Casey's Minis

Tessie Wants to Meet Him....

2012-01-28T15:10:00.011-07:00

We went to the Gem Show this morning. We both forgot our cameras, but Walter had his phone. The very first thing we saw was this...He is between 7 and 8 feet tall and very well mannered.

As soon as Tessie got a load of him, she wanted to meet him. He is made of tools, gears and various motorcycle parts of all shapes and sizes.

She seems to think that he would be a great addition to our front yard...I think that the neighbors would run us out of town! Really cool though.

I didn't get too carried away. I plan to go back later in the week.
One of the first, and most original things that I bought were these copper splashes. They are made by dropping melted copper on a flat surface and then hitting them with an acetylene torch at different temperatures to get the colors. The photo doesn't do them justice. I think that I can use them for both miniatures and jewelry work. Irresistible.The ring that Tessie is wearing is one that I got from Walter. I always hit the same booth for rings. It is a lady from China that has hundreds of different ones. It is hard to choose.

I may have to arm wrestle Tessie to get it back.

Here's the rest of the stash....So far. Did I tell you that the bead shows start on Wednesday? I will be forced to go to at least one of the venues for that.

A lot of the things that you see will be used for mini as well as big. I took a little closer shot here so that you can see some of the findings that I got for a dollar a bag.

The white and brown beads to the left are carved bone. I think that they may work for legs on mini furniture.

The ones on the far right are toggle closings for jewelry, but the round ring parts will make perfect picture frames. There are 8 sets per bag. Sixteen mini frames for 2.oo. Not to shabby.

Anyway, as soon as I grapple with Tessie for the ring(and hopefully win) I will have to see what I can do with some of the loot.

I am off to play now.

See you tomorrow.

I Have Rocks In My Head.....

2012-01-27T12:46:00.002-07:00

Every year, right around my birthday, Tucson puts on a show just for me....Well maybe not just for me....It is the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show. Tomorrow will be the kick off for this year.

I think that the powers that be are just trying to help Walter out with his birthday shopping. It solves all of his problems. He simply coaxes me into the car. He makes sure that my seat belt is fastened and off we go.

I get to pick out something that I like and he doesn't have to figure out what to get for me.

Before we go, I always spend a couple of days pondering what I have purchased over the years and why, supply wise, it hasn't been put to use thus far.

Then I start to feel guilty and madly work on finishing a couple of pieces before I find something else at the show that I like even better.

For the past few years, Tessie gets involved in the sorting out process. She seems to think that, if she helps, she will get something from the show too....She won't tell us when her real birthday is and she has adopted mine. That way we will remember it. Sneaky....But not really helpful. Especially when she sits there with a thread bobbin on her head singing, "Diamonds are a girl's best friend"....Diamonds???

This morning she insisted that we go through the kumihimo thread supplies and pair up some of the finished cords with pendants. The theory being, that will free up space for new stuff....

Here are two of the pendants that we finished. The one on the left is a very old piece of Native American silver/turquoise that I picked up somewhere.

The other one is a bone pendant that I picked up at Walmart, of all places!

That's two long cords and large pendants finished. In all I finished four.

Here are the two boxes of cabochons...Real stone and cast resin. The one that Tessie is holding is cast resin. Yes, you have seen it before....No, I haven't finished it yet. I need to braid a cord or string it on beads or something....Sooner or later I will decide what to do with it...And all of the rest...

The point is....I don't really need more stones. I am just addicted to pretty stones. I even like plain old rocks.

April and Seth go on vacation and they know what to bring back. I always get a rock from wherever they went. That makes me a happy camper.

I did finish one other piece this morning. I bought this "stone" for myself a couple of years ago and a few months ago, when there was a bead show here, I found square wire with an antique bronze finish to wrap it with. All it needed was a chain. I hunted all over creation for chain to match and couldn't find it.

Would you believe that good old Walmart had a six strand, chain necklace in their jewelry department that was the exact match? I tore it apart this morning and used two of the chains for the pendant....Now about the stone....

It is a piece of a fosselized dinosaur bone, cut ground down, and polished.

I had Seth along to help me pick it out. He has a degree in geology. He's a handy man to have around when you want to know about stones. Thanks Seth!

Anyway, I cut down a bit of the inventory and now have a few nooks and crannies for new rocks. Now I have an excuse to stock up.

See you tomorrow after the rock fest!

The Last Step.....

2012-01-26T12:48:00.005-07:00

This morning I had to go to MVD and get a renewal on my driver's license. They ask for at least two forms of ID including the old driver's license and one other such as your certified birth certificate.... They took the old license and never once asked to see anything else. I guess that the ugly photo that they took of me last time does look like me after all!

Oh well...To celebrate,(I passed) I went thrift shopping and to the antique mall after I finished.

First I have to tell you about finishing the chair...Then on to the important stuff.

I measured the inside of the chair bottom for the cushion. It was exactly 1 3/4" square. I cut out a piece of foam core in that size and rounded two corners for the back.

I glued two thicknesses of quilt batting to the board and trimmed the edges to match.

Then I cut a piece of fabric, that Tessie picked out, about 1/2 to 3/4 " all around. I centered the fabric over the fuzzy side and wrapped it like a package around to the back and glued it all around. I nipped here and tucked there on the corners so that there would not be much bulk.

I then took 6 one yard lengths of the thread and put a knot in one end. I pinned it to a pillow and braided the whole thing.

This is the edging for the chair. It goes around the top, the seat and the bottom.

The top goes from one end of the arms to the other, covering the ends of the wires. The center one goes from the edge of the wicker on the front, around the side, back and other side. It is cut flush with the edge of the wicker on both ends. You must put some white glue on the back of the braid before you cut it, so that it won't ravel. The bottom one starts a the center of the back edge. It goes all of the way around, following the edge of the chair. When you get back to the center back again, glue and cut it to butt up against the beginning.

I used some of what was left to go around the cushion. I only had a small piece left after that. It takes a lot of braiding.

Here it is! I hope you like it.
And the horse? I found it at the 22nd St. Antique Mall. It's a Brayer. I'm not sure if I spelled that right. Anyway, I thought that it looked like a perfect starter horse for Tessie....

She saw it and the first thing she said was, "Tell Cordelia that she can have the stupid chair! I am taking the horse to sit on. He Rocks!!!"

I think that there was a pun intended in that one.

I now have tiny hoof prints on my tables.

I have to show you the rest of the loot.

I found all of it at a tiny little thrift shop that I had not been in for a long time. I'm glad that I stopped. I spent all of five dollars and made out like a bandit.

First there is a punch needle(with fine point included) for 50 cents!

Then there is a puce tin with a window in it. Tessie may get to spend time in there if she keeps being a brat.(1.00)

The white thing behind her is some kind of carrying case made of fine even weave nylon mesh. I am going to use that for needlepoint. I know it will work because several years ago, I found a men's kit for toiletries for Walter. It had an inset of that and rather than leave it plain, I embroidered his initials on it.

The pile that you see down front is a 28.00 fine cross stitch kit that was never even opened. I got that for 3.00! The fabric is fine even weave. I haven't measured it, but it looks like about 28 or 30. There is enough thread to cover the whole thing....That's a LOT of thread.

I have several back up patterns for rugs that I have designed, but not yet stitched. Here we go again....That piece of fabric will make quite a few rugs. I can't wait to get started....The kit even included the needle.

First I need to corral Tessie and the new horse... I heard her telling the horse, "Casey will make you a saddle and bridle. Bare back is uncomfortable....Yes. A saddle with lots of padding and a nice fluffy horse blanket..." And so on and so forth....

On second thought, I am going to go hide instead of looking for trouble.

See you tomorrow.

Almost There.....

2012-01-25T07:56:00.005-07:00

OK. Here we go on the upper chair. Start where you started the bottom, in what is now the left hand corner...Yup. You heard me right. Once you turn the chair right side up. That's where it is. The two thread ends should be in the same place.

Straighten the wires as much as you can. Then start working from the outside as much as possible. You may have to work some rows from the inside, but it is much easier to see what you are doing from the outside.

This time you loop the thread around the first arm(leg)post once. You will have the thread coming out between the arm and the first wire on the inside if you did it right. Now go around the arm again and start looping on the outside towards the back of the chair. Go all the way around and when you get to the other arm, do a plain weave back across to the first arm. When you get there, do a second row of loops. This is officially your third row. Since you are now on the right side at the end of the row, that means that you do nine rows to get back to the starting point, where the thread is attached.

Always keep your starting point in mind. That will keep you on track. Next, you repeat the first three rows. Loop row. Plain row. Loop row.

Now for the fun part. This is the arched back section. Work six rows of plain weaving. Then, starting back across, go to the first spoke after the center one in the back.

Loop around it and go back to the first one on the other side. Loop around and go back across to one more on the other side. Keep doing one more stitch on each side until you reach the corner posts.

Then complete the row.

Weave back to the center +1. Loop around and do the whole series once more. Now you should have a nice arch in the back.

Now continue on and weave back to the starting point.

People are going to be seeing the chair from the inside, as well as the outside from here.

Sometimes it is nice to have the loops on both sides of the wicker. Inside and out.

It makes for a more lacy look, and is a handy method to know, even though you won't want to use it all the time.

Do a row of loop stitches going in one direction and then instead of doing the straight weave back, simply go around the arm post and do a row of loops from the opposite side.

Do the same thing a second time. That is the first row of double loops that you see above the curved back.

Go back to plain weaving for 8 to 10 rows and then do the double line of loops again.

After the loops, for the open area, do a line of wrapped wires that are five wraps each, starting with the front post. Be sure to wrap the thread so that the excess going from post to post is on the back of the chair.

Now, starting at the side that you end the wraps, do two of the front and back looped rows.

You can finish with eight rows of plain weave and then a row of loops, plain weave and loops.

On this particular chair, I went back to the center back and did the arch method all the way out to the fifth wire on each arm....That is, five more passes than the original arch. You only have to do it one time this time.

This gives the chair a bit more height. Lastly, I finished the top edge with a row of loops, a row of plain weave and a row of loops... Put white glue on the top edge of the last row of loops so that the thread won't slip off of the wires when you cut them.

If the thread does slip, just push it back on. This area will be covered......Tomorrow.

As soon as I got this far, the chair disappeared. Tessie zapped it to the front porch of Cordelia's house.

She says that I can have it back to finish when she gets done trying it out...

Mind you, there isn't even a cushion yet and she has a perfectly good, brand new rocking chair.

I am going to go try to pry her out of it so that I can show you how to do the trim and the upholstery. Wish me luck.

See you tomorrow.

Larger Than Life....

2012-01-24T08:31:00.005-07:00

I am not sure why these photos came out so big, but as they say, "The better to see you with...."

When we last parted, I had just threaded all of the wires through the seat and glued them in place.

I couldn't get Tessie to leave the chair, so you have to put up with me.

To start the weaving, I glue the end of the thread between the first two wires on the left front of the chair.

Then I bring the thread around the front of the first wire and over the back of the second one. I keep doing the same thing until I get to the other end of the front.

I want all of the loops to go in the same direction, so I do a row of plain weaving back to the other end. When I get there, I go over the end wire and back under to get in the right position to do the loops again. Only the end loop will be different. The rest will be done the same as the first row.

I flip the chair over and I do a plain weave back and forth across the front wires, bending gently as I go. When I get the weaving even with the bottom of the seat piece, I start looping at the right front corner, facing me, and go around all of the wires on the bottom with two rows of loops. This time you won't have to go back. Just keep moving forward until you have two rows of loops all around.
After that, start weaving plain for 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch. With the thread that I was using, that was about 8 rows. You can count the number of rows by looking at two, side by side, columns in the weaving. I will not hold you to that exact number, but make sure that you go all the way around to your starting point or your weaving will be lopsided.

It is easier to see on the inside. You can clearly see my eight rows at the bottom, next to the seat board.

Next, do two more rows of loops.then work down for two rows of plain weaving.

Now comes the hard part. I am going to make a point at each corner of the front and sides and straight weaving across the back section....One step at a time.

I forgot to take photos, but I think that I can talk you through this. You should be starting at your right front corner. All of the rows should start and end here. Refer to the photos to see what I am talking about. take one loop around the next wire and then weave back to the first wire on the other side of the leg. Loop around that one and reverse. Weave over to the second wire on the other side of the leg and loop. Come back, with plain weaving and loop around the second wire on the front. Keep doing this, turning around when you get to the next unused wire on either side of the leg.

You should do this over five wires. When you hit the fifth wire in the center front, turn and keep going up to the leg, down to the unused portion and continue weaving plain until you hit the THIRD leg. I will be the back right leg, facing you, if you turn the work as you go.

Now for the two back legs. You are going to do the same thing that you did for the first leg...Only you are going to have plain weaving across the back( see above photo). Loop around the first wire following the third leg. Reverse and weave back to the left back leg and loop around the first wire beyond that. You will be on the same side as the first leg that you worked.

Now turn and plain weave across the back to the second wire beyond the leg. Loop and reverse.

Weave back to the second wire on the other side. Again, keep going until you hit the fifth loop on the left side. Reverse and plain weave until you are at the last, un-worked leg in the front. Do this one the same as the first one.

When you finish the last leg, simply work your way back over to the right front, starting point and the points and the back panel should all be about the same depth.

Next, do two rows of loops and finish where you started.

If you wish, you can stop here. Or you can go on with more plain weaving and two more rows of loops.If you want to do something a bit more challenging, you can try the wrapped open section that is shown in the photo.

I reversed the looping. Starting with the leg, I wrapped the thread around the leg three times and then moved to the next wire with the thread behind. You do this by wrapping your thread from right front to left and around. Keep doing this all the way around.

Then pull the thread back to the front and do two rows of loops to finish off.

The first leg can be wrapped and a bit of glue put at the bottom to hold it. Wait until it is completely dry to cut it close. The other legs are worked separately, gluing the end inside the bottom and working to the end of the foot. Glue and cut.

It is not necessary to cut the wires at the bottom yet. I just did it so that the photo would be more easily readable.

Turn the chair upside down and put some glue on the bottom two rows of loops to keep them from coming off of the wire when you do cut.

I forgot to mention wire cutters in yesterday's post. You will need them for cutting wires to start and for trimming at the end.

OK...I am stopping here for today. Next comes the top of the chair.

Some people like to do the top first. I do it bottom first because I find that, if I do the top of the chair first, I am more likely to mess it up while doing the bottom. Just a personal quirk....I seem to have a lot of them.

I am off to play with the top of the chair now.

See you tomorrow.

It Is a Rocker After All!

2012-01-23T09:22:00.004-07:00

I finished the rocker this morning. It was meant to be. I made it too short to be a regular, run of the mill, chair.

Tessie is pleased with the finished product. She posed for the photo and then ran for her sign making supplies. The first one says, "No sitting in this chair....MINE!"

I will take better photos later, but I had to get to work on the beginner's chair and supply list.

Several years ago, I ordered the book "Wicker Furniture for the Dolls' House", by Sheila Smith. It is an English book and out of print now.

I just wanted to see what other people were doing. It is very basic and I often recommend it to people just starting in wicker.

I have never used her method or the supplies that she uses, because I like to work with finer thread and walnut or cherry wood for the bases.

She uses mat board( Mount board in England). I decided that, since everybody has access to this and not all have access to hardwoods, I would try it and let you come along for the ride. I am designing the chair myself and it is not intended for resale.

I wouldn't really recommend it for pieces that you want to last, but for first timers it would be a good way to start without a lot of expense. Feel free to upgrade to basswood, walnut or cherry if you want it to last. No balsa wood PLEASE!

Anyway, here's a list of what you need. I am using all of the other materials that I usually use for showing beginners how to do this.

1. #10 crochet cotton and a scrap of mat board or illustration board.

2. fabric covered floral wire in two sizes....#22 or 20 for legs and #26 or 28 for the spokes. It all depends on what your local stores carry.

3. Aileen's Fast Grab or Tacky

4. Pin vice with two bits to drill the two different size holes. If you don't have that, a needle tool will do in a pinch, but it is much harder to work with, especially for the big hole.

5. Ruler

6. Pencil for marking.

7. Bee's wax! This is very important for keeping the thread smooth and under control.

Note, some people use waxed linen thread. It is very expensive and hard to find. If you want to use that after you learn you could probably find it on the net. The cotton is just a personal preference.

I am just using what I have on hand. I would recommend a harder thread than this. The Coats and Clark balls of # 10 are pretty good. DMC Cebella, like I used on the rocker is better, but more expensive.

OK. To get started, cut a 2" by 2" square of mat board.

Round the two back corners. I go two squares in and two squares down and then draw a curve between.

I put two holew in the front corners for the front leg and inset the back legs to the end of the back curve. I do ten evenly spaced smaller holes on the front edge, between the legs. Then twelve smaller holes on either side following the curve at the back. Last are seven small holes in the center back section.

Now I cut 31 four inch lengths of small wire and 4 four inch lengths of the larger wire. Then I cut 10 two inch pieces for the front.

As I said a couple of days ago. Start with the leg pieces. In this case(regular chair), mark the legs at 1 1/4" and insert them so that the mark is at the top of the base at the hole. Put glue around them on the bottom of the base. Set it upright on the table to see that it is level.

Let this dry.

Then do the rest of the wires, Pulling them up about an eighth of an inch shorter than the legs, so that the chair will be sitting on the legs. Again, put glue around the wires on the bottom side of the base. Make sure that you wipe some of the excess off if you get messy. You will be wrapping thread around these and you want it to look neat.

I am stopping here. That will force the drying time for the wires to lengthen to 24 hours.

Tomorrow Tessie will start teaching the weaving part, if I can get her off her rocker...No wait....That didn't sound right. She is already off her rocker....I should have said get her out of her chair...One of us will continue the lessons.

See you then.

A Mind of Its Own.....

2012-01-22T09:36:00.002-07:00

As you probably already know, when I do wicker pieces, I just start working and let the piece talk to me as I go. Once in a while I sit down and sketch something, but not often.

As I am working on this chair, it is telling me that it doesn't want to be a rocker. So I tried, but it is rebelling.

I worked on it all afternoon yesterday and more this morning. It argued with me until I decided that it wanted to be a more modern, low slung easy chair.

Once I let it do what it wanted, we got along just fine.

Pay no attention to the date on the bottom of the chair...As I said, I sometimes cut a bunch of forms and drill them all at once. That way, when the mood strikes, I can just jump in and do the fun part.

I took the photo of the upside down chair so that you could see that the sides and back go straight down from the seat.

Here's the front. This is how the front roll looks.

When I get down even with the bottom of the seat piece, I do a couple of rows of loops all of the way around. That puts a finish at the top of that area.

I went down a ways with plain weaving and then did it again. In order to get the corners to point down, I started at each corner and worked out over one more stitch on each side of the corner until I got to the middle of the side.

Here you see the side arm section. I am doing the curves one section at a time to fill in the scallop.

I have decided that as soon as I finish this chair, I am going to do an easier, step by step rocker so that people that are interested can follow along and learn. So, if you can hang in there a couple more days until I finish this one, I will get to that. For people just starting out, I would recommend size 10 thread. It is what most people use at that stage. Size 20 takes a lot longer to do and is more difficult to work with.

Back to the chair at hand. Tessie curled up in it last night and slept there. I guess that she approves so far.

When I asked her why she did it, she replied, "I'm just protecting what's mine!"

I have finished filling in the scalloped area and now I have to go on to finish the arms, one at a time and then the back...This is done with one continuous thread.

I am not a fan of tying in new threads and using a lot of glue.

Anyway, I will at least have all of the weaving done by tomorrow. Maybe I will even get to the upholstery, if I can get Tessie to go sit somewhere else whilst I do it..

Wish me luck.

See you tomorrow.

Wicker Rocker, Wicker Rocker, Wicker Rocker....

2012-01-21T11:34:00.004-07:00

Say that three times fast! I even had trouble typing it three times fast....

We still have no decision on the sofa. Tessie announced that a big ol' wicker rocker would be cool. To quote her, "I have never had a wicker rocker in my whole life. I really need a wicker rocker....I like saying wicker rocker and how am I going to keep saying wicker rocker if I don't have one to talk about?".

I guess, in a round about way, that is a logical question. At least in Tessie's mind it is.

So I decided to do a wicker rocker....That is fun to say.

I dragged out the wicker drawer and found a base that has been sitting around just waiting and Tessie dragged out all of the wicker books in the place.

She found several that she kind of liked, but not quite. I guess that, with her help, I will just wing it.

This is all that I need to do it.

One base made of walnut. I would need a drill if I hadn't found one that already had 57 small holes and 4 large ones drilled into it. The larger ones are for the legs and upper supports and they are 18 gage cloth covered wire. They are cut 5" long....They were already cut. I usually cut them 4", but I left them longer just for fun. The 24 gage wire is cut in a length between 4 and 5 inches. I am not very exact on these because they will all have to be trimmed after the chair is done anyway.

