This takes the prize for fiddly!

It was really exciting yesterday afternoon when the order from BJMiniatures arrived - only 10 days from placing the order!  This site has lots of lovely little accessories and furniture kits.  So I've spent the last two evenings assembling some of the furniture.

The first thing I did was to glue two bits of thin plywood together to make a base for the bed, since a normal bed won't fit in the upstairs gallery where my mini person wanted to sleep.  After it was well dry I rounded the corners just a little bit and added some Kleenex tissues to pad the timber base, and formed a double pillow from the tissue as well.  The rounded corners just make the finished corners easier to keep neat, and having the tissue to soften the wood base makes it more realistic when covered with a quilt.  One of the things in my BJMiniatures was a quilt printed with a pretty Baltimore design and having a green border that fitted the colour scheme well.  So I covered the bed with the quilt.  This bed will not easily be seen when the roof is on but what can be seen is pretty.  Here it is:

The colours in the photo are a bit washed out which is a pity, and you can't really see that the quilt tucks under the pillows and there is a dent to define the two pillows.  My mini person is quite happy with it.

Next I tackled a sofa, which came with fabric printed with tiny, tiny dark green checks.  In fact that fabric pretty well decided the colour scheme for the furniture.  It came in parts, made of plastic and you cover each piece as you assemble it.  Doing the front of the arms is fiddly but not too bad, probably because I've done similar things before.  I'm quite pleased with the way it came out.

I did the cushion out of left-over fabric.  I always think a cushion makes things more comfortable.

The other thing I did with some of the fabric was to make a window seat.  This was easy, just a piece of ply cut to the appropriate height, and a second piece of plywood to form the seat.  I padded the seat with Kleenex tissue again and covered it with the fabric, before gluing it to the support at right angles.  Then the whole thing was glued into the bay window.  It will be a nice comfortable place for my mini person to sit and daydream or read, or for visitors to sit and chat to her while she is cooking.

Sorry that the photo is a bit blurred :(

After doing those I tackled the kitchen, also from BJMiniatures.  This is a really nice little kitchen, having a fridge, stove and sink of course.  And it also has a kitchen island with two little stools.  Here are the pieces sort of in place, though I haven't as yet added the rings to the stove or painted the handles on the fridge.  There are taps to add to the sink as well.  Then tonight I did the island and the stools in front of it.  These stools are beautifully designed, but would have to take the prize for one of the fiddliest (is that a word?) thing to make.  I'm still not sure that I have the legs properly spaced or the ring between the legs even.  But here they are:

At this stage nothing is glued into place.  There are still the knobs to add to the cupboards and the finishing bits to do to the stove, fridge and sink.

After tackling the stools I was ready for something a bit less fiddly so I did the coffee table and console table that came in the kit with the lounge.  Don't know whether I'll use the console table in this house, but it certainly gives a nice place to put things.  I don't really want to use the space below the gallery because obviously the french doors would open inwards. But there is a space between the doors and the wall that could take the console table.

Now I have some decisions to make.  I don't like to have a house without a bathroom, even if it is a wall with a door in it, open or closed, to hint at the bathroom beyond.  But this house is a bit difficult to decide what to do about this.  Do I add a 'room' ?  It would have to go between the small window and the upstairs gallery if I do.  Or do I leave it as is and my mini person will just have to keep her legs crossed!!  What do you think?

The room could do with a carpet in the living room area, but nothing fancy I think.  I don't have anything appropriate at the moment.  The green rug I ordered from BJMiniatures is the wrong green for the lounge so not suitable.  Perhaps my mini person is one of the modern women who prefer to have bare boards for their flooring.

Now I have an idea what furniture will go in the cottage, I can make decisions about lighting.  I don't want to bury the wires too deeply after my experience with Woodnook Cottage, where it will mean digging the wires out to repair them.  

Hope you like the progress so far!

Blessings

Sandie

So very rusty!

