New Group (just 2 of us) Project

 The proper size heart punch has not as yet arrived, and we'll be heading off for a short vacation shortly, so Marilyn and I decided to get started on our joint winter project, a maple sugaring diorama which we will donate to our local living history museum, Kings Landing Historical Settlement, for use during their Maple Sugaring Weekends end March of each year.

Marilyn and her chief carpenter are starting on the actual diorama (roombox), while I'm beginning the many pieces needed to flesh out this scene. I've begun with a pair of evaporating pans, and hope to have a photo in the next day or so. We are working with instructions by Ruth Armstrong, published in 3 parts in the summer 1992 issues of Nutshell News. Mrs. Armstrong specialised in metal miniatures, but we are not metal-workers, so we'll be using card, matte board, wood and the like to create our sugaring equipment. 

We are awaiting the landfall of Hurricane Lee, which we all fervently hope will be downgraded to a tropical storm when it hits our shores; however, we are moving everything that could be picked up by heavy winds to a safe, roofed place. We'll likely take the clothesline down too, as the last time we had a really bad storm, a tree came down on it and tore off part of corner cedar siding on our house.

Working Away Rather Unspectacularly....

 One of the UFO's from my previous post has been worked on. This is a re-purposed industrial,  steam punk loft corner, with two floors, that was a Camp MiniHaHa project some years ago. One of its more interesting components was a spiral staircase; well, it has driven me to the point where I've decided to do away with it altogether - I just cannot fit it realistically into the space I wanted it in!

What has been done is that the building carcass is now glued and pinned up, which means I can begin plotting the lighting; there is a purpose-built false roof to hold the batteries for the LED lights. Yesterday, while helping clear out a stash of  a friend's miniature materials, I found some small brass bells, which make great tops for industrial lights, and that is what this vignette is intended to get. I have some wonderful textured brick paper for the outside, and will do the roof as verdigrised copper, as originally planned, with a faux finish on card. It will look rather like the roof of Floriana (q.v.) but I'd like to drag some verdigris drips down the walls here and there....

With the re-thinking of how this will go, I've come across some interesting steam punk ideas for furnishings, and have decided to be smart and finish the building itself before I start on the furnishings; I always make way more than the space can hold. It will be a corner of a two-story steam punk loft apartment for the owner (female, as far as I know!) who owns the book shop in the books, also a steam punk project from Camp. I'm heading towards a lot of dulled copper, as I'm working with a very autumnal colour scheme, for the pipes against the cream-coloured walls, and also want to put lots of art work on those walls.

Today's Finished Objects (Yes!)

A mahogany bench kit, now glued up, and just awaiting its varnish coat, is another CMHH kit, made by Debbie P. from her mahogany kitchen cupboards. When they renovated their very old Nova Scotia house kitchen, she cut the original mahogany cupboards down to miniature lumber. The previously shown laundry tub and other vintage laundry paraphernalia is mahogany from that renovation as well, as is a small bookcase I still have to put together - I remembered overnight that I had a similar book case in one of my vignettes, so I dug that out to try and use it for measurements.

On the bench is a laser-cut cat treat kit, complete with a baggie of cat-shaped snacks (which I have to paint cat-treat brown), also put together. The box I will use a varnish on, as I like the laser work on it. It was made by Grandpa's Dollhouse in Ontario, and was a CMHH gift; I have another one of these to make up too.

The bench, with the addition of a cushion, can work in my Tudor Apothecary shop, a place for the rich, favoured customers to sit while awaiting their medicaments. The cat treat boxes will go into the second steam punk project (another UFO), and my older daughter's dollhouse, which was left, according to her, by an old lady to her cats. That house has been exhibited at children's libraries, with a challenge to count all the cats in it....

I have still, on purpose, not photographed all the embroidery kits I have to finish up. Hope my old eyes hold out for that!

Not a Good Week

First of all, we are buried in snow; see photos below. I took them from my front steps this evening, to show the amount that we are dealing with right now. It is only the beginning of March, and we have at least six more weeks of winter to go. They are already indicating that we may have another record flood this year, based on the snow pack.