First I put the larger wires in place and glue them so that there is 1" sticking out of the bottom. If I were making a regular chair, I would measure 1 1/4" below the seat. The rockers will make the chair a bit higher, so the difference is made up for in the legs.

I glue those with white glue and let them dry. Then I put in the thinner wires.

I forgot to mention that the ones on the front apron of the chair are cut to about 2".

I always do my chairs with a rolled front. I like that finish much better than just having it hang down underneath. Therefore, I glue them in above instead of below the seat.

Now we walk away and let the glue dry. By the way, I am using Aileen's for this.

I am using DMC Cebella #20 crochet thread for the weaving. I use the bee's wax to run the thread through. This makes the thread smoother and stronger. All of the thread on the chair will be treated this way.

I start at the left side of the front and glue the end to the seat, behind the wires/reeds. Then, one at a time, I circle each of the wires all the way across. I then come back the other way, this time the thread is looped around each reed in the opposite direction.

Then the third row is the same as the first. This gives a finished look to the top of the apron. From there, I start doing an over and under weave back and forth.

In this photo you can see that I have started bending the wires over the front edge. I will keep going with the plain weaving until the edge of the weaving is even with the bottom of the front edge and covers it.

You will have to stay tuned. Tomorrow I will start working the base of the chair.

See you then.

Sofas, Tables and Tatting....

2012-01-20T12:40:00.010-07:00

I spent last night struggling with Tessie over what kind of sofa she wanted....She is still searching.

So while she is doing that, I decided to go on and build a new table for the breakfast nook in the bay window.

If you are interested in doing one of these, there is a tutorial for the whole thing here. http://caseymini.blogspot.com/2008/04/tabled-for-today.html I made the new one so that I could take off the top cloth. I am not sure that I like the pink and white check. Neither is Tessie....She says, "It's too girly!"I am still finding it difficult to take photos of the kitchen. With the light, it is too bright.

Without it, it is still a bit on the dark side. I will keep at it. Hopefully, I will get on to the sofa for tomorrow. I will approach Tessie with a whip and a chair and get her to choose one.

On to the tatting part. I am a winner! Pamela, at "Tatting and Other Nonsense" http://totusmel.blogspot.com/ had a drawing last week. I won one of the prizes. It came in the mail yesterday. This is it! A beautiful necklace. It is one of her many original designs. She makes all kinds of fabulous jewelry, masks and other pieces. They are on sale in her Etsy shop. If you are interested in seeing more, go to her blog. From there you can get to her other site on Etsy. Thank you so much Pamela! It is perfect!

I am off now to go sofa shopping. There will be a tutorial as soon as Tessie makes up her tiny little mind!

See you tomorrow.

A Shot in the Dark.....

2012-01-19T14:51:00.008-07:00

I was awakened by noises coming from the family room about 4:30AM. The waking up part isn't unusual. Although it is usually Mookie meowing that wakes me.

Today it was crash, bang, and rattle, followed by bad words....

I went out to look and there was Tessie, stumbling around the kitchen of the townhouse.

She was carrying one of the LED lights that I bought last year. I was planning on using that one in the Clockwork cottage, but she filched it.

I made the mistake of asking her what was happening..."I stubbed all of my toes and bumped my head twice!" She took a couple of steps and crashed again. "This is not a lamp! It's a glow in the dark disaster magnet!"

I was trying not to snicker at her, but she was so right. Those LED lights are cute, but they don't throw enough light to see your hand in front of your face. I don't think that hanging over the table is going to do a bit of good.
She presented her case to Zar. "I want a new house! This one doesn't work. It is trying to kill me....It is alive and it hates me!"

I do believe that the drama queen has been watching too many late night horror movies.

Then she went on with, "And besides, I don't like living room furniture that looks like over sized balloon animals! Who's idea was that?!?"

I gently reminded her that she picked the pieces out. She settled down somewhat and then started to growl. It makes me very, very nervous when she growls.
To appease her, I told her to go look at some of my decorating books and see what she could find that would suit her.....Anything to keep from building her yet another house....It was blessedly quiet for a few hours. I went into the bedroom and she was on her seventeenth book...Literally.

Using one of my antique crochet hooks as a wand, she was zapping pages as she went so that the books would automatically fall open to the pages that she has picked, I guess that is better than marking them with a big red grease pencil, the way she used to do it.

Anyway, while she was occupied, I was on a quest of my own. How do you make a dark kitchen lighter? The answer finally appeared like a light bulb over my head....Please don't throw tomatoes at me for the pun.

Out of nowhere, I suddenly remembered that I had just one of those LED lights that I bought at Walmart on a close out last year....I do so wish that I had bought all of them, instead of just three.

That reminds me. There is still one stuck inside the box on the cat tree from Christmas decorating. I also remembered that the ceiling of the arch had a 2 1/2" drop. Perfect to cover the light.

Earlier, I tried putting in a lighter colored table.

Now we can see everything....Unfortunately, that makes it so that decor in the kitchen has to be done.

Of course, Tessie is taking the credit for lighting things up. She said it was all in the crochet hook/wand. "It's just a simple flick of the wrist! It works every time..."

Keep your fingers crossed. Maybe, without the balloon animal furniture, she will move in after all!"

Wish me luck!

See you tomorrow.

It's All In How You Look At It.....

2012-01-18T08:23:00.003-07:00

I am really referring to the house, but I couldn't resist showing you the books that I got in the mail yesterday afternoon.

April and Seth gave me an Amazon Gift Card for Christmas. I waited until now to spend it. These are what I got.

The first is a bead embroidery book by Sherry Sarfini. Wonderful beaded jewelry. The third is on gourd baskets. Lots of ideas for mini baskets as well as large.

I saved the best until last..."Walls". Only I would be crazy enough to buy a book called that with only the cover showing.... I have to say that I am glad I did. It has all kinds of fantastic color photos of walls from back in cave painting days to the present. It is chock full of ideas for minis....Now all I have to do is get it away from Tessie.

Would you like to see what she wants from the photos in here? Here you go. I have three words for her...."Dream on, Tessie!"

Anyway, back to the townhouse. I put the frames around the windows inside and decided to leave off the valences that I made a while ago.

You wouldn't be able to see anything in there, even with lighting, if I put them in. It is reallllllly dark.

I wanted to see what would show of the counters and such. Just as I suspected. Not a lot shows. I will have to make the table very inviting. I may have to make the table white or put a white tablecloth on it. You can hardly see the table at all. Not good.

I have a very bad attitude about this house now. I just want it over and done. It just isn't something that I would like to live in and I have a sneaking suspicion that Tessie feels the same. It has lost all of it's charm for me. Terrible attitude. Bad!

Now I am sitting here dreaming of doing something else, but feeling guilty because I haven't finished this one yet....I know I will never be tempted to go back to it if I quit now, so I am going to grit my teeth and finish it....Very soon! Sorry for the rant!

I am going to get ready and go to Wednesday Witches Mini Meeting. That is my excuse for not working on it today.

See you tomorrow.

First You Build a Box....

2012-01-17T11:14:00.007-07:00

I decided to go through the steps of building the stove while doing it. This will give you some idea how to go about any of the illustration board builds.

Here's the pattern...It is on 1/4" quad rule paper and the sizes for each piece are on the patterns.

This stove is extra small because of the area I have available. It is about the size of the stove that I had in my first apartment...And again, it is only an illusion.

I always use a T-square when drawing out patterns on the illustration board. This insures a straight piece of furniture or appliances.

Incidentally, you can use this method for all kinds of non working appliances and cupboards.

I don't recommend it for working doors and drawers.

After I got all of the pieces cut out, I built the box itself. It is closed on all sides for sturdiness. The sides fit between the front and back and the top and bottom cover the ends of the box.

Oops! I just noticed that I forgot to draw those two pieces. The bottom is two inches square and the top is two by one and seven eighths. Easy enough to measure and draw.

The box is put together and dries. Then you apply the front pieces, the top instrument panel and other add ons.

I don't add the base until I am ready with the cupboards and all. This one will be 1/2" high, to bring the counter up to 3". That is standard counter size.

If you are using this in a smaller house, you can adjust the height by simply making the base shorter.

Here's the stove all put together, sans base.
I painted it with two coats of Folkart Wicker white.

I probably could get away with a shorter base for Tessie, but I will be using the half inch because I still want the counters and all to be as visible as possible.

I decided to make it a glass top stove and have a window in the door. Since there is nothing behind the window, I simply put a piece of black scrapbook paper and a piece of leftover plastic window material behind it to give the illusion of depth. you would do the same if you were doing a front loading washer.

I used a piece of scrapbook paper for the top also. It was metallic with just a hint of purple in it. My real stove top is kind of dark blue. I took a Beryol Prismacolor white pencil and used a circular architect's stencil to draw the burners.

I doubt if the knobs will even show, once it is installed, so I faked them with small circular spacer beads and jump rings.

The handle on the front is simply a piece of a key hook like the one in the photo. I flattened it out and then cut off the section that I needed.

I have it setting on a 3/8 thickness of foam core in this photo It needs to be a bit higher. I will build the one that is 1/2" when I finish here.

The last step is to put a finish over the whole thing. Probably semi gloss. I am not crazy about gloss in mini. It always seems too thick to me. Just a personal taste.

If you want to reproduce other things with this process, just grab a tape measure, get the size of the real thing and scale it down. It's fun. Honest!

I have to go now. Tessie is anxious to move in and she is cracking the whip. Of course, as soon as I finish the townhouse, she will find something else for me to work on....

See you tomorrow.

Darkness falls....

2012-01-16T11:05:00.003-07:00

Now comes the fun. I started making the basic boxes for the kitchen counters and cupboards this morning...It is cloudy and rainy, so it is a good day for testing the darkness factor.

I did the sink box according to the measurements that I showed you yesterday. I decided to go with a regular sink. I am not going to waste time on a sink that is essentially going to be hidden.

Here's what happens when I put the front wall in place. You get a glimpse of the counter if you move waaaay to the left or waaaay to the right. Otherwise, all you see is the kitchen table.

I will be putting a light over the table, but so far it is going to be an LED light and not cast a wide circle of light over the rest of the kitchen.

The counter will be 1/4" to 1/2" higher, depending on the toe kick space that I put under it.

For those of you that question the use of illustration board for minis, this is a kitchen that I did about 20 years ago. I built boxes for the counter and cupboards. I painted the body of the cabinets and then cut separate doors and edged them with molding. The panels inside the molding are mini wallpaper that matches the wallpaper of the room.

For this one, the fridge is a small, counter height one. The lady of the house doesn't cook. It's mainly for carry out and bottles of champagne. Mirrored back splashes aren't to practical unless you don't use the kitchen.

I even did the stove and range hood the same way. All of the pieces have held up extremely well. Of course, that could also be because of no cooking going on. Note the catering boxes scattered on the floor. Even the cat food is catered....No pun intended.

I have a problem getting good photos of this one. The glass reflects terribly.

This is one of my favorite room boxes. When I built it, I made it so that it is almost impossible to get into. I find that is a good thing when you are like me and tend to pilfer from one project to use in another. This one is still intact.

I have to go back to playing with illustration board now.

See you tomorrow.

Why Do I Bother?

2012-01-15T09:55:00.004-07:00

Off I go on the bottom floor of the townhouse. First of all, I have to finish the kitchen before I put the front wall on it. I have painted myself into a corner there... Once I enclose it, you will only get to see part of the kitchen from the open side of the house. If you look into the front bay windows, you will be able to see the rest. I had half a notion to put blinds on the front windows so that the kitchen couldn't be seen from that side...But then, what would be the fun in that? So here I go again.

It probably won't be as detailed as it would if it was visible from the living room side, but it still has to be done.

I repaired an Eugene Kupjack dining room for the mini museum once and discovered a cool secret. For those of you that don't know, Mr. Kupjack is famous for building the Narcissa Thorne rooms. He also did other rooms and the dining room was one of those.

Anyway, he did amazing work. The room that I did had to be taken apart, cleaned and repaired...While doing it, Pat A. and I discovered that, if it didn't show, it was faked. There were two side doors on one end of the room. You could just get a hint of what was behind them...In actuality, what looked like more beautifully carved furniture, was commercial pieces and blocks of wood! Nobody ever knew or questioned them as other than part of the whole picture.

So I don't feel guilty about faking it here and there anymore. If Eugene could do it, so can I. Fooling the eye can be fun.

Anyway, I got the plans drawn up now on to making it look like there is a fancy kitchen in the space.

As to what I have been doing besides drawing plans, I have been doing some more experimenting with the gourds.

I decided to see if I could make them into pincushions.

Every once in a while I check into the flickr pincushion pool http://www.flickr.com/groups/pincushions/pool/ to see what is going on. I don't belong to the site, but I love pincushions of all sorts. I may just have to join after doing these. There are some really crazy pincushions at this site. Lots of fun.

They could use a little tweaking, but I am having fun with them. I did a couple of rows of coiled basketry around the edges, then stuffed them with a pouf of fabric and decorated the outside like the basket from yesterday.

The first one was the bottom of the gourd and the second one is the top neck with a piece cut off of the very end to make it stand up.

This one, I decorated with a hand carved bone piece and stuck a bone bodkin in the side to match.

I need to figure out how to get the big ugly pleats out of the sides. I think I know how to do it. Wish me luck.

Back to kitchen work tomorrow.

See you then.

I Got a Day Pass....

2012-01-14T10:34:00.002-07:00

OK....Tessie gave me permission to NOT work on the bottom floor today. In just a little bit, April is bringing the baby and her cat over....She has an appointment with our vet on this side of town. She was dissatisfied with the one that she has been using. Therefore, I don't have to start on the living room and kitchen today.

Instead, I decided to work on one of the larger sized gourd baskets...Still small, but a start.

As soon as I finished the body of the basket, Tessie took it over. She thought of several uses for it. Bathtub was one suggestion. I had to patiently explain to her that, with the holes in the sides, it wasn't going to hold a lot of water.

She seemed to lose interest after that. However, there was another taker for it and that made it more attractive.

Eskiaga, the Apache scout, showed up. It almost came to blows over who would get it for their collection. I settled the argument by decorating the basket in a southwestern style.

I doubt if Eskiaga will ever really claim it. I think that he just wanted to pull rank on Tessie to see what she would do.

Anyway, it was a photo op. Here's Eskiaga with two of the real mini horsehair baskets that are made by the Native Americans in this area. I tried messing with horsehair just once....Never again. The cats kept trying to eat the horsehair...I am not sure what the attraction is, but it is very difficult to try to keep the horsehair in place and the cats away at the same time. I admire the people that weave these. They aren't easy to do right, so I just purchase them from the experts.

I am pretty happy with how the basket turned out. Not too bad for my first attempt at a regular sized gourd basket.

Now I have to go get ready for company.

See you tomorrow with townhouse in hand....

The End Game.....

2012-01-13T11:07:00.005-07:00

First, let me say that I am not good at taking photos in the dark. This was what the sunset looked like from our back yard last night...I was a little disappointed in the photo. The sunset was even more colorful than this. Almost a dark coral. Oh well. It's pretty anyway. One of these days, I am going to have Seth show me the settings for this and write them down. He could have done it justice.OK. We are pretty much done with the second floor now. A few touches here and there, but The top two and the roof look pretty good.

After I finished yesterday, it was decided that the bed would go in the bay. That's where the bed is in our real master bedroom. I guess that Tessie is following me for once.

She moved in some of her clothes. She seems to have misplaced a few of her hangers somewhere in the move. I will either have to find them or make more....Here's a close up of the second floor. The photo isn't great. I am going to have to work on lighting in the family room. All I have right now is the swing arm lamp that is attached to the table and it changes the colors a lot.

Yesterday somebody said that they didn't think that Tessie would let Spike have a dog bed in her bedroom....Spike is her favorite. He can sleep anywhere he wants to. In fact, by the time that the house is finished, I am sure that there will be a few more showing up.

Remember, Rocky Raccoon has already taken up residence on the roof and happily scarfs down her tomatoes. Theo the tiger cub shows up any place that there is food. Monte, the python moved out and went to live under Zar's trailer. He seems to be very happy there. He has taken a job as the watchdog for the place....No burglars want to tangle with a ten foot python....

Now about that last floor of the townhouse....It is going to take some elbow grease and some large storage boxes...This is it...See what I mean about the lighting? The walls in there look almost blue. They are actually very gray....

Somebody grab a box and let's start shoveling out. Who knows? We might find treasure!

This should be fun....Not...

Actually, I can't wait to get started. There is a light at the end of the tunnel!

See you tomorrow.

I Am the Queen!

2012-01-12T13:39:00.005-07:00

Give Tessie a little crown molding and she instantly assumes that makes her queen.

I finished all of the molding in the bedroom just this minute. Well, not quite. I still have to go back and fill in corner cracks and repaint a bit here and there.

First I did the rest of the blinds. I didn't like the way that they hung away from the window, so I turned them backwards. They would be hard to roll and unroll this way, but I am not going to move them so who cares. I doubt that anybody will even notice. They are in the farrrrr back of the house. It is almost my arm's length to get them into place.Next step was the crown molding. That had some really odd angles. Anybody want some very short scraps that I sawed off to get it right. I have been doing crown moldings for about 30 years and I still have to be very careful of which way I turn the stock in the miter box.

After that, I laid the rug with Yes glue. Then I proceeded to finish the baseboards.

Incidentally, someone asked the other day, what kind of fabric it was. It is plain upholsterer's cotton velvet. I don't buy the expensive stuff at the dollhouse stores. It is the same thing and when you figure out the price on it, the people that sell it are making a bundle! I go to Hancock's fabrics and rummage through their flat cuts. Much cheaper and half a yard will do several rooms.

Tessie is very excited...."OH!!! I have a place to sleep tonight!" As if she slept outside under a bush every night....Anyway, I still have to fill in the corner cracks in the molding and do touch up. That didn't stop her. She zapped in a few things for comfort. Then she turned to me and in a snide voice exclaimed, "What a relief. No more sleeping on the neighbor's couches." I have found her kicking people out of their own beds so that she can sleep there, but never have I seen her on someone else's couch or sofa.

So that's the story up to now. We still have not decided where everything is going in this room....That can wait until I get the touch ups done tomorrow.

See you then.

To Blind? Or Not to Blind......

2012-01-11T09:09:00.004-07:00

Actually, I should say "shade or not to shade", but blind sounded better. I tried sheer curtains this morning and did not like them one little bit. They just weren't Tessie.

I grabbed this place mat, made of very fine matchstick bamboo.

Tessie didn't much care what I did about the shades. She was playing with the leftovers. She was very excited about those.

She was practically jumping up and down and declared, "If we cut these down and leave the string connecting them in the center and paint the sticks red, they will look like strings of firecrackers! Where's the paint?"

I, being not to excited about Tessie and firecrackers in the same sentence, tried to ignore her. I took one of the bedroom windows and used it as a template for a roller shade. I drew around it, making sure that the two lines of strings were equal distance from the center of the window.

I cut it to size and rolled it up part way. If you wanted to make these so that they roll up and down, you could do it around a very thin dowel. I am just going to leave them in one position, so that wasn't necessary.

I covered the string with black silk ribbon, to match the bed and other black pieces in the room.I rolled the shade to the point that I wanted it and glued it at that point.

Next, I strung a flat, antique brass, bead on a head pin and stuck it in the end....Both ends.

The finishing touch was a round bead glued to the center bottom for a pull.

Then I glued the whole thing to the top of the only finished window frame. I still need to cut sills for the other two windows.

As we work, we are trying to decide where the bed should go in the room. I don't think that I tried it on the left side wall before. The right side wall is very long and needs to be broken up, but for some reason it seems as if you have a better view of the room with it on this wall.
The third option is to put it in the bay. I kind of think that it is going to make the room "end heavy". All of the interest would be in the bay and your eye would go there, passing up the rest of the room....Decisions. Decisions. Decisions.

I also noticed that, what with all of the moving and shifting for the past couple of days. The black on the bed is getting scratched. Round and round I go....

I also need to paint the corner leading into the bay. That's the panel that I glued into place last week. It is showing white. Now I have to go hunt up the green again....I am going to be really lucky if I get to laying the carpeting today. I still need to do all of the crown molding and door trim. Then comes the carpet and the baseboards.

I have to get back at it. I want this house over and done with. NOW!

See you tomorrow.

Cutting a Rug.....

2012-01-10T09:14:00.005-07:00

We got the townhouse back to its proper place in the family room this morning. Now I can get back to work.

I decided that, for the three or four people in the world that aren't familiar with making a pattern for a wall or floor covering the easy way, I would demonstrate.

With a little bit of help from my friends, I started laying out the pattern for the bedroom wall to wall carpeting.

I armed myself with a stack of fresh computer paper, a pencil(It doesn't have to have lead.), a pair of scissors and some scotch tape.

Starting on the farthest wall, I centered it in the front bay. I pushed it up into the bay, against the wall, with the corners curving up.

Then Tessie ran her pencil along the wall to crease the paper, so that it would fit in the bay exactly. Hold onto the paper whilst doing this so that it doesn't slip.