What a long time it has been since I posted!  I thought that by now we would have packed up our house, sold it and moved and unpacked and got back to normal!  But we are still here due to family issues.  Still here but mostly all packed up so I haven't had access to most of my miniatures and supplies for over 18 months and although I was able to fill in the time with an English paper-pieced, hand-appliqued queen-size quilt called The Pemberley  (one of Katrina Hadjimichael's lovely designs, I go to one of her classes once a month and am now on my second quilt called 'Lambton' http://katrinahadjimichael.blogspot.com/) I have really missed having my mini fix!  The advantages of the hand applique is that I can sit and do it at night without creating a mess (once the individual pieces are prepared anyway).  Which has been a blessing to keep me from going completely barmy!

Finally I decided that enough was enough and when my Christmas present from my son arrived, I started on it.  It's the Little Duck House and base, from Petite Properties.  With most of our days at present ranging in temperature from the 30's C up to some in the mid-forties, I have set up a table in the lounge room and started working in air-conditioned comfort rather than my studio which has piles of packed boxes everywhere.

Of course being mostly packed up meant access to my glues, tools, accessories etc was either limited or non-existent.  They are either deep in the bowels of our huge storage shed or in boxes with other boxes on top and not necessarily labelled with the particulars of the contents.  I did list some but became distracted due to the rush of packing them.  So much to my chagrin I've had to buy new paints and a lot of new bits and pieces. 

But boy am I rusty!  I found that not only did I not follow my usual method of assembling a kit but I did things that made it more difficult in some ways, such as not painting the floors until the house was assembled.  Then I decided to use a method of 'plastering' the inside walls that I usually only used for 1/12th scale, which is to mix paint with talcum powder.  This gives a nice rough surface which would have been okay for the exterior but was a bit out of scale for the interior in 1/48th scale.  But it will have to do.  I've sanded it down a bit and did a couple more coats of paint to smooth it out somewhat and pushed on.

Then I did the outside walls with some interior filler so they have a rough, plastered look to them as well.  For a change I decided to paint the house and mixed Jade green with cream to produce a nice soft green.  All the trims are done in cream and it does look quite pretty.  I forgot to take photos of the house in progress but here it is at the stage it is now, with the windows and doors installed.  The front porch isn't attached yet because I want to paint and distress its roof first.

I did take photos of progress with the base though.  Here it is when first assembled.  The lego blocks are to keep the apertures for the house lined up exactly

Next step was to pad the openings of the pond and the exterior with newspaper to fill in the gaps.

This was covered with paper strips covered in glue - like papier mache, moulded and squished until it was pretty well the shape I wanted.

And over it all I did a couple of layers of interior finish, to give it more stability and strength.

I didn't pad the opening where the house will be, because the batteries can be tucked inside there when I light the house.  They can have a bit of double-sided tape on them to hold them in position so they don't fall out when the project is handled.

Once the whole base is painted dark brown (as per Bea's instructions) it doesn't look so messy and the brown gives a base for the landscaping later on.  I took this photo a bit later on, after I'd started to landscape the bottom of the pond.

Next I assembled and painted the walkway that goes around two walls of the house.  Because it is outside I distressed it a bit.

And here it all is at the moment, roughly in place.  Still have the exterior trims to add on a couple of bits.

I have decided to be very brave and tackle my first attempt at doing water instead of using the clear plastic supplied for the purpose with the kit.  Thanks Stephanie for the encouragement!  I've ordered some so I need to wait for that to arrive.  Along with numerous flower kits from sdk miniatures and furniture from BJ Miniatures, Debbie Young (Young at Heart) and other bits and pieces. I am a bit worried that if I leave it too long it will end up yet another ufo, so I hope the orders arrive soon!

Blessings,

Sandie

 

Happy Easter!

Hello dear readers!  I have been awol for a long time now.  In case you are wondering, it has mainly been due to health issues - mine and my family's.  I had bronchitis for several months last year and was just beginning to recover when my son became ill.  It turned out that he had to have his CV shunt renewed so he went into hospital for his 27th surgery on his brain.  We have been fortunate for the last 16 years that he has had a respite but for the first 10 years of his life he had lots of hospitalizations.  He has cerebral palsy and hydrocephalus and has two shunts from his brain to his stomach.  One of those shunts kept blocking and had to be renewed each time.  This last surgery had some complications and he had four weeks in hospital then another four weeks in rehabilitation.  Christmas was then on our doorstep and no minis of course during all that time.  After Christmas my darling husband Peter had increasing trouble and pain from his hip so finally he went to see about it and the result was a total hip replacement.  He is in rehabilitation now after the surgery.  So between looking after our son and visiting my DH, along with all the daily chores, life is very busy at the moment.  I certainly appreciate all that Peter normally does!  I have also been making twelve quilts for an Aboriginal school in Outback New South Wales, and they have to be completed by the end of this month.  Nine completely done, 3 tops done ready to quilt.  I will post photos of them when they are completed.  So please excuse me for not blogging lately - I hope to get back to minis when Peter is home and these quilts are done, and then I will post about what I am doing :)  I also hope that this year will see a larger studio being built for me in the back yard, by my brother.  More to come on that too.

