The Next Level

I have to confess . . .   When I figured out the number of steps in the castle a couple of weeks ago I said 25 steps by 5 floors, that's 100 steps.  I hope it doesn't take you as long as it did me to realise how very terribly wrong that little bit of simple mathematics is.  There are, of course, actually 125 steps.  At least I can be certain when I tell you the castle now has double the floors it had last week.

At least I seem to have managed to get the measurements right in building the castle, at least so far as the next floor sits on the basement and matches up with level of the door opening on the stair tower.

One mistake I did make was to put an arched ceiling in the basement dungeon.  I used toothpicks to make bars to secure the dungeon, but continuing the bars up to a curved ceiling and having them fit properly is not easy.  So at the moment anyone wanting to escape the dungeon only has to climb over the top of the bars.  In future I will have another go at sealing off this escape route either with bars or a solid piece of wall.

Above the dungeons are the castle kitchens.  The floors are tiled with pieces of orange EVA foam cut into squares and glued in place.  This was given a wash of brown paint to create a more terracotta tone and 'grouted' with a mix of pollyfiller, water and grey paint.  Under the arch on the left side of the room is an area separate to the kitchen that will probably a scullery or buttery.  The right side of the kitchen is where the kitchen proper will be.  The opening in the back wall is for the ovens.

On the opposite side of the castle I used a door kit from Petite Properties to add a door to the wall dividing the well room from the alchemists lair.  The door itself is quite effective but when you see it against one of the doorway arches I cut you'll notice it looks very short.  It looks even worse against a 48th sized person.

Working to scale, a 48th (1/4") person the equivalent of 6' tall should be about 1 1/2" tall, therefore a doorway should logically be at least that high too, preferably a little higher.  Yet the professionally made to scale door is no more than 1 1/4" high.  Set against my admittedly generous arches, this door really looks wrong.  Worse, I have five more of these doors to use higher up in the castle and they're all going to look silly too.  Up until now I've loved everything I've bought from Petite Properties but it seems items they sell as 48th scale aren't all quite 48th scale.

Above this dwarf door is a pretty swanky room with a smart red and black tiled floor and linenfold panelling look walls.  Like the kitchen, the floor tiles are cut from EVA foam, but this time laid closely enough not to need grout in a smart diamond pattern.  The panelling is just printed paper as is the fire surround and brick backing.  The wall on the right of the room is where the castle's front door will be located, making this room the castle's entry hall.  It will also be the armoury with displays of weaponry and seating for newly arrived guests waiting to be shown further into the castle.

Christmas Came Early

Last week the wonderful Lorraine of Fairy Meadow Miniatures sent me a message to let me know she was sending me a surprise.  I was thinking it was so generous of her to send maybe one or two small items.  Then the delivery guy showed up with this:

Once I'd picked my eyeballs up off the floor I opened up this massive parcel to find two boxes absolutely stuffed with wonderful things!

There were kits for all kinds of furniture and embroidered cushions, rugs, all maner of furniture (including the kitchen sink!) and so many little accessories.  There was a set of brass scales (of which Piers the Apothecary has been in dire need).  There were plates of food and ceramic jugs.  Even a wired outdoor light.  Every time I thought there couldn't possibly be anything else squeezed into the boxes something else new and exciting emerged.  There was probably enough in those boxes to furnish and accessorise an entire three story house!

I can't thank Lorraine enough for this bounty of wonderful and infinately useful items.  This is absolutely the best and most appreciated present I have received, possibly ever, but certainly since the Christmas I received a Magic Moves Barbie (hey, it takes a lot to top a doll whose arms move by themselves!  And there's a thought, how come no one makes a 1 /12th scale doll you can wire into the houses electrics so that when you switch on the lights the doll will start drinking tea or flipping the pages in a book?).

Even the empty boxes were enjoyed by Charlie who sat in them and proceeded to shred the cardboard.

Included was this package of books.  I have to admit my first thought on seeing them was 'Oh no, not more books!' having made so many over the past few weeks, but it didn't take long for an idea to form. . . .

