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rbytsdy

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Everything posted by rbytsdy

  1. Hi, check out my blog for example of installing siding on the Willowcrest first, then exterior frames and trim afterward. It has its disadvantages (like the long trim pieces sticking out because of the added thickness that the siding adds).
  2. Thanks, Linda! This house has given me unique challenges, in the way it fits together (or doesn't, in the case of the windows!).
  3. Well I have been chugging along the past couple weeks, nothing interesting, just prepping porch and window trim assemblies: ...installing roof pieces, prepping and installing roof trim: ...installing exterior window trim pieces: So the corner trim pieces don't quite fit flush to the base trim, because of the pre-installed siding. That might be a reason to install siding afterward, but then one gets paint everywhere... I guess I should have dremeled the siding pieces thinner, or made some new ones out of thin strip wood, but oh well. I had a bit of trouble with the windows; the interior frames, I mounted too low because I didn't take into account that the exterior have sills that add to their height; thus I mounted the interiors flush to the horizontal plane of the opening. Too low, because then you can see a good portion of the wrong side of the interior frame when you look from the outside of the house. Hmmmm... So I had to mount the exterior trim low to cover that. Well then the sills of the so-called "small" trim doesn't line up to fit into the window opening, but rather lines up lower, so I had to dremel it down so that it would lie against the side of the house. These window trims will need alot of spackle and paint and extra trim to look OK...
  4. Mmmmm-boy, this is a good thread. I occasionally try to cook something on the weekends, but usually fail miserably! - no sense of seasoning... That discourages me enough to stop trying for a while... The only thing that I have developed, through trial and error, a consistent ability for, is Italian-sausage pizza with the dough made in the bread machine. It's about the only thing that I can make that I actually really like!
  5. I've used white school glue to apply all my wallpaper (I smear it evenly on the backside with a bit of cloth, then use a clean white cloth to smooth it onto the wall), but then I use printies on cardstock. Not sure if it works just as well on "store-boughten" miniature wallpaper!
  6. So they are- that's a bit out of the norm; it usually seems to be twice a year, once in June and once in Nov time-frame... Well I spent pretty well back in June so I guess I have to wait a couple months...! Thanks for the heads-up though.
  7. So very nicely done- love the "peach sherbet" color!
  8. I've meddled with both Paperclay and DAS and it seems to me that DAS is coarser... It did fine for my bricks and stones though, so since it is cheaper, I'll be buying more of it...
  9. I had been prepping the attic, papering and installing the interior window frames, but nothing could move forward until I installed the interior chimney piece, and I couldn't do THAT until the flooring was finished! I have a couple pics w/o flash so one can see how the colors really compare to one another. The flooring is 1/2"-wide planks of 1/16"-thick basswood, on a card template, stained with Minwax (oil-based) golden pecan; I am starting to run out so I need to get some more of that stain-- I like how bright and cheery it looks, and I think it compliments the blue well. I'll seal the floor in place after it's had a chance to cure some more (though I didn't use a whole lot of tacky glue to put it down-- I learned my lesson on that San Fran floor)... Now I can put in the barrel roof pieces-- in this kit, they are very thin wood veneer pieces on cardboard. One of the sections on each piece had dried and chipped away, so I cut those sections out and replaced them with a section from what appeared to be an extra, short piece; I held the sections together with masking tape on the back and that seemed to work fine. I glued the mansard roof support pieces in, using liberal amounts of wood glue: I dry-fit the mansard roof pieces themselves, which are also thin wood veneer on a cardboard base (though not scored into sections as were the barrel pieces)-- they seem to fit quite loosely. I checked the instructions again, and the mansard roof pieces are to be fit between the "Main Roof Cornice" (check!) and the "Mansard Cornice Trim" (check!). So apparently I haven't forgotten anything, and they just fit loosely. I can see even from the dry-fit that there will need to be some trimming because between the side and front roof pieces, there is some extra sticking out... Also it looks like the front roof pieces may not fit nicely against the barrels, so I might have to think about some curvy trim to cover any gaps there... I traced the roof pieces onto brown paper, which I'll use for my shingle templates; I'll let those roof supports cure and work on my exterior window frames and porch subassemblies for a while...
  10. Since they were for adults and everything was glued down, I made furniture out of balsa wood for my roomboxes; staircase out of balsa (and strategically-placed card)... Actually, working on the roomboxes felt kind of liberating because I didn't have to worry about how sturdy something would be, just how it ended up looking from the front!
  11. Welcome, Lindsey; check out overstock.com for some of the regularly-lowest kit prices (and can't beat their shipping rates)...
  12. Haven't made a whole lot of progress-- worked on the parlor floor though, and here it is in dry-fit (I'll put sealer on it after it's glued in place): I put balsa strips over those printed-on mullions in the interior window frames; I'm thinking of using my Gallery Glass paints to make some "panes" look like stained glass, but need to decide which ones: I'm thinking about the toile in the attic. It too looks pretty overpowering in this photo but not as much in real-life (and the blues compliment each other more):
  13. rbytsdy