In the meantime I want to thank you for hanging in there, I see that there are still some faithful followers checking out the blog and I'm sorry to disappoint you by not posting lately.  And I want to wish you and yours a very happy and blessed Easter.

I hope to 'talk' to you all soon!
Blessings,
Sandra

Here's to a wonderful 2017

I am looking forward to a much healthier and less stressful 2017, and wish all of you the same:  may it be filled with much happiness and many mini joys!

Hopefully there will be many UFOs completed and projects done right through to the end as well :)

Happy Christmas to you all!

I would like to wish you all a very happy Christmas (or whatever holiday you celebrate at this time of year).  May you all have a wonderful time full of love with friends and family.

Nearly finished....

Well, except for a lot of touching up and a couple of areas that I am very unhappy with.  I have spent whatever time I could squeeze into the studio over the last few days doing fiddly things and today I was able to put the last parts together.

However I am not happy with quite a few bits - the doors look messy, the roofing material on the larger dormer moved after I glued it on and I didn't realize until everything was dry.  And I messed up the wing roof sections by trimming what I thought was extra bits, only to find that they were then too small :(  I was able to cover up that mistake to some extent by putting in a strip of paper into the grooves where the roofs met, and painting them to match the roof - like flashing.  On the opening to the rear wing roof I had to cut away some more of the wood because the flashing solution wouldn't have worked there.

When I look at it closely I see so many areas that I'm not happy with, but they'll have to do.  And that's not like me at all.  However there's no way I can fix them so I'll just hope they aren't as glaringly obvious to others as they are to me.

Anyway, here are some photos of it now.

I love this view, it shows the windows in the side as well as both doors.

Front door still needs the shop sign and the 'open' sign attached

Rear view of the wing.  Love the door and balcony on the side of the main section

Rear view of main section.  The shop door wouldn't stay closed so it will stay open a little bit

The colours in the photos are a bit light.  In real life the blue is a bit darker but with the light on in the room and the flash working, it came out pale.  I will need to go over everything really carefully and touch up areas where the paint has had other colours go over it.  Today I decided I didn't like the colour of the roof and mixed another grey for that, and repainted it.  So that will probably need touching up and then distressing with lighter and darker colours.   Also, I need to paint the edges of the walls and touch up around the dormer windows where they attach to the house.

Those things are all very fiddly and will be time-consuming but they are necessary.  However at least while waiting for paint to dry I can start on the furniture kits.  I just love this little house!  I'm disappointed it wasn't my best work by far but when all the furniture and accessories are in it, they will distract the eye from its faults.

A quick look at 'Vignettes'

As I said before, Bella Rustica is part of a trio of buildings all with a French theme.   Bella Rustica is a shop and a pension with owner's accommodation, Le Lapin Saute is a restaurant with owner's accommodation and Vignettes, the smallest of the three is a shop selling kitchen accessories.

Here is a photo that I've scanned from one of the order sheets for the furniture and accessories.  I apologize for the quality of the photo, it was only a small one on the sheet so it is rather grainy now it's enlarged.

Trio of French-themed buildings on base, from Suzanne and Andrew's catalogue

I found where I had put Vignettes away and thought I'd share some photos with you.  I realized when I looked closely at it that there is a little bit to do to finish it, mainly adding bottles and plates to the shelves and units in the ground floor shop.

It's a sweet little building and I really enjoyed doing it.  Here is a front view,

You'll notice that there's a gelato stand that can go at the front too, here that is in closeup.  No, the top isn't on crooked, it's the way I hold the camera to take photos, they often end up looking a bit odd :(

the right side of the building

and now the left side.