I glued the books into a crazy stack and added the victorian cookbook stand that came free with the current Dolls House and Miniature Scene magazine to create this bookstand.  The book displayed on the stand was made from a free printie glued ontop of several layers of plain paper aged with some tea and cut to size which were in turn glued onto a piece of thin leather.

The bookstand only just fits into the Library now the rest of the furniture for the room has been made.

The canopied desk sits at the end of the centre row of shelves.  It has a sloped writing surface and plenty of shelves both above and below the writing slope to store such neccesities as bottles of ink and even more books.

Another open book made in the same way as the book on the stand sits on the writing slope.  Spare scrolls, books and a crystal ball have been piled on top of the canopy above the desk.

For the back corner of the room is this wing chair made from balsa wood with bought oak legs and upholstered with blue satin.  The celestial pattern on the fabric seemed perfect for a wizard's library, I just wish I could have srunk it down so you got more of the pattern on the chair.

To help reach those high shelves there is this set of library steps.  They are again balsa wood with a staircase spindle and some small brackets.

If this chair at the front of the room looks at all familiar, that's because I stole it from the Witch Shop; there were always too many chairs in the reading room anyway and I think the chair looks much more at home in the Library.

The firebox for the fireplace has been started, but still needs work.  The back is cardboard with a thin metal scrapbook decoration and polymer clay lion's head glued ontop.  The front is formed from wire mesh between two short turned posts.

Now you've come to the end of my blog for another week, please everyone (at least those of you in Australia) go and pay a visit to Fairy Meadow Miniatures.  You may not end up overwhelmed by freebies, but you certainly won't be disappointed by the service.

A Trio of Sorceresses and a Tonne of Books

Chrysta has been joined by new friends Amethyst and Gemma.  Amethyst (Amy for short) wears a purple gown while Gemma is in black.  Like Chrysta, they're all handmade from the same mould (hence they look like triplets).  While Chrysta was made from Cernit clay, Amy and Gemma are both made from Sculpey.  As you can see, the Cernit definately gives the better result, it has more of a 'glow' and a more translucent finish that make it more realistic.  It is however so much harder to work with than the Sculpey.

 

As you can see with the three ladies standing in the garden, Gemma just gets lost in her black dress, but both she and Amy fit in much better than Chrysta due to their narrower skirts.  Chrysta is still my favourite though and I think either she or Amy will get the job of tending the Crystal Garden permanently.  (I welcome all opinions on who it should be).  The two remaining sorceresses will find homes in later rooms of the ToM.

 The garden itself is practically finished now that water has been added to the fountain.  The pool is made of Solid Water while the fountain is done with Scenic Water trained up thin wires.  The fountain part is a bit messy but somehow looks more like crystal than water - perfect for the Crystal Garden!  Floating in the pool are lily pads (wire and faux leadlighting paint) and flowers (resin beads).

 Hopefully, the garden will be finished by next week and if I'm lucky and actually get to see some sunshine I may even manage to get some decent photos of it.

 Meanwhile, after their modelling job in the garden last week, Saskia and Artie have dropped by the Library on their way back to Castle Starcaster.  After weeks of neglect and being slept in by cats, there is finally some progress for them to see.  I've taken down the arches from the shelf tops and run some coving stained to match the rest of the shelves around the top instead.  I'm not sure about the fancy trim on the top.  I don't have enough to go all the way around, so I was going to just do the ends of the shelves as it is in the photo, but it doesn't look right does it?  And Artie reminded me that it's the same trim used in Castle Starcaster's library and it might look a bit 'samey' if I used it in another library.  So I guess it's time to think up plan B.

 I have installed the mirror in the back corner creating the illusion of continuing shelves.  Everything behind the red curtain is mirror.  I wasn't clever enough to postion the mirror so that it reflected only shelf from every angle so to compensate I hung the curtain to block the side of the mirror where you tend to see things beyond the library.  I'm very pleased with the overall effect, it works really well.  It will be impossible to fill the shelves down this aisle area after the centre shelf is permanently glued in place so I had a marathon book making session and managed to make enough books to fill this area and glued them in place.  Next time I decide to make a room filled with books, someone please hit me.  What I've found to be a good rule of thumb for making books is to make as many as you think you'll need, then make as many again and an extra dozen on top and you may have enough.  By the time I've filled the remaining three quaters of the library I will definately be swearing never to make a book again!

