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Well mercy me. I really wuzzunt expectin' no guests to come a-callin' this time of day. But now that y'all are hear, come on in. Have some of Miss Hatties special tea. I gay-rone-tee it'll have ya feelin' like a young girl on her first date. Come in! Come on in. Don't mind spot. He only bites bad folk. And thas' not you now is it?This here's mah livin' room an the place where I first meets mah new clients. I also sells potions, and such as yew can see over yonder on the shelf. That big leather book on top was handed down through seven generations of the women folk in my family. Now y'all don't pay no never mind to an old ladies foolishness by all them hats on that rack there. I jes cain't resist picking up one hear an there on one of my trips into town. I do so love mah hats. Have yerself a seat on that there couch while I go put some water on for some tea. And if'n that flea bitten cat is aroun' here somewhere and bothers ya lookin' for some pettin' jes push him outta yer way. Ok, hope y'all weren't too bored lookin' around my lil ole livin' room. But the tea's ready so y'all can come on in tha kitchen and we'll visit over a cup. Lack I said, this here's a special tea and it'll make ya feel what for. Cackle. come on now. Don't be a-feared. Lemme jes move this ole weejee board and tarrot cards outta yer way. Oops! Jest ignore that weight loss spell. That wuz fer a "client" that wuz in here jes a little bit afore y'all came a-callin'. What's that? Well of course I heated it up on that ole cook stove. And I gots a really good well down to some GOOD water. But I gotta get someone in here to fix that danged handle that done fell off agin. Y'all know a good handy type man that maybe needs a spell in exchange for a bit of work? Ya can see I got a few more of my special supplies in here too. The place is kinda small so I do my fortune tellin' and give readin's in here too.Y'all know what? I gets really good feelin's about you. I don' normally trust folks all this easy but I thank I may just let ya'll see my private stuff. If'n ya won't to, jes come up upstairs. Be right carefull now'. They's kind of steep an a bit rickety too. Ole Jeb, who lives further down in the darker part of the bayou had someone put an awful hex on him. An' he needed it taken off. I was really cramped in this tiny lil shack so he fixed it fer me so I could use the attick upstairs. So now I gots a really nice private place, all my own. Come on up. I'll show ya.That there's my bed. T'aint very big but it's soft and comfterbull, and I gots plenny o blankits fer those nights when it gets a bit chilly and that blue norther starts a-blowin so hard the moss might near falls offa the trees. What's that? That lady up in tha picture? Why that's my third cousin' Marie, the voodoo Queen hersef who lives down yonder in N'orluns. She taught me an my momma both lots of her most powerful magic, for when it's needed.An over here, I keeps my personal items, and, (whispering) don't tell nobody but I also do a few personal stay healthy spells on mahsef when I gets to feelin' old. I don't look 68 do I? Now watch yer head comin' thru this door. This room is my most private place. It's where I do my most powerful spellin' an conjurin'. You really should consider yerself privleged to see this room cuz y'all could count on the fangers of one han' the number of folk that seen it. Y'all unnerstan' I can't letcha stay in here too long. The forces of the spirits I keep aroun and active in here can really hurt those what don't know how to control 'em. They heps me keep Spot in line ya know? I'll show ya in a few minutes when I takes ya outside.Well I surely hope y'all enjoyed yer visit? I see the tea is already makin' a few of ya wanna go dancin'. I hear they got a decent fiddler down to the ice house tonite. Might be a fun place ta go kick yer heels up till the tea wears off a bit. Looket there, unner tha house. Ya can see Spot all alert an watchin'. He KNOWS I gots anuther client comin' soon so he keeps an eye our fer me. Y'all come back now real soon. Hattie makes the best potions and does the mos powerful magic in all of 20 parishes 'round here. An' I so love havin' cumpney over. Next time ya come I'll give ya a different tea. A bit stronger'n this one was. But ya gots to start out slow ya know? Bye bye now. Come back an visit soon.Hattie waves g'bye.

