped-off end of a sewing pin on each end; the dowel was very splintery so it was difficult to make starter holes in the ends for the pins, but I managed to have at least one side of the finished rod presentable... Those decorative flourishes along the sides are parts of stickers; the stickers were originally silver-colored but I went over them (loosely) with a gold paint pen to give them some visual interest and to match the wallpaper better.

I broke out the egg carton so that I could finish the fireplaces; I tried something different this time-- instead of coloring the egg carton before cutting it, as Victoria Miniland and others do, I pasted on my stones and colored them, with a combination between dirty washes and dry-brushing, afterwards. I dunno-- six of one, half-dozen of the other, seems to me. I guess the good thing about coloring first, is that it's easier to avoid too much uniformity that way... I used my recipe for Mod Podge that I found on the internet a few years back- three parts white school glue, one part water, several good spoonfuls of semigloss sealer; I applied two coats to the stones before grouting but the whole thing will still need a final coat of sealer-- satin, as opposed to semigloss, I'm thinking. I also tried something different with the grout; I had used joint compound mixture for the egg carton stone on my contest houses (and applied it with a cake decorator tip), but it was heavy, coarse and a bit unwieldy. So I tried mixing up light-weight spackle with a bit of water and some paints, and it worked pretty well; I had used my last bag from the cake decorator kit so I just cut a suitably-sized hole in a sturdy plastic bag that I had sitting around and that was just as good. I had to keep poking a length of wire through the cake decorator tip because the mixture would dry out on me a little, but it worked pretty well all in all.

I went ahead and installed the bookcase (which included installing the fireplace), and the flooring, in the parlor. I also assembled the left chimney; I am still thinking about how to finish the chimneys, with those slotted parts complicating things...

I'm finishing up the parlor ceiling; I used my trick that I used for the Willowcrest parlor ceiling, with partitioning the ceiling paper and making a grid out of stripwood:

I think I'll install the interior front door frame, and then the parlor ceiling, and then start on installing the 1st floor staircase. I have cut out a wall for the understair, and I am thinking that the power strip might have to be located there...