I'm sure I'm not the only one out there who loves starting a project and hates to finish it. That's become the problem with the Arthur. I really haven't done anything on it since my last blog entry... and I'm embarassed to check and see how long ago that was.

Well, I gave myself an ultimatum... I can NOT start on the Westville until the Arthur is finished. The Westville will be for me and I'm brimming with ideas for it... and, just by virtue of it being a new project, it feels a whole lot more exciting right now than slapping the rest of the shingles on my Arthur and painting more trim. But tonight I bit the bullet and got the bulk of the remaining work done.

About a week ago I glued the back roof onto the Arthur. Let me back up a bit though... a few weeks ago (after my last blog entry) I had another tantrum, akin to the siding incident from earlier in this project. This time it was with the wallpaper. I was just having a terrible time with it. I loved the colors I'd picked out but the scrapbook paper was too stiff to get it onto the irregularly-shaped ceiling easily. Plus, I'm apparently the only person in the universe who doesn't like Yes glue. Even when I was super careful, I wound up with glue on my wallpaper. And it showed... badly. Finally, after spending several hours futzing with the wallpaper and getting more and more frustrated, I stopped myself. Why was I spending all this time decorating a house I'm not planning to keep? The new owner will have her own ideas for how it should look, anyway... I know if it were me receiving the dollhouse I'd be thrilled to have the outside finished but would want to put my own touches on the inside. So, I ripped all the paper out.

That may be one reason I haven't blogged lately... the inside of the Arthur looks really ugly and... well... plain, now. But I am trying to ignore that and focus on the outside. I am not planning to give the house away immediately, so I can always change my mind about this (and very well may!) But for now, it was holding me up!

Anyway, here's the house with its back roof glued on.



It took me about 3 hours to do the shingles, but I'm SO glad to have them done. I was surprised by how few shingles I had left when I finished... only about 3/4 of a sheet. I expected to have a lot more since I didn't do the porch roof. I might have run out if I had.



And I put one more coat of paint on a few of my trim pieces. Calamari only used one set of the trim that goes under the peak of the roof on either side of the house, and graciously sent me the extra when I asked. I am planning to use this on the front of the house, instead of the longer (more gingerbready) trim that's supposed to be used. I'm also leaving off the trim from the peak of the roof. My roof doesn't meet perfectly at the peak, so I'm going to have to get some corner trim from the mini shop to cover up the gap.



You can see the porch fence is getting a little more paint... I have not found a good way to secure it to the porch and it keeps coming off. I wanted to try sticking a mini nail up through the porch and into the post, but the blocks of wood I used to keep the foundation square when I glued it are in the way. I may just have to settle with glue and the knowledge that the fence is really fragile.

Stay tuned for one more blog entry when I get the trim up.

Compliments of fov

I am finally getting a chance now to upload the pictures of the work I did on Saturday.

Geoff and I made another trip to the hangar. My main objective for the day was to get the door finished. Doors in die-cut houses are notorious for not fitting right, especially after you've painted on the edges. With my Orchid, I must have spent half a day trying to sand down the inside of the doorway to get the door to fit... very frustrating! It didn't occur to me at the time that I could use the electric sander to sand around the edge of the door instead. Since the sander lives at the hangar, I wanted to get the door assembled so I could sand it to fit in the doorway.

But first I started my day by staining the rest of the shingles. (I had only stained about half of them initially. There isn't really a well-ventilated place in my house to do it so it's better to do staining at the hangar.)



(Notice the torn wallpaper inside the house... I had a mishap with Yes glue. Fixing that and finishing the papering is next on my "to do" list.)

Next came the door pieces. Some of the outer layer of wood came off the back of one of the door pieces when I punched it out. It's not terribly noticeable, but you can see it if you look closely at where the two pieces meet (where the window fits in). I just have to console myself by thinking that most people won't be staring at the house from an inch away the way I usually do!



Another great reason to visit the hangar -- to borrow Geoff's C clamps!



While the glue on the door was drying, I smoothed out the inside of the doorway with woodfiller and then painted it to match the trim.