With that one cut and laid in place, we kept adding sheets, overlapping as we progressed. We taped each sheet to the one under it to keep it in place.

We simply kept going until the entire floor was covered.

When we got to the edge, we creased it and cut it off.

I took over and pinned the pattern to the fabric at about six inch intervals along the edges so that it wouldn't shift while I was cutting off the excess.

I cut it with regular sewing shears. The longer the blade the better for cutting straight lines.

I laid it back in for a dry fitting. It fits.

I am not going to install it until the windows at the back are in place and their frames are on...I may even finish the curtains first.

As soon as I got it in place, Tessie had to see the trim against it.

The photo is a bit strange. The carpet is actually a couple shades darker than the paint...

When I get to laying the carpet, I will use Yes Glue. I will paint it on the floor with a brush and then put the carpet over it. Again, I will start at the back and work my way towards myself.

This same pattern method can be used for walls(wallpaper patterns). It works for any kind of material, fabric or paper.

That's enough of this for now. I am going to go trim out the windows.

See you tomorrow.

Waiting For the Glue to Dry.....

2012-01-09T12:01:00.003-07:00

I fixed the table leg this morning and what did Tessie and Zar do? Seriously. They settled in to watch the glue dry.

So far, so good. Tessie fell on her nose a couple of times, but picked herself up, dusted herself off and went right back to watching....

Personally, I don't get the fascination that they seem to have for this activity. I don't think that Zar is as enthralled with it as Tessie is. He just seems to be hanging around to keep her from falling off the table again.

In order to fix the table, I had Walter help me move the townhouse down to the floor last night. Of course the cats immediately thought that I was giving it to them as a playhouse.

I covered it with a sheet and pinned that in place around the house to keep them out. That seemed to work.

However, the cats were very disappointed.

Cordelia made up for my mean spirited actions with a little help from her friend, Tessie.

I wasn't happy with the worktable in the bedroom. There's not enough natural light in there. I moved that back into the family room, where it was before. I will probably wait until tomorrow to move the house back onto it.

I wonder how much Tessie would charge to zap it?......Probably an arm and a leg.

Back to Cordelia. She got Tessie to zap the house, table and all into the bedroom. Then she wheedled a new table covering out of me.

When I put it on, she made sure that I left a couple of openings in the back corners...OK....The table doesn't have corners, but I think you know what I mean.

Anyway, Widget is now happily asleep in his new tent. It won't be long before Mookie is under there too.

Sorry that this is a little short on minis today, but I still have a lot of moving to do before nightfall.

See you tomorrow.

The Indignity of it All!

2012-01-08T14:34:00.004-07:00

Since I am moving house and fixing table later today, I decided that it would be easier to work on a small project whilst waiting. It probably not be ready until Tuesday. I chose to do a quickie.....Or so I thought.

These three ladies have been patiently waiting to be clothed for several years. I drag them out and do just a little to them every once in a while.

This morning I decided to get them dressed all in one fell swoop....What is a fell swoop anyway?

The taller lady is the one that is going in the antique radio case. For some reason, I stopped on her after doing all of her padding but one upper arm....Don't ask me why. I don't remember.

The second one had no destiny planned. She had both upper arms unpadded and the third one, for some reason, had the lower half finished to the fancy underskirt. Her upper arms were also bare... I am mystified as to why I did bottom halves and no arms.

As I remember, I was doing them in an assembly line the last time I worked on them. These are the dolls that I had to lengthen the arms on. They were all way too short for real people.

Anyway, this morning I started an assembly line once again. I got all of their arms padded and the two with no clothing received bloomers and long under skirts.

From there, I decided to concentrate on one person at a time.

I picked out the dark haired diminutive girl and started in. She has the least fancy hairstyle and she told me that she wanted work as a maid.

She didn't specify what kind of maid, so I made her a kitchen maid.

I didn't use a pattern, so I won't be drafting one for you to use this time. She is an unusually small lady, so in all probability, her clothes wouldn't fit the standard dollhouse person.

I found some blue and white striped cotton and started to work.

She got an A line skirt and puffed upper sleeves, typical of the 1890s. Most of the costume was hand sewn. When I got to the apron, I went with the glue syringe.

She still needs some buttons and I am going to paint or cover her shoes with leather. Whomever made her used something strange to paint the shoes and they are wearing off. They weren't fired into the porcelain.

As soon as I got her dressed, she started coming to life. She has a little of Tessie in her. She immediately took over and ordered me to cover the other ladies! Then she took it upon herself to do the job.

She grabbed a handkerchief and held it in front of the others....Of course she was not aware of the photos that I previously took of the three of them.

I am not going to tell her about computers and such. She wouldn't believe me anyway, so why try. She is a good old fashioned girl and she will go in a good old fashioned kitchen when I find one for her.

I only have two more to go....No promises. The six year old is getting bored. I am going to put the maid's trim on and then stop for the day.

I still have to get Walter to help me with the townhouse and then I will glue the table back together. That may wait until tomorrow.

When I have the attention span of the six year old running things, I tend to put things off and go find something new to do....Often.

See you tomorrow.

Moving Day......

2012-01-07T12:08:00.008-07:00

"Where's all my stuff???" That was Tessie this morning. I am getting ready to move the house off of the table, so I have taken all of the furniture and other things out of the bottom two floors.

Of course, that set Tessie to fuming and fussing. "She took all of my things out and burned them! I'll bet that there's a bond fire in the back yard! She can't do that!!"

I let her fume. She stomped up and down, around and back in the house.

I caught this photo when she was hanging over the edge of the third floor in despair. Fortunately, Zar is good at calming her down.

(Please note. His new clothes are all finished. I used patterns from the clothes section in the labels list. Tessie can no longer call him a sissy.)

He pointed out that her stuff was not in the back yard going up in a blaze of glory.He showed her the infamous laundry basket that I dump things in, when I want to get them out of the way. That set her off on another rant...

Did I mention that the left front leg on the table has come loose and if I don't do something about it the whole house is going to eventually tip over and slide onto the floor....Into the abyss. Bye bye house....

So, into the basket it all went. Now all I have to do is take the house off of the table, with Walter's help and repair the leg. I should be able to do it. I built the table from a kit from the Copenhagen store about 15 years ago. It has held up well for all it has been through. I just need to put some wood glue in the joints where the pegs hold the legs on.I also want to move the bed, so I had to take the kits out from where they are stored underneath...

In the middle of this,just after I got the kits stacked, Walter brought lunch home. I took a break and ate.

Big mistake....As I wandered back into the room to finish what I started, this was the view.

The Terrible Two were trying to get to the Harrison kit. I heard Tessie saying, in an excited voice, "Here's the plan! If we can get the big one out, we can put it together somewhere out of the way. Then we can add the Magnolia to one end and the Sweetheart on the other."

Zar asked, "What about the other kit that is going to be the Clockwork Laboratory?"

Tessie thought for a few seconds with a crease or two in her forehead and then replied,"What laboratory? That kit is going to be my carriage house. I need a place to store my Vesper and my pogo stick and my skate board and my Harley....I might even look into getting a Porsche....Can we say delusions of grandeur?

I am going to wait a little until they decide to give up and take a nap. Then I am going to have Walter help me move the bed and shove all of those kits back under it.

By the time that they wake up, they will have forgotten the whole incident. You know how they are......

See you tomorrow.

No More Bloomers...

2012-01-06T10:07:00.005-07:00

When I wandered in, after not enough coffee this morning, I found this.

Zar pulled his boots off, not too carefully and was about to take off his pants.

I could tell that he was irritated, so like a fool I asked what was wrong.

"I am thoroughly tired of being called a sissy. I want long pants. Tessie keeps harassing me about wearing bloomers. I found one pair of old leather pants and if you don't tailor me some new ones, I am just going to wear the old ones. And besides, these boots are just plain uncomfortable."

It was too late to coax him into wearing what he had, but I did manage to salvage the boots. I glued them back together and they will be waiting in his closet, should he ever change his mind.

I talked him into keeping the shirt. He hadn't started tearing it to shreds. So it looks like new pants and vest, not to mention the shoes....

OK. I will mention the shoes. I am going to go back to the basics. Who knows how long he will keep them on?

Grab yourself a leather glove and come along. These are the most basic pattern I could make for shoes....Unlike the boots. Those were complicated.

The first step for these are to cut a U shape of flat leather. Hopefully you will find a pair of gloves that are soft and can be manipulated. The one lying over his foot is exactly the same shape as the one that I wrapped around his foot. I put white glue on the back side and pulled and stretched until it fit. I did cut a few little Vs out of the toe edge to make it lay flat, one thickness on the bottom of the foot.

The second piece was cut so the it flairs at the bottom. The top wraps around the ankle with a bit of a gap. You can make these as tall or as short as you wish.

This piece also wraps under the bottom of the foot and the part around the heel gets Vs snipped out of it too so that this piece doesn't overlap anywhere either.

I am not too particular about the tops on these, because they won't be seen, once Zar puts his pants back on.

He banned Tessie from the room whilst we are doing this.....Modesty.

For the soles, I glued a rectangle of leather to the bottom of each shoe. Let the glue dry and then trimmed it to the edge of the shoe.

For the heel, I glued another smaller rectangle to the bottom back of the shoe, covering about one third of the sole. Then trimmed that to match the other piece.

The shoes are now ready for trim. I am not going to do that until I put the clothes on him. I only decorate if it is going to show. Just lazy I guess. I will color the gray lines at the edges with a pigma permanent pen.

Anyway, now I have to go back and make pants and vest. I will show you that part tomorrow.

I have to go shoo Tessie away from the keyhole now. She is snickering at him again. Bad Tessie!

See you tomorrow.

Cheap Thrills!

2012-01-05T09:51:00.007-07:00

There's one way to make people forget things that you don't want remembered....Give them a large bottle of dis remembering potion and 98 champagne flutes.This is the first of the cheap thrills....I have been waiting for at least a year and a half for Dollar Tree to get the champagne flutes back in stock. They are wedding favors and they consist of two flutes tied together with ribbon. The package is labeled "24 favors", so you are really getting 48 flutes per package. They come in gold and silver in separate packages. I had to get one of each, so that accounts for the 98 glasses.

Even Rocky Raccoon got one. Frisky has one, but I am not at all sure that is wise. He is a mean alligator when he drinks...The second cheap thrill is the typesetter's drawer that Sue gave me. Thanks Sue! Not cheap exactly. It was just that it was free and I finally got around to hanging it this morning. This one is a bit different from all of the other ones that I have. The cubes are all the same size. Now all I have to do is shoo the forgetful drunks away and start filling it.

Of course they have plans of their own for filling it. I heard Zar say, "Hmmmm...This thing would hold a lot of bug beer..."

Thank goodness, Tessie vetoed that idea. She wants it filled with hats, shoes and purses. Typical witchy woman....

I spent the morning in the workroom, tidying up from the holiday mess. I am so thrilled that I didn't have to spend a couple of weeks doing it this year.

My last cheap thrill for the day is something silly. Strange things entertain me....I bought a package of suction cups with little plastic hooks run through the shank, at the same time as the flutes. I am just getting around to opening both.

I had, from I don't know where, one suction cup hanging on the workroom window. It had lost its hook and I replaced it with a fancy Christmas ornament hook in copper. I kind of liked it. It had a beaded needle case hanging on it for the longest time. It looked lonely.This morning I opened the package of lots of suction cups and started wetting them and pushing them against the window. I didn't like the plastic hooks. They were easily removed. I found more of the ornament hangers and put them on. Then I grabbed a bunch of my scissors and hung a pair from each hook.

It almost looks like bubbles are floating up outside the window. I don't know how long they will stay or if I will replace the scissors with something else, but it's a handy dandy place to keep things beside the desk.

As I have said before....Simple things amuse simple people...Case in point? Tessie is having a ball swinging from the scissors and watching the world go by. Too bad I am not small enough to join her. It looks like fun.

See you tomorrow.

Hang On! I'm Here.....Finally!

2012-01-04T16:46:00.005-07:00

We had the annual after Christmas, Christmas party for Wednesday Witches today. A great time was had by all. We ate until thoroughly stuffed and then played.

The gift I received in the exchange wasn't a mini, but it has possibilities....It is a potpourri jar with a pewter top, from Williamsburg. It is very pretty and smells good to boot.

I do believe that the top, should I ever desire to do it, could make a very pretty crown for a four poster bed. For now, it is just going to sit, smell good and look pretty.

The other mini that we all got was a choice of paintings printed on fine canvas. I chose "The Hay Wain". It is one of my favorite John Constable paintings. I will have to get to work and put a frame around it soon. I definitely want to hang it somewhere.

While I am showing Christmas gifts, I have to show you the match box that my friend Jo sent me. I couldn't show it earlier because she made several for friends and I didn't want to give it away before they all got theirs.

She made the scene in side from tiny cuts of wood and turned it into a shadow box. Jo said that it was NOT for Tessie....I don't think that she can do anything about keeping it away from her. Tessie is getting quite a collection of minis. All pilfered from me.....

I have been contemplating some furniture moving in our real life bedroom. I mentioned it, in passing, to Walter a couple of days ago.

When I got home from the party, this is what I found. Tessie, Zar and Mookie were rummaging under the bed. As I walked in, all three turned and looked at me accusingly.

Of course, Tessie took the lead, "You've been holding out on us! There are houses under the bed!"

In my defence, they all knew that there was a stash in that location....Sometimes their collective memory is short...

In any case, Mookie is losing interest fast. No Kitty Condos under there.

I am not so sure about the Terrible Two though. Zar found the Greenleaf contest kit from last year. Tessie found the Magnolia.

That's the one that she wanted to turn into Spiderwort Manor a couple of years ago....Nope...Still not started.

Zar is off drawing up plans for a Clockwork Laboratory now, with the Greenleaf kit under his arm, so to speak....

I am going to quickly move the bed and shove both kits back under. Then I am going to hope and pray that they don't find the Harrison kit on the other side....Here's hoping that all will be forgotten by morning....

See you tomorrow.

Back to Reality....The New Year....

2012-01-03T11:13:00.004-07:00

Last night, I worked on finishing some of the basket starts that I have in my work box. I got a couple completed and managed to start a couple more....No. I know that's not how I'm supposed to do it, but that's how I do it.

I am loving the gourd baskets. I think that they have a lot of possibilities for experimentation.

As I told some of the commenters last night, I cut shingles for the front roof of the house until I was blue in the face and then started putting them on...It took a couple of hours and between the cutting and the shingling....I only got a row and two thirds finished.

I did cut the back wall for the observatory this morning and found some windows that will work well for that. Now all I need is a tiny telescope....I also put some of the rugs that I made in place and some experimental furniture here and there.

So you see. I am doing minis, but this is the start of the new year. As usual, I have big plans for rearranging and cleaning out. Don't we all?

It seems like this is when the mood always strikes me anyway.

This morning I started moving and cleaning in the kitchen. I was tired of looking at the radio case on the counter, under the cupboards.

It's not exactly a dead space, but it is hard to reach, so we don't have anything there that is useful. I dragged down the "Rusty Needle" from the top of the bookshelf and put it in where the radio formerly stood.

At least now I will have something fun to look at when I do dishes. I went to work on the window sill above the sink. It is right next to the counter with the quilt shop. I was taking the plants out and cleaning the sill under them.

Noise....I heard noise coming from the quilt shop. Here we go again. Heretofore, Tessie has shown no interest in the shop. It was high up and not easily reachable without zapping, so she left it alone.

Guess who now thinks that she owns a quilt shop? Yup. She is in there cutting up little squares, preparing to sew them back together....All the while, humming a happy tune and sipping coffee.

Zar invited himself along and had the nerve to help himself to my favorite cup. How do I know? It has my name on it in big bold letters! I want my cup back!

Oh well. It is keeping them out of my hair whilst I clean. I will just have to sanitize the cup after he finishes. My cup! No Zar germs allowed!

Back to work.

See you tomorrow.

A Happy Boring New Year,,,,,

2012-01-02T09:09:00.005-07:00

OK. You are going to think that you are seeing triple...But you're not.

Yesterday, I was relaxing and watching boring TV. As is usual when Walter is watching sports, I am in the bedroom watching anything else that I can find.

On the wall, to the right of me, was this....

It was crying out for attention. Poor little wall shelf house...

I grabbed some paints and brushes and started listening and it started talking. Loudly....

It was all white and brown. First I started painting the rooms different colors. Then I had to go back and touch up the brown...Then I had to go back and touch up the colors in the rooms....Back and forth I went.

After that, I finished shingling the right side of the peaked roof.

Then I started laying flooring in some of the rooms. I still have five floor spaces to go. Considering that three of them are the entrance to the place, and will probably be cobblestone of some sort, I am not doing too bad.

The slanted left roof had to be covered, so I cut a piece of illustration board to fit and glued it on. That will be covered with shingles, but I was shingled out for the day. That will come later today or tomorrow....Sometime soon.....Promise.

Since the outside of the house is basically half timber Tudor style, I decided that the person that owned it was an alchemist kind of guy with an interest in the stars and other sciences.

The top peaked roof would have to be an observatory. Thus the stars....I have been saving that wallpaper sample since the 80s. I knew it would come in handy someday....I imagine that the entryway on the right bottom leads into a courtyard, thus the view of the dark above that section. No stars. Too low. Just darkness.

The rooms in the tower section will be a series of four shops. I am not sure what kind yet.The row of rooms at the bottom will be The wine cellar, which I have already worked on, and the scullery, kitchen, a pantry for storage and maybe a laundry or some other essential room.

The living area will be in the five larger rooms above.

The fun has just begun. Please don't disturb the six year old's attention span. I want it to last for at least as long as the house is talking to me.

See you tomorrow.

Party! Party!!! Party!!!!!

2012-01-01T07:30:00.004-07:00

Have a great 2012!!!!!

The sun is rising and the Terrible Two are still partying.

See you tomorrow!!!

Redheads Have Way More Fun!

2011-12-31T09:13:00.005-07:00

Don't tell Tessie that I got this shot! This morning she came to me whinging and whining, "I still have paint hair! Zar didn't do his job... Some hair stylist he is!"

By the time she was done, the whinging and whining had turned into ranting and raving, so I took her in hand.

The nice thing about her hair is, it is about the easiest style that you can do with mohair.

I took of her old hair. That's when, with camera in right and hair in left, I took the photo. If she ever finds out, she is going to have a hissy fit. That's the worst kind in her repertoire.

After peeling it off, I pulled out the "hair drawer" and she pawed through all of the colors. I knew that she would pick the same color that she always does, but she likes to have a choice.

She settled for her "natural" red and we went to work....We didn't invite Zar to help...

I took one end of the braid of mohair and fanned it out. Then I cut it across the end in a straight line, making sure that the very end turned under, towards her face.

As I was trying it on, she told me, "I could have been in that "Tangled" movie. Seventy feet of hair is nothing. OK, so she was a blond....That's OK. Everybody knows that redheads have waaaay more fun!". Then she followed that with, "Take me for example."

I kept moving. I glued the hair around her head, with the trimmed end circling her face. I cut the hair off at the back of her head, very close.

Then I took three strands of the hair, about six inches long. Each strand was about 1/8" wide.

I made Tessie hold one end and I braided the other. Then I wound it around into a snail shape, tucking the end under the edge and simply glued the whole thing to the back of her head, covering the cut ends at the back.

When we had everything in place, I called Zar into the room for the finishing touches. We put a purple band around the bun to match today's apron. Tessie pulled the plug on him when he tried to use the dryer on her finished hair. So, instead he shot hairspray on the whole thing and she was done.

Now on to the rest of the day. We are going to a movie and an early dinner to celebrate New Year's Eve.

Happy New Year's Eve!!!

See you tomorrow.

Tennessee Spinners and Calendar Art....

2011-12-30T15:11:00.004-07:00

The only minis that I worked on today was cutting up gourds, to see how many baskets, large and small I could get out of each one.

I knew that each of the small Tennessee Spinner gourds would yield three, if I was lucky. Incidentally, the Tennessee Spinners are sold on Ebay if you are interested. I can't give you the name of a particular seller. I haven't bought any from there yet....

Each gourd has lots of seeds inside. I am going to try to grow some, once it gets a little warmer.

As you can see, the top row in the photo is all one gourd. It gave me five pieces to work with. Two will be large the other three may work for mini. We shall see when I start coiling.
Here's a close up of the smaller ones. The steps are, wrap a piece of paper or tape around the gourd and cut on the line that you draw. Then drill holes about 1/8" apart around the cut edge.

Stain the gourd or paint it if you wish. Sometimes people just wax them with paste furniture wax. I prefer them darker.

I will continue with the rest of the instructions as I go.

The reason that I didn't get much done today was, I had to run some errands and visit the baby person that has been added to the family.

Tessie was very happy with a couple of the things that I did. I went to the mini museum and renewed our membership. This year,when the membership was renewed we got two calendars. One for me and one for Tessie. Very cool.

