Lucky Winner!

Legos and Other Little Things....

A Few weeks ago, Dear Readers, I was lucky enough to be the Winner of Noelle's giveaway on her blog Nono mini Nostalgie! I could not believe my good fortune to win her teeny tiny mini Lego set! My sons' favorite toys were Legos (and we still have a big box of them!) so I was enchanted to see them in mini on Noelle's blog. But for some reason our emails would not connect to each other... so after a couple of tries both ways I put my mailing address on her comments so she could send me the prize. It worked and the little package arrived last week in my mailbox. I tell you, I am always amazed that a little parcel can cross the Ocean and reach its destination without mishap!

But here it is!!! 

The little box itself is a tiny wonder...!

But the contents are beyond amazing!

Can you believe how perfect these tiny Legos are?

I feel so Lucky to have them!

Thank you, Noelle, for sharing your treasures!

They are Awesome!

And in another way I also feel very lucky, Dear Readers,

 because I have had a few alarming set-backs

 with my stone floor for The Dollmaker's Studio....

which might have turned out alright after all!

You might recall that I had showed the floor

 with the newly applied grout all dry and ready for "dirtying up"....

The pale color of the dry grout was too new and

 clean looking for such an "old" stone floor!

So I mixed up a watered down acrylic mix of brown and black

 and began to brush it onto the floor, 

planning to wipe most of it off the stones 

but leave the grout a darker shade.

I started in the back corner where it would naturally be very dirty...

and quickly realized I had not swept off the dry grout residue

 from the original application.

 It would be too gritty if I didn't clean it first.

So I did a little careful sweeping... 

only to realize that the grout was lifting out of the cracks...!!

Yikes! That was not supposed to happen!

Since most of the grout was still in the cracks,

 I decided to go ahead with the "dirtying" process... 

and fill in gaps later if necessary.

You will understand if there are no pictures of this part of the process...!

As I brushed on the dirty water.... 

the grout just melted... 

apparently it had dried to dust!!

 It was really very alarming....! 

So I just "dabbed on" the color... 

and wiped it off with a paper towel... 

and where the grout "lifted" I smeared it back into the cracks 

with the wet paint mixture...

And then I let it dry.... again....!

I could not get the paint tones to mix carefully.... 

it was scrub and dash and smoosh and dab....

Yikes!!!

Here it is part way dried....  

At this point I couldn't be sure

 if I was going to have to scrub it ALL off and start over.

So the next morning I had a closer look

 once the "grout" was dry again.

I was planning all along to add a sealer coat of matte varnish, 

and decided to give it a try

 in spite of the gaps and the uneven colors..... 

it is supposed to be an Old floor after all.

Of course, the newly applied varnish 

just adds a milky looking glossy sheen.... 

so it is really hard to tell how it will look when dry....

But at this point I was telling myself 

that I could just  cover the whole floor with a carpet....

(possibly part of the plan anyway...!) 

so who cares how it looks?

(Yes, I Know.... I would know anyway....)

So I let it dry and refused to look at it for a couple of days!

And when I did look at it again,

 I scuffed the tiles a bit with a scrubbing sponge.....

 and decided that they might not look so bad after all!

There are a couple of spots where I will 

"repair" the missing grout with a paintbrush....

 

Somehow, Dear Readers,

 the floor seems to have turned out alright....

and I guess I am starting to feel like 

I'm a Lucky Winner after all!