An overvew of the open rear of the building.  Hmmm, I notice now that the door of the ground floor has come out again.  These doors are a pain!

A close-up of the 2nd (top) floor, where the owner's bed/sitting room is located.  I added the kitty to the chair in the bedroom - all my projects have to have a cat or more as you might remember.

A close-up of the 1st (middle) floor, where the owner's kitchen is.  I had to add another cat to this section :)

And one of the ground floor, showing it with all the shelving units in place.

A look at the left side of the shop.  These shelves need more bottles and plates added to them.

And a view of the right side.

Here's the shelving unit that goes in the right side

and here's the central shelving unit, ready for some more plates and bottles to be added (front view)

And the rear of the same shelving unit.  The empty shelf is supposed to be filled with vases, which are printies that you cut out and shape to give the illusion that they are fully formed, plus plates and platters.

It won't take too long to finish adding those bits and pieces and it will be ready to display.   I don't think I'll be buying the base that is shown in the first photo, which takes all three buildings plus has a park with fountain and seats much as I like it, because I also have a kit called 'La Belle Femme' which I think would go nicely with these three and I'll possibly make a base to take all four buildings.

No time to do anything on Bella Rustica or anything else for that matter, it's been a busy day.  So I'll get back to it on Sunday and hopefully will have it finished, or almost.  And I'll post photos then.

On a frustration scale of 1-10, Thursday scored

....around 20.  All because of the doors.  But first let's go back a bit.  I had a free day on Tuesday so tried to make the most of it, working on Bella Rustica.  I wasn't sure how long I'd last in the studio because the forecast was for 36degC and by time I arrived up there at something past 10 it was already 30 or so outside although it was cooler in the studio.

In the photos I showed you in the previous post, the top floor of the main section actually isn't glued in because I wanted access to the doors on the first (middle) floor, to put in the interior door frames and doors.  So today I took that floor out, and was glad I had left it loose because to fit them in that middle section was very frustrating indeed.  I thought one in particular - the frame of the door going from the hallway to the wing - was going to beat me for sure but finally realized the problem and fixed it.  Whew!  I can't see how I would have been able to do it though if I had already attached that floor above it.

After that I decided that I would stucco the exterior.  I know I had a really good reason for deciding that, when it is further down in the instructions, but I can't remember what is was now lol!  Anyway the interior filler that I used certainly dried quickly in the heat (and yes, it did get to 36, in fact to 37) so I didn't have to wait long for each wall to dry before I moved on to the next one.  Actually it dried so quickly that I could move on to another wall straight away without damaging the one just done.

 Then I did the exterior of the house with a dirty wash also as per instructions, and hoped I hadn't been too enthusiastic with the amount of  'grubbying up' I gave it.  Next morning I checked it out and it was okay.  In fact I might give it a bit more 'grubbying' later on.

In the end though it wasn't the heat but the lack of light that beat me.  The sky clouded over about lunchtime and by mid afternoon it was really poor light.  With the tarpaulins up on the verandah so I can move things from the studio out there to sort through and to hold while I empty the rest of the studio to re-organize it all, it was even worse light than it would otherwise have been and it was too hot to turn on the standard lamp or desk lamp I have  because of the extra temperature from those.  My LED ceiling light hasn't been installed yet because that will be part of the major electrical work that still has to be carried out.  At the same time we want to have an updated fuse box for the house, plus rewiring a couple of areas.  Big expense involved and we will try to get it done next year.

Nothing on Wednesday but today, Thursday, I was able to spend more time on it.  And a large part of the day was spent wrestling with inserting those frustrating doors.  I am not happy with the results, they look quite amateurish to me when I look closely but they'll have to do and that is not pleasing at all.  I hope that by the time I put the wooden interior frames around them, and add some lace to cover the doors, their shortcomings will be reasonably hidden.

Fortunately the windows went in quite easily.  I cut the 'glass' from a sheet of perspex that is provided in the kit, added them to the interior frames, then popped in the exterior frames.  And as always, the windows make an enormous difference.  It almost compensated for the poor results with the doors :)

I also fiddled with a few other bits and pieces, nothing that has been attached to the house yet.  Today was mercifully much cooler, temps only up to about 27deg C, with a nice southerly (cool) wind blowing so I was able to work with the lights on to cut the material for the window 'glass' and to see properly for everything else.