She still is not paint free in the hair. Zar did the best that he could. I am afraid that I am going to have to step in and do more.

On the way home, spur of the moment, I stopped at 22 st. Antique Mall. I benefited on this stop. I found a tatting pattern book from 1944 and a full box of #5 Perle cotton in black. That was a color that I needed. I am almost out of 310.

The only problem with this book is the bright red nail enamel on the cover....Now Tessie wants some. She is crazy if she thinks that I am going to sit down and give her a manicure. She would have it ruined in 10 seconds flat.

She will probably benefit from it though. There are some really neat patterns for edgings and some small doilies that she could possibly use. Those will have to wait. I am going to absolutely, positively, get back to the townhouse bedroom tomorrow.

See you then.

She's a Closet Diva....

2011-12-29T10:36:00.004-07:00

No. Not the cat. Widget is a he. I just had to get the cute photo of the day out of the way first. This is what I have to contend with whenever I get my basket of Perle cotton out to work on needlepoint.

The "she" that I am referring to is.....Altogether now......Tessie!

I am starting on the second floor now. I have to finish the closet first because of the dividing wall between it and the bedroom. That wall is in two sections.

As soon as I got the rod installed in the back and the floor covering in place, she started loading up.

This is the person that seldom carries a purse/bag or ever wears shoes. She crammed five purses into the shelves and put eight pair of shoes on the rack at the bottom.

To her credit, for once she actually hung all of her aprons up. Well, not all. I should say, her most regularly worn aprons. It won't last. She will take them down, one at a time. She will wear said apron for a couple of days and then throw it in the annex. That's where aprons go to either die or get replaced in the closet by me.

She managed to squeeze in various other objects that have nothing to do with wearables....Unless you count the sock monkey that was made of her last pair of socks, before she started going barefoot........I think that was in about 1945.... See how she is holding the shopping bag just over the line? this is her idea of putting new things away. The next step will be to drop it straight down....There it will stay until someone takes the trouble to put it away. It won't be her...

OK the door is now in place. I did notice that the apron that she was wearing yesterday is nowhere in the closet....Off to a good start....

All was good until she got a look in the mirror a little while ago. White paint doesn't match red hair. You should have heard the howling and carrying on!

She is now with her private hair stylist....Remember the last time Zar got a hold of her head? Yup! The electric hair dryer is in play.

If you want to see what happened the first time she was talked into using it, go here. http://caseymini.blogspot.com/2010/06/good-morning-im-balthazar.html And this is how it was put together...
http://caseymini.blogspot.com/2010/06/every-girl-should-have-one.html

I am going to be brave and go see what Zar did to her hair this time. I also want to check to see if he is still alive and in one piece....

Then I am going back to work.

See you tomorrow.

Over Half Way There.....

2011-12-28T10:17:00.003-07:00

I just realized this morning that I am over half way finished with the townhouse. I am tired of working on it, in case you can't tell....

Starting at the top and working down, I cleaned it up this morning. I want it done!

It was in worse shape than the last time I had to muck out my workshop! The workshop looked clean in comparison.

I had to take everything out and start over. There was dust on everything.

The roof garden is now officially finished, as is the top floor workroom, bathroom and hall. Everything that needs to be is glued in place.

As I moved from the top to the bottom, so did Tessie and Zar. I had the feeling that they had a list and were checking to make sure that I did everything properly.

No. They didn't offer to help.

Actually, I just noticed that I need to put a bit of trim around the top edges of the workroom and bathroom. Of course I figured that out after I put everything in place.....Oh. Baseboards in the bath.....

In the bedroom and closet, I need to finish installing the wall. Then I have to do all of the trim, glue down the floor coverings and add more furnishings....Lots to do here.

I stole the clothes rack from the closet and put it in the annex for Tessie's aprons, so I am going to have to do that again. Grrrrr. Oh! It needs curtains! Rats!!!

The bottom floor is the worst. I haven't even started doing kitchen cupboards, appliances and lighting.

I am in pretty good shape for furniture in the living room. Tessie still insists that she wants mid century mod stuff in there, so it is essentially finished. Score one for Tessie!

Anyway, we are ready to start. I am still knitting second socks for two more pair. No more minis today. The Terrible Two are just happy that I made it this far. Bug beer, cold cuts and cookies for everyone!

See you tomorrow.

Just a Little More Time....

2011-12-27T09:41:00.004-07:00

I am slowly, but surely getting into the after Christmas mode. I actually did some mini-ing this morning....Hey! It's not much, but it's a start!

I finally glued the two panels on the front of the townhouse. The middle panel is warped a little. That's why I didn't like it as an opening wall to the front of the house. That sucker is going to stay glued in for all eternity now......Well at least for as long as I need it to stay there.

Tessie is relieved to find that I am actually doing anything to her abode. Zar is hoping for closure, so that I will someday get back to the Clockwork Cottage.....Someday.....

I am very proud of myself this year. Usually the week after Christmas is when I figure out that the workroom will never be clean again. This year I made it a strict rule that I would NOT pile anything on the floor. That seems to be where it always starts.

The piles that you see on the chair and desk are all that I have to clean up. I can do that in a flash....Now all I need is a little time to do it.

This is one of those days when I am doing laundry with one hand, cleaning with the other, and knitting with my toes.

Speaking of knitting, I finished April's Christmas socks....OK....They were only two days late. Sorry about that, April. I am happy to report that there will be enough yarn left over to do socks and a hat for the baby.

Just before Christmas, I entered a drawing on "Stitching 'n' Knitting" http://ourknitalong.blogspot.com/ . Teresa Fox was giving away a few socks to keep your tatting shuttle warm...That's what happens when you both knit and tat. Anyway, I was one of the lucky winners. Isn't the shuttle sock the cutest thing!?

I will have the warmest shuttle in Tucson! Thanks Teresa! I love it.

Last but not least, look what I found!

The printer's tray in the back was something that my friend Sue brought to me at the last Wednesday Witches meeting. She knows that I collect such things and she wanted to get rid of it. Thanks Sue!

While rearranging stuff and putting away, I found the gourds in the basket. They were some that I bought a couple of weeks ago at the antique mall. I also found the five larger gourds in the closet.

Guess who is going to be experimenting with more gourd baskets. I think that some of the tops of the smaller ones can be cut off for mini baskets, but I want to do some larger ones also. Those should only take me a couple of years to use....That's in between minis, knitting, tatting and other needlework....

It looks like the coming year is going to be full of things to keep me busy.

Tessie and Zar are nagging me to finish cleaning the workroom and get back to mini-ing. I had better get to it and do it.

See you tomorrow!

Lots of Minis for Christmas!!

2011-12-26T08:03:00.005-07:00

A wonderful Christmas was had by all! Zar and Tessie spent most of the time in the tree, but unfortunately, those photos didn't turn out well....So....On with the ones that did.

April and Seth have a very small house, so we ate breakfast in the living room in front of a roaring fire.

Tessie and Zar were the bravest of us all. they sat on the hearth. See the rock that Zar is sitting upon? That rock is not a rock! Well it is a rock, but it has a couple of stickers on it that makes it a gift certificate to Summet Hut, an outdoor store here in Tucson. Very original idea!The Terrible Two had a great time exploring the rest of the house. They don't get out much..... Here you see them in the hallway. This is how April drys some of their Casey Sox. Tessie and Zar decided that this would be a good place to hang out, just in case Santa might make a second trip and fill the socks....It didn't work.

They came back to the living room when they heard the rustle of wrapping paper. Wise choice!

They made a haul!April got Tessie a bunch of fabric from Cactus Quilt Shop. It's a store that she goes to quite frequently for classes and fabrics. The mother of one of her friends owns it.

Tessie is in love with the roosters. She wants curtains, aprons and anything else that I am willing to make from it.
I did quite well in the mini department also. Look at this! It is hand blown glass! Walter got it at the Mini Time Machine Museum Gift Shop. Actually I got two! The second one is even smaller than the first! Aren't these incredible?!? The photos don't do them justice.
Tessie and Zar received these birds from the newest member of the family. More on that in a minute.

The dragon with the crystal in his paw and the fancy egg shell was from Walter. He knows what Tessie and I like.

We are fighting over this one.Just call them Auntie Tessie and Uncle Zar! April and Seth adopted a newborn baby boy a few days before Thanksgiving. He is now a month old and having Seth and April for parents, he is going to have to get used to having his photo taken.....Often. They both enjoy photography. We get the benefits of their efforts. As a grandparent, I get to say that he is the cutest baby ever and nobody can argue.

April took some of their photos and framed them for Tessie and Zar to take home....We can clearly see whom she likes best!

The photos are all wonderful and they gave us larger ones that are equally as nice. I have a spot in mind for mine.

Tessie and Zar have yet to make a decision. For the time being, Zar's will go by the head of his bed in the Clockwork Caravan and Tessie is hanging hers in the living room of the townhouse, finished or not.

Anyway, I hope that you had a nice a Christmas as we did! Happy Boxing Day!

See you tomorrow.

From Tessie and Zar!

2011-12-25T06:50:00.002-07:00

May your Christmas be full of joy and happiness!

Happy Holidays to one and all!

See you tomorrow.

Knitting My Little Fingers Off....

2011-12-24T15:35:00.004-07:00

Yes. I am still knitting. 2/3 of a sock to go. I am not going to try to get Seth's or April's other socks done. They live here in town and I can run the second socks over to them anytime.

I'm sure glad that Tessie and Zar agreed to move the party elsewhere. The cat tree is coming in handy as a place to store the presents until we go to the kid's house tomorrow.

The only trouble is, Tessie and Zar seem to thing that they have proprietary rights to anything left on the tree now. Look closely at the center shelf....

I took time out to make more cookies this morning. I won't give you recipes. They are standard Chocolate chip cookie bars and Spritz cookies. The recipes come on the Chocolate chip sack and in a recipe book that comes with the cookie press.

The Terrible Two had a great time making mini furniture this morning. I fear that it will not last very long though...

Walter walked into the kitchen and grabbed an arm from Tessie's chair and started munching on it. At this rate, the furniture will be gone before tomorrow night.

Oh well...Merry Christmas Eve!

See you tomorrow.

Getting Down to the Wire....

2011-12-23T11:01:00.007-07:00

This morning I made cookies. This morning I ate cookies. This morning Tessie and Company insisted that I share the cookies.

They had to hold a gun to my head to get their share.

I don't make these very often, because I start eating them as soon as they are cool enough to break apart.

For a change of pace, I am going to give you the recipe and stand back. Never get in the way of people that like chocolate or crunchy cookies.

These are the easiest, fastest and the most yummy for the time spent making them. They take less than ten minutes to put together.

They are called.....

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Saltine Cookie Bars

Line a large cookie sheet with foil and butter it well.

Lay a single layer of saltine crackers on the foil, covering the bottom.

In a sauce pan, bring to a boil, 1 c. butter and 1c. sugar and boil for 2 minutes.Pour over the crackers and spread evenly. Bake in a 400 degree oven for 4 minutes.

Remove from oven and sprinkle a 12 oz. package of chocolate chips over the top. When chocolate is softened enough, spread it around evenly.

Refrigerate until hardened and break into cookie sized pieces.....My idea of a cookie sized piece is about 1/4 of the slab!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Feel free to experiment with toppings. just be sure to use at least one package of chocolate chips.

This morning I made it in a little larger pan than I usually do. The same amount of sugar and butter was fine. I added a few white chips to one end of the chocolate chips and some peanut butter chips to the other. Sometimes I add some nuts on top, after spreading the chocolate, if the mood strikes.

Anyway, I am now going back to the kitchen to see if the Terrible Two and their friends left me anything on the plate...

See you tomorrow.

Pre Party Party....

2011-12-22T08:14:00.003-07:00

There was a trial run this morning. Tessie and Zar pushed, pulled and zapped as much furniture in the cottage as they could, just to see if it would all fit.

They are now rethinking the plan... Half of the furniture that they had in the tree is still in the tree...

The trouble is, as soon as they got everything in, people started arriving. There is now a pseudo party going on. So far, there are nine people in that tiny house and Tessie is making noises like she should have a larger party place!

This one isn't even finished yet. They didn't finish the woodwork or the window trim inside. They are very sneaky. On the top floor, they covered one window with the tree. They shoved a chair in front of the opposite window. The middle window now has a fireplace in front of it...At least they didn't try for a real fire in it. No chimney is involved...

In the bottom, both windows are just holes in the wall. I am going to attempt to shoo everybody out later and put the frames around the windows. This may be a difficult procedure, since I will be shooing nine people, two dogs and a tiger out of the house...You have heard the saying, " Harder than herding cats...".

Anyway, as things stand, the pre party has started. Maybe after I bake some more cookies, I can put out a plate of those and lure them out.

Wish me luck! I am also still knitting....

See you tomorrow.

Tom Sawyer Has Nothing On Tessie....

2011-12-21T09:38:00.004-07:00

OK. The cat's out of the bag. I gave Zar and Tessie orders to finish the party house. I served an eviction notice on the cat tree, after Mookie tried to eat some furniture on the second floor. He wasn't to blame. He hadn't been up there for months. He just wanted to see who was in the tree that he isn't using....

Anyway, I told the Terrible Two that they had 24 hours to get out. They only agreed after I said I would help. So now I can openly take photos and get the darned thing finished.

This morning, I made Tessie a paint roller. This, in theory, will make things go faster.

She picked Sachet Pink for the main floor. Ceramacoat as usual. Then she proceeded to try to make it look like loads of fun, so that she could foist the job off onto Zar....He is such a sucker.

After she finished the main room, he took the roller and paint tray upstairs and did a very sloppy first coat of Dusty Mauve. It looks like I am going to be doing the second coat.
The two of them put it in their contract that they get a 15 minute break every hour on the hour and that includes potato chips, cookies, fudge and bug beer.

They got as far as the potato chips and fudge on this break.

While they are breaking, I will give you the recipe for a paint roller and tray.This one is super easy. I took a bamboo skewer and cut it down to four inches. Then I drilled a hole in one end. I sanded the ends to round. They could be painted if you wanted to get fancy. Not necessary.

Next I took a 2" piece of 24 gauge wire, it could be larger, and wrapped it with white chinelle stem for 3/4". Cut that off at both ends. Bend the wire around the end of the chinelle and stop in the middle. Bend the end away from the roller and then put glue on the end and stick it into the skewer.

Go back to the first photo for reference. Now for the paint tray....Super, super easy. I took a Listerine breath strip packet and simply pulled the front off of the back. Then I filled the back part with the paint. That's it.

Back to the knitting needles! I have two and a half socks to go...

See you tomorrow.

What Is Christmas Without a Tree?

2011-12-20T12:26:00.004-07:00

Never leave the house to go shopping for a couple of hours, if you don't want things to change whilst you are out! That's the lesson I learned for today.

Last night I thought that I heard the usual banging around in the family room. This morning, when I arose, It didn't look like they had even removed the cover from the party house. Not a good sign.

I didn't ask questions. I just went on my merry way to do some late Christmas shopping. The real mistake was not starting the shopping months earlier.....You know the feeling.

I found a few things and also got sore feet.

I knew something was amiss when I came home, entered the back door and not a sound was to be heard....Then I strolled into the living room and saw this!

The party has started. At least the decorating part has.

I confronted Tessie(and Zar) with, "What did you do? How could you?"

Tessie stood up to her full five and a quarter inches, looked me straight in the eye(she was standing on the third level) and said..."Well the cats seldom use this monstrosity. We decided that we want our usual Christmas Tree Party and this is the only tree in the place! We've got dibs!"

Zar was a big help. His comment was, "Yeah. What she said!" All the while fidgeting and pointing at Tessie.

I looked up and on the very top, Santa was perched between two trees. Nobody seemed to notice. He was checking his list....There were a great many checks on the "Naughty" side....

Below him and to the left is our one and only wrapped present for the year. It's something that I got for Walter. I can't tell you what it is. He reads this.

The next step down, Esmerelda, Spike and Buffy were settled in with beer and cookies. I question their taste in party food.

Yes, there are real lights around the edge of this layer and the next one down. I went and looked in the drawer where I keep the batteries....All gone.

Going down.

The spinning sister seems to be happiest when left alone. With drink in one hand and three pizzas to keep her company, can you blame her? She is putting up with the tiger cub, Theo, kind of. He had best draw back that paw from the deluxe pizza box though. She is Tessie's older sister and a witch to boot.

Inside, Tessie has the best room in the house(as usual).She moved in some of the mid century modern furniture and she has the tree from last year. This is the only room with actual lights. The fireplace is flickering. She stuck one of those little battery operated tea lights behind the screen. They also managed to get one of the LED lights stuck to the ceiling...I am going to have to investigate that....Bubble gum or Velcro?

After I got over the shock, I decided it wasn't so bad. I did tell them that it was up to them to keep the cats out of their party if they insist upon staying in the tree....It IS Mookie and Widget's tree. Not theirs.

As everything stands now, it looks like interest has been lost in the party house.

Maybe if one of the cats tries to take a bite out of one of them, they will change their minds.

Either they will go back to the party house or I am going to have to clean up the mess that they started. Wish me luck!

See you tomorrow.

Gingerbread and Gold....

2011-12-19T10:02:00.003-07:00

When I got up this morning, the outside of the party house was essentially finished. Tessie used the up and down bouncy thing about 150 times....Allowing for a few that she didn't jump up and down hard enough. Those didn't cut all the way through the index cards.

There are 14 different pieces on the front alone. They decided that it was too much work to make six for each side on top of that. Too much jumping is a bad thing....

Next, they went to work on the door.

They used the illustration board from the center of the door frame. They trimmed it down a bit, to allow for the thickness of the covering. They covered it with scrapbook, Christmas card stock. Then Tessie rummaged through my gold sticky things and found door decorations. The design in the center of the door is actually a window. It is cut out behind the gold sticky stuff so that she can see who is outside. It is the same design on the inside.

She also pilfered two fancy door knobs that I was saving for a rainy day....I guess that's OK though. It IS raining today. We have had more than our fair share this year.

I knew I shouldn't have baked cookies and made fudge so far ahead of Christmas....They finished the door and found the fudge....That was the end of the work night.

When I looked, the cookie jar was half empty and the fudge was scattered around the inside of the fridge. It looked like someone had dug through it and found the largest pieces and left the small ones.

It's a good thing that they don't know that I am recording all of this. They would probably jump up and down on the camera, like they do on the gingerbread punch.

At least I know that Walter and I have not been sleepwalking and getting into the cookies! Here's the proof. They even enlisted Spike to do the heavy lifting!

I do hope that this doesn't slow down the work.....

See you tomorrow...

Illustrating What Can Be Done...

2011-12-18T10:51:00.003-07:00

We went over to April's to decorate their Christmas tree yesterday afternoon. Tessie and Zar stayed home and worked.

Since this house was five dollars at a thrift store, it was just a shell. No trim or other parts were included.

Tessie and Zar raided my store of Illustration board and went to work right after we left.

Tessie took a scrap of paper and did tracings of the arched windows and door. then they laid that down on the board and traced around it. they did another line outside of that for the outer edge of the frames. Then they cut them out and painted them.

The then glued them in place and clamped them until they were dry.

They found my stash of clips and mini clothespins for that task.

I recorded a conversation between them that went like this.

Tessie: "It's blah! It needs fancy trim."

Zar: "Where are we going to get fancy trim? Casey doesn't have any."

Tessie:"No, but I know where she keeps the jump up and down on punches.".

So, they disappeared out of camera range for a while. When they returned, Zar started poking index cards into the punch and Tessie jumped up and down on the lever that cuts fancy corners.

I used these self same corners when I did Hubert's Haberdashery. That must be where Tessie got the idea.

What you do is cut out five of the design and glue them in a stack. They come out about 1/16" thick when you do that. Let them dry and paint them. Let them dry again and stick them to the building. Fancy fretwork is the result.

They have only just started fancying up the party house. At least the outside is almost finished.

On to the inside......If they don't decide to quit...

April invited both of them to come over and sit in her tree on Christmas day. I don't think that I am going to tell them that until they finish the house. I want to see them finish it. Don't you?

See you tomorrow.

The Brush Off...

2011-12-17T09:06:00.003-07:00

The camera is still working...The Terrible Two continue to keep me out. I caught this image early in the evening.

They have been watching me work, it seems. They are staining the roof first. If it drips down, it won't ruin the new paint job that goes on next.

Teamwork all the way. Zar on the ladder and Tessie on the table, passing the full brush up to him. This is fun to watch. Once in a while, Tessie slaps the side of his head with the brush....Accidentally. Once in a while Zar drips stain down on her head.

Believe it or not, they are getting along quite well.

Somewhere in the process, they decided to cooperate with one another. I am still trying to figure out a way to gently tell them that the corners of the roof need to be capped with something. I guess it doesn't matter if the roof has holes. After all, it seldom rains inside our house.

Next they went after the walls. It was decided that they would be Wedgestone Green Ceramcoat. and the beams that were terribly worn would be covered with Burnt Umber Ceramcoat.

