Chapter 26 - Floor and Back Wall of Left-hand Room of First Floor, Changing Room Shelves

February 27 - 28th 2012

Everything in bits and pieces....

The changing room shelves pretty straight forward altho the internal shelving pieces were not perfectly slotted.  They’re still more than passable once completed.  In the meantime, I screwed around with the drummel tool and found it had a tiny drill bit.  So I used that to drill the holes to attach the spa changing room and it worked much better.  Only stripped one screw.  And it fits enough to look fine to me.

Even if I was tempted to install the spa roof, I held off.  I figured I’d just create confusion for myself if I went out of order.  Sometimes there is a reason for installing things in the order they say and since I have no experience in building a dollhouse, better to stick to the instructions.

I decided to use a green like the original house plan.  These pieces again are slightly warped but will try and work with them the way they are.  The fun thing was I decided to stencil some leaf design on the wall (like a Japanese Maple Leaf) and I had the leaf design from my niece Laura’s wedding favor.  I had two of them so I have saved one for a souvenir and the other I cut to make the stencil - immortalizing her wedding in the dollhouse.  Pretty cool...

Stencil from the favor box.

Chapter 25 - The Tatami for the First Floor Room, Sink for the Kitchen

February 25 - 26th 2012

I started straight off with the kitchen sink.  Figured it’d be easier.  Well, it was till I got to the insertion of the faucet.  The hole was soo much smaller I had to really ream it out.  The paint wasn’t quite dried but I wasn’t too concerned because keeping in theme with a beat up used kitchen, the porcelain sink would be beat up too.  I added a little brown staining around the drain and the back stop.  Looks pretty filthy.

I tried out Fimo today too.  That was an adventure.  I really have no idea how to use this stuff and have seen instructions on the internet and that’s about it.  I did mange to get my gas oven low enough to cook some “tomatoes” and a small plant vase.  I had looked into plants in small scale and they were so expensive I figured I’d have to make my own.  So I bought some plastic plants for fish aquariums - much cheaper.  After making my Fimo plant vase, I stuck a few pieces in the pot.  I think it looks pretty cute sitting in the kitchen window.

First attempt with Fimo...not bad really.

I think the plant looks pretty cute

Working on the tatami, which I guess is the floor of the next room that we are working on, I opened the bag and it was full of dried mold.  The tatami was pretty covered with it.  So I had to use these sheets and not the leftover from the other tatami construction because I was afraid there would be some color differences.  Even if the construction was pretty basic, these damn things are time consuming and believe it or not, back-breaking.  And with all that mold...it was not a pleasure. 

Chapter 24 - Sliding Doors to the Changing Room, The Ceiling, the Scale

February 23 - 24th 2012

The Scale was the easiest so I put that together first.  Just a little paint and gloss and it looks really quite nice.

The rest of the changing room was pretty straight forward except for the fact that the pieces were warped etc etc etc.  What I ended up doing was sanding down the top as I figured I’d have to and cutting the trim to fit.  The most amazing thing was that the ceiling piece fit in amazingly well considering how far off the outside wall is. 

At this point, I screwed in the hinges.  I figured it’d be better now than when the sliding doors went in.  Thank goodness I did it because the screws are so small and I cannot find a screwdriver that fits them accordingly.  The kit came with a little hand drill so I’ve actually started drilling in far enough so the screw should go in a little easier.  Easier said than done.  I may have to resort to an electric drill to be sure that the screws don’t get stripped during installation.  The kit came with a little screwdriver setup but I cannot figure out how it works.  Unable to locate the instructions on how to use it too (unlike the little drill and other tools that they explain how they work).  I ended up leaving the attachment to the house for last...

The sliding doors were the usual fair.  Time for glueing and painting and waiting for stuff to dry again...ho hum.  The inside grates of course were too long and hand sanding or power sanding was out of the question.  So, I used the wire cutters and trimmed off the bottoms.  Worked perfectly!  The grates in any case were still too large for the windows and the plastic for the windows was slightly small.  But it all turned out in the end.

The top left side looks pretty good compared to the foto from the previous post.

Chapter 23 - The Spa Changing Room, External Wainscotting, The Geta

February 22 - 23rd 2012

Painting and waiting.  But matching up all the pieces to the Spa room was pretty impossibile.  The pieces were so warped that now they are proving hard to match up.  Major glueing involved and clamping them down.  I think I’m going to have to sand most of the top of this extension down to fit the room section and be sure the next floor is level.  What a pain.

Then I attacked the Geta shoes.  These little shoes made for walking on surfaces with water (or snow).  WTF.  Nothing like the explanation would be remotely possible. 

After screwing around with these stupid things, I figured the best way to go would be thru simple glue glue glue.  They look great but need drying time.  Figured out a trick by clamping them and glueing the small cords onto the geta that worked well enough.  What a total BS that was.  But I must say, I think it’ll look great in the spa.

Yeah, right.

The Geta and the Spa Extension

This was the first chapter that I felt totally without desire and totally frustrated! Thank goodness the ground floor is nearly done!

Chapter 22 - The Flooring and Left Wall of the Spa, Kitchen Window

February 21st 2012

Left is the Spa extension - right is the finished window to the kitchen

The last few chapters have gone very quickly because they are similar but also because most of the time is spent painting walls and just glueing things up and letting them dry.  This one was not different. 

Lots of clamping tho as these walls were very warped.  Did the best I could.  Once I get the roof on the spa extension, things should straighten out a bit more. 

Showing here two little baskets that my work colleague and another lover of all things miniature picked up for me in a shop in Milan.  They are a bit big but they should be fine for the kitchen and are so cute ! Will probably paint them with a little gloss just to protect them.

Chapter 21 - Spa Extension and Ceiling to Kitchen Extension

February 20th 2012

Again, painting and drying and painting and drying...

The roof section of the kitchen went in just fine.  Some detailed cutting work but it looks fine and fits fine.

The sections to the spa extension were warped which required overnite dampening and then glueing in two sessions.  But it didn’t help as much as I had hoped.  Will have to do some searching to find a better method for unwarping.  I will probably have to correct the fit later with some clamps and extra glueing.  But I won’t be able to gauge the damage until I finish the next chapter.

Chapter 20 - Right Hand Wall of the Kitchen Extension, Kitchen Credenza

February 19 2012

This section marks the 20th Installment! Only 100 more to go ! Wow. Can’t believe that I started only a month ago (January 17th).  It is quite quick so far in terms of construction.  Hope it keeps up this way.

I put the final wall piece on the kitchen extension after painting etc and it fit just fine.  The area between the kitchen flooring looks great!

The floor between the kitchen extension and the kitchen.

I'm going to leave it open to fit some plates and platters.

I put together half the credenza and while it was drying, I decided to attack the attachment of the kitchen extension to the house.  True, it was something for the next chapter but I just felt like doing it.

Turned out to be pretty difficult only because getting the wood screws in was harder than it looked.  There was no where to get a good grip on the whole house to have some leverage so I had to Ask Lu for some help.  He held the house while I got the screws started.  I stripped a few simply because they are so small and it’s pretty hard to get in a good position but they luckily supplied some extra screws (at least I hope they are extras! and not to be used in future hinge installment!)

Anyway, a little gloss and paint and the credenza looks used and abused as it should.  Still deciding where this one should go.