And, I also took this opportunity (drying glue) to paint and glue on the piece of trim I bought to cover up the "crack" where the top and bottom parts of the front wall visibly meet (because I left off the porch roof).




Unfortunately, when I glued this on I didn't use a ruler, so it went on crooked. I didn't notice until the glue was mostly dry, so when I tore it off some paint came up too. This means sanding and repainting before I glue it back on. That'll teach me not to use a ruler! (Or maybe not. )

Before we left the hangar, I sanded around the edge of the door and it fits well now. The next step will be to apply woodfiller to the edge to make it smooth, then paint it, then put the door in place. I've had frustrating experiences with hinges before so I'm not exactly looking forward to that.

Back at home, I finished the shingling. Here is a picture of the front of the house.



The porch fence is not permanently attached... it keeps breaking off when I glue it. I might try to stick nails up through the porch, into the posts. Also, the piece of trim across the center of the house is held on with fun-tac right now because I haven't glued it back on yet.

Next up: finish the wallpapering and the front door, get the back roof up and shingle it, and finish the little bits of trim. Almost there!

Compliments of fov

Ever since I've been working on the Arthur I've had this idea in my head that I'd like little leaf embellishments on the shutters. Why leaves? No idea, except maybe because the green accent color is kind of leafy. I'm not usually into "cute" houses but because I'm not planning to keep this one, I'm giving myself permission to do things to it that I normally wouldn't. And who knows... maybe the Arthur will cure me of my disdain for cute houses!

Last week I made a trip to the scrapbook store and bought a leaf-shaped paper punch. I have been looking for these for a while to do a wreath project Dollhouse Miniatures featured last year, and unfortunately the scrapbook store only had one style of leaf (maple), so I'm still looking. But the maple leaf was fine for what I had in mind for the Arthur.

First I tried using the paper punch to make a stencil, and painting leaves through the stencil, but it didn't work. The paint seeped through and it came out looking like a blob instead of a leaf! So I went on to plan B and painted a piece of posterboard with my accent green. Once that dried, I used the paper punch to punch out a leaf for each shutter.



I glued the leaves onto the shutters, then painted the shutters with a coat of matte finish. This made the leaves more durable, so I'm not as concerned about the edges curling or peeling off.



The other big thing I got done this week was shingling - my first ever shingle effort! I started by staining the shingles that came in the kit.



I started shingling with wood glue but it just made a big mess, with the shingles curling and slipping all over the place. So I decided to use a hot glue gun like Greenleaf's instructions suggest. I've heard horror stories about using hot glue on dollhouses but honestly can't imagine getting the shingles done any other way. The hot glue dries very quickly and doesn't warp the shingles. I will definitely use this method again on my next house!




Compliments of fov

Finally, painting all those little trim pieces is starting to pay off!

I love this phase of building a dollhouse... well, love it and hate it. I hate all the tedious trim painting. But when you start to glue that trim in place and step back to see how pretty everything looks - I wouldn't trade that feeling for anything!

First of all, I finished my porch railings. I'm so glad I decided to "bash" this, even if it's a small change. I really like the colors, and the newel posts are surprisingly easy to paint (with a tiny brush!)


I glued a newel post to each piece of fencing. When that dried, I glued the fencing together at right angles.

I haven't glued them on to the porch or the side of the house yet, but here they are assembled.


I'm pretty happy with how they look!

Also, I painted the window trim for the five curved windows, and assembled the windows. (I'd already cut the wallpaper for inside the house and marked where the windows are, and painted the inside of the window frames to match the trim color, so it was safe to glue the windows in now.) I started by gluing the windows to the house. I had to cut them down so the plastic part wouldn't stick out past the trim (this was especially a problem on the bottom).


This can be hard to do without making a mess. I was careful to wipe any glue that showed off the plastic while it was still wet.

Some of the trim looks a little crooked because the vertical pieces were thinner than the ends of the curved piece. That's okay, though, because the shutters will be glued on top of the vertical pieces, hiding the crookedness. I have my shutters all painted but there's one last thing I want to try on them before I glue them in place.