They also did the stone work on the base with charcoal gray, white, a little of the green and brown mixed in to make it coordinate.

Somewhere in the middle of the night they decided that the table needed to be Christmas-ed up. They dug out my red and green plaid tablecloth. I guess that it makes a good drop cloth.....Their logic is, the table won't get dirty...Fuzzy logic....

I have only one problem with these two working on their own. Brushes. See the pile by Tessie's feet in the last photo? That is just from last night. They think that all brushes are disposable. Yes. I own a lot of brushes, but contrary to their belief, I also wash a lot of brushes.

Thank goodness, I know the Alcohol trick. One cap full and the whole mess was conquered.

Compare the pile by her feet in this last photo to the previous photo. Yes they are the same brushes. I simply swirled them in the alcohol. Then I took them to the kitchen sink and used dish washing soap and warm water on them. Almost like new.

I have the feeling that I will be doing this every morning, for the next few days. Hey! A bottle of alcohol is much cheaper than all new brushes.

Notice the stain brush in Tessie's hands. That is the only one that I don't bother doing this way. I use a stiff bristle brush for stain. I don't bother with cleaning it. The Minwax stain is solvent based or some such and as soon as you start using it again, it softens up and works fine. That particular brush is a few years old and has never been cleaned....Still works well.

I am now off to bake more Christmas goodies. Zar and Tessie handed me a list of cookies and fudge that they want for the party. They don't mess with mini stuff. A stack of cookies and several pieces of big people fudge is all they need.

See you tomorrow.

The Night Shift.....

2011-12-16T07:15:00.003-07:00

OK....Team Tess-Zar were at it all night long. I woke up with a headache from all of the pounding and chiseling that went on.

I suspected that they would ban me from the family room, so I set up a hidden camera in one of the spider plants on the kitchen counter. I set it to snap a photo every 15 minutes. Please don't tell the Terrible Two! If you tattle on me, there will be no more photos of their progress!

As you can see from this first shot, they made short work of the basic shingling....I suspect that there might have been some zapping going on...Plus, they used the largest shingles that they could find and I can't say that they are very careful about lining them up. The words willy nilly come to mind. There has to be a way to suggest to them that they cover the bendy places in the roof....

They covered the cottage with a towel this morning and weighted it down with cans of beans and soup from the cupboard. Under no circumstances, am I to peek. Dire threats were made... Nobody gets soup or beans for the duration...

I solemnly promised that I wouldn't peek. I didn't say that I wouldn't use a hidden camera.

The two of them work a lot like I do. They jumped from the half finished roof to the foundation. They got that covered with rocks, but not painted yet.

I heard them discussing whether or not there was a need for a fireplace of the same rocks. Nothing was decided as far as I could tell.

They have been paying attention. They stole the remainder of my egg carton stash. Reminder to self: "Eat more eggs!"

That was the end of the work for the evening. The photo time stamped 2:15 AM found them on the top floor of the cottage, playing tug of war with a chocolate dripped pretzel. I am not sure why they both wanted that particular one. There were more in a bag a few feet away. Maybe more chocolate on that particular one?

That reminds me. In order to keep them interested, I probably should leave cookies or fudge laying around. I have fudge in the fridge.

Tomorrow I am making Spritz Cookies. I have the stuff to make a couple of other kinds.

I do hope that I have enough to keep them full and working until a couple of days before Christmas....I wonder if, if I suggested it, they could get some of their friends to help. We need to speed up the process, if they want their usual three day Christmas bash. That means more cookies! Lots more cookies! I have to start baking now.

See you tomorrow.

Breaking the Bad News....

2011-12-15T14:56:00.005-07:00

I finally had to tell everybody this morning...There will be no big Christmas Tree Party this year. It has been decided that we aren't going to put up the big tree. We are going over to April and Seth's and help them decorate their tree Saturday and spending Christmas Day over there. Thus, no tree. So..... No party?

Tessie and Zar were both extremely upset...Not to mention the rest of the participants. Spike was crying little doggy tears when they broke it to him.

You know that Tessie and company are not people that give up easily. She looked me straight in the eye and said, "Well! We are going to have our usual party anyway. And YOU aren't invited!"

Mind you, I never am invited anyway. In fact there are "Keep Out!" signs all over my tree every year.

I found Tessie and Zar digging through their box of Christmas decor, with help from Spike. They were talking amongst themselves.

Tessie, Zar and Spike wanted to make sure that I didn't throw away anything that they would need. Check. It was all there.

By this time, they were utilizing the kitchen table as their construction site.

I brought up the question of where they were going to have the party. Tessie did the "woe is me" bit. "My townhouse is still under construction. Zar's cottage is still not finished. You changed my cottage into a hat shop, of all things! And Zar's caravan is much too small!"

After that tirade, they disappeared. I knew that they were hunting for a space for the party. Then I remembered the one $5.00 unfinished dollhouse that I found at the thrift shop last year.

I meekly offered them the use of it. I told them that they would have to do all of the work. I don't have time to do a whole house before Christmas.

They condescended to look at it. Tessie zapped the silver tree inside....The top of the tree hits the ceiling.

She looked me straight in the eye and said...."You will have to drill a hole in the ceiling! It's too short."

Heaven forbid that she would take the tree topper off. We are going to have to have a little talk about that.

The house has no doors or windows. No shingles. It is painted a putrid color of green.

I made them sign a contract to the effect that they would do all of the rehab themselves and would leave it in no worse condition than they found it in....It couldn't get much worse....

As I tip toed out, I heard the words, "Party Central" and "Fun House" being batted around.

They are now happily digging through leftover parts from other dollhouses to see what's what.

This is going to be a fun ten days....I am going to sit back and watch....Would you like to join me? Have a cup of tea and a cookie.... This could get interesting.

See you tomorrow.

How About a Pup Tent?

2011-12-14T10:50:00.001-07:00

OK. It's not quite a pup tent. It's a bed for Spike.

Since I had all of the stuff out to make shaped objects like the umbrella, I decided to try out a fancy doggy bed. I think that it was Neman-Marcus that had one similar to this in their Christmas catalog one year.

I have seen a lot of different versions, but never tried to do this particular style. If you enlarge the photos, you can get the measurements that I used. You might want to do a different size, so I am not going into a lot of particulars.

Mine is 2 1/4" square, with a peaked roof. I used foam core for the base and illustrtion board for the bottom sides. I cut the four squares and then cut the fancy door from one of them.

I then measured up a ways from the top edge and drew an s curve from the top corner to the top center. After that, I cut four from index cards and glued the bottom part of them to the illustration board squares.

I covered the base with batting and then with fabric. That measures 2 1/4 by2 1/8".

I didn't get too fancy because I didn't want to waste good material if it didn't work. It did and I will probably do it again with fancy stuff.

I covered the side pieces with fabric, wrapping the front around to the back. Then covering the back with another piece of fabric, I trimmed that close to the edge.

Then I curled the top part into the S shape.

I glued two of the side panels to opposite sides of the foam core on the longer sides. Then I glued the other two sides to the shorter sides, thus covering the corners.

I pinned and taped the edges together to hold them in place until the glue dried.

All that was left was the decorating. I ran braid along the seams and around the door frame. I used sequin pins to fasten on the feet and the top decoration. I glued another gold finding over the door.

Spike has been in it the rest of the morning. Tessie is insisting that I make it again....Only she wants it larger. She is thinking four poster bed with the canopy in that shape. She doesn't want much.....We shall see.

All together now...."Tessie, don't hold your breath!"

See you tomorrow.

Zap! I Made You An Umbrella!

2011-12-13T14:06:00.006-07:00

Tessie hid for quite a while after I threatened to change her into an umbrella yesterday.....In fact, she was still hiding this morning when I went to get her for the final photo of this project.

No. I didn't make her an umbrella. I made her an umbrella. I started with a couple of index cards, some fabric to cover, trim, a cone finding and a piece of copper wire.

First I made a pattern that was curved at the bottom and just a slight S curve on each side of a triangle. The wider and longer you make the pattern, the larger the umbrella.

This one is permanently open. Nothing fancy. As Tessie said, she needs it now. It is still raining buckets outside.

The center example in the first photo is the shape to cut the fabric, so that it will go around the piece smoothly. The last one is how it looks glued.I did seven pieces just the same. Then I curved the bottom downwards and the top point upwards on each piece. After that it was simply a matter of sticking all of the sides together in a circle.

Here you see two of the panels glued together on the left and five glued together on the right.

Yes, you can see a bit of glue sticking out between the two on the left. That's OK. It will be covered with trim after everything is glued together.I cut panels the same size as the index card to glue to the inside. I will cover the seams in there also.

For the handle, I cut a piece of copper wire and curled it in a cone shape on one end and a hook shape on the other. You could use a thin piece of wood and get really fancy, but keep in mind, I had Tessie tugging at me and whining about getting rained on.

I did manage to get some trim on the outside before she grabbed it.

I told her that she was going to have to pose on the back porch for the final photo....

She got the strangest look on her face and replied, "But it's raining out there! I will melt!!!".

I told her that statement was just a myth. Witches don't melt in the rain, or in the bathtub, or washing dishes.... Then I shoved her out the door and closed it.
She ran and stood under the porch swing. She hopped from one foot to the other and whinged,"It's cold! My feet are turning blue! My fingers are numb."

I timed it. she was out there for all of 23.5 seconds. I took photos through the window in the back door...

Then I let her back in the house.

She threw the umbrella at me and stomped away. She is now rummaging through my yarn stash. She wants a sweater and leg warmers to match....

She hasn't learned yet. If she gets those, I will have to shove her out the back door again when it snows to see if they are thick enough to keep her warm in freezing weather....

This time I am going to warn her ahead of time. It will save me a lot of knitting if she opts to stay inside where it's nice and warm...

See you tomorrow.

Cleaning Out Big and Little....

2011-12-12T12:20:00.004-07:00

Today is a dreary Monday and thank goodness I don't have to hang my clothes outside on a clothes line. It has been raining all morning....Drizzling....Icky....Wet...

It's OK though. I need to do my Monday cleaning and laundry and so does Tessie...

At least that's what she tells me she is doing.

She spent from 9 to 10 in the confines of my UFO drawer for beading. This is definitely in need of organizing. The six year old has been at it again....However, my room is as clean as the last time you saw it. I have been being good. Putting away as I finish, before going to the next project.

From 10 to 10:14, Tessie managed to keep herself entertained in my box of unfinished spirit bags. I won't tell you how long these have been unfinished, but some of the fancy ribbon that I made these from hasn't been sold in stores for about 15 years....I did finish a lot of these when they were popular. I wasn't sure why I still had them and attempted to put them in the donation bag in the garage when Tessie spotted them. She grabbed one and announced, "This will be a good project when you don't have anything to keep you busy. All of these can be cut down and made into Eco friendly shopping bags for me. Recycle and reuse, you know!". It seems to me that by the time I get them all cut down for her use, she will loose interest in them and want a bigger, better bag.

Next, she found the big jar where I keep the spare parts for the Russian Cottage. She turned to me and informed me, "You know? You can't keep a whole cottage in this jar. I don't think that, even if you stomped it down with your big old foot, you could get the whole thing in there." Then she turned around and spotted the cottage on top of the bookcase, where all unfinished houses go to live. She then had the audacity to tell me that I lied and insisted that I change the label on the container to read...."Russian Cottage Unattached Parts". She is very specific about content labels.

After I refused to make new labels for about half of the storage in the workroom, she flounced out. I like it when she gets miffed at me. She goes somewhere, where I'm not, and pouts.

I finally found her in the bedroom clutching the third gourd basket that I finished yesterday....Of course all she would say was..."Mine. It's my basket. No....You can't have it back."

This one is more experimental. I finished it off with a vine going down the front. All of the "leaves" are jade chips. I ended up coiling a bottom to match the top and glued it to the gourd.

I don't guess that I am going to be able to keep that one for now. She trotted off to the townhouse with it over her head.

I asked her what she was doing and she answered with, "Well! It is still raining and you never made me an umbrella....I need an umbrella....Make me an umbrella...NOW!"

If she doesn't cut it out, I am going to make her the umbrella. I wonder if she would like to be a red umbrella or a blue one? She's asking for it.....Zap! Tessie, you are an umbrella!!!

See you tomorrow...Maybe even with a newly made umbrella that is Tessie....

Basket Making Details...

2011-12-11T09:47:00.004-07:00

I decided to throw in a few extra details of the gourd basket. I finished it this morning and I thought that you might like to follow along.

First of all, this is how I started the coiled weaving inside the basket. See the gray fuzzy stuff in the top center of the photo? That's the start of the covered wire. I bent it into an "L" shape and glued it to the inside of the basket between two of the holes. I hit it with a dab of the stain that I used on the shell. For some reason, the cotton fiber turns gray instead of brown. That's OK. Just as long as you don't have a glaring white spot.

As you can see, I had already completed a few rounds of the coiling.

I wanted the top edge to curve in just slightly. In fact, it hardly shows in the photos. I hold the wire where I want it to stay when the basket is finished. Wherever you hold it, that is naturally the way that it is going to want to stay when your basket is completed.

I am using a five wrap....In other words, I am wrapping the floss around the wire five times and then on the fifth wrap, I plunge the needle into the row below.

If the needle looks funny to you, it's because it is a big eyed beading needle. Only the two ends are closed for about a quarter of an inch. The center length is open. I find it handy for all kinds of needlework where you need to get into a tight space. You don't have to have this for regular basket coiling, but for getting through the holes in the gourd, it helps.

I did five rounds and then finished directly over the place that I started. I whip stitched the last 1/8" of the wire down to the layer below.

Here's a sneaky trick. After you are finished, decorate the spot directly over the beginning/ending. That way, the eye is fooled and it looks like all of the layers are the same height and not slanted in that one spot.

By the way, I am not sure what kind of feather that is. I cut it from the tip of a much longer feather. The turquoise is real. I picked up some chips at the gem show a few years ago.

I see a couple of white spots poking through the thread. That will be taken care of by manipulating the threads to cover. Sometimes these are easier to see in a photo than they are with the naked eye.

And I will give you three guesses as to whom the basket now belongs.....You don't really need three, do you?

She grabbed it. She posed for the pretty photo. She zapped herself away. Basket and all! I heard her say, as she disappeared, "It's mine! I deserve it because I gave up my new sofa!"

See you tomorrow.

P. S. I have added a way to get to Tessie's first appearence on the right column. I still haven't had any answers to where my "newer posts" and "older posts" buttons have gone. I hope this helps those of you that want to know more about Tessie.

Still No Feet....

2011-12-10T12:22:00.006-07:00

Sooner or later, Zar and Tessie are going to have to give back the sofa so that I can finish it. Tessie zapped it onto the balcony of the townhouse. She and Zar have settled in to watch TV, watch me work and drink bug beer. Luckily, I have lots of other stuff to work on.

All of yesterday evening, I knitted and watched "24" on Netflix. The first Flat Foot sock is coming along nicely. Very Christmas-y It's just a good thing that the two of them like "24" too. It keeps them out of my hair and my knitting. I am liking this yarn a lot.

Since I can't get to the sofa, I decided to try out some Tennessee Spinner Gourds that my friend Jo sent me to try for basket making.

We tend to get each other into trouble. She is a basket maker in real size and a talented miniaturist besides. Years ago, I talked her into trying to make mini coiled baskets. We have both progressed a lot since then.

Earlier this year, she found these mini gourds at a basket making show and grabbed a bunch. She was nice enough to send me some. I am just now getting started. Trying them out is a nice break from the Christmas rush.

There is a lot of work that goes into making a basket out of them.

They have to be cleaned, drilled with lots of holes, sawed apart and the edges sanded.

I got three baskets out of one gourd. The tiny one that is hanging off of Tessie's hand is the neck of the gourd. The one that she is working on is the bottom.The shell, sitting on the floor next to her feet, is the top portion with the neck cut off. I will have to put a bottom in that one. It is hard to see, but it tapers nicely on the bottom.

Next they have to be stained or waxed or both. Then the fun begins. The top, like the one in Tessie's lap is coiled just like a regular basket. I used ColorWorx hand dyed embroidery floss.

Just like my regular coiled baskets, it is two strands of floss over #32 cloth covered wire.

Here in the southwest, there are lots of people that make large versions of these. Some of the Native Americans even paint the gourds like fine pieces of pottery before completing the basket part.

Anyway, a belated thanks to Jo for getting me into more trouble. That's 1 and 1/2 baskets down and more to go.

The sock score is two pair finished, and I think four pair that are at least one sock finished...We won't talk about the ones that are started and the first sock is not yet finished....

Back to knitting, basket weaving, trying to get two obstinate people off of the sofa and watching "24". Not necessarily all at the same time...

See you tomorrow.

It Needs Feet!

2011-12-09T11:56:00.004-07:00

OK. Back to the Chesterfield. I finished the second arm this morning. then I took index card and cut it to fit around the back and sides. I covered that with suede and glued it on.

The last suede pieces were the front of the arms.

Tessie plopped herself down on the sofa with the second piece to show you how I clipped it all around so that it would fold over the back, without any overlaps.

After I got that on, it was a lost cause. I still need to do a bit of trimming and it still needs feet, but I am afraid that is going to have to wait.

Tessie called Zar in and announced that she made him a sofa for Christmas, to go in the Clockwork cottage! The nerve of some people.

They are sitting here celebrating with bug beer whilst I type.

Tessie turned to me and said, "You know, since I gave Zar the sofa that I worked so hard on, you need to make me one for my townhouse.".

If she thinks that I am going to make another one in rapid succession, she is crazier than a hoot owl! I haven't even finished this one yet!

By the way, I did the bolster pillows in the usual manner. If you want to see how, it is in with the bed tutorials.

I will finish with the usual statement that I make when Tessie makes one of her demands....."Don't hold your breath, Tessie!" If she doesn't watch it, I may pull down the Clockwork Cottage from the top shelf and work on that.

See you tomorrow with ZAR'S finished sofa.

No Niddy Noddy Needed.......

2011-12-08T14:09:00.005-07:00

I am not working on the Chesterfield yet today. It's OK. I have several great excuses for not doing so.

The first was these six pieces of fabric. No. They aren't cut up pieces of tie dyed sweaters.

My friend Jane, from Pennsylvania wrote to me and asked if I would like some of her extra sock yarn, since she knows that I love to knit socks. She told me it was Flat Feet Yarn. I had heard the name, but never seen any. Not being one to say no to sock yarn, I said yes.

This is it! It seems that the people that make it take 80% Marino and 20% nylon sock yarn, machine knit it and then hand dye the pieces in various designs..... It's a good thing that I knew this part, or I probably would have thought the tie dyed sweater thing was happening!

Of course, this stuff was irresistible to try. It seems that they make it so that you can unravel the knitted swatch and knit right from there onto the needles. What a great idea. No balls to roll away across the floor. You simply lay the swatch on your lap and start knitting from one end.

It is really fun. I had no idea what design was going to come out of it when I started knitting. Here's the first couple of inches from the swatch laying beneath it. Pretty cool! Thank you, Jane!

OK. Second excuse? I spent the morning over at April's place. I couldn't take the Chesterfield over there to work on it. So.....I took the new yarn. April is very close to Tessie in personality. She immediately tried to claim any and all socks, hats or other garments that are to be made with this yarn. She had a bad case of the "I want!"s. I have a bad case of the "No, it's all mine!"s. I barely got out of there with the bag of yarn. I am really not in danger until the socks are knitted though.

Third and last excuse? Tessie is once again fit to dance on tables and is doing so as we speak.

She is so happy to be back to normal that I am not even going to try to stop her.

Zar is perhaps not as wise. I fear that, if not careful, he is going to get kicked in the teeth. I did warn him to keep back.

Once Tessie gets started, you may as well let her wind down in her own sweet time. Go, Tessie!!!

I promise to work on the Chesterfield tomorrow.

See you then!

Slowly But Surely.....

2011-12-07T12:46:00.004-07:00

Now I remember why I don't do more Chesterfields! The tufting on this thing is taking me forever, plus a day and a half...

I got the seat cushion finished yesterday. That meant only the back and the arms to go. However.....The back is half again as big as the seat. And the arms are two thirds the size of that.

I played with the pattern until I had all of the pieces fitting correctly....Then I had to cut it down a bit at the corners to allow for the thickness of the suede and the stuffing.Be aware that the pattern pieces don't allow for this. Every sofa that you make will differ in thickness, so this is just a general guide to work with.

After working on it for hours, I have the back and one arm tufted.I have them in place, but the seat is still movable. I have to wait until the other arm is done before I can finish the seat. I still have to stain the bun feet and put them on, so it sits a bit low still.

There may be a pause in the proceedings. Tessie broke a knee this morning....That means full leg replacement. Serious operation. That's why she isn't jumping around. Usually, by now, she would be bouncing up and down on the sofa to see how the pogo stick works on that particular surface.

