I'm not nearly as religious about blogging when working on my own wee house it seems, I suppose it doesn't help that the majority of us seem to show off our hard work at the green leaf forums these days! Regardless, despite radio silence, I have been working diligently on the Glencroft in the desperate hopes of clearing off some table space so Ben might work on the house he was planning on giving his neice for Christmas, or should we fall behind schedule, her birthday. Although it doesn't matter how much space is cleared off, it never seems to be enough, he may be intimidated by the amount of work these tiny houses appear to contain!
That said, here is my progress.
1. The paper clay shingles. Greenleaf supplies sheets of thin shingles with this kit. I actually did consider using them until I realized that my house would look like thousands of other ones out there if I did that. I also remember having a hell of a time getting them on straight, keeping them from migrating, and an even colouring throughout because of glue spots and whatnot. I went with my tried and true method from the Chantilly and dug out the pasta maker then cut inch wide strips, notched the strips for the look of individal shingles and glued them on with modpodge. Every couple of shingle rows I would go back with my knife and texture them to look a bit more like wood-grain, specifically pulling at the lower edge with the blade so that it both cut in a bit and pulled back. I think this gives you more of a realistic yet story book illustration type of roofing shingle.
2. The base coat - to get a colour variation between shingles, I applied a base wash of greys and yellows, mixing on the fly so no two shingles are actually the same colour. It's painstaking, and to be honest I don't know if it actually makes a difference once you put the stain on. I was thinking of leaving the shingles in grey tones but it was too much grey on the house between the stonework on the front/chimney.
3. Wood stain - I coated the roof in Minwax "Provincial 211". I definitely prefer the darker shingles, but love that it doesn't match up whatsoever with my timbering on the front of the house.
Last but not least, this is my first electrified house, for months the little roundwires have been played with by the kitten, tripped over, painted over, glued, taped, moved, trampled on and yanked upon. At long last I was able to locate a transformer. The unfortunate side to this story is that I wasn't able to test any of my lighting before moving forward. I am currently sitting at a higher than expected success rate with all lights working but the upstairs ones. I need to check bulbs at this point, if there's a break in the wiring I have no way to access them and the lights become purely ornamental.
1. interior lighting shot of the living room
2. Exterior shot of the ground level.
Next the interior progress. I'm almost done since the last post anyways. I have flooring left to do in the study and a bit of trimwork to figure out, but the interior finally made it over the slow hump or the ("to hell with this I'm leaving you on the side of the road" stage). The floors on the bottom level are cut up lino tiles in a stone pattern and then grouted with spackle, toned with watercolours. The second floor bedroom is strip wood stained and glued in place. I also have the doors up and hinged aside from the dining room door, it is waiting patiently in the wings, and the windows leaded and half installed.