I haven't painted the trim for the rectangular windows yet, or for the interior. With all those little pieces, working in small batches helps me stay sane! (Okay, relatively. )

Oh, I also stained and assembled the porch step. That was so easy. It's not fair how much faster it is to stain pieces than paint them... I wish stain came in the same colors paint does!


It's getting there!

Do you see the "stripe" running across the middle of the house? It's where the two pieces of the front wall came together. Even with wood filler, it's obvious. I guess the porch roof is there to cover up that crack! My plan is to cover it with some fancy trim, but the dollhouse store was closed this weekend for the holiday so I haven't been able to buy any yet. I think it'll look cute when it's done. (I love trim for covering up mistakes!) Stay tuned.

Compliments of fov

As expected, May turned out to be a very busy month for me and I didn't get to do any mini work for several weeks. But now I'm back on the horse! My Arthur is very close to being done. The biggest thing left to do is the wallpaper, and the roof and shingling. Other than that, it's all trim, trim, and more trim... which can take a deceptively long time!


It has to be done, but painting all those little pieces sure gets tedious!

A couple of weeks ago, before I went out of town, I painted the shutters, porch posts, and the fronts of the porch fence. Now that I'm back, I'm working on the railings and the backs of the fence pieces. I'm hoping to get through all these today and to assemble my porch. I can't glue the shutters on yet, though, because I haven't done the trim pieces that go around the windows.

Because I'm using Houseworks porch posts instead of following Greenleaf's instructions, the railing pieces that came in the kit are a little bit too short. So, I cut the porch posts from the kit (which I didn't need anymore, since I'm using the Houseworks posts instead) down to the right size.


This is the piece I'm supposed to use for the railing... too short!

Once I cut my railings to the right size, I painted them green. (The color scheme for the house is purple, with off-white trim and green accents.)


Waiting for paint to dry, again. I am not a patient person!

Before I went out of town, I went to a scrapbook store near my office and picked out paper for the walls. I wanted nice solid colors, a different one for each room, that would go well with the purple exterior. Originally I'd planned on pastels but wound up buying darker colors, instead.


I think these colors are really pretty... I just hope they don't make the rooms too dark!

I covered the first floor ceilings with white posterboard, and cut the wallpaper pieces for the first floor rooms. I'm not going to glue in the wallpaper just yet though. Since the porch fence pieces fit into slots on the front of the house, I don't want to put up the wallpaper until those are glued in and any cracks are sealed up... just in case. I'd hate to get glue or paint through the slot and have it mess up the wallpaper.



Here's what the first floor will look like. I haven't cut the paper for the second floor yet (that's the hard part, so I'm putting it off!)

Off to see if my paint is dry yet...

Compliments of fov

On Tuesday night I managed to get the rest of the siding off. The last stubborn bits came up after I doused them with a vinegar / water mixture. I don't know if the vinegar helped at all to loosen the glue or if it was just the water, but in any case, I was able to loosen the last bits of trim and rip them off. The downside is, the house smelled like vinegar. The wood also turned an awful black color where the vinegar and water touched, but no worries, since that will be covered up.


The aftermath.

I had to sand away the remaining glue and wood scraps before I could get on with the house. I tried doing it by hand but it was making a lot of noise and I didn't want to disturb our neighbors, who share a wall with our house. So the Arthur sat that way until today (Saturday). I think it was a little mad at me for leaving it in such a state of disarray... I could feel it scowling. Geoff was going to the hangar today so I decided to pack the Arthur into the car and go with him. I'm much more likely to work on a house for a long stretch if I'm working there with him, because there's nothing like the internet to distract me!

I showed him the mess I made with the siding and asked his advice on smoothing it out. I was planning to use the dremel tool but he had a better idea... the belt sander! Power tools scare me, so I let him do the honors.


Looks scary, but the house wasn't damaged at all!

The belt sander was the perfect tool for the job. You can hardly tell the wood went through a trauma. There were a few hollows where part of the wood came up with the siding, and I smoothed these out with wood filler. Otherwise, I'm really happy with it. As I said the night I ripped off the siding -- there's always a way to fix a die-cut house!