That will have to wait until both she and the sofa are in better shape. I think that Tessie comes first. I will get right on that....You know what's coming next. She never consents to one of these operations without a new outfit. It has to be the contract in writing, in triplicate and notarized.

I guess that I had better get back to work. It is going to take a while to fix her knee(and sew her dress). She is insisting that I do it right away. She doesn't have a leg to stand on.....Literally.

See you tomorrow.

Why Did I Bother?

2011-12-06T10:59:00.003-07:00

Remember all of the cleaning that I did yesterday? It was for naught. The closet is still not perfect, but it is much better than it was when I started. I will fine tune after Christmas.

Why did I do it though? I think that it was a ruse on Tessie's part, just to see what was in there.

You see, right after I got the last piece of fabric folded and put away, she announced that she didn't want fabric.

We have been watching the English series on Netflix called "The Black Books". Very funny if you are looking for something make you laugh. In the first season there is a wonderful Chesterfield sofa right in the middle of the store in some of the episodes. Very old, worn and well used. It is brown leather. That's what Tessie wants now.

So... we all know the routine. Don't argue, just go with it....It's easier that way.

The closest thing I had in my stash was some camel colored suede, from a shirt that April wore out a long time ago. It is thin and wonderfully soft. And Tessie approved right away.

This morning I glued the couch frame together and covered the front bottom with leather. The seat cushion will go on last.

Anyway, while the glue dries, Tessie and I started working on the tufting.

I made the dots twice as close together as I had them in the first draft. They are more like the real thing. I went and put in "Chesterfield sofas" on Bing Images and got a LOT of photos. Most of the photos on there had the button tufting closer together, so I went with the trend.

I always start in the center of the panel and work outwards in a spiral. That gives me more control and works out much better than starting at an edge.

As you can see, I put two thicknesses of a thin, fluffy batting between the index card and the leather. Oh and I pre-punched all of the holes for the tufting. It can sometimes be hard to get the needle through if you don't do this.

I clipped the edges so that they wouldn't shift. Starting on the back with a knot, I went straight down through all of the layers.

Then the whole thing is turned over and going straight down again, I put the needle through the three layers again. I go through the leather or fabric a bit away from the original hole. If you don't take that step, you will just get a hole and no tufting. For the leather, I go about 1/16" away. For fabric, it is only necessary to go a few threads over from the original hole.

Then the thread is pulled down firmly on the back side. You can either anchor it by tieing a knot around the original thread or simply pull it up tight and take a stitch in the next hole. It takes a bit fo practice, but I prefer the second method. That way I can tighten any stitches later by looping through the back threads.

Now you know how to tuft. Next I will continue putting things together. I still have laundry to finish and more house cleaning to do, since I was conned into doing that closet yesterday.

See you tomorrow.

Where Did the Sun Go?

2011-12-05T09:42:00.004-07:00

The current temperature in Tucson is 36 degrees. It may get as high as 47 today. We desert rats don't like days like this.

I was out at 4:30 this morning to go get groceries. It was 32degrees. I beat the crowds, but not the temperature.

I decided that today would be the day that I had to clean out that closet that has all of the fabric stored inside. I seldom go into this one. At least not the left hand side. Whoever designed this was a complete idiot! It has double doors. That's good. The doors are to the far right hand side. That's bad.

About three and a half feet are virtually inaccessible. I don't know why they couldn't have put the doors in the middle. Most irritating....

So about once a year, I dive in and pull everything out. That's the only way it can be cleaned.

I won't bore you with the piles of stuff all over the floor. I did find, at the bottom of the back, an oak, curved glass room box that I have never done anything with. One of these days....It is very pretty and sits on cabriole legs that I found in a thrift shop. Someone, probably a high school shop student, made the frame for an oak footstool. Amazingly, it is the same dimensions as the box. It makes a nice occasional table when the two are put together.

You may ask why I never did anything with it? Simple. It is a very awkward shaped box. The ceiling is high, but not high enough for a second story. I have argued with this box for years about what it is going to be. One of these days, I am going to win! For now, it is out of the way.

I found my stock of yarn. Some is going away now. Some is staying to be made into something or be finished.

The half sock to the left is a good example. I started designing Halloween socks a few years ago. Then I got down to the part that would logically be boring black.

The six year old's attention span wandered. I am going to leave these out where the six year old will see them and get a guilty conscience. they will get finished. My goal is next Halloween. Tessie says that they would look good with pointy toes and no shoes....

The crochet below the sock is a granny afghan that I started a few years ago also. That's another one that I am bound and determined to finish. I really like it, but it is so time consuming. Every square in it is different.

So far, I have found two candidates for the Chesterfield.

They are both fat quarters that April found at her favorite quilt shop. They are both quilt weight cotton. The first one is a kind of tweedy material that looks like upholster's fabric in miniature. I think that it will make great mini furniture.

The second one is my first choice so far. Cheaters sometimes win....This one would be easy to tuft. I could use the diamonds in the fabric as a guide. I would probably use every other dot.

So....While I clean, I talk to myself, answer myself and sometimes argue. That part I do with Tessie. She likes the last fabric and wants me to stop cleaning and start upholstering her couch.

The only problem is, I can't reach the door! Until the stuff is all put neatly back into the closet, I can't get out of the room!

The next step in the Chesterfield will be here tomorrow. I promise. Can someone slip a pizza under the door, so that I can keep cleaning?

See you tomorrow.

One Step at a Time....

2011-12-04T10:07:00.004-07:00

Today is pattern making day.

By the way, I lied to you yesterday. I left out three pieces of wood that are needed. Those are the ones that you see at the top edge of the outside. They are all 3/16" by 1/4". The back is 6 1/2" long. The sides are 2 1/2" long.

I rounded the edges, lengthwise on two sides of the quarter inch.

The purpose of these is to make a nice rolled edge on top.

Now. As I said, today is for making patterns. After I am finished here, I will check them twice and re-draw them for your benefit.

I seldom use a tape measure in minis. They aren't always as accurate as they could be, but when I need to measure over or around something they are the only tool that will work. OK. I could use a piece of string and then measure that, but this is less work, in the long run.

So...I need to find the length of the sides and back pieces from the seat, over the top and under the back roll.

I pinned the end to the front, wrapped it over the back and poked it snug with my fingernail, then stuck a pin in it at the crease. 2 3/8" long.

To draw the pattern, I used an index card. I already knew that the back of the sofa was 6"long. I centered that measurement on the card then drew a 45 degree angle out from the top of the back. There has to be an allowance to cover the corners of the top rail. It will continue down and around the back of the roll. I will have to wait to figure that out when it is cut out and can be fit around the base. The side patterns will simply be two inch sections cut from either end of the back.

Who said that geometry classes go to waste after high school? I use it all the time in mini.

I also drew out a pattern for diamond tufting on the seat. That's under Tessie's feet. She is being unexpectedly cooperative. Oh! The excitement of new furniture. Especially if it's for her.

The pattern was easy, because there were no odd numbers. All in inches. No quarter or half. I simply drew a line down the center length, marked off the edges at 1" intervals. Then diagonally connected the dots.

Wherever the lines intersected, I put a dot for tufting.

Tessie even helped me out with the post it note, for making a template for the front of the arm. By the way, this is a great way to get a tracing of anything small. Just stick it to what you want to trace and have at it. Then just take it off and cut it out. It also sticks to whatever you are going to make the piece out of for marking purposes.

I think that is as far as I am going to go today. I need to get a head start on the week of laundry that has piled up. And yes, I am still knitting.

I promise to keep it coming until the Chesterfield is finished. Just a few more days left.

See you tomorrow.

Chesterfield....

2011-12-03T11:49:00.004-07:00

Not the kind you smoke....The kind that you sit upon.

When Walter and I were first married, we had a house so small that a regular sofa wouldn't fit in the living room. I am talking about 12' by12'.

I coerced him into at tufted Chesterfield Sofa. It was actually more of a love seat. It was cream colored and very comfortable...Too small to stretch out on.

It stayed with us for almost 20 years....It finally bit the dust. I always liked that style.

I made the mistake of showing one of the same style, in a magazine, to Tessie. They never seem to go out of style.

Anyway, as soon as she saw it, she demanded, "Make me that!" No please in front or thank you behind. Just the three words.

I made one in mini years ago. It was a pewter colored velvet. Looked pretty good. I think that I finally sold it, because it never found a home in any of my mini scenes.

Tessie's demand put me in the mood for making one again. If you want to follow along, the directions will be in the next two or three entries.

And please note. I am actually working in the workroom today! It's fun when it's clean.

The first step is to cut the forms for it from balsa. I don't use balsa for anything but overstuffed furniture. It is too soft for wood that is going to show. Anyway, I cut two 2" by 6" pieces of 1/2" thick balsa for the seat. Then in quarter inch balsa, I cut one back 2 1/2" by 6" and two arms that are 2" by 2 1/4". That's all the wood that you need.

I test fitted those and pinned them together. Tessie tried it out for size as soon as the pins were in place. She approved of the size.

Did I mention that I put bun feet underneath? I did. Between those and the padding on the seat, they will be the right height.

We will carry on with the building tomorrow. Now for the hard part. Fabric selection....

Open the closet door and jump back quickly. I have the distinct feeling that before fabric selection, comes closet straightening.

This is going to take some time! Hang in there. More to come.

"Now where did I put that ankle rope?
Hang on Tessie! I'm coming!"

See you tomorrow!

All in a Day's Work....

2011-12-02T14:14:00.006-07:00

The first order of the day was to go out and photograph Hudson Hawk. Then tell him that he couldn't have breakfast here. The back yard was closed, due to rain...

He never pays much attention to me. I was about 10 feet away from him when I took this. The poor bird was dripping and miserable, but I still wouldn't let him play with the other birds in the yard.

After I kicked Hudson out, I came back in the house and continued knitting....It is getting down to my pre-Christmas
knitting madness...

Of course, Tessie has to get into the act. This is one of the new yarns I bought yesterday. I had to see what it was going to look like when knitted. I am always surprised when the yarn does something unexpected. With this, it is going to spiral down and around the wearer's foot. I can't decide if I like it or not. Just have to knit and see.

There is another edge of knitting at the bottom of the photo. That will be a hat that April requested. I am not going to let her see it until its finished. So you don't get to see it either.

Tessie wandered in and out, whining and whinging because they weren't for her. She finally jumped into the tatting box. She dug around until she found puce. Remember the phase that she went through a couple of years ago. She was puce crazy for a while. She insisted that the thread was small enough to make her an afghan. I kept saying, "No". She kept stomping her feet and poking one of the tiny metal knitting needles at me. It was starting to scare me, so I gave in...Better to try it and prove her wrong than to be poked to pieces.

I was right, but she likes it. She says it's bulky weight and it will be warm.

I am using the pattern to the left. It is called "herringbone. I have 1/2 of one repeat done.

I chugged along on it for about three hours, off and on. This is what I have to show for it.

Then, just now, I made a mistake. This is not going to be fun to fix. That's why I am here writing instead of still knitting. I am afraid that I am going to have to throw in the towel and start over. It is nearly impossible to rip this pattern back to the proceeding row.

I am about to go break the news to Tessie now. Somebody give me a push. Maybe a little moral support?

I wonder if she would like that piece finished off and made into a scarf? That's what I get for stopping to eat lunch.

See you tomorrow.

Niddy Noddy vs. Swift....

2011-12-01T13:27:00.004-07:00

A swift can be a niddy noddy, but a niddy noddy can't be a swift....I know that you are saying, "Who cares?".

Since I am going to be using my swift/niddy noddy for the next couple of hours, I am very happy that it is a swift and not only a niddy noddy.

I treated myself to a trip to Pearl's yarn shop this morning for a few last minute skeins of sock yarn....Yup. Maybe for Christmas socks....At least that's the excuse that I used. They could also be for me if I don't finish them by Christmas.

I am usually madly knitting the night before Christmas, so who knows?

Of course, Tessie set out to claim all three skeins for herself. I keep trying to tell her that they are too thick to make things for her. She never wants to hear that.

OK. Back to the swift/niddy noddy controversy. The photo at the left is a swift. It holds your skein of yarn and spins it whilst you wind the yarn into a ball. But! It can also be a niddy noddy that holds the yarn and measures it at the same time. The arms accordion in and out and the wooden spindle in the center holds it to one position. You can set it so that it measures a certain distance around and thus count the length of the thread.

The niddy noddy is a long rod with two opposing cross bars on each end. Usually one turn around the ends of the bars measures one or two yards. It doesn't spin and you have to hold it. Awkward. So now you can go and tell all of your friends the difference and bore them to death.

Anyway, Since I already knew from the label that each of the skeins measures over 400 yards long, I also know that I am going to be spinning the swift until I am dizzy.

Tessie thinks it's the greatest tool that I have. She loves to ride on one of the bars. Did I mention the getting dizzy part? Maybe in her case I should say getting dizzier....

I have two swifts. This one sits in a weighted stand directly on the table top. The other one clamps to the edge of the table. I use them both, depending on my mood. I looked on the net this morning. These are now going for about $75.00! No! I didn't pay the price. Here in Tucson, workers at thrift stores have no idea what these strange looking things are or what they do. I got each of them for under five dollars. Both times, the checkout girl gave me an odd look and asked what the thing was and why did I want it.

The same thing happened with the ball winder....I got it for two bucks and as I walked around the store with it, several customers asked what it was. I don't think that they make this type anymore. The ones that they have on the net are mostly plastic with metal parts here and there. They are about $40.00.

I have to pull Tessie off of this one. She keeps trying to jump rope with it as I wind.

I have the ball of Navajo Dawn wound....That means that I only have about 800 yards left to wind. Wish me luck.

I will either have it wound about 3:00 PM or I will be wrapped in thread like a mummy from the backlash of the swift.....

See you tomorrow.

Painting On Silk.....

2011-11-30T08:58:00.008-07:00

Kathi asked to see a close up of the flower paintings from yesterday. I decided to go all out and show you more.

Here you go, Kathi! The little ovals of silk were wrapped around and glued to illustration board ovals. The frames are some of the metal miniatures that you can get and paint yourself.

To do the paintings, I used tube acrylics and thinned them down like watercolors. I started with a light pencil sketch. Then I did the paintings lightest colors first and finishing with darker colors and in this case, I did a few details with Pigma brand Micron Pen .005. They are archival and don't run or fade over time. Very fine.

This next one is the very first one that I did. It is a copy of a Japanese painting. This one is all painting. no pens.

I did notice that it is "foxing" up in the right corner. That's OK. It just makes it look old. If you enlarge this one, you can see the weave in the silk.

The last one is the desert dweller in the Southwestern Room Box. She is done with a little more oil painting technique than the other ones. That is, there is thicker paint on this one and less watering down of the paint in some areas. Some layering of the paint in other areas.

Here's a closer look at the top half of the painting. Her face and cowl are completely covered with paint, as is some of the mountain. The mountain is a kind of stylized version of my favorite Arizona mountain. It is Picacho Peak. It is between Tucson and Phoenix. Picacho means peak in Spanish...So it is a bit redundant....Peak Peak....I always wondered who named it.

I am still working on the real house. For some reason, I get in the mood to clean out cupboards and closets this time of year...Maybe it's because I think that I am going to get a lot of new stuff to fill them when Christmas comes.....If I'm good...No comments please...I really do try...Honest....

Back to work.

See you tomorrow.

Still Slogging Upstream......

2011-11-29T13:56:00.004-07:00

The never ending laundry is chugging away and I am off on another tangent whilst it chugs.

Last night, Walter and I heard a clunking noise and we both thought that one of the cats had gotten into mischief.

Actually, it was Tessie's Townhouse getting into mischief. I have been trying for ages to get up enough courage to break apart the two pieces of the bay wall that were supposed to be a door on the front of the townhouse.

I put it on and immediately took it back off. I absolutely hated the hinges on the corner of the house. I decided that it wasn't going to open.

In order to make it fit right without the hinges, I needed to have it back in two pieces. The townhouse fixed itself. I went to investigate the noise and lo and behold, the piece that I had taped in place had fallen to the floor and the two pieces were no longer together. Maybe the townhouse is trying to tell me something....

Anyway, back to the stream of consciousness. It seems that it even applies to miniature rooms. I was putting things back where they belonged this morning and when I put a few books back in this corner box, I decided to dust it and re stick some of the pieces. I noticed an example of one of my other upholstered back wicker chairs. That lead to Tessie wanting photos taken.

This box was made in the nineties. I know because the shelving unit on the right was done at an Arizona State Day in Phoenix one year and I made the corner box for the shelving unit.

I am going to have to work up a similar piece for the blog sometime. It is easy, but it looks fancy.

The drawers don't open and the legs are just Houseworks.

The reason that I took the photo though, was because of the chair. This is one that I made at the time. It also has an upholstered back. On this one, the pad is only partial.

The two paintings above it are some that I painted on silk. I was on a kick at the time of doing that technique.

I came up with it when I did the Southwestern Room Box. The portrait over the fireplace is done on silk. That was the first one that I did. It was one of those "I wonder what would happen if I did this?" kind of ideas. And it worked. I wrapped and glued the silk to a piece of illustration board. Then I went to work with watercolors. and Prismacolor fine point, water proof pens.

Anyway, the stream of consciousness is still going strong and I just heard the dryer quit. Time to jump back in.

See you tomorrow.

What To Do With An Ugly Chair......

2011-11-28T12:24:00.003-07:00

The white chair is as done as it is ever going to be. After I finished weaving and trimming it, I positively hated it. There were not enough ribs in the center section of the back and it looked sparse. Now I know why, on the real chairs, they put double reeds where there is going to be this much open work.

It looks like a drunken spider did the work on the back. Oh well. I guess that they can't all be perfect. You get to learn from my experiments.

I decided to turn it into one of my chairs with a padded back. If you can't live with it, cover it. That's my motto for the day.

Not wanting to waste materials on this thing, I went and got a piece of the foamcore that I bought at the dollar store.

It is more like 1/8' than a quarter, so I used two thicknesses of the stuff. Then I put some of the low loft batting on top. I wrapped the whole thing with some cotton calico fabric and glued it on the bottom.

Then, to cover the ugly, I cut a piece of card stock the size and shape of the center panel. I covered this with a piece of low loft batting and then with matching fabric.

I haven't decided if I want any other trim on it or not. I am leaning towards leaving it as is and putting a fancy pillow on it. We shall see.

Meanwhile, I am doing "stream of consciousness" house cleaning now. That's where you pick something up in one room and put it away in another. While doing that, you see something that needs to be done in that room... Example... Carry tweezers to bathroom....pick up two rugs that need to be washed and put them in the washer. Notice that the laundry closet could use a good straightening...Find the missing Windex bottle in the process. Then take it to the back door and clean the window.... Through the window, I see that the bird feeders in the back yard need to be filled...Fill the feeders and then stop to re pot a couple of plants on the back porch. Talk to the woodpecker that hangs out in the backyard. Then realize that the rugs that I put in the washer earlier should be ready for the dryer. Put them in the dryer and go to the kitchen for a load of towels.

I decided that the furniture in the living room could use some lemon oil. Went to the hall closet. It needed a good straightening. While doing that I found some wrapping paper and wrapped the first Christmas present of the year.

I could go on and on, but then I wouldn't have time to do the rest of the stream.... I found the computer in the middle of the stream and checked to see what was going on in Bloglandia. The towels are still waiting in the washer....I guess it's time to go back to wading through the messy house.

See you tomorrow.

I Am Now Officially a Basket Case....

2011-11-27T07:25:00.005-07:00

No progress on fixing the links from one page to another. I did find that, if you start at the beginning or the end and keep pushing older posts or newer posts at the bottom of each page you can navigate that way. But if you go to a month in the archives, it still only leaves you the choice of "home". So....You will still have to follow the instructions in yesterday's blog. Bah Humbug!!!

On to more important things...Iris http://itsalwayssunnyinminiland.blogspot.com/ asked about two specific basket styles that I haven't shown before. The first one was the ecru basket to the left of this photo. Both of these baskets were woven at about the same time....Very early in my wicker career. It started out as a sewing basket on legs, but somewhere along the line, I broke the legs off. So it is now just a sewing basket. I noticed that I am going to have to replace the tassle. It started out as bright red to match the silk interior of the basket. The other one is some of my first hand dyed thread. I used Dark Green Rit dye on that.

Anyway, they are just wicker baskets done on Woodsies bases.

If you want to dye thread for weaving, here's the process. First, in order to insure an even dye job, you have to unwind the whole ball of thread and put it into a loose hank. You have to tie it loosely in about four spots to keep it from tangling. Follow the instructions on the package and leave it in the dye pot until it is a shade darker than you want the finished thread. It will dry lighter.

Then you have to reverse the process and wind the thread back into a ball of some kind, so that it doesn't tangle while you are working. I am thankful for the niddy noddy and the ball winder that I found in the thrift shops every time I do this. The niddy noddy makes for unwinding the thread and putting it into a skein very easy. The ball winder puts it back where it started much faster. Those two tools make it much easier than doing either process by hand.

