New......

And Not So New..... Progress!

It was a busy weekend in my RL World, Dear Readers, with the removal of the last Christmas decorations and the Beginning of a major refurbishing of one of the bedrooms in my house, so not much got done on the mini houses. But whenever I say that, I often discover that I got more done than I thought I did! Since the Christmas Trees have been taken down, the Doll Houses have been shuffled around again, and it suddenly feels as though there is a Lot of room, and the new positions of the houses makes it easier to see what needs to be done. So I started to "chip away" at the problems I was having with the Willowcrest. The windows continue to be the most obvious sticking place when it comes to moving forward with this building! Above you can see the kitchen window from the exterior, after I had already added the cross pieces at the bottom of the windows where they abut the sill. I could not find a good picture from before.... but I had already decided that it looked too unrealistic to leave them with no "bottom" to the windows! And to make matters worse, this window was originally constructed with the exterior sill sitting above the level of the window openings so that it would show from the interior and look awful! (It must be a mistake in the kit design!)

This picture shows the interior view (or it would if it was lit well enough... sorry about that!) where you can see the window sill and the added pieces at the window bottoms when looking out from the inside.

And since the kitchen wall still has not been attached, 

you can see it better here.... along with the larger pieces I am adding 

on the interior to hide both the exterior pieces.

And testing it with the sink I plan to use in this kitchen...... 

before adding the interior window sill.....

Which you can see here.

And I think it looks okay, even though it would look better

 if I had realized before adding the muntins...

that the windows would need an extra "bottom" piece.

But it turns out that once the sink is positioned in front of the window......

you can't see much of the sill anyway!

And while I had the sink out, I glued all its pieces on too!

And while I was adding the fiddly little pieces to the windows....

 

I also added the cross bars and muntins to the cellar windows.....

although here, I decided that there was not enough room 

at the bottom to add the window bottoms.

Probably not noticeable to anybody else....

But I think it looks strange... and will probably

 hide it behind a bush when the house is finished!

And here you can see a test run of the kitchen stove....

Not a new piece, but I haven't shown it here yet!

It resembles the stove in my RL kitchen.....

because this house resembles my RL house in the basic layout, 

so I decided to use that to influence some of the design choices for this project!

Here you can see the mini stove on top of the RL kitchen stove!

The rooms in this kit are really quite small.....

just like the ones in my RL house....

You start to notice that as soon as you try to place the furniture in them!

Here you can (sort of) see the Willowcrest back in the construction area....

(It is really difficult to get good pictures at this time of year!)

But I think, Dear Readers, that I am getting closer 

to being ready to glue the walls on this house!

 

 

I have also decided that I will need to paint all those "trees" in the parlor, 

and not just leave them the unpainted color of the sculpey clay.

 

 Here you can sort of see them as they are 

(picture taken months ago when there was still a little sunlight...!)

I think they need to look as though they are the same carved stone as the fireplace... 

otherwise they neither look real nor like stone.... 

but just sort of raw... and that has been bothering me!

And while I have debated with myself for a long time about the name for this house....

in my mind I have always thought of it as "Hardwick Hall".

Yes, it is a bit of a Grandiose name for such a tiny bit of space!

But it belongs to my Witches, and it does have a fairly Grand facade....

and I am just getting tired of calling it "the Willowcrest"!

So I am making it official..... "Hardwick Hall" it is!

And on an Entirely different note... also a New beginning...

There is a new persona in my doll Worlds.....

She is made by the very talented Sumaiya.

Sumaiya's blog was one of the first blogs I discovered 

years ago as I was finding my way back into miniatures, 

and I have always been enchanted with her exotic and elegant dolls.

As soon as I saw this one posted on Sumaiya's blog,

I knew she had to come play in my Little Worlds!

She comes with the name "Meera"

But I think that is only part of her name...

She obviously has the ability to hold her listeners Spellbound....

and perhaps, like Sheherezad, 

she has a thousand songs to sing...

or ballads to enchant us....!

I do not know yet what her story will be... 

or where she will lead me...

But that, Dear Readers, 

is part of the mystery of anything New!

And I do hope you have enjoyed 

all this "Little" Progress!

I Made A List......

(And the Sun Came to Play.......)

Have I mentioned, Dear Readers, how much I Love it when the Sun comes to Play in my Little Worlds? Even when they are situated far away from the windows of my RL house, so the sunbeams have to stretch and reach way into the distant corners.... and there they are for the briefest moments before they have moved on, illuminating the Tiny Worlds in a way that is impossible to copy with artifice! There were a few such moments on Sunday morning, making me pause Life in order to capture the moments with my camera! And here I can share them with you.....

Alas these moments are so brief, 

If you are not there with the camera, 

they are gone before you blink!

And in the Willowcrest too, 

the sun filled the Parlor with radiance.....

Don't you just love the way this delicate lace is silhouetted by the sun?