The Final Furniture

This week I focused on getting all the remaining furniture and building decoration work done in both Pennicott's and the Apothecary so that I can now start making accessories like dresses for the mannequins without splashing wood stain on them.  I found a long, low shelf that I pulled out of the pre-renovation Dawncrest Castle to position behind the upstairs counter and built some new shelves from balsa wood to sit atop them and frame the window.  I don't really like the fact that the counter/shelf structure now has three different wood finishes in one area, but my excuse is that when A.L. Pennicott renovated, she started to run short of funds and has to reuse a few items that no longer quite matched the rest of the shop.  Hopefully by the time they're filled with stock you won't notice the mis-match.

The rails have been added around the top of the stairwell.  They're done with pre-bought plastic railing and balsa wood posts.  I can't add the angled railing on the stairs themselves just yet as I am one length of railing short.

 Most of the furniture I made this week was for the apothecary.  The big hole in the back wall has been filled with a simple shelf unit which will hold the apothecary's various ingredients and supplies.  Beside the shelves is a small pine cupboard.  The stairs leading up to the main building are more salvage from Dawncrest Castle.  On the left wall is a small desk and stool while in the middle of the floor are two trestle tables.  I'm having trouble getting the trestle at one end of the longer table to stand up properly so I'll replace it with one of the spares that belong to the third trestle table currently folded up in storage under the stairs.  The row of hotplates on the right wall have been covered by a large metal look hood.  The hood looks decidedly out of place at the moment; it's too new and shiny looking.  I wonder if it would be better if I covered it with more brick effect or perhaps some wooden planking?

Four Projects

 As scary as it may sound, there are now only five weeks left until Christmas.  Normally, I intend to create a Christmas themed scene, but am busy working on other things in the lead up to Christmas and it gets put off for another year.  Not this time around though!  I was lucky enough to find a nicely sized gift box in a local store and have started transforming it into a Christmas-y vignette using (almost) only items I already have on hand.  The wall is papered with gold and brown scrapbooking paper and the floor in green carpet.  The fretwork at the front is a room divider I bought forever ago but never used.  The fireplace came out of my box of miscellanious furniture and was repainted from mahogany to marble while the fire box within is made out of balsa wood, lace and a polymer clay lions head.  Dan is sitting on an armchair made of balsa and covered in red velveteen with a matching footstool (again made of balsa).

Here's how the tree was made:

Step One: carve a cone shape out of oasis foam.

Step Two: cut pine roping into sections about half an inch long and press into the oasis cone.

 If you're a little short on roping, don't go all the way around the tree, just do the front part where it will show.

Step Four: Use the plastic reel from an empty roll of sticky tape (or similar) to make a base by covering it in fabric and press it into the bottom of the tree.

The next step is to decorate the tree, but you'll have to wait until next week to see how I do that!

I had intended to make this scene with items I already had on hand, but decided to lash out and electrify it.  I already have some spare fireplace bulbs so I've ordered a string of lights for the tree and a lamp to go next to the chair.  I figure to hide the elcetrical connections in a big present under the tree.

Coming back to ongoing projects, my bedroom roombox window has been installed.  The window is made of strips of balsa wood glued onto a backdrop that was a free cut out in an old Dolls House and Miniature Scene magazine.  The curtains made last week frame the window.

 I'm still re-arranging all the furniture in here.  This is how it looks at the moment.  This arrangement makes room for a fireplace on the back wall and a chaise by the window.  I'm still not sure I'm entirely happy with it so by next week you might find it's been totally rearranged again.

Tilli's house hasn't been ignored either.  All the rooms now have rugs on the floor.  These were made by printing rug designs on something called "canvas paper".  It's paper that has the look and feel of fabric canvas and is designed to make printed images look like they were painted on canvas.  It's perfect for rugs as it has a woven texture and always lies flat on the floor without curling up.