So..... here are some photos of progress so far.  First, here is the front, showing off those windows in the main front wall to advantage, with a view of the entrance to the wing on the left.

And a view of the side, with the door to the shop on the right.

Here's a closer view of the door to the shop and the door to the wing.  The balcony for the wing window on the upper floor still needs to be attached, as does the roof with its dormer.

And here is a close-up of the side of the main part, showing the shop door,

and one of the front of the wing, showing the entrance to the pension.

Here's the rear of the wing,

I am still not quite following the instructions because I haven't attached most of the roofs yet, to enable access so I can do the trim around the door on the top floor of the main building, and also put in the railings around the stairs without the roof getting in the way.

However I have glued on the rear roof of the wing.  If you can see through the hallway on the right, you will notice that I still haven't managed to put in the door from the main building to the wing on that first floor.  Or the door to the bathroom.

So there it is so far.  What else have I done?  Painted the railings and the trim for the doors, the pieces that go under the double door on the first floor of the wing to make the balcony, and the door on the side that also forms the balcony for that side.  And I've started to cut out the roofing material to go over the wooden roofs.  Still a lot to do, and all of it quite fiddly but it's getting there.  More soon!

At last some photos to share with you...

It has taken me over a week to get to the stage where it is worth taking any photos of my progress with Bella Rustica, the quarter scale kit from Suzanne & Andrew.  It is one of three buildings, described as 'A Quarter Scale Shop and Pension'.  I have finished Vignettes, another of the trio, and will also share photos of that soon - I just need to make sure all the pieces are together where I packed them away so long ago :(.

Here is a photo of Bella Rustica, from Suzanne & Andrew's site:

Photo from Suzanne & Andrews Miniatures

The whole ground floor of the main section of 'Bella' is a shop, full of miscellaneous items with a French twist: a fabric and ribbon cabinet, French chair, Rose floor clock, Bench with French pillows, store cabinet full of accessories, and 'Ode to Paris' corner cabinet and so on.

There is a wing that goes off the main section.  The ground floor in the wing is the guest lounge and check-in area.  The first floor has guest accommodation in the main part,  and the guest dining area in the wing while the second floor has the owner's suite in the main section and another tiny guest room in the wing.

The first step in construction is to prepare and paint all the windows and doors - and there are quite a few of these - plus the stairs and railings.  So the first day was taken up with doing the primer coat on these, and a coat of flat white spray as suggested.

The second step is to paint the ceilings, which I did while the coats of primer and spray paint were drying.  The third step is to wallpaper the building.  Now I know a lot of people do wallpaper quarter scale buildings before construction but I've always preferred to build first and wallpaper afterwards except for bits that absolutely have to be done as you go because you won't be able to reach them later.  However for this kit I decided to follow the instructions and wallpaper first.  But when I first began doing minis I was taught to always give at least one coat of white paint over all the areas that are going to be wallpapered and this is a habit that has stuck with me, so after sanding everything thoroughly I gave all the areas to be papered a coat of sanding sealer and then a coat of white paint.  I do feel that the white paint underneath makes the colours in the wallpaper show up better.  But even if it doesn't, that's the way I was taught and I find it impossible to shake the habit.   that's what I did to the walls that would be papered.  That and painting the ceilings and the plastic pieces with their final coats of paint took all the time I had on the second through the fourth day.

On Sunday I finally had almost a full day to work on it and I finally got to Step 2 - wallpapering.  That felt like progress!  It's still only the end of spring here but we've had some warm weather: Friday reached 38deg C, in the studio which was a bit cooler than outside because it's so well insulated.  Sunday was 30degC in the studio but was humid because we had had lots of rain on Saturday night.  I also had to keep the door open because the smell of the paint was a bit strong in there after it being shut up all Saturday.

However with the heat the glue on the wallpaper certainly dried well and by the afternoon I was able to start putting the pieces together.  Here are some pictures of it at that stage:

Overview looking at open side of main structure

Main back, with open side of wing

Main front, entrance to wing can be seen on left

Wing side, looking towards the shop door on right

View of interior of shop, which takes up the whole ground floor of the main buildin

Interior of first floor of main building - guest bedroom on left, bathroom and stairway on right