And the way the sun shone into the bedroom, 

casting a pattern on the floor!

I know you can't see it from here with the curtains closed, 

but these are the very windows 

that are causing me such trouble on the exterior!

Fortunately, I have thought of a workable solution to the problem.

 

But first I made a List, Dear Readers,

 of all the things I needed to do on this house 

before I could glue all the walls in place.... 

and it was longer than I had thought it would be!

There were ten major categories of tasks to do!

Everything from planning the attic lights wiring routes 

to completing the painted details on the bedroom walls, 

to finishing the trees in the Parlor, 

to fixing the curtain rods 

to completing the window frames details...... 

to mention just the most obvious ones!

Yes, it is a good thing I have NOT yet glued the walls in place!

 

Meanwhile, I have tested an idea for the exterior window muntins. 

You might recall that I was bothered by the idea that from the outside 

the muntin on the lower half of the windows 

would abut directly onto the exterior window sill....

(See previous post for reference pictures!)

I found some very thin and narrow coffee stirrer sticks 

to use as the framing material. 

Above you can see the lower edge of the "window frames"

being tested on the windows. 

I think they succeed in making the windows

 look more realistic from the outside.

But you can see here what it looks like from the inside!

 

Here you can see a little closer......

(Sorry it is so dark.... it is night and it is hard to get

 close enough and not block all the light!)

 So you can see I am going to have to add 

small pieces to the inside window frame too.

And I think it will work if I conceal the "crack" between them 

and the outer frame by adding a little window sill as well!

(At least I hope it will look okay... and the curtains will conceal it too!)

And here you can see the exterior with the thin muntins in place....

At least it Fosters the illusion that the lower window 

is set back and can slide past the upper window when raised...

entirely an illusion, of course, as these are non operative windows!

I think it looks So much better with the bottom edge 

of the window frame visible!

And believe it or not, Dear Readers, that is the Only thing 

I got done this week in my Mini worlds!

That and Making the List!

So at least now I know what I need to be doing...

Besides capturing the Brief sunny moments, that is!

(I do Really Love it when the Sun comes to Play!)

Oh look! There's that little fairy again.....

I wonder where he is off to now?

Trees

Day and Night.....

I had very little Time to devote to minis last week, Dear Readers, as I was trying to prepare my RL house for visitors! This means I have to move Dollhouses off of the chairs and put them back into the corners where they are less in the way! As I was moving the Willowcrest, and all the pieces fell off yet again because they are still not attached, I realized that I really want to get the side walls attached so I can go forward with the major construction portion of this house! So I decided to catalog all the steps that were keeping me from attaching the side walls so I could get started. If you recall, the side wall on the left was held up by all the details required to complete the front hallway which would be inaccessible once the walls were in place. That included the doors and trims, the windows, the lights (for downstairs, upstairs and front porch!) the curtains.... and of course the murals with the Moon Maidens.... and even the stairway up to the top floor! All of which have been done! So what is keeping me from attaching the left side wall, you ask? Courage! Because once it is glued in place those Moon Maidens will be nearly invisible... the trees climbing the stair wall will be just a memory... the stars overhead will be barely visible.... yet I know I have to take this step in order to move on! It was Time, Dear Readers....

After fitting the tabs and slots together and making sure they would all match correctly 

(or as correctly as possible with this sort of kit)

I took my Courage in my hands and applied glue 

to all the joints in the lower portion of the wall!

(The upper portion needs to stay unglued until the attic floor is added)

I held it together with masking tape while the glue dried.

Here you can see the interior of the stairway (I know it is a bit dark...)

without the interior bedroom wall in place.... 

another one of those Details that need to be finished!

With the left side wall glued, I looked at the right side 

and found a much longer list still to be done!

To begin with, there were still many more details 

to add to the murals in the bedroom....

Not to mention the windows and trims and lights...

Above you can see a picture taken in the morning light

(I apologize for the poor focus!)

And in the Parlor below, there were even more complicated details 

and Decisions that needed to be made 

before I could safely attach the side wall. 

(Although, I could probably manage to complete most of it 

with the side wall attached.... it is easier while there is more access.)

Here you can see the Parlor in the morning light as well....

and you can see I have been adding the 

three dimensional trees made of sculpey to the corners of the room.

The biggest decision I have to make with these trees is whether or not to paint them!

I cannot make up my mind!

So meanwhile, I started to make the remaining tree 

which also needed to have a light in its branches.

(I forgot to take pictures of the process.)

And by the time it is finished, Dear Readers, 

it is night time and dark, and you can barely see the tree!

And while the sculpey was baking, 

I worked on adding details to the bedroom murals.

I started by adding a central dot of gold paint to the blossoms on the apple trees....

I know it is difficult to see in the above picture with the glare from the light.

Here you can see them up close!

I know the gold paint looks almost black in these pictures....