I threw this one in for good measure. A friend of mine made the egg basket years ago by using hardware cloth (wire screening). She simply cut an x shape and folded up the sides. Then she put a wire handle on top. By the way, the eggs are small white beans.

Iris was particularly interested in this one. It is a bent wood Shaker style basket. I cam up with making these out of the infamous Japanese calendar wood. I haven't put it on the blog before because I don't particularly like making them. When I first started doing them, back in the 80s, everything country was in style and they sold like hotcakes. The only trouble is, they are messy and smelly to make. I soaked the sticks in ammonia for a day or two so that they would be flexible. Then I would bend them, glue them together, and let them dry another couple of days. I lined each one and put angel lace between the lining and the outside of the basket. Then I hand painted the outside of each basket to match the lining....Lots of work for the price that I got at the time. This is the only one that I have left.

Tessie finds it handy to carry around bits and bobs of sewing stuff. I do think that I will easily resist the urge to make more though.

I am off to knit more socks now.

See you tomorrow.

Do You Want to Play a Game....?

2011-11-26T08:06:00.006-07:00

It's called "See if you can get to Tessie's first appearance on the blog in less than 15 minutes." I will even tell you when it was.

Tessie first showed up here on January 10, 2009. Next January, she will have been here three years.

She is however, much older than that. She was born in London England in 1593. But that's another very,very long story.

A few days ago, there was a comment on the blog, saying that the reader couldn't get to that day.

I thought that was strange and started investigating. It seems that most all of the archive pages in the side bar lead to only part of any given month.

As you know, the newest entry is always at the top of the page. I went to January, 09 and scrolled down....It went as far as the 19th and then there was the bottom, where the "newer posts", "home" and "older posts" buttons are supposed to be. Those navigate to the next section.....However....There is a problem. Right now, the only button there is "Home". That takes you right back to this page. GRRRRRR.....Frustration abounds!

I went and checked. The posts are still there. I got through to them through my "edit posts" page.

At that time, I thought that it was only the one section that was being strange. Then last night, I caught Tessie bouncing around on the keys and she discovered that all of the pages were like that, with the exception of this one.

We played with it for a while. We first went to the January 2009 page. We went to the last entry and selected it by poking the title. That brought up January 18, 2009... One problem. In order to get back to January 10th, we had to go to the bottom of each one and poke, "older post"(singular). On each entry between.

After investigating a bit more, in the same manner, we managed to get to January of 2010. By that time Tessie was opening the Tea Shop and Zar was there helping.

I wrote a question on the Blogger forum about how to fix this. Evidently nobody else is having the same problem. No one has answered on there.

This morning I put a question on the "help" page. I am, so far, not hearing anything about it being fixed.

This year in January, Tessie was turning her cottage into a millinery shop. She had high hopes of moving into the townhouse....It's not ready yet....

If you need to get to any old entries on the blog, these the only ways that I know how to do it.

You can do it by "label" or you can take the long way around as I described above.....

You can always start at the very beginning and, one at a time, work forward.....Very few people are that patient.

Hopefully, I will get it straightened out soon. Wish me luck.

See you tomorrow.

Long Live Rock and Roll!!!

2011-11-25T15:16:00.003-07:00

At the present, Tucson Museum of Art is featuring a show called "Who Shot Rock and Roll?". Since Walter had the day off, we went down to see what it was about. It consists of photos, candid and posed of rock and roll from 1955 to the present. Very interesting. Some I would love to have hanging in my house. Some others, not so much.

While Walter was intent on seeing the photos, I wandered off a couple of times into other galleries because something caught my eye elsewhere. Leave it to me to see this out of the corner of my eye and run for it.

It is a Chinese Ancestral Shrine, about the size of a Barbie house. It was beautifully carved and real tiles on the roof. Unfortunately, all we had to take the photo was Walter's cell phone.

Wouldn't this make a wonderful backdrop for Chinese miniatures?

When we got home, Tessie was ready to make me feel guilty for taking a couple of days off from miniatures. I walked in and there she was, sitting in a half finished wicker chair on the thread that it would take to finish it.

I ignored her and went to eat leftover turkey lunch. Then there was no excuse.

I booted her out of the chair.
Here you can see how far along I was in the weaving. Not very....

I had the front edge woven and turned down. I had done some experimental open work and even wrapped the legs and finished the bottom edge.

Here, I am starting the first row of the top. I always do two rows of overhand loop stitches to start, just like a lot of the real chairs have. It looks much better than when you just start weaving.

I though you might like to see the positioning of my hands. I support the wires with my index finger and hold the chair with the rest. That way there are less bent wires to contend with.

In the last photo, you can see what progress I have made so far this afternoon. I don't think that I am going to be doing many more of these. Personally, I prefer working with either natural or darker colors. The white can't be worked with bee's wax. It discolors the thread after a while. And believe it or not, I find the open work more fiddly to work with. You have to hold the crosses in place whilst wrapping them. You have to hide threads in places and you keep having to tangle and untangle wires when you cross them. It's easy enough, just not really much fun.

I think that Tessie should let me off easy. After all, it's a holiday weekend and I want to do something fun. Hmmm.... Pumpkin pie with whipped cream sounds like much more fun than weaving a chair...Maybe if I offer Tessie a piece too, she will consider a pardon for good behavior.

See you tomorrow.

Someone Call the Turkey Police!!!

2011-11-24T08:31:00.007-07:00

When you don't have time to cook a turkey for Thanksgiving, what do you do?

I don't know about you, but Tessie and Zar solved the problem by thievery. The took the food from the Christmas Kitchen Island. Tessie is zapping it all to make it replenish able for Christmas, so I guess that there is no need for the Turkey Police after all!

Happy Thanksgiving! See you tomorrow.

1-2-3 Stitch....

2011-11-23T12:23:00.003-07:00

What with all of the pre cooking I am doing for tomorrow, I only got six of the baskets stitched.

Anybody can do this. All of the stitching was done with either two or three strands of floss.

The piece of canvas that Tessie is holding shows the basic stitches. The simplest is the running stitch on the bottom. The first half (left side) is simply done by weaving the thread over and under the vertical rows. The second half was done by doing it twice. The second pass was done to fill in the in between stitches.

The second row is a diagonal stitch. Basically, this is the first half of a cross stitch. The second section shows the crosses that happen if you just go back the way that you came.

The third (top) row is diagonal stitches on every other X of the canvas. If you do this both ways, you wind up with a rickrack pattern or a simple line of hills and valleys.

The top row and the two end baskets on the second row are the ones that I did this morning. They definitely take up a lot less space than they did as components in the plastic bags.

I still have eight to go.

I thought that you would like to look at some of the finished ones in the basket shop.

If you enlarge the photo, you will be able to study the patterns. The only other stitch that I used is a back stitch for the edges of the two oval baskets on the bottom shelf. The white part is back stitch. Two threads forward and one thread back in front.

Now you know how easy it is. you can either do the stitching before you glue the canvas to the basket. I do it both ways...It just depends on the mood I am in when I start. There is another tutorial on these baskets elsewhere on the blog, under the heading "baskets". I think that it is about the first one, so you may have to go back a ways to get to it.

You can also use any stiff even weave fabric to do this. The bases are Woodsies. Have fun.

See you tomorrow.

Baker's Dozen Plus One....

2011-11-22T12:25:00.005-07:00

I am still whittling away at the drawers in the workroom. This morning I ran across some old kits that I had for classes and sales a while ago, for Penelope canvas baskets. To be specific, fourteen of them.

Tessie, in all of her wisdom, suggested that I finish them. According to her, "You might as well have useful finished baskets, as a bunch of plastic bags full of junk!"

Actually, that made sense. Someone please tell me that I am not starting to think like Tessie!

I sorted through them and realized that there were really only two types. Not wanting them all the same, I cut down the side canvas of some of them. I then trimmed them and glued the bottom edge of the canvas to the base. I had cut them to size, with just one group of threads overlapping at the starting point.

I took this photo of Tessie when I was half way done putting them together....OK....So I took a few minutes out to look at the new beading magazine that I purchased along with the groceries this morning. Hey! I have to take a break once in a while.

When I got to the back cover, I had to put it in the photo. See that tree? It's all made out of copper wire and beads! I am now wondering about a beaded garden in miniature.... Very pretty tree....

Anyway, back to work. I have completed the assembly of fourteen baskets. Now I can start the fun part. They will all get a woven design with two strands of embroidery floss.

Tessie is pretty good at that part too. We will be stitching this afternoon.

I have to go dig up the boxes of floss.

See you tomorrow with finished baskets and instructions on the stitches I use.

Above and Beyond....

2011-11-21T14:47:00.006-07:00

I'm talking about six loads of wash....And getting on a stepladder to take photos of what's behind the stuff that you saw yesterday.

Actually, the first photo is of the "attic" plant shelf in the bedroom. There's a hatbox that was, at one time, a finished hat shop inside. It needs renovating.

Next to it is an intriguing box that my father in law found somewhere. It has two separate lids, split down the middle. In front of that is an old jewel box. All three have possibilities.

Now for some of the stuff behind the front layer of the plant shelf in the workroom. It is so nice to have a place to put a step ladder so that I can get up there to see it all. I am keeping the floor all uncluttered!

Tessie had to get into the act. Behind her is the Sundance Saloon movie set. That is April's. She asked me for it soon after I made it, but she doesn't have room for it right now. Unfortunately, it is going to have to be completely re done. The window that you see that is broken is on purpose. One of the actors just slugged a guy for cheating at cards and he went right through the window.

Tessie is standing on one of the unused boxes and behind her is another pile of boxes that will be used in the future....I am getting tired just counting them...Maybe some of the tired is from doing laundry and cleaning house. I started cleaning kitchen cupboards. It is Monday again....I vote that we eliminate Mondays. All in favor, say "I".

Meanwhile, Tessie is still harassing me about the unfinished aprons. That's all I got done in mini today....I finished the one that she has on. One down. Three to go....

Tuesday will be better. No laundry. Just three more aprons. I am eyeing the 1/4" castle. I went on line searching for Tudor scullery photos. I found some wonderful ones of Hampton Court kitchens and sculleries by putting in "Tudor scullery" and pushing images.

If any of you are interested in this period, these photo collections are outstanding. http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarge_schultz/1672279511/ and http://travel.webshots.com/photo/1052249601031312462OoTffd Very interesting detail photos in the second group.

I am off to finish the laundry now.

See you tomorrow.

Not Really Procrastinating....Honest.....

2011-11-20T13:15:00.006-07:00

It is called more like "Doing forty things at once." It's almost the end of the year and I am taking stock....See these five photos, all done up in a neat little frame?

Since one of my first jobs carried the title "Inventory Clerk", I have a bad habit of counting things that shouldn't need counting. For example, this morning I looked around the workroom and in just these five areas, I counted 33 various kinds of either unfinished or never been started room boxes, vignettes, houses, birdcages, and other unusual containers for mini scenes....We are not talking about the ones that aren't showing.

This is serious enough to make me want to tiptoe out the door and lock it until after Christmas! I won't. But I do reserve the right to tiptoe out once in a while and work on something else.

For example, knitting. Every year I knit socks for April and Seth and if I have time, I do it for other family members too.

I am making headway on the pile that I showed you the other day. I finished the first pair and am up to turning the heel on the second sock of the next pair....However......The other day April requested a stocking cap. So....I went and got a skein of yarn and started that this morning. That won't take long. While I was looking for needles, I also found a diagonal patterned scarf that I started earlier in the year. Make that two....One of them is not in the photo.

I somehow think that there is a pattern here. The six year old's attention span is alive and well...Tessie is not being of much help. Now she wants socks too. She insists that she is part of the family and NEEDS socks.

The six year old is going to be very busy, jumping from one project to the next. If I finish the hat today and a sock tomorrow, will I do all of those minis? Don't worry. I will squeeze them into the lineup somehow.

See you tomorrow.

Gone, But Not Forgotten....

2011-11-19T10:15:00.004-07:00

I couldn't bear another shingle or brick. Sorry Claudia, I am not going to be a bad influence anymore. If you start your Fairfield, it will be of your own volition....Maybe if you do start, I will got back to mine, but for now, it is back in the workroom.

I did leave it down on my grandma's stool, where it is to be seen every time I walk in the door. Of course, I can always turn my head as I walk. It is so nice to have a clean floor now. I won't even trip when I turn my head...

It didn't take me but a minute to carry it into the workroom. Very lightweight and portable. That's one nice thing about 1/2" scale.

But then, so is the Milliner's cottage...By the time I had walked back into the bedroom, Tessie had whisked that one into the space on top of the jewelry/needlework chest.

As I strolled through the house, looking for a replacement, I noted that the milliner's cottage was missing....Of course it was.

When I arrived, Tessie was in the sewing room with a pile of fabric. As I neared, I started getting very nervous. I realized that was all of the unfinished aprons that I had hidden there a few months ago. She didn't know about them and I had forgotten putting them there.

Guess what I am going to be making for her now? She counted four aprons in various levels of completion. Luckily, two of them only need fasteners on the waist.

Meanwhile, she and Zar have settled into the main floor. She zapped the kitchen table and chairs from the townhouse over there to sit on.

She has figured out that this is an advantageous point for directing my work... She announced, "You will now address me as Madame Project Director!" Yeah....Right....

I figure that, what with the large pitcher of bug beer and all of that food, both of them and Spike too, will be ready for a long nap in no time.

Then I can go to work on something that I want to do.....Not aprons....Not today....

See you tomorrow.

Another Way to Get Around It....

2011-11-18T10:33:00.005-07:00

This morning I realized that it is just a bit over a month until Christmas is here....Again....As I am still not in the mood for the half inch house, I needed another excuse....

I wouldn't want to be a bad influence on Claudia by encouraging her to start another house before she finishes her first house, so maybe I should put it away for a while....

Last year, about this time, I started thinking about doing a Christmas living room with Santa inside. Somehow, that just didn't thrill me. It has been done so many times.

I got out the box of Christmas Minis, and as I passed through the house, I spotted the gazebo that I did a few years ago. It is now pretty boring and stale.

As Tessie dug through the box, I remembered that, when I was little, it was a tradition to go somewhere to sit on Santa's lap and tell him our Christmas wishes. There are still stories of the first time my parents dragged me into Sears to sit on Santa's lap and I screamed bloody murder because they wanted me to sit on the lap of that strange, scary guy with the white beard. I never did live that down. I still got presents, so I soon figured out that Santa was a myth.

I think that Tessie has had that figured out for a long time. She still sat on his lap in the Christmas box and asked for a long list of gifts. He finally pushed her off of his lap and stood up so that she couldn't ask for more.

I seem to remember that one year the "real" Santa was set up in a gazebo of sorts and it was more fun than just Santa sitting in a big chair in front of a fake backdrop. Sooooo.....I put two and two together.

With the help of Tessie, Zar and Santa, we whipped it into shape in no time.

Here's the old version.

Basically, I painted over the lavender flowers that were on the trim. I changed out the wicker for an easy chair and footstool for Santa. Oh, and a rug in Christmas colors was installed.
This is the new version.

I used the sparkly chenille stems for wrapping the posts. I installed a few bottle brush trees. After all, this is Arizona and we don't do real pines as much as other parts of the country. You are just lucky that Tessie didn't plant prickly pears and saguaros around the outside.

See the slight sprinkling of snow on the ground? I raided the pantry and used some Kosher Salt. After Christmas, I will just dust it off. Critters and bugs don't like salt, so I am not worried. Not that I have critters and bugs. Just a statement of fact that it won't attract them....

Santa is now ready and open for lap-sitting. Of course we all know which person is going to be first in line. I am not sure how she managed it, but she already has a package in hand.

I will probably go back and do something with the bases on the bottle brush trees in the front. More railroad greenery, coming right up.

See you tomorrow.

I'm Revolting....

2011-11-17T13:27:00.003-07:00

This morning, I couldn't take another shingle or brick. I have been house bound for the last three days. So I revolted! I went to the antique mall. All I got was two old handkerchiefs and those weren't even exciting enough to take photos.

So, when I returned, I went in a completely different direction. I decided that I needed to take an inventory of the Christmas sock situation. All year long, I knit. One sock here. A half a sock there....

I cleaned out the knitting basket, where I store all of the half done socks.I found these five pair in various states of unfinished-ness...I know that's not a word, but it describes what I found. I am not saying which socks go to whom. That way it will still be a surprise. Kind of.

Then what happens? Tessie has to be a blabber mouth and show you what is still in the sock basket. Rats! Foiled again!

Just for that, I decided to change courses again and clean out the tatting box...

Darn! There, I found all of these pieces in various states of undone-ness...I am, after all, just practicing. I am getting better at needle tatting. I am now to the bead adding stage!

Having not tatted for years, I am remembering it quickly. In fact, my bead knitting box has now changed into a bead tatting box/bead knitting box. Notice that the bead tatting box comes first in the title...

My only problem is, Tessie keeps following me around and telling on me. This time she sat in the box of thread and kindly pointed out, "There sure is a lot of thread left in here. I could use a couple of doilies and maybe a bedspread or two...". Somehow it always come around to the task of making something for her.

Don't tell her that I bought the hankies for her. I am not happy with the stiffness of the dress that I just made her.

But since I have vowed not to do any minis today, I can't tell her that or I would be breaking my vow.

I am going back now and finish at least one pair of socks. That's my goal for today. The second pair from the left only need a toe knitted. I can at least do that much before Tessie finds the hankies. Wish me luck!

See you tomorrow.

A New Technique? Maybe....

2011-11-16T10:10:00.005-07:00

This morning I started bricking the chimney with egg cartons....As I worked, I kept trying to think of an easier way to do all of the brick and stone work that I do with egg cartons....Light bulb over the head moment....

I stopped cutting tiny bricks and started playing. Mad scientist experiments are much more fun than bricking.

I have done bricks and tiles with illustration board, just cutting groves for grout into the board with an Exacto knife. I wondered if I could do the same thing with egg cartons?

First, I tried just doing half inch brick in the egg carton, rough side, with a tiny stylus. It kind of worked, but not as well as I wanted. I don't think that 1/2" scale will be possible because the egg cartons aren't as hard pressed as illustration board.

Next, I tried 1" scale stone work. First I painted a mottled, all over pattern with my Hippo Gray and Trail Tan. I left some egg carton showing through.

Then I took a NEW BLADE in and Exacto and started cutting a V shape into the carton for grout lines between the stone. Not bad at all for a first try. If I do it again, I will probably draw the lines on the painted carton first. I think that I am happiest with this application.

To take the experiment a bit further, I decided to carry on to bricks in one inch scale.

The first one is the lighter red. I just painted the egg carton with shades of brick and then carved the mortar lines in. Unfortunately, if you don't let it dry thoroughly, the lines can be a bit ragged in places. It looks pretty good though.

The third try was the darker brick. I first flooded the piece with hippo gray. Then I painted over that with the dark red. Again, I carved too soon. I was anxious to see how it was going to look. I like the mortar better, but next time I will soak it better. The gray didn't penetrate the carton as deeply as I would have liked it to go.

I am going to try again and wait impatiently for 24 hours before carving. As with the stone, I will mark the lines before cutting for the next try.

You MUST use a fresh blade in your knife for this technique to work. The egg cartons chew up blades quickly. I probably should have changed blades between the second and third example.

When I do the bricks with illustration board, I go through a LOT of blades. The tile floor in my Southwestern Roombox is done with this method and I think that I used 3 or 4 blades just on that floor.

I need to go back to work now...More experimenting....

See you tomorrow.

"Halloween Is Over!!!"

2011-11-15T09:25:00.006-07:00

That was Tessie's pronouncement yesterday afternoon....She followed it with, "I am sick of trying to bend over with a bat stuck to my stomach.

I'll bet that you thought that I wasn't going to work on the house....

I only stopped long enough to shut Tessie up. She insisted upon going back to her dress/apron combination. I didn't fight her much, because I knew that I wouldn't win.

She is now happily back in her normal white dress with apron.

She announced, "Now I can get some serious work done!"

I looked around to see who had cast the "work spell" over her. Hmmmmm...Nobody....But she was in a good mood, so I wasn't going to question her too closely.

This morning, I made the final decision about the roof. It is definitely going to be slate.

The first step was to cover the stain with Hippo Gray and some smudges here and there as I went along, of Trail Tan. That knocks down some of the bluish tint and makes it more compatible with the walls.

Here you see it with just the paint.

Then I started shading.

With Tessie holding the extra pencil, that went pretty fast. I used the silver Prismacolor to shade along the top front edge of each row of shingles. I laid the pencil on its side and ran it along the edge.

Then I used the Burnt Umber to run under the edge at the top of each row. That makes the shingles have more dimension.

I took both pencils, still on their sides, and ran them down the length of the roof lightly, here and there.

When I finish the whole roof to this point, I will then go back with a couple of other metallic colors of the pencils. This will bring the whole roof out into the sunlight.

