Looking for an illustrated children’s book (perhaps 12″x”12 and ~48 pages) about a group of kids who discover and clean out an old abandoned cabin in the woods and fix it up, paint it in vibrant colors and decorate it. I read it at my public library in Vancouver, Canada in c1974 and remember it being full color on all pages so am guessing it was published in the early ’70s. I can’t recall the title or the author. That book was so magical because the kids had a secret playhouse in the woods that no one knew about. There was no adversity/bad in the book that I recall (other than overcoming the shed’s dilapidated condition) and I believe it ended with the kids hosting a party there?????
Thank you in advance for your efforts to figure out what the book was.
The Deserted Cottage by Eileen Heming ?
This is actually a chapter book about a group of children who find a cottage in the woods and do it up
They furnish it with household items bartered for doing odd jobs for people in the village.
It is a secret until they get stuck there during a thunderstorm and then their parents find out and they do have a party in the last chapter…
Roy, Maggie-Ann, Tim, and Baby Loo
The storyline is very similar?