Both bedrooms have had their fire surrounds installed.  A fan shaped jewllery finding was used to create a fire screen for each room.  I haven't fixed the curtains in Till's bedroom, still building up the courage to tackle that problem.

 Downstairs in the kitchen/dining/lounge room, new furniture has been added.  There are two small coffee tables, one at the end of the couch and one between the two armchairs.  A third large coffee table fills the floor infront of the fireplace.  All the tables are balsa wood tops with plastic chess men for legs.  A set of shelves by the fire was made with pieces of "Tiny Turnings" and yet more balsa.

 To help put the size of Tilli's house in perspective, here's how it looks when Dan pays a visit.

 And when he actually makes it inside:

And now for a surprise.

Last month I dressed a doll to enter in the fantasy dressing competition run by DHMS magazine.  Now that the deadline for competition entries has past, I can finally show you what I created.

I call him the "Dragon Wizard" because of his Chinese influence.  I think he turned out absolutely perfectly even if he comes dead last in the competition.

Now I just have one problem . . . . what do I do with him now?  He's been standing ontop of the CD player in my ipod dock for the past month, dangerously close to where I slosh paint and glue around and sooner or later he'll get splashed.  I need to find someplace suitable (and safe!!) for him.

Whew!  That's it for this post but come back soon as I want to get your opinion about which of two very different projects I should start to work on next!

Curtain Call

This week involved making four sets of curtains with two very different results.  The curtains for the roombox bedroom are quite possibly my best curtains yet.  They are made of damask with silk dupion tails and swag.  The total height of the curtains is about 20cm.  The next step is to make a window for them to frame, then they can be hung on the wall.

 At the same time as making the curtains, I dressed the bed for the room in more of the silk and some pink brocade.  The bed covers are fairly basic with no fancy flounces or frills because I didn't want them to detract from the bed itself.  I am thinking however that I need to add a canopy over the bed of some kind.

Now to move on to curtains of the less sucessful kind.  The curtains for Tilli's bed and bathroom were made from a light green linen and are . . . pretty horrid to be kind to them.  It's not the scale (24th instead of 12th) that is the problem, its the way I did the windows.  The windows and roof line are all angles with no where to really hang curtains from making it really awkward to get the curtains to hang and look right.  Add to that the fact that I either didn't starch them enough or weren't left to dry long enough as all their pleats unpleated themselves while I was struggling to get them in the right spots.

Fortunately Tilli's bed was much more cooperative.  It's fairly basic, just a bed sized slice of foam for the mattress while the headboard is the one that came with the foam house kit.  The base of the mattress was covered with a ruffled trim to create a valance while the bed cover is a lilac cotton covered with a white and silver lace.

The bathroom curtains are just as bad as those in the bedroom.  They're also too long and hang down behind the toliet.  As you can see I'm replacing the so called bath tub that came with this 1/24th scale bathroom set with a larger built in tub.  If you recall the original tub was a tad on the small size.  The frame is balsa wood and foam while the tub itself is airdry clay.  When the clay it dry it'll be trimmed around the top and painted to match the sink and loo.

 Downstairs in the lounge is another set of curtains that rest somewhere between the green and the pink ones in terms of success.  They are a pre-crinkled fabric with a piece of fancy trim used as a pelmet.  Not horrible but not fabulous either.

At the kitchen end of the ground floor, the kitchen has been installed.  The cabinets are simple box shapes covered in thin cream card.  Extra rectangles of card ontop of the fronts make the cupboard doors.  Dashes of gold leadlighting outliner give the impression of hinges while the handles are pieces of gold wire positioned on blobs of outliner.  The countertops are balsa wood.  The oven is balsa wood with wooden bead feet painted silver.  I still need to add a hood over the hotplates. 

You may be wondering where Tilli does her washing up and keeps her refridgerated foods.  Unfortunately, the answer is that she doesn't.  There just isn't room to include a sink and a fridge in this house.  Infact there are lots of details that there just isn't room for which isn't surprising when you consider the house was intended to be a cheap toy.  Next time I do a 1/24th scale house I'll design it from scratch and allow space for everything!