I am still administering shingles to the side that you can't see. One...At...A...Time. Someone said that I should use a paper template. I don't like that method. For me, the paper in between the shingles and the roof adds thickness that I don't want. It also changes the character of the roof. If you do it directly on the roof, you can see how it is going to look as you go. I just prefer the long way around. So it isn't as fast, but I think that it looks better when I finish.

One other thing to report...I have EVERYTHING up off of the floor in my workroom. Most is in the proper drawer or receptacle. Notice, I didn't say that I had finished cleaning out each and every drawer yet...I do however, have several empty drawers and a couple of shelves that don't have anything on them....I count that as progress. I may just have to have a workroom warming when I get done....No. On second thought, Tessie and friends aren't partying in my workroom! I would have to start again from scratch! No way!

See you tomorrow.

One Down....Four to Go.....

2011-11-14T11:21:00.002-07:00

I am still working on the half inch house, but at Tessie's insistence, I am also finishing off the 1" scale wicker pieces that I found in the drawer.

I am nothing, if not sneaky. I picked the plant stand. It was the closest to done.

All I had to do was finish wrapping the legs, trim all of the wires, braid and then put the braid around in three places.

That doesn't sound like a lot. But then the braiding takes longer that you think.

I speed it up quite a bit by using a clipboard.

It also helps when Tessie keeps reeling in the finished braid. The clipboard is like a third hand.

Ta da! One down! Well really it's not down yet. This just means that I will, at some point, have to pull out all of the flower making materials. I like this type of planter with nice bright geraniums.

Tessie already has a spot for it. I am afraid that all of the unfinished pieces are going to show up in the townhouse or go in Tessie's stash...

I stained the roof on one side darker this morning. It still needs a lot of highlighting and other shading if I go with this color. I am almost tempted to turn it into slate...

I have to think on it for a while...

See you tomorrow.

Rainy Sunday in Tucson?

2011-11-13T10:18:00.005-07:00

Yes. It actually does rain here on occasion. It is gray and drizzly this morning. After yesterday's search for wicker pieces, I decided that this would be a good day to stay warm and cozy and clean out the two wicker drawers. You wouldn't believe what I found in them that was supposed NOT to be in them. Let's not talk about it. I will just say that the two drawers are now one drawer....Get the idea?

Tessie helped....The only problem with that was, she kept finding unfinished one inch scale pieces that she wants me to finish.

Then, bless her, she picked up one of the half inch forms for a chase and discovered that there were already holes drilled in it. Her eyes are much closer to the subject than mine.

Bless her again, because she also found the bundle of #32 gage wire. I told you yesterday that I thought I was using #26....Nope. That wouldn't fit in the holes. It's been a while since I did half inch and I forgot...

The wire in question is finer than a regular straight pin.

Anyway, here's the "after" photo. I discovered that I had a LOT of un-dyed thread that could go towards making browns and greens. I think that I am going to have to unwind and dye some of it one of these days. Maybe on another drizzly day like this one. It takes most of a day to do it. It's just a good thing that I have a niddy noddy for putting the thread in lose skeins for dying. And I have a thread winder that will put it back where it belongs after it is dry. Now all I need is the urge to do it.

I found lots of bases for different furniture, some drilled and some not. Then I got into unfinished pieces.

If Tessie wants all of these, I am in trouble. The dark green one on the left is finished....The plant stand at the back just needs braided trim and cutting the wires.

The camel colored table laying to the left needs trim, cross braces on the legs and wire cutting.

The white chair is the one she was messing with the most...She likes the chair, but not the color. The other two pieces are hardly started. I think that I have my work cut out for me if she has her way....You know what I always tell her...."Don't hold your breath, Tessie!"

Maybe I will weave for a while. It is a nice thing to do on a rainy day.

See you tomorrow.

One Teeny Tiny Little Problem....

2011-11-12T10:33:00.006-07:00

For once, Tessie isn't really the problem.... Well, maybe a little bit. She made me look at the new wicker book. She insisted that the half inch house needed some wicker porch furniture.

Then she went and hunted up some seat bases that I had already drawn and even cut some of them out... A long time ago...

While I am telling the story, I will throw in a few instructions...The seats for my one inch furniture is made from 3/32 cherry or walnut stock. When I go down to smaller sizes I use model airplane plywood. No warping and much sturdier than 1/16" solid wood.

When I get down to half inch scale, the seats are only 1"by 1" square, with two rounded corners. The love seat and the chase bases are 1" by 2". The equivalent of 2' by 2' and 2' by 4' in real life.

When I get down to this scale, the wires become much thinner. I can no longer use cloth covered wire and keep it in scale, so I go down to 26 gage brass or green floral wire.

Therein lies the problem. I cut those bases and never finished the pieces, not because of a loss of interest, but because I no longer had a drill bit small enough for said wire. I broke the two that I had.

It looks like I am going to have to hit some of the train stores in the area and see if they have drill bits that fine and if not, I am going to be forced to try the inter net...In a case like this, I usually like to see what I am getting to make sure that they are the right size. This should be fun...

The second photo shows Tessie with one of her sized chairs. The one in front of that is a half inch scale and the one in her hand is quarter inch. She keeps petting that one and saying, "It's so cute." Then petting it some more. She is going to wear it out.

I took these two pieces out of a gift bag setting to try them on the porch. The size will be perfect, if I can only find a drill bit.

I know that there is one out there somewhere...

I use #20 thread for the one inch wicker. #40 or 50 is my thread of choice for these half inchers.

If you are crazy enough to try the quarter inch size, those are 1/2" square on the seat and I use sewing thread to weave them.

Now that you know my problem, I am going to go and pout until Monday, when I may get a chance to go find a drill bit....Such a smalllllll problem.....

Meanwhile, I am still shingling away and bricking comes next.

See you tomorrow.

I Found It!!!

2011-11-11T12:47:00.005-07:00

It was meant to be... April and I went out to play this morning. We met for coffee and then went on to Bookman's Used Books from there.

Remember me telling you about the first piece of furniture that I did, copying a real piece from a book? It was the balsa bible box from a few days ago.

The book that I copied that from was one of the books that I found this morning.

I must have checked that book out of the Wilmot library a hundred times or more, when I first started doing miniatures. Back then I couldn't afford fancy books, but I could afford a library card.

That was the first one of the two books that I found this morning. "American Painted furniture 1660-1880" is the name.

As soon as I got it home, I started looking for the bible box....I found it!!!

Now you can see what I was working from. It was a black and white photo, but it had the length of the box and a description of the colors used in the notes by the illustration.

What fun to find it again and now I own it. MINE!!!

The second book was called "Wicker Design. It is chocked full of color photos of all kinds of wicker, from very early to a lot of present day designs. I am going to be very busy!

Tessie is already going through both books as fast as she can. She has so many bookmarks shoved between their pages that I doubt that I will be able to close either volume.

She isn't happy with me. I told her that I was still going to work on the half scale house....

I fear that I am going to have to lock her in a closet or figure out some other longer series on Netflix that she can get caught up in. There's always the old stand by...."Buffy the Vampire Slayer". Yup. Five or six seasons of that will keep her busy for a couple of days.

I am going to go turn her onto Spike and Angel. That should do the trick.

See you tomorrow.

Up to My Elbows in Chalk...Really Pastels.

2011-11-10T13:34:00.006-07:00

Still working on the attic. As you can see, in the first photo, I stained the floor. I used Provincial Minwax stain. There are some spots where the stain didn't take as well...I anticipated that. When some of the glue oozed up between the boards, I just wiped it, without attempting to get it all off. I wanted some wear and tear and this is one way to get it so that it looks like some of the stain has worn off or something has been spilled that damaged the stain.

Next, I went for the rafters and the baseboard trim. Somewhere in time, the owners had plans to turn it into a rec room. So they painted over the existing rafters. I used 1/8" b5 1/16" stock to depict these. I used one inch scale baseboards around the bottom edge, because the roof slants to the floor in some places and in others it is cut off and goes straight down. I hid the fact that it did this with the wider boards.

I painted the rafters white before installing them. I didn't feel like either turning myself or the house upside down to paint them after they were installed.

The last step was ageing the walls a bit. The homeowners never got around to putting a Foosball table up there. Instead they started hauling no longer needed furniture and other things to the top of the house...

It is hard to see in the photo, but effective in real life. I used brown and charcoal grey pastels that I shaved into a paper plate. I put them on with a brush, along the top of the baseboards and part of the way up on the slanted ceiling.

I still have to finish shingling. I am down to the tower now. That is fun....Not. It is curved inward. I have to allow for the curve and curve the edges of the shingles on the ends.

I must be going now.

See you tomorrow.

One of Us Is Working....

2011-11-09T10:57:00.004-07:00

Remember the old story about Nero fiddling whilst Rome burned? Today it is Tessie fiddling whilst Casey works.....

I started about six this morning. I was determined to get some of the boring stuff out of the way.

I finished laying the floor in the attic. It still needs to be stained. I wanted it to look like it was the original floor, with all of the gaps and edge buckling that old floors....I think that I succeeded
beyond my wildest dream....It was intentional. I can lay a flat floor when I want to. Honest....

I am currently working on the back side of the roof....Or maybe it is the side side? It all depends on what you consider the back and the side. I think it must be the side side. The front door is on the wall to the left and the kitchen is on the far right...Yup, it's the side side....

Anyway, I think that doing the boring stuff gives me too much time to think about what side is what. There are too many sides, backs and fronts to this house. That's why I keep finding more places that have to be bricked and shingled.

I did try the bricks that I cut. I didn't like them. I am debating on which method I want to try next.....

Now, about Tessie fiddling....I was watching something that she really wasn't interested in, on Netflix. I went out of the room to get a Pepsi.

When I returned and tried to find the control for Netflix, I couldn't find it.....Then I noticed that, strangely, "The Vampire Diaries" was playing.

I put two and two together and this is how it added up...

Tessie was relaxing on the balcony of the townhouse with a pitcher of bug beer and a plate of cold cuts. And yes, she was fiddling with the remote.

I attempted once to get it away from her. She slapped my hand.

She is happily poking the remote to fast forward every time that the vampire guys leave the picture. As soon as she gets them back, she starts it again...I don't think that she is following the story at all....Just following the cute vampy guys, as she calls them.

Hey, if that's what it takes to keep her out of my hair while I am working, I will gladly let her fiddle with the remote.

Now. I am close to finishing the shingles. I have to get back to work.

See you tomorrow.

Half Scale Is Where You Find It....

2011-11-08T10:14:00.005-07:00

If you are a person, three inches tall, looking for furniture, good luck! For some reason, half inch scale is interpreted by different companies in different sizes.

Maybe the best way to determine scale is to carry a man around in your purse....A very small man!

Here's an example...The bath set on the left is one that Fisher-Price produced back in the 80s. The kitchen furniture was passable, as were a few of the other pieces. Then they got crazy and produced a bathroom that is more 3/4" scale. They are smart though. They never said what the scale was. In this case, our man would have to have a stool to stand on.... The other set isn't very detailed, but more accurate to scale.

Where am I going with this? The point is, half scale furniture is where you find it...

The two men in these photos are from a set of "Annie" figures from the movie, whenever that was. They are perfect half scale, as are the other people in the series.

All of the furniture that I am showing you is stuff that I had in the half scale box. Most has to be redone. It is well used and scratched.

The desks and chairs in the second photo are the exact same pieces. This just shows you what you can do with a bit of paint and fabric. I got these at a thrift shop in a grab bag full of furniture. Just lucky, I guess...

Be on the lookout for the fridge magnets that were around a few years ago....Maybe tell your friends that you want them. This cook top was the top of a stove. I still have the stove, but since the top fell off....Bad glue....I am thinking of using it as a drop in cook top on a counter. Or I guess I could glue it back onto the original.

No....I am not going to make the desk into a stove. Speaking of which, you can change the look of the plastic pieces still more. They can be cut apart easily and the style changed.

I could easily cut the bottom two drawers off of this and use the top part for a skirted vanity table. I would just have to do a block of either balsa or ceiling tile for the bottom....Hey! I just might have to try that. I like the way it is cast so that the drawers open.

While I am in the bedroom, I will give you a "what not to do or to do" tip or two. The bed on the left is an example of not....I made the puffy pillow and quilt before I knew that using foam is a no no. After a few years, it tends to start turning to powder and the whole bed is lumpy and spoiled.

The green bed was done with low loft quilt batting and will probably last forever, almost...

By the way, the fancy gold headboard was part of a Christmas ornament. It was a plastic frame to hang on the tree with a photo inside. I cut the top and the sides apart and re glued part of the sides at an angle to fit around the head of the bed. I didn't even have to paint it. Both beds were made on a base of ceiling tile.

True half scale is very easy to make. If you have a pattern for a piece of 1" scale furniture, simply cut ALL of the measurements in half. Just remember to half the size of the wood also. If it calls for 1/8" square stock, go to 1/16".

The black chair is one that I made for Tessie. The smaller one is one that I made for a half inch Christmas house that is no longer with us. In this case, the half inch one came first.

The baby on the chair is a porcelain doll that can either be a doll in a one inch house, of a baby in the half inch world.

The one inch scale needlework stand is one that I made and put a tutorial on the blog. The half inch one is an example of why you need to drag a man along to shop. I bought it at one of the shows. As you can see, next to the chair, it looks a little over sized. You just never know....

Anyway, I am going to spend the rest of the day putting things away in the workroom....Sooner or later I will get all of the stuff out of the laundry basket. I am hoping to find a few more half scale things for the Fairfield. So far, I have another case of coke....At least nobody will go thirsty.

See you tomorrow.

Step Away From the Keyhole Saw!!! Now!!!

2011-11-07T07:39:00.013-07:00

Tessie made some adjustments this morning. I thought nothing of it when I heard a rasping noise coming from the bedroom. It kept going....After about five minutes, I though better of it and went to investigate.

I was too late. You see, Tessie takes after my Aunt Altha. When I was a little girl, my aunt lived in an old Victorian farm house with husband and kids.

One of my earliest memories of her house was when she got the harebrained idea to open a beauty salon in one of the front parlor rooms.

I don't think that there were many rules and regulations about beauty parlors. Yes. That's what they called them back then. I don't believe that she went to a beauty school or had a license. She just opened it and went to "fixing hair" as she called it. I was fascinated by the electric perm machine. It was on a pole and had long cords with rollers attached....It looked something like a machine that Doctor Frankenstein would have used to curl hair. Scary. I do believe that she got it second hand from someone that had updated and gone to chemical perms by then.

Anyway, we had moved to Arizona by then and lived in a small trailer for the first few years. When we went back to Michigan to visit in the summer, we were always greeted by a newer and better version of the old house.

I was always impressed.One year, she had glassed in the front porch and was calling it a sun room....It was surrounded by giant maple trees and I don't ever remember any sunlight in the room. At the same time, she closed off the front entrance so that everybody had to go in the side door, through a kind of storage area to get to the kitchen.

She didn't want anybody messing things up with muddy boots... My uncle was a dairy farmer and there was a lot of muck and mud. It probably was a good move on her part. It saved a lot of wear and tear on the new wall to wall carpeting that she had installed in the living room. It now consisted of the two front parlors together. The wall between had disappeared...
Another year, we pulled into the driveway and up to the side of the house and I noticed that the windows didn't look the same. There was now a picture window in the living room wall and also the dining room. At least they were on the side of the house that had a view...

I made the mistake of telling Tessie about this. I think that is where she got the idea for this morning's modifications...When I got to the bedroom, she had the keyhole saw in hand. I tackled her and took it away just a little too late...

The Fairfield now has three picture windows. The first one is in the living room. Oh and notice that she was at least kind enough to finish the last of the clapboard siding. I can't scold her too much. Now all I have to do is paint it.

The second one is in the dining room. It will be pleasant to look out on the view whilst eating dinner.

Maybe she is right... Wait... Did I just say that???The third is in the kitchen. Now all I have to do is decide if the tenants will want to wash dishes while looking at the view or will they be happier with a built in dinette, so that they can eat breakfast with the view?

Decisions, decisions, decisions......

Aunt Altha would be proud.

See you tomorrow.

A Very Old Mini....

2011-11-06T10:56:00.004-07:00

This morning I decided to use this piece somewhere in the house. The poor thing deserves a new home.

This is the very first miniature furniture that I ever made by copying a real life piece. It is actually a 1" scale Early American "bible box".

It was in a book of antiques and at the time, I didn't know any better than to use balsa wood to build fine furniture....Duh! It has stood up pretty good, but it has a lot of dings and scratches.

The only tools I had was a metal ruler and an Exacto knife...Oh and some sandpaper. I was even silly enough to make it with dove tail corners. Very crude, but I was proud of it. And I carved the ball feet. The top actually opens, but I didn't know how to make hinges of any sort, so I put an interior piece of balsa on the lid to keep it in place. The painting on the front was copied with a fine brush and I think that is the best part. That's why I have kept it for over almost 30 years now.

Strangely, I have never used it as a one inch scale piece. It has lived in several half scale houses as a blanket chest. As a first try, I don't think that it is too bad.

I painted a first coat on all of the brick parts of the Fairfield this morning. I think that it needs a different name. Somehow, Fairfield doesn't fit what I have in mind.

I also did a second coat on the clapboard. I am still trying to decide what I am going to do with the trim, inside and out.

The living room is coming closer and closer to being rehabbed. I just don't like that wallpaper at all. It's too green.....

Tessie has finally come to the realization that there is no way that she is going to be able to use this house. She did try a few different shrinking spells, but she couldn't seem to get them to the right size. I think that it may have something to do with the fact that she has already done a clone of herself in quarter scale....No..I am not going to tell her my theory. I don't really want three of her running around here.

I had to pull her out the front door this morning....She insisted on posing for photos and got stuck. She couldn't go backwards and she kept trying to get herself out without turning sideways. A little axle grease and a lot of tugging did the trick. I don't think that she is going in there again for a while...

I have to get back to it. If I don't, the six year old mind(She is getting bored now...) may take over and start something else. We wouldn't want that now....Would we?

See you tomorrow.

Playing For Time....

2011-11-05T13:12:00.005-07:00

OK....So I am stalling. I don't want to do the brick work yet...Can you see me stomping my feet, sticking my tongue out and growling all at the same time? That's strange...I look just like Tessie when she is being obstinate.

I decided that I need to keep going, even if it isn't bricks. So...I started doing the walls in the kitchen. I told you that I had all of that 1/2" scale bead board. I decided to do it the old fashioned way. I remember that my grandma Daisy's kitchen had bead board like that. Somehow that made the kitchen more cozy than the chair height that we use today.

I got out some Golden Pecan stain and, with Tessie's help, went to work. I cut the pieces and Tessie stained. It was somewhat quicker that way, but a lot messier. There was stain everywhere. Thank goodness for Clorox Wipes!

I glued the pieces into the kitchen. and then did the trim, one piece at a time....That takes a while. I still have some to go, but I am mostly done. So far, it's kind of boring.

I am not sure that I like the floor. I didn't have enough of the border to go all of the way around. I will have to think about that.

I did a little repair work here and there on the outside of the house.

Tessie found a very large golf club and a sword in the swizzle sticks. She is using them to encourage me to keep going. If I stop she takes a swing with one or the other at my head.

This could get dangerous. I think that my next chore will be to hide the box of swizzle sticks. I am tired of the whooshing noise from the club swinging past my left ear. She is getting closer all of the time.

Anyway, I am on a roll. Back to work.

See you tomorrow.

A House of a Different Color...

2011-11-04T11:22:00.005-07:00

Yes, I did say house and not horse... I wasn't happy with a yellow Fairfield. I kept wondering why I painted it that color. I don't even really like yellow. And the dark green trim was just icky.

It is now Trail Tan. One of my favorite Ceramcoat colors. It looks much more like what I need for what I have in mind for the inside.

Nope. I am not going to tell you yet.

While that dried, I started cutting new brick....Do you know how many 3/8" X3/16" bricks it is going to take to cover that chimney that goes through the attic, three fireplaces and the foundation? Neither do I, but I know that I don't have enough yet. This is the same material that I used to make the brick on the outside of the Rusty Needle quilt shop. It is file folders that I found at a garage sale. It makes perfect bricks. The color is kind of vague and the two sides of the cardstock are just slightly different.

That reminds me, I need to paint a cement color on all of those places. And no, I am not doing tatting, that is just where the bricks landed. They were flying all over the place.

Last but not least for today, I had a "light bulb above the head" moment while I was working. Remember all of that wood that I purchased at the mini show for 25 cents a piece?

I went and checked and sure enough, there are two big slabs of 1/2" scale bead board. I knew that there was a reason for spending all of that money....With the two pieces, i will be able to do the kitchen in this house a probably several other rooms besides.

I am now going to go lose my mind cutting tiny bricks and gluing them to the house. I still have just a few inches of clapboard siding to put on. I couldn't wait until I had that done to try the color.

I guess that I should go back to work now. The question of the day is, "How many tiny bricks does it take to drive a person mad?". I will let you know tomorrow.

See you then.