More Work in Progress

Thank you. blog commentators, the Carpenter-in-Chief went cider shopping yesterday (Sunday) for a dish he was making, and came home with a jar of gel stain for me. It is rather more golden than my favourite Ipswich Pine, but it will do beautifully for the undercoat of my miniature "antiques". The tray is supposed to be black with flowers, so it is sitting around until I get to painting again.

On my storage shelf is a basket with "unfinished kits" - so I hauled that out yesterday, with a view to finally completing these things, emptying another box, and perhaps having some more items for sale.



So we have a trellis (I foresee a morning glory vine!), a planter, a "cat butt" bird house, and a bathroom shelf (which is upside down - the round bar is a towel rail. More painting in my futute!



I am particularly proud of this peculiar item; it is, in fact, a very early form of adjustable lighting. The design showed up at my volunteer job (I do museum accessioning) in one of the reference books I was checking. It is an adjustable candle stand; the holes allow one to move the shelf to four different heights, depending on where you are working. A peg through the hole holds the shelf in place. The candle cups in the original were removable, by pushing up  the peg under them. You could thus move your light from this unit to a pierced shelf in another space, pop the candle and peg into that hole, and there you are, one candle in use at a time (or two!). The original post was round, but I just can't drill holes into something as thin as a skewer or toothpick, so my post is a narrow plank. This, once it is painted, will go into my Tudor apothecary workshop.



This peculiar item is a birch twig fairy bed I started many years ago, at least 10. I decided to try and finish it, just to be able to say I did. The headboard is done, the footboard still needs some gluing, and then I can add the bed base. Perhaps this will become a flower bed..... (for those who have never seen one of these, people here sometimes use an old metal bed frame and plant flowers in it, for out of doors).

In between, I am doing some cross-stitch and some knitting, while trying to whittle down my stash of stuff - I'd have to live to 150 to be able to use it all up, so away it goes!