Greenhouse and a Dispute!

Time to start on the roof of the greenhouse. I had a container of Skinny-Sticks , so used a few of those for the rafters.

I glued up three pieces of square stock for the back support piece, then found some decorative brackets to use on the ends.

I glued these together, several times actually, then found a piece of window trim I cut for the front support. Right about then, I heard an awful fuss and saw Larry and Louie rolling around on the ground, swords in hand.

What is with you two! I said.

After settling them down a bit, I put each one in one of the corners of the garage after finding out they were fighting about who was going to drive the truck next.

This should be an interesting partnership for sure! LOL! After trying out the roof, decided it needed a couple more brackets.

I painted on the first coat of white paint and set it aside to dry. The next thing I had to address was the front wall. Every time I tried it in place, it looked wonky to me. I finally figured out that it needed to go on the top of the left wall, not inside the wall. A narrow strip was added and then I had to trim the right wall to fit better. It fits the way it should now even though the windows aren't exactly in the middle.

Maybe I'll get a little creative with my utility knife tomorrow morning. If I try to cut it now, I will probably damage myself. Looking at the picture, I could make it one large window centered, then divide it up with mullions.....Sounds like a plan! Of course, that means I won't be able to use the trim or the "window glass" that came with this....I'll have to think on it. Have a great day!

Starting over....

Work on the greenhouse was not going well. Ever have a project just stop co-operating? It seemed like whatever I did became a struggle....pretty weird for such a tiny building! I finally realized that it didn't want to be stuccoed. But what? I have been a miniaturist for quite awhile and I can tell you for sure that these things let you know what they want. I know, weird but true. It didn't want egg carton stonework, didn't want stone fabric,

didn't want brick paper.

It wanted the brick fabric like is on the teashop I have! Don't ask me how I know, I just do! LOL! So after spending 2 hours in the shop trying to find said fabric, I finally put my hands on it.

While trying to get the stucco paper off, I knocked it apart so we are indeed starting over.

After peeling off as much of the paper as I could, I glued the back and sides together and started cutting the brick fabric to size.

Once the glue was dry, I started glueing the fabric on. I had to make some careful cuts around the vents, but it went on well and is drying.

I wanted some landscaping and had run out of tiny bushes so I found some plastic trees in my stash. I cut the tiny trunks off with my wire cutters and put them in place. Hmm, kinda plasticy...so I pulled out a bottle of dark green paint and dry brushed them....much better!

So now the ideas are rolling in again and tomorrow I will start work on the greenhouse roof! Have a great day!

Can a Building be Disagreeable?

Larry & Louie's Landscaping is having a rough start! LOL! This required a lot more sanding than these little buildings usually require, then it didn't really want to be built! But I have clamps and I know how to use them! LOL! So with a few here and there, the garage was subdued!

By morning it was removed from the clamps and was behaving itself.

My first thought was to finish this building completely before starting the greenhouse section, but changed my mind and started cutting up the schoolhouse kit to make it fit the space. The first step was to cut the end piece without the door in half top to bottom, then I cut one of the sides with the windows shorter in length. I thought I was going to be able to have 3 windows, but it would be too crowded so only have two.

I cut the floor piece to fit as a back wall and will use one of the roof pieces for the new floor.

Making all these cuts was not an easy chore, I wrestled with my cork backed steel ruler, my utility knife, and multiple cuts to get these done. Since the end pieces now had a half window in them, I thought they would be perfect for vents like you see in greenhouses. Sat and thought about what I could use and then remembered that I had one shutter that's been kicking around for years. I found it in a container and proceeded to cut it up. After a few false starts, I ended up with the beginnings of my vents

and also a completely destroyed shutter! LOL!

I thought a stucco-like finish would be fun on this and had scrapbook paper that I knew would work. Just as I was finishing more of the walls, Larry and Louie showed up from the printer with posters of flowers to decorate the back wall. I said maybe we should wait until the walls are up, but they wanted to "see how they would look"....wonder where they get that from, hmmm....

The final project of the morning was looking for more of the little resin plants that I bought years ago. After some glue and tea leaf "dirt", they are ready to be placed in the greenhouse.

Larry got the contract to raise the flowers for Buns & Roses so he is all excited about that; especially since he will be paid in their newest offering....banana donuts. So I will be working more on this this afternoon since we are busy having a snow storm. But that's okay, we are warm and dry and have plenty of "Milk and Bread".......and bananas! LOL! Have a great day!

Larry & Louie's Landscaping, Garage

Since Larry and Louie did such a nice job on the landscaping for Buns & Roses, I felt an obligation to them to get them up and running. So cracked open the box for the new village buildings. Mmmm, the smell of plywood in the morning! LOL! These pieces seem a little rougher that the older kit I was working with and required more vigorous sanding. The first change I wanted to make was to square off the door opening.

I think this is going to be made to look like one of the barns here in Tennessee so figured that was a good start. Cutting it square was no easy task and I ended up carving pieces away with my utility knife.

The greenhouse will be built using the schoolhouse kit cut in half lengthwise and also shortened by one window. I propped a few things in place and this is actually going to fit on the little base.

A little more sanding and I glued parts of the garage together and have them drying.

I dug around in my scrap box and came up with a few pieces of siding that I used on the Steampunk Summerhouse.

I have more that isn't stained yet so I will get that all out and dig out my stain I used on it. This should be a fun build! I'm still thinking about the greenhouse section but I have a ways to go before I have to worry about that. So, something to do while the glue is drying, hmmm...Dear Hubby offered to drill holes for the windows in the fairy house, so I took him up on his offer. This is a fake shell that has sat on a shelf for years and after looking at Pinterest pictures of fairy houses, I got inspired to create something a little different. This is just part of it, the rest will have paper mache parts. He started with small pilot holes to see how this resin would behave. Then switched over to a large paddle bit.