Since I could no longer rely on siding to cover up the surface imperfections, I needed to use wood filler on many cracks and slot holes. I did this all afternoon... filling holes, waiting for the wood filler to dry, sanding them down, and filling again. I didn't take any pictures because it wasn't very exciting, but I repeated the process three or four times. While I was waiting for the wood filler to dry, I got to work painting the shutters and porch railings.

I applied wood filler to the edges of the shutters before painting, to make a smoother edge. I did the same on the inside of the windows. I wanted to do this on the railing too but there are so many nooks and crannies and small spaces that are hard to get my fingers into, I opted against it. The top edge of the railing is covered up with trim, anyway, so that will not be visible. I will add wood filler to the bottom edge but haven't yet.


This smoothes out the rough edges of the plywood. I will do it to all exposed edges before painting (assuming I remember!)

Next, paint! Painting trim is pretty tedious and seems to take forever, so I'm glad I was alternating between that and the filling / sanding on the house. I am using some of the same paint I have for my Fairfield, but reversing it. The house will be purple, with tan trim and maybe light green accents.


Painting porch railings.

After seeing a finished Arthur on eBay that didn't have a porch roof, I decided to do this on mine as well. I don't like how the porch roof blocks a lot of the front of the house. I love the shade of purple I'm using and want it to be visible! This means the porch posts are taller than I need them to be. Rather than try to cut them down to a smaller size, I decided it would be much easier (and prettier) to use some Houseworks newel posts. I ran up to Dollhouses, Trains, and More, a shop about 10 minutes away from Geoff's hangar (very convenient for me!) and bought some Narrow Centurian Newel Posts made by Houseworks. (They're item number 7204 at Miniatures.com, if that link doesn't work.) I like these because the slight point on the top complements the little points on the inside of the railing. The newel posts are too long so Geoff helped me cut them down with his band saw. (No pictures yet, sorry!)

When we got home from the hangar I put the first coat of paint on the house. I'll say it again... I LOVE this shade of purple!



The house looks pretty content in its new color. I think it has forgiven me for the siding debacle...

Compliments of fov

I just did an impetuous thing.

I spent about an hour tonight applying a few strips of siding, waiting for them to dry a bit, and then applying a few more. As I was waiting for the glue to dry I got to thinking how much time applying this siding was adding to the building process, and how I'm sort of on a deadline because we're all supposed to be building this Arthur at the same time, and how many hours this was going to add to my project -- hours that could be spent in other ways. The more I thought about this, the more annoyed I got... at myself, for deciding to put on siding, at the siding itself for coming in separate strips, at the Arthur for being so damn cute it just NEEDED siding. And then, looking down at the siding I'd just spent an hour (today, plus two or more hours this weekend) applying... I started ripping it off.


Moments before my outburst. The house never saw it coming.

The stuff I'd glued on tonight came up easily. The rest was much harder to pry off. Wood glue is strong! I almost took my eye out with the utility knife. There are still a few strips clinging to the front of the house, that I haven't managed to get off. I figured I should step away from the house. I can work on prying those last strips loose tomorrow. The wood is a bit worse for the wear, of course, and will need some sanding and possibly some wood filler to fix spots where I pried off the top layer of plywood along with the glue. But I will not spend umpteen hours putting siding on strip by strip, and I've learned a valuable lesson.


Rampage in progress.

A few lessons, actually. One is that I am not a good person to apply siding strip by strip. I have used Houseworks siding before, the kind that comes in sheets, and even that annoyed me... but far less than gluing it on one strip at a time. I should have known, knowing myself as well as I do, that this was not something I'd enjoy... in fact, that it was something I would despise. It's never good to force yourself to do something on a dollhouse... for it to turn into a chore. Remember: This is supposed to be FUN!

The second lesson, for which we're all extremely lucky, is that you can do practically anything to a die-cut house and it'll still come out okay. Glue pieces on, tear them off, shove too-big tabs into too-small slots, rip out stairs and windows and towers -- die-cut houses are made for this type of abuse. My Arthur will be fine, without siding, and if it has a few scars it'll wear them proudly.

