Scratch build - Day 4

Dear readers I am ashamed to say that in my haste to build this next house I ignored two cardinal rules.  The first of these rules was "measure twice, cut once" - the second, and possibly the most important - dry fit.  With my front walls glued firmly in place I came to realize that the measurements on my hallway were all wrong.  Nothing about these measurements was at all correct.  Had i completed my foam core dryfit I would have realized this.

My hallway was supposed to be 7.5" wide, this allowed room for the stair kit I have which is 2.5" wide.  I'm not sure why something didn't trigger when I realized that my double door kit was too wide - regardless my beloved front wall had to come off tonight and now I have to figure out how to cut my base without taking down all the other glued and nailed walls so that I can add a spacer of three inches.

I wrestled with putting a "tower" on the back of the house but in the end I knew that I wanted to have visibility of the hallway, and if it was only 4" across it wouldn't be very impressive at all.  Two steps forward and one step back it seems!

I will have further news once I figure out the best way to cut my base!

Chantilly - Day 16

Siding is no longer new and exciting, in fact I'm still a bit disheartened by the window framing fiasco.  I did manage to get a bit more on this evening but it got rather persnickity up around the eaves.  I then decided to frame out around the central upstairs window.  On the bay window and inside this frame I will make scalloped shingles out of clay and paint them the same colour as the clapboard.  It won't be obnoxious but will still add some textural diversity to the house and pay homage to the high victorian siding styles found on older farmhouses along the coast.

However I soon tired of this as well and decided to do some more work on the shingles.  The watercolours have  firmly set and the shingles are now quite dry, so I added a coat of pecan stain to even out the tones a bit and saturate the cracks between shingles.  It's given the shingles a bit of warmth and has toned that blue/purple tinge out of them quite nicely.

The stain was applied heavily with a sponge brush.  I started in the corners and worked my way out (the idea to have darker shingles where moisture would tend to collect, lighter where the roof would be baked by the sun).  I'm debating adding moss to the shingles with my oil paints and a stiff brush.  It could either be really great or really not... I may need to make a practice roof :)

Chantilly - Day 15

Disaster!  It appears my measurements were ever so slightly off and the window frames aren't thick enough to cover the edges of the siding!!

After siding the lower half of the side wall it's painfully apparent that the frames should have had a subframe built.  Now I have to figure out some what to make window frames to go over the window frames and somehow have it still look decent.  I sense a lot of carefuly snipping in my future... oh so careful snipping.  Maybe the siding should be removed and a clay exterior constructed, or perhaps a flat board siding.

I was so pleased with the little window sills too, I think that's the true salt in the wound.  Especially after spending hours coating these things with layer after layer of white paint and then enamel!


 I know it's not ruined, I just need to figure out a plan so that I can continue on with confidence... to the doll house forum!

http://www.greenleafdollhouses.com/forum/index.php?

Chantilly - Day 13

Today I attempted multi-tasking.  Now I was in a workshop a while back where I was told that multi-tasking is impossible for the human brain, you can only do multiple things with short bursts of attention.  Laundry and construction and television do not go hand in hand.  I rather foolishly followed the instructions and glue the bay window segments to the veranda roof, trimmed the whole thing and then realized that it will be exceedingly difficult to install.

I think my way around this is the cut the tabs off the bottom of the wall and glue very well, maybe installing deck boards to hold the walls in place.  Deck boards will make the front door more difficult to install however... bah.

Anyway, I started putting the corner pieces on for the siding, will continue with the window trim tomorrow, another coat of white paint on all of them and then I start installing the clapboard siding.  I will make clay shingles to scallop the bay window I think, and then the rest will the straight clapboard.  I may install siding panels under the windows for that victorian choppy siding look, that's still up in the air.

As my painted shingles dry they're turning more purple than I had anticipated, they will need another tamer coat of colour as it appears some blue got mixed in from my palatte.

Chantilly - Day 5

Day 5 was apparently a day of deliveries rather than shopping, which is just fine by me because I've already forgotten what I have ordered.  The result of this, well it's much like Christmas :)  The day started with the deliver of my Glencroft, followed by the delivery of my fireplace (remember I demanded it faster from the universe just yesterday), the brass bed, a stack of HOM furniture which is sadly in full scale (how do you think I justified the Glencroft), and the tiny doorknobs for the Chantilly which I haven't opened yet.

I then motored over to the hobby store to pick up more balsa wood, but missed them by 5 minutes, no biggie there's a Michaels around the corner and I wanted to go look at paper there anyway.  I got some of the wood only it was the wrong size, and some paper, as well as some pecan stain for the flooring.

 I'm not sure if the wallpaper is turning the floor orange or if it's actually the colour of the stain, but it's turning into an interesting room for sure.I did another dry fit on the stairs, which is good because my first approximation was completely out to lunch, got the floor laid, carpet down, and wallpapering out of the way. If only real life renovations were this quick to complete!

The Pesterhood of the Traveling Stain

To my horror, this morning I discovered that the stain from the floor had travelled up the wallpaper on one of the shell sections.  This just happens to be the section that I hammered in much like Thor, I don't know if it's bad enough to warrant a repapering or not..  I'm going to have to go to work and think about it.