cdalzell

I started to build the Garfield when my first granddaughter turned 1 year old. As a dotting grandpa, I planned to build her something to "play with". Well after 3 years and a second granddaughter, the Garfield is finally finished. It gets delivered this week to my granddaughter's house. It's been in my office for these last 3 years with little bits getting done evey once in awhile. Early in the build process, just after I began the gluing of the siding, my daughter-in-law suggested that it become an "Anne of Green Gables" house, as that was her favorite childhood story. Didn't use any of the Greenleaf trim; created a custom staircase, added working windows and inlaid wood floors in each room. It has fully functional lights in each room with a light switch to control each floor. I'm happy how it turned out.

Well, I'm not quite finished but this dh is for my granddaughter and she's only 16 months old! Here are a few pictures. It's not furnished because I want that to be the first thing we do together when she's a little older!! I also didn't use any of the kit trim; added working windows, siding strips and different spindles throughout. Colin

SuzyQ, only the kitchen wallpaper was ordered from an online miniatures shop. All therest came from either my local mini shop or a wallpaper store as remnants. Colin

Thanks for the kind words. Here are few pictures of the inside. All the trim and crown molding not complete. Kitchen Dining Room Living Room (haven't decided to add fireplace yet!) Kids bedroom Bath Master bedroom (haven't decided whether to add fireplace?) Attic rooms (purpose yet to be decided) - railings still to do. Second floor landing Should be done by Christmas!

I used the cheapo birch shingles $10 per 1000 and had some MinWax water based stain tinted up to match the green color that my daughter-in-law had chosen fromthe Anne of Green Gables house. They unfortuantely can only mix up a quart so I'll have a lot left over!

Well it's been a LONG TIME coming. I have almost finished the siding on my granddaughter's Garfield. In the end I was way off in my initial estimates. For your collective information, I needed 3800 sqinches of siding, somewhat less than that suggested by Greenleaf. I was very efficient with almost no waste. The cedar strips that I used were easy to work with and were particularly easy to carve around the already installed windows and doors. All I have left to do is the tower - not easy as it requires lots of little shaped pieces. I have also finished all the floors and can now complete the attic before capping it off with the roof. I plan to hinge the removable pieces and cover it all with the same tinted shakes that you can see on the porch overhang. Just a few more MONTHS!! and it will be done.

I bought nicer interior doors for all door openings in the Garfield - all were "standard" 3/8in. thick. For some I had to enlarge the door opening; for others I modified the door by trimming the bottom or taking a chunk out of the center. Some of the doors were flipped to swing the door the correct way. Better trim (door molding purchased from mini store) was added with shims on both sides to accommodate for the thin walls on the Garfield. All in all not bad.

The siding strips I am considering are 21/32" wide with 3/32" overlap leaving 9/16" reveal. I will do some comparative pricing to determine the best one. I do like the idea of the single strips as the new doors and windows have all been glued in already and it is probably easier to fit the single strips around them. Thanks for all the input (and giggles).

Doogster, I hate to question your numbers but if there are roughly 6 sections to the outside and each is approx 350 sq.in. (20x14 + 10x14/2 - don't you just love it when your high school geomtery actually becomes useful!) then that would leave 2100 sqinches minus the holes for all doors (2 regular and 2 french) and windows (29 weird and 2 oval shaped). I would like to be more precise than that if possible. Thanks

Yep, I mean Savannah GA and Charleston SC. I have tried to look up hobby stores but couldn't find anything.

I will be travelling to Savannah SC and Charleston NC for a couple of weeks vacation soon and would like to know if any of you great shoppers can tell me if there are any great miniatures stores in the area that might be worth a look. Thanks

A little help if you please, ladies and gents. Has anybody determined the amount of siding (in sq. inches) needed for covering the Garfield? I will be using single cedar board strips (which are pricey) and would like to get enough but not more than I need. Thanks

Those two pieces you are looking for are in my kit on sheet 15. I can trace and send paper copies of both if you want.

I used real cherry wood strips (1/32" thick and 5/8" wide) with just shellac for the living/dining/entry and real oak strips upstairs (1/16" thick and 9/16" wide) some stained with dark oak stain to enhance the pattern and then all shellaced. It was tedious - had to lay small sections at one time with contact cement.

Well it’s a good thing that my granddaughter is only 8 months old – it might take a couple of years to finish the build of “the Garfield”. I made some crazy decisions early on. I wanted (what do I know about dollshouses!) working windows and better doors; I also didn’t like the look of the staircases or the floors. So with the intent of building the best little doll house in town I ordered the working windows upgrade, found the plethora of engaging miniatures online stores and ordered up electrical supplies, all shapes of doors and trim and flooring materials. Now after 2 months of planning and some very long days (and nights) I am finally starting to see the fruits of my labor. I have added cherry wood floors on the main floor and oak on the second floor. These were a lot harder than I had thought they would be (and as it turned out the pattern I chose had a lot to do with it) as each piece had to be measured, cut, laid in place temporarily, sanded, glued, sanded again, stained and then shellaced. I also found out that you can’t use wood glue on the very thin floor strip as it causes instant curling – I used contact glue which meant mistakes weren’t tolerated!! Here are a few of photos of the (almost finished) floors: I decided to keep the base for both sets of stairs but add better treads, balusters and newel posts. It would probably have been a lot easier if I had started from scratch as the kit steps were not even; it took many attempts and modifications to the posts to get it all to fit together around the landings while remaining as a unit outside of the house but ensure that it would fit and match to the new railings that also had to be built.! I also believe that I will want electricity for a fireplace and lights on the staircase first floor walls – and as I had planned for the wiring to run under the floor, I needed a way to get the staircase wiring connected once installed (which it isn’t yet!). Here are photos of these: The electrical is another story. I (maybe I should have asked some 6 year old girl if she felt the same way but…) thought it would be great to have separate circuits for each floor and for the porch so I had to figure out a way to add switches in the correct places to handle that. I found it difficult (understatement) to get the ceiling lights installed. The doors ended up being a big deal as well. The doors are designed for standard doll house wall thickness of 3/8” and the working windows set is 1/16’ thicker than the luan walls; this meant that the trim needed to be “shimmed/thickened” and made custom for each one. I decided to add the wallpaper, paint and trim before the staircase gets installed – I couldn’t see anyway that I could get inside afterwards. So now I will be working up the house the same way. On to find some nice tile flooring for the bathroom. Colin