Or maybe that's just the adrenaline talking.

Compliments of fov

So, I glued the gables on. Next step is supposed to be the porch but since I haven't painted yet, that should come first. I decided to use siding on this house so obviously that has to go on before I paint. Of course, as I thought this through I realized I should have done the siding before adding the roof (or at least the gables) to make it easier to fit the siding on the triangular parts of the walls. Oops.


It'll be a little harder to get the siding to fit well in the gable with the roof already in place, but I'll manage.

First, I used wood filler to seal up some cracks where the walls went together. There will be trim covering these on the outside and wallpaper on the inside, but I just wanted to make sure the cracks wouldn't be visible from any angle.


It may not have been necessary for me to do this, but it only took a few minutes. If I weren't using siding on the exterior, it would be much more important.

Then I started my siding. I am using birch siding from Corona, which comes in individual strips. I cut several strips to size and started with the front of the house.


The siding cuts easily with scissors. The edges can be sanded with an emery board.

I'm bad at drawing straight lines, so rather than draw guide lines on the house, I am using a 3/8" wide piece of balsa to make sure that each strip of siding is the correct amount of space away from the one below it.


Gluing on, one strip at a time!

The strips are curling as I glue them on, so I am putting on a few, weighting them down with paint cans, and waiting them to dry before I do a few more. This is time intensive, obviously, but no more so than gluing on other pieces of the house. Next up, after siding: paint!

Compliments of fov

Again, didn't have any time to work on the house during the week. Now that it's the weekend I'm hoping to get a bunch done. Didn't get off to a good start though. The last work I did was on Tuesday, when I glued the left and right parts of the front roof onto the house. (I deviated from the directions a little... they say to put the second floor partition in first, but since I didn't punch out the hole for the stairs, I didn't have a slot to put the partition into. Gluing the roof pieces on provided some stability for the second floor partition.)

Last night (Friday) I glued in the second floor partition. Since I didn't punch out the hole for the stairs, this meant I didn't have a slot for the partition to fit into. So, I cut off the tab with my utility knife. Of course, this meant I was up against the same problem as with the foundation... gluing a very thin piece of plywood onto the floor. Then I made a little mistake. I glued the partition in backwards, so the sloped part was up against the wall rather than facing out. There's no excuse for this... I just didn't read the directions carefully. Last night as I was falling asleep it occurred to me that the sloped part should be facing out so it would butt up against the roof...

So, the first thing I did this morning was wiggle the partition out so I could glue it in again. The glue set nicely and it took a little work with the utility knife to get the wall out, but nothing got broken and it was relatively painless. Now it's gluing in again... the right way this time!


I put the roof on the back temporarily, to help weight down the partition while the glue sets.


Always knew Shakespeare would come in handy one of these days!

When that has glued, I plan to move right to gluing on the gable roof pieces. The instructions say to glue on the back roof first, but I'm going to skip that for now. I want to wallpaper inside before I glue that part on.

Compliments of fov

Just did a tiny bit of work today. First I stained the bottom of the porch (realizing a teeny tiny lip would show if the house were displayed on a glass table and someone got down on the floor and looked up at the bottom of it... okay, I'm anal!) and the porch foundation pieces.


Staining on my messy workbench.

A few hours later, after the stain had (mostly) dried, I glued the porch foundation pieces together. I think I found a mistake in the instructions. They say that the side pieces and front piece of the porch foundation should have tabs and slots that interlock, but those pieces don't have tabs or slots. They do in the pictures on the box, but not in the kit I have. Maybe a change was made to the dies when Greenleaf retooled this kit, but the instructions were never updated. Anyway, I glued in wooden blocks for support again, because as we have learned gluing little pieces of plywood at perfect right angles is NOT my forte!


Unfortunately, I'm running out of little wooden blocks!

That's all for the time being. I will glue the porch foundation on to the bottom of the porch before I go to work tomorrow.

Compliments of fov