But it adds a layer of definition and texture to the trees as  a whole, 

which you can really see when you compare the painted one with the unpainted one...

And in the right light it glows a burnished gold!

This is not the "right" light.... but the tree on the left 

has the centers painted and the one on the right does not.

And next I started to add the leaves....

just the tiny baby leaves that are starting to grow as the trees are blooming....

Here you can see the side wall with the leaves added...

And the front wall with only one of the trees with the leaves.

This wall is the hardest to paint as it is "attached" to the house!

Here you can see the right wall "in place" but still not attached.

Yes, there are more details still to paint!

And while I am shining a light into the back of the room, 

can you see the glitter in the gold paint?

Well, even though you can't see it now Dear Readers,

perhaps when I get the lights for this room attached

Perhaps then the light will be just "right" for seeing the gold glisten!

But meanwhile lest we forget the baking Sculpey trees....

I finished the one with the sconce for the window wall...

and I still can't decide whether or not to paint them!

And until I decide one way or the other, 

the right side wall will not get glued in place!

I spent my Time on Trees, Dear Readers,

But they are as different as Night and Day!

Curtains Again

The Old Fashioned Way.....

I Hope you will not mind, Dear Readers, if I take you back to the Parlor of the Willowcrest, even though I have made almost No progress with the Branches over the Mantlepiece. I had decided that the trees on the walls needed to be a darker shade of gray than the sculpey trees. I have painted at least two different coats of gray and still am a long way from satisfied. I am also trying to decide whether to paint the sculpey portions or to leave them as is. I think they look more realistic as trees when unpainted. But that is not the subject of this Post, so we will leave it for another day. What I really wanted to show you was the Wide and Gracefully arching doorway from the parlor into the entry hall. I was almost at the point of gluing the outer wall in place and thus making access to this hallway impossible, when I realized that those lovely wide doorways needed Curtains. Portieres, to be specific. And even though I am a long way from the "decorating" stage of this house, I have realized that the hallway has to be completed now while access is possible. And I had a scrap of fabric I had been saving for Ages and Ages that I thought would be the Perfect material, so I dug it out.

It is a lovely piece of Dark Plum colored antique velvet.

And I really only could find a small scrap remaining in my stash.

Very wrinkled too.

But isn't it a Divine color?

And doesn't it go just Perfectly with the walls?

But then I found another scrap of velvet that might work too...

It is a newer, slightly more wine colored velvet with a 

pattern of glittery roses strewn across it!

How to decide?

Well, I noticed that the antique velvet was a bit thin 

and light would show through unless it was lined....

So I decided to use the glittery fabric as the lining!

I also found a scrap of antique bead work trim 

to use on the bottom edge of the curtains. 

Here you can see me testing it in place.

And here you can see the glittery side of the curtain 

looking into the hallway from the kitchen side.

And here we have both curtains being tested....

the back wall to the stairs is still removed in this picture.

And another view from the kitchen with the hallway light lit

and both curtains pinned in place for testing.

It was quite a challenge to get the length right!

I also added a narrow gold braid trim 

to the open edge of both curtains.

Here you can see them, still just pinned in place.

The real trick was going to be getting them on a curtain rod...

and attaching that to the wall above the doorway!

I know you are going to think I am silly, Dear Readers,

but I wanted my curtains to be able to slide open and closed!

So I sewed rings to the top of the front of the curtains

(they were going to hang from the hallway side of the wall,

 so this is hidden from view).

And I made a curtain rod from a piece of wire hanger

run through three eyelet screws 

which were screwed into a strip of wood trim 

just shorter than the width of the hallway.

Once this was assembled and glued in place, 

there would be no way to adjust anything!

Here you can see both curtains with their rings attached,

the right one is still not on the rod.

And a close-up of the beautiful old bead trim.

It reminds me of the full moons in the hallway...!

But, Oh the challenge of gluing this in place Dear Readers!

I had to turn the house on its side, 

and hold the hallway lamp out of the way with a bit of wire...

And hold the curtains themselves off to the side 

so they would not pull downward with their weight

and distort the placement while the glue was drying...

Not to mention that I was reaching into a tiny space I could barely reach....

I spread half the glue on one end of the wooden rod framework,

and the other half on the wall above the doorway 

where I could reach from this end...

I used E6000 glue.

I let it dry for quite a while,

Hoping that my "measurements" were right...

So that they would hang right to the floor when the house was righted.

I think they are just about right!

So I have to test them with the still unfinished fireplace....

Here the curtains are open....

 

And here they are closed!

So while the temperature plummets, Dear Readers,

And the snow continues to pile ever higher outside,

We will pull the curtains across that drafty old doorway...

and try to keep warm inside by the fire.

Please Do come on in!

But be sure to pull those curtains closed!

So now you can see, Dear Readers, 

just why I had to make my Curtains 

the Old Fashioned way!