The first three holes went well, but cutting into the side caused a minor catastrophe. But, miniaturists are a resilient lot and now the fairies that will be living there will have a picture window! LOL!

To make the hole for the door, he started with the paddle bit and then made it larger with his zip router.

Nice to have a guy with a few power tools! He did some work for a person a while back and traded for a used drill press so guess who's going to get the little drill press from Harbor Freight.....me! :D

See you next time, have a great evening!

Final Work on Buns & Roses!

The landscapers came back this morning and started right in. They started fitting the turf in the back and questioned me about how well I was taking care of the new grass.

I assured them that I had been watering properly and snuck off to avoid further questioning. I did get a shot of them applying glue to the back of the turf....

hmm, never knew that's how you put that stuff down; they must use lots of bottles of white glue to put that stuff down on a real life house......;) The next step was to put the generator in place so that all the ovens, refrigerators and coolers can run. They had a bit of a set to with the inspector,

but things were ironed out and E6000 is now holding it in place. So as they were finishing up, they noticed a mushroom growing in the grass on the back corner.

Of course I was grilled as to how much water did I actually put on the lawn and they were going to go to great lengths to remove the little mushroom. I like it though so said I would take responsibility for it myself. It looks like a happy little mushroom to me. They grumbled a bit, but said they would go back and prepare my bill for me. So Buns & Roses is complete!

As I left the shop, there was already a line forming as the "hot donuts" sign was lit up in the window. Oh my, how am I going to work in there with the scent of donuts all the time! And I just managed to lose 14 pounds too! So I put in my nose plugs and started cleaning up the work area so I can start on the next building.

I'm not sure if I put a picture on here of the Greenleaf Village that I use as a starting point for these buildings, so here it is!

Actually, I had 2 sets of them, I used the old one first but I think I will use another little garage building like the Banana Republic banana plantation for Larry and Louie's Landscaping. They have commandeered the old pickup truck that the Crominions use for hunting as their landscaping truck,

so I have to make sure and make room for that too. They were talking about wanting a greenhouse also, not sure how I'm going to fit all that on a 4 3/4 X 6 3/4 base but we will see what we can do. Next time, we will be starting a new build! Have a great day!

Burning the Midnight Oil....

Had trouble falling asleep last night so figured I may as well get up and putter on Buns & Roses. I had just been laying there thinking through how I wanted to do things anyway, may as well get up and do them! The first thing I wanted to take care of was the wire from the interior light. I wanted to take it around to the back in the least noticeable way possible. Using a toothpick, I dabbed a thin line of E6000 on the top edge of the end wall. More went on one side of the wire. I waited 2 minutes and then put them together. I used some of my inexpensive Harbor Freight clamps to hold the wire in place.

Since this should realistically dry for 12 to 24 hours, my next step was to glue the building onto the base. This was a little easier said than done as this building was just a bit wonky and not perfectly square. So I resorted to a little brute force with my handy clamps.

As that was drying, I had an Uh Oh moment when I realized that it would now be very difficult to get the grass along the sides with those window boxes so low. I had a meeting with Larry and Louie and they drew up a landscaping plan for me and told me not to worry, they had it all under control.

They wanted to create something more formal for the French owner yet something colorful for the manager, Slash. So closely cropped lawn and pots of sunflowers were installed and admired by all the minions who have now decided to casually walk back and forth while they watch the progress.

The pots of sunflowers were actually made of resin and purchased years ago from a sale bin. I put a little white glue on the "dirt" part and sprinkled on some tea leaves from a tea bag and touched them up a little here and there.

The landscapers left early and said they'd be back tomorrow so I gave the keys to the new owner and a second set to the manager so they could set up all the equipment inside.

One side of the building was pulling up from the base, so I installed another clamp and went back to bed for the night.

This morning I had an idea for a fairy house, (yes, I've been looking at Pinterest again..)and started drawing up a plan. If the minions catch wind of this, I am in deep trouble as they want their village done before I do anything else. And there are also way more of them than there are of me and I do like sleeping in safety at night.....maybe just drill a few holes for the windows.....Hey! Come back here with that! He took my sketch! Sigh, I guess I have to start the next building soon, the fairy house will have to wait. Have a great evening!

Signage

Now that the roof is all done, I started thinking about a sign. I knew I would need a thin piece of wood for the base so dug out my box of punch-outs. Whenever I build a dollhouse kit, I save all the punch-outs from windows and doors and keep them in a box. These come in really handy for small projects. I found a window punch-out with a rounded end that looked like it would work. I traced around the curved part and made a pattern for the other end.

After some careful cutting, I thought it came out pretty good!

For the supports, I used some of the roof supports from one of the other minion houses that I didn't use. I needed to trim them to adjust them to the angle of the roof

and then glued them to the back of the sign.

For the print-out, I looked online and found a sign from a small company and stretched it and shrunk it in my Microsoft Word program and printed it out.

Since it is on printer paper, I was wondering what to glue it on with and decided on a glue stick. I will see how this holds in the long run; I might have to use something else in the future. The wood base was painted black and now sports a copper colored edge. Glued the paper sign on and then glued the whole thing to the house.

This came out great and was out of scrap wood! My kind of project! LOL! I still have to figure out what to do with the wire from the interior light, then this can be glued to the base and landscaped.....Woo! Hoo! Have a nice evening!