Welcome to my life . . . .

This is a blog about my passion: dollhouses and miniatures. This particular blog was started to follow my miniature dream: to create a Victorian Mansion. But work on my Mansion is slow. Very slow. Sloth slow. Ice Age glacier movement slow. Why? Because I am easily distracted by other personal miniature projects (I have 50+ roomboxes and 15 dollhouses in various stages of incompletion) and because I work for a miniature shop and am often up to my elbows in miniature projects that aren't mine! So, I thought, some artists work in a particular medium (woods, watercolors, clay, oils, etc.), I work in progress . . . .

Friday, June 8, 2018

Mansion Mini Mojo

I've been working on finishing up some details on the right side of the mansion...
First attempt at crown was too pink
Lady's bedroom crown molding was too pink, especially with door and window molding being gold (baseboards had been stained to match floor and glued in months ago). Technically (someone told me) the baseboards and crown should match but mine won't. It's not a real Victorian, it's my FANTASY Victorian so if it doesn't match, no big deal.  And now looking at this photo I realize that I'm missing the little piece of baseboard to the left of the doorway.

So I wanted crown molding that would add some color, coordinate with the gold door frame/window trims, and yet still be light and airy. Lawbre makes a molding that I painted pink and gold:
First coat pink

Highlighted in gold
And then I went crazy with myself and also added pearls. So fancy!
Little pearls above gold painted parts
Once those were ready I did some minor soldering repair behind the left removeable wall and then glued the crown moldings in place...

Next I worked on the front coach lights.  There are five other coach lights to be installed in various places around the exterior, but these on either side of the front door were important to get in as the wires have to pass thru the foyer and butler's pantry so those rooms can't be started until the front lights were in place.
And I finally put the wallpaper up in music room!  I cut the trim to fit but haven't glued the crown or baseboard in yet...I will do that after I remove the protective film off the flooring.
Looking into the music room from open right side of dollhouse


Door on the right leads to library...

Looking into the music room from the foyer.
I painted double bead trim to trim out all the panels, but I still need a shell-type piece to trim out the top of the larger panels (can't just frame them out in a rectangle)...so that will be another project to tackle some other day.
Shell design creates a bump in the top that prevents me from doing a straight framing job around the panels.
With the front lights finally being wired, I can move my decorating focus back to the inside (although I really need to stay focused and finish the exterior too -- I swear I have miniature ADD).  In anticipation of decorating the foyer I cut a wall for under the stairs:

I was hoping to do more this past month or two (haven't really shown the mansion any love since March), but real life interrupted my play time with broken A.C. units (at home and at work), broken hot water tanks (at home and at work), various doctor visits, end of school year events/projects, and summer colds.  I can't wait for summer; I hope to rekindle my mansion mini mojo and make great progress the next 2 or 3 months!