Furniture and bits and bobs

I've bought some furniture with vouchers given to me by work colleagues for my birthday, so a big thank you to Vicky, Francis, Simon, Kate, Joanne and Karen.

You can see below that I bought the shop counter, shop shelving unit and shop deli counter. Also the fireplace and the fire, which lights up once connected.



In this picture, I've added a few bits and pieces that I've either made or bought.



And while I was shopping, I couldn't resist this oven and the table and chairs. The table and chairs need staining, but that is reflected in the price, a bargain at well under £5 for the set.



Finally Mum found this cabinet and side table set - it's lovely and just needs some new laminate 'glass' which I've already got.

Daffodils and herbs

I've painted some wooden pots - 85p a set of 7 (small) and 4 (large)
- with brown acrylic paint. I gave them two watery coatings as a thick coat of paint doesn't seem to work very well on miniatures, and loses some of the realism.

In the larger pot is a little florist foam which is a great base for the little stems.

The 'parsley' is just some lichen from a railway set, which I've also used to make a moss-type surface on the daffodil plant.

Paper roses... well, daffodils

I plan to make some of the flowers for the house from polymer clay and some from paper.

These flowers have been made from a craft-type paper, the tiniest drops of glue, some florist wire, florist green paper and much patience. It is very easy to make the stem too thick, which looks unrealistic for flower stems, so I had a 1/12 doll nearby to check for the scale.

I'll finish the daffodils and make a bunch for the kitchen, but I'm not sure about the pink/violet flower.





Dolls...

A repainted roof

I've now painted the roof the darker grey and I'm very pleased with it, it is a much better look for the house and will suit the brickwork and shop frontage that I've planned.

I'm leaving the flashing, wood bits and sides of dormers the lighter grey for now, but I may change my mind.

Painting the roof

I gave the roof a coat of paint tonight but the colour is just too light.



The colour in the middle is a sample matt colour which is much better. The lighter grey will serve as a good undercoat.

Update: canopy tiling complete!

I continued working on the house tonight and now the canopy is tiled, ready for painting along with the roof. It will need to be glued to the front of the building but I'm going to paint these parts separately to prevent any runs.

Flat roof ready and chimney pots painted

I've now cut and glued sandpaper to the flat part of the roof to give the appearance of a tarred surface, similar to that on the sides of the dormer windows.

Now it is ready for painting into grey, but I will need a darker grey for the 'lead' flashing.

I found tubes of red and brown acrylic paint and mixed a bit until I had a deep terracotta for the chimney pots.

I'm trying to find a suitable paint in our garage for the walls now. I've decided to paint the top half with a white emulsion mixed with sand. The bottom half of the walls will have 'bricks' made from stipple painted sandpaper. I'll need a sandy/grey colour for the base to look like mortar.

Before all of this, I'm going to tile the roof of the shop canopy, so that all the grey paintwork can be carried out in one go.





I've had to insert one of the lights as the wire groove is under the flat roof. I've covered the groove with card, so that the glue from the roof doesn't stop me from pulling the light to and fro to fit it properly once the room is decorated.

Making things...

I bought 'Making miniature food' by Angie Scarr yesterday. It's a step by step guide and includes cheese, cakes, bread, fruit/veg and meat/fish. I'll get started on more food soon. Meanwhile, I made some books by printing out the covers in colour and pasting them to some balsa wood. Much quicker than the all-paper versions so I will be able to fill some bookcases a bit more easily than I thought! I also made a veg punnet out of card, brown paper and some foil. I'll need to distress it a bit when I use it as it looks a bit too squeaky clean. Some pics below include a couple of the steps to make the punnet.

Tiling complete!

The tile part of the roof is ready now for painting. The next task is to cover the flat roof with sandpaper and that too will be painted.