We added the door handles (no picture) and a stove pipe.Here is some of the furniture that came with the kit and what we did with it.Both of the round tables were painted off white. One of them has a printie glued to the top.The end tables stained nicely and antiqued.I added some upholstery to the chairs.The bed stained nicely as well. The blanket is reversable.Stay tuned for a tour of the completed house.Melissa

Well in the southern area , where this house is, the rain began to fall. This immediately caused the roof to rust. How ever on a good note, it also helped the plants grow. You can see Spot the guard "dog", in his favorite spot under the porch. (You can tell him, he's not a dog if you like, I'm not gonna do it). Hattie started hanging a few curtains to brighten the place up a bit. IN the front yard on the right side you can see a young tree. It was made from a small tree form and leaves from one of those long vine wreaths you can get at the dollar store. The leaves for the tree in the distance also came from one of those. You can see Spot's tail sticking out, wagging and hoping for a visitor.This is my first attempt to make spanish moss, (something I have never seen in real life), I hope I did ok with it. You can see some of the shrubs the rain helped grow. The path is still being worked on. It will lead to the "Greenhouse" , Where Hattie grows her magical and poisionus plants.This picture is here just because Darrell likes the red checked curtains and "spot" so much. He has helped me weave such a story about this house. The stairs are in, but I am not taking pictures untill I finish decorating. I noticed on these pictures, I forgot to put a door knob on the front door and a handle on the screen door.Compliments of DarrellandMelissa

I have been very busy on the house the last few days. I added newspaper wallpaper and wooden beams to both second floor rooms. This was another war against warping. Each individual page of newspaper was cut out and applied. The beams are made from some scrap craft type sticks I had laying around. It took me a few tries to come up with a workable roof. I wanted it to resemble a tin roof. I used corragated scrapbook paper. Darrell spray painted the papers for me, as I can't be around those fumes. As you can see by the clamps on the back edge, I'm still fighting the warping war.This next picture is here because I finally won the war aginst warping. This time instead of gluing the boards down, and regluing the warpage, staining, regluing the warpage, waiting untill dry and gluing some more, I changed my tactics. I stained the boards. While they were still damp I cut them to size and glued them on. I attached a clamp at each seam and won the war. there was no need to reglue anything.The roof and flashing are on, but still need to be aged, that will take a few more days. The door and screen door have been attached. The steps are just sitting there, as they will be glued on after it has been attached to the base.The house has been attached to the base, steps glued on, and the landscaping has begun. It will have a rock pathway that will line up with the rock pathway to the Greenhouse (built earlier and on a seperate base).And last but not least, here is a close up of the porch.Today I plan to start aging the roof, landscape some more, and put in the kitchen curtains.Compliments of DarrellandMelissa

The inside has been covered with boards to keep with the design of the house.The outside is starting to look like I visualised it. In this picture you can see the screen door and steps leading to the porch, as well as the porch posts themselves. The screen was made from coffee stirrer sticks and panyhose. The steps were made from scraps from the kit.Darrell created an arched door, out of the scraps from the kit, for the second floor doorway.Here you can see how we used pieces of leather to make hinges for the door..I think it may be easier if I add the second floor winow and inside trim before gluing the roof on. The trim will have to be constructed to match the new shaps the windows have. Wait untill you see the roof, not sure what we have planned will work, but will try it.Compliments of DarrellandMelissa

I have been pretty busy the last few days. I started gluing on some left over siding to the inside walls.The ceiling needed some boards as wellNow to begin the long process of aging. I am applying many coats of wash in varing shades of gray to get the desired look. It seems every time I put a coat of wash on, one or more of the boards would warp. So far I have used 4oz of glue on this house. Here are a few pictures of the begining of the aging processI made the aging inside a lighter shade then the outside.The second floor was glued on last night. It took a lot of sanding, as I had to compinsate for the thickness of the wood added to the walls. I also had added the boards in a way they covered the tabs, and the slots, so some areas had to be sanded, or carved out.Today I will work on aging a little more and making sure it has full coverage. I hope to get to adding the boards on the floor of the second floor as well.Compliments of DarrellandMelissa

I started putting the trim I had to tear off, back on the wall. I made sure it was as straight as I could get it.I put the walls together and test fitted the secong floor.Darrell suprised me by "helping" , well that's what he said he was doing. What he did was make sure the walls were straight, without his help it probally would look like an abandoned shack instead. I did have a little trouble with the center divider wall lining up correctly. The changes I made were to square up the windows, and open up the divider wall to allow more floor space.Thats all for today, tomorrow I will start the aging wash, and start instaling the wooden floor and porch.Compliments of DarrellandMelissa

I usually work on a dollhouse after Darrell has built the shell. This time I am building the shell. It seemed a simple kit and I have never put one together from a kit. The first day I got the house I put all the sheets in numerical order and numbered each piece. I built the base and test fitted the wall marking the few changes I wish to make. I plan on making this house into a shack one might find on the bayou or back woods somewhere. I am brainstorming how to decorate the outside. I usually add trim ect to the outside after the shell is put together. The trim I need on this house requires me to add it before the walls go up, I believe. My first attemt at decorating the walls yesterday was a small disaster. Darrell pointed out that none of the board I had glued down were straight, so I had to rip all of them off and start over again.Compliments of DarrellandMelissa