    Exterior

    So cute! Love the cotton-candy-blue!
  14. Yep, it's all contextual. Don't know if it's the best, but I use Elmer's wood glue for structural joins, Aileen's quick-grab tacky for just about everything else, white school glue for wallpaper and window transparencies, and super glue for a very few things.
  15. Good thing I had a build pic-- couldn't remember! Coarse-grit sandpaper.
  16. First coat never looks good! This is Olympic interior semi-gloss latex, in "Rendezvous". I used it for the Adams (HBS contest house a couple years ago) and had quite a bit leftover. I painted the chimney stack stones and put some sealer on them because they scuff easily (I added some scuffs but didn't want any more than that)-- I installed the attic paper, the blue that I had picked out earlier, but now that I see it with the exterior color, it washes everything else out. It isn't my favorite shade of blue either. I am thinking of going back to the toile but using it sparingly-- alot of white wainscoting should tone it down...
  17. Thanks, I appreciate that! I tried not to overwhelm it with lilac (which I only used because my friend said that she was doing her baby's room in lilac, where this house was to be, but eventually the color really grew on me!)... I learned alot... And I'm still learning alot on the Willowcrest now, which I guess is my tenth house! Guess I better keep building. Love your additions and changes-- that left roof did look like a vast wasted space to me, and your dormer looks wonderful. I think it will look great with the same wallpapers but like I said, I fixed on the trim method a few years ago and now it just looks normal to me!
  18. Haha... I remember thinking about this problem with my very first house but I started doing this, with trim of some type (shown here in my Westville)-- --and never really gave it a second thought (beyond the wallpapers being vaguely color-related), much less thinking about how real houses look...! How do real houses do it?
  19. I used up the rest of my DAS air-drying clay and covered what will be the interior of the chimney: I almost waited too long to scribe the stone outlines in it because I got so tied up in siding-- the DAS sets up in a couple hours... I wanted to use a particular pattern of my embossed paper (from Hobby Lobby) for the parlor ceiling, but I hadn't remembered how low I was getting in the ceiling papers last time I went to HL, and there wasn't even a whole sheet left of the paper. So I decided to parse it out on a cardstock template and fill in the gaps with woodwork. You'll notice that I have the same type of light in the parlor as in the foyer- I had meant to use a nice hanging globe that I think I got from Manor House, but this is why I should never get lights that aren't advertized as having replaceable bulbs: It didn't light up when I plugged it in, so I was trying to get the globe off and it finally came off leaving a big shard still attached... It turned out that the bulb was loose! Sigh... I have been siding, and have finished all but some bits around the bays: I remembered to attach the porch light with the siding this time! (I forgot on the Westville and had to drill a hole through the kitchen wall and cover it up inside with a strategically placed shelf...) I also took a tip from Gina (formerly butterflyex; now MoreMinis) and traced out where the arch trim sits so that I could avoid having siding where the decorative holes in the trim will be. I almost forgot to carve out the siding to accommodate the front wall slots, and punched a hole in my parlor paper whilst trying to carve out a slot with the siding piece already in place; I'll have to put a patch on that bit of wallpaper, I think... (I cut the rest of the slots in the siding before I installed it, after that!)
  20. I put the end of a cut-off sewing pin in my spindles- about 1/4" in the spindle, and about 1/4" sticking out, with the sharp end out. Then I put it in place on the stair, poking the pin end down into the wood. It works pretty well for me, and I can pull it out to reposition also.
  21. I was just thinking the other day how fun it would be to run a workshop, demonstrating a Buttercup build (or something simple like that)-- I would do alot of prep work for the "students" ahead of time, including sanding all the big pieces and printing out all sorts of wallpapers... We'd use embossed paper for the ceilings and we'd plank our own floors; we'd even paperclay our foundations and do some gardening. I wouldn't be "teaching" so much as coordinating the builds. I guess it might help if I would actually build a Buttercup first though! (Yep, I even had fun thinking about it...! But I am seriously thinking of building a Buttercup.)
  22. I added the kitchen and living room bays; the living room bay has some big gaps in it (due to the angled wall not being wide enough) which I will have to fill with wood filler. Other than that, they were some of the easiest bays I have ever assembled! I installed the attic walls, the side dormer walls, the mansard cornice and trim, the front dormer interior walls & roof, and the main roof cornice. (I used the main roof cornice in dry fit while the attic walls were drying just to keep them square.) I did some more wallpapering, and the kitchen ceiling with its light: That last paper in the parlor seems to have some extra blue ink that runs a bit with the glue on the back of the paper. I think I got most of it but I might need some strategic wall decor... I also thought hard about the 3rd floor paper, printing out a few different designs and looking at them in place. I had first been thinking about toile but even though it goes with the exterior color pretty well (the bed in the pic is painted with the exterior color), it's too busy and I wouldn't be able to use patterned window treatments very well with it. I finally settled on a muted blue that doesn't match the exterior blue but hopefully compliments it OK. I also worked on the chimney assembly, letting it dry in place so that the roof support pieces will be square with respect to the main roof cornice. Hopefully I have enough DAS paper clay left so that I can stone the chimney section. I went ahead and installed the house foundation trim because I want to paint it before I install the siding.
  23. Yes, I sure do have troubles with the seams showing... I print on cardstock and cut with a sliding papercutter so that helps keep the edges straight. (Actually I am fitting wallpaper right this minute so it's fresh on my mind!) I place one piece then slide the other into it, if that makes sense (so that one edge doesn't stick out past the other and they're on the same plane); then I rub down the paper and especially the seams pretty well with a clean white cotton cloth and that helps with melding one edge into the other...
  24. Great idea, Deb! Here's mine...
  25. Hahaha-- I am thinking of the Pierce, when hubby insisted that I MUST put flashing on the roof. So I did. Alot of flashing. And then there was the Adams contest house, when hubby insisted that the stud spacing HAD to be 16" (1-1/3"). I fudged a sixteenth or two here and there but that's our secret. I can't wait to find out what I MUST do for the HBS contest build...! Hubby had the idea for what it will be so I'm sure there will be quite a bit of review...
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