Goldenrodfarm

There is a whole world of minis out there that never makes it to Northern Maine, have a good time!

While drilling and chiseling the inside I did break the back door off in half accidentally, but I think it will be a good thing because I wouldn't have been able to clean it out much less sand if smooth. I used the dremel carving tool to get it mostly cleaned out and the next step will be sanding using both dremel sanding drums and the 2" sanding circles that also attach to the dremel. The inside of the main trunk was a trial and error process. I started using a burr rasp that attaches to a drill, but it wasn't very good at getting rid of all the lumps and bumps, and was hated to manage. I switched to trying the dremel, but that was just too small. I thought about the angle grinder, I had used it for years with a rigid base that attached sanding disks, not for building projects but to trim pony and donkey feet, was quick and easy and just took offf a little at a time. My angle grinder is a 4" not a 4.5", but I have disks in both 4 and 4.5". The 4.5" ones hange over the rigid disk and that proved to be an asset while trying to get into the curves of the trunk. I was wearing safety glasses during this process but discovered that some of the little bits of wood shot out rather forcefully and resorted to leather gloves to protect my hands. Most of the smoothing was done with 35 and 50 sandpaper disks. The inside is now smooth, and I was able to rapidly clean out some spots I couldn't get to withthe chisel or drill. After getting it mostly smooth I added glue to some sawdust and filled in some places around the balcony opening. The next step was going to be cut an opening in the front to hinge for access to the inside, but I backed up and decided that a roofline should be astablished first. I decided on a round roofwith a peak in the middle, maybe curved at the end, kind of like a whitches hat. I made several attempts this week making a structure for the roof, and learned what I didn't want. The first two peaks were too wide, and now I am going to do the gently curved part first. The back of the stump is taller then the front, making it more challenging, plus it will end up being more of an oval then a circle. I want to put a dormer in the peaked part of the roof. The following two pictures are after using the angle grinder to smooth the inside, the first one shows more clearing out using the grinder. The next two are a picture of the top where the roof will be, you can see the back is higher then the front.

I live in Maine, but at the opposite end, Kennebunkport is about 5 hours away!

I spent several weeks attacking the inside alternately with a drill with a 5/8" spade bit and a chisel and hammer, I ended up with a giant planting pot full of chips and a a very rough interior. I got the bottom leveled up, the final leveling will have to be done after all the center is cleaned out. I went down back to find a shelf fungus to use as a balcony, with the dremel I did some fitting.

After doing some leveling I started by using the hole saw to cut the back door, then drills and chiseled to clear as much as I could. There was still a lot of wood in the center as you can see by the second photo. The third photo is looking in the side hole, that will need a lot of cleaning out too.

I am a collector, let's face it, but when you collect tree stumps for future use you need a big storage place lol. This tree stump was collected many years ago, I was trying to place it, I have been here on the farm about 25 years. You tend to place things in time by major events in your life, sadly one of mine is the death of my husband 14 years ago, that day still seems like yesterday to me, I will never forget every event in that jumbled day, but dislike it being one of my major events. A couple of months prior, I remember finding the tree stump down back and lugging it back up to the house, Gordon laughed at me, but kindly, then helped me carry it! It sat around the barn for years because I just didn't want to think about the whole thing but this spring I decided it was time to do something about it. These are the first pictures I took of it, It is skewed to one side, and I wanted the big opening on the side to be upright enough to be French doors and a balcony. The last picture is the "back door"which is a branch, before I cut the hole. A lot of trimming and belt sanding occurred before I got it to sit the way I wanted it to look.

We were supposed to be 51%, but with the clouds and haze it was not even noticeable, no lessening of light at all, guess I will have to wait for the 2024 one lol

I know what you mean about the sewing, not only fabrics are expensive but trims, zippers or buttons can double the cost of the project. Sometimes a sewing project is just blah without the trims that make it unique. I stopped sewing for myself years ago and went to mostly quilting except the years my two nieces had American girl dolls. Their dolls were the best dressed AGD's in the neighborhood. Their playmates used to ask them if I would make their dolls clothing. The last big project I did with the AGD was the 12 princess dresses, they were beautiful, tons of people at work asked me to make them AGD clothing but I held a firm NO! The project I liked best was the horses and riding outfits. They came from an older Vogue pattern and were designed for 18" dolls, they included making saddles, bridles, cooling coats and a canvas pail. The outfits were complete English riding habits with jophurs, blouse, wool coat, helmet, and boots. The most trouble I had with the AGD patterns is that there are a lot of really poor fitting patterns that sell tons. I have several books by a well known designer of AGD clothing and I had to extensively alter the patterns. The dolls will be slightly different because of the stuffed body, but when the waist on a 11.5" measurement is 14.5" finished that is a problem. Guess my tailoring experience would not allow me to dress them in clothing that hangs off them. At least the amounts of material for these dolls is minimal, but some of the princess dresses cost $25-35 in materials, and people would want to pay $20. The Cinderella ball gown was an expensive thing to make, but a labor of love.

In general I tell people I am too busy to do hemming and sewing, but I got stuck last summer. My nephew was telling his new wife that I did sewing, I had hemmed an expensive silk suit for a friend that has a massage business, while visiting on the island in exchange for a massage. So his new wife says she has some pants that need hemming, just cheap cotton, I figured that it wouldn't take long, a machine job not hand sewing. However the pants in question had a cuff with a draw string and there were 12 pairs. Who buys 12 pairs of pants at a time anyway, they are all exactly alike except the color, 6 white, two peach, two tan and two an olive green. I ended up cutting the cuff off with a seam allowance, cutting the pants to length, then sewing the cuff back on, I opened the bottom of the cuff and tucked in the raw edges and top stitched it. Probably I took too much care on them but I hate raw edges showing, it was a lot of seam ripping to get them apart!