 Photo one is from the front door to the garage. Our apple trees are once again buried well above the trunks. Photo two is the drift pile in front of the kitchen window; this window is at my eye level when I work at the kitchen sink. To get into the house, we go up three steps. So, I estimate this pile is about a meter and half or higher. We had some very heavy winds for two days this past week, so there was a lot of drifting! Photo 3 is out to the road; we are running out of space to dump snow, and there is more coming tonight....



I turned in an odd way last Sunday, resulting in a serious back spasm. It is almost back to normal, but lengthy periods of standing are painful. So I didn't get as much done this week as I had hoped. Today, I did manage to stain the second floor of my steam punk loft project. As the wood used was very rough, there was a lot of hand sanding involved, and my back is complaining! The little chair is for the Remembrance Day project, it will be painted and then rubbed back for wear and aged and dirtied.
The only other thing I managed to finish is to paint a sheet of paper for the leaves for the poppies in the Remembrance Day project.

There is a real beauty to winter, but at this time of year there is also a desire for it to just go away, already!

Camp MiniHaHa 2016 Project

I arrived home yesterday around dinner time, having driven all alone for 7 hours on about 4 hours of sleep; not to be recommended! To stay awake, I alternated travelling on country roads with stretches of high-speed highway, and by doing this managed, just, to avoid a fatal accident between a car and an eighteen-wheeler. I did have the emergency service vehicles screaming down the country road beside me on the way to the scene.

The camp project was very intense, and was accompanied by a number of smaller projects; I managed the lamp shades, but haven't installed them as yet. The radiator, mattress and pet bed will have to wait their turn. The theme this year was Crazy Cat Ladies, so there will be cats....

Below is a photo of the half scale prototype: no mezzanine, and double the number of windows.

I took this photo to help me remember what the pipes looked like; as my plan is for a steam-punk inspired piece, I will be adding pipes, although I am thinking they will be cream in colour rather than black!

This is my project in trial; I thought I had earlier photos, but apparently I don't. The wainscoting is made from scrap wood top and bottom, with craft sticks in between. My setting is intended to be a companion piece to last year's book vignette, the home of the book store owner. The whole thing except for the finished wainscot is held together by masking tape. The grinning cat toy is the weight to keep the mezzanine floor steady.

I decided to do the floor, again of scrap wood, in a diagonal pattern, as the corner will be cut off. The original project had a 12 x 9" footprint, but I cut it down to 9 x 9", as I wanted the project to be a little less demanding of display space - it is running low here!

Flooring and wainscoting in place, the corner of the floor cut off, and the window openings both cut. By this time it was dark, so the windows reflect parts of the room. The wood has all been stained with a mixture of dark burnt umber acrylic and water-based golden oak stain, to look aged, as the loft is a re-purposed industrial space.

Window frames painted, baseboards being tried out. On the mezzanine floor are the two industrial lamp-shades which will light up the place, made from the tops of plastic Easter eggs and a couple of tiny brass bells - held in place for now by the toothpicks I used while painting the plastic with 4 coats of nail polish, inside and out.

The walls were finished in butter cream-coloured tissue paper stucco above the paneling. This now needs to be aged to bring out the wrinkles in the stucco. The central panel of the industrial window is intended to pivot, but as I am not in the least fond of pin hinging in cramped spaces, I will glue one in, in the open position, and leave the other closed.

The flat roof is finished with a hollowed space to hold the battery box for the lights; I asked to have mine cut to continue the slope of the mansard, which I hope to do in faux copper. The idea right now is to make the knob to lift it up out of dowel roof vents. We'll see!

Next to me, the project turned into a much larger Via Rail station lobby, with an elevator leading to the Tim Horton coffee shop on the second level, being made by Louise. Next to her, Marilyn turned her project into a 1/24th scale, New York brown-stone with three floors. Down from her, Myra was doing the project in 1/48th scale! There was also a speak-easy across the room, a townhouse with a roof garden at the end of the table, and two dozen other variations of the basic project. No-one tends to stick to the original idea....

I also, thank heaven, managed to finish the basic steps and spacers for the winding wrought iron staircase up to the mezzanine, very important as I wanted an opening cut in that floor to allow miniature people to go up the stairs without bonking their heads.

Tomorrow, I will post photos of gift exchange items and tidbits.