A Randomly Selected Newspaper Headline:

The following is a randomly selected newspaper headline from many years ago:

Welcome to my blog. Please feel free to leave a comment. I assure you I always read and appreciate everything you have to say. Unfortunately, thanks to Blogger being, well . . . Blogger, I can not respond to comments nor leave any on your blogs. They simply disappear into the ether. Occasionally I will remember to respond in the next blog post I put up, but usually these good intentions slip my mind. So if you want to ask a question or get a response to any comments you may have please leave an email address or other contact method in your comment and I will get back to you.

I have also added a separate page to the blog for the Tower of Magic with a brief summary of all the rooms of the ToM in the one spot. The link is just below this and above the main body of the blog, or you can just click here.

Monday, August 26, 2013

Occupied

It may have taken an extra week, but the residents of Bellerose House have finally moved in and made themselves at home.


In the Second Bedroom, Rebecca is dreaming in front of the mirror.


Tammy still hasn't gotten out of the tub in the bathroom.


Hildegard is wearing a Tea Gown in the Main Bedroom.


 Millie is just entering the Sitting Room . . . .


Where Dan is already busy with the newspaper.


Harry and Thomas have a game going in the Rec Room.


Thomas waits . . . 


While Harry lines up his next shot.


Anne and Letitia have just arrived home loaded with bags and boxes from their shopping trip. 



Andrews the butler casts a last glance over the dining table to ensure it is ready for the meal before attending to the ladies' packages. 


Don't tell anyone, but Letitia is actually a male wearing drag.  'He' was a free gift that came with an order, but I had enough men for the house and he looked a little effiminate anyway so I stuffed his corset and made him into a girl.


Anne on the other hand is a hand made lady.



Sally and Ivy are busy in the kitchen while the housekeeper watches on.


Mrs. Penderwald, the housekeeper.


Ivy the kitchen maid.


Sally the cook.

Now that the people have moved in, Bellerose House is almost finished!

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Lights and Little Things

Well, for good or bad I sent off my entry in DHE's creative competition durring the week.  Although I don't expect to be one of the place winners, I hope I've done well enough to at least make the judges short list . . . um, well maybe.  Competition conventition dicates that I have to keep it under wraps until the start of September, so be sure to check back here for the big reveal then.  For the time being though, I get to concentrate on Bellerose house without having to juggle two houses at once.


I concentrated on finishing the lights for the house this week.  I should point out that the house is not wired and all the lights are dummies and don't actually light up.  It would be easy enough to add a wired bulb to all of the various light fittings, but I find that "real" lights are just too expensive, especially considering I only ever turn them on in my wired houses just to check they still work about once year.  The Main Bedroom now has a ceiling light in red and white beads.  There are two rings of beads, an inner ring of crystal look and faux pearl beads and a more decorative outer ring of faux pearls and red faux crystal.  Both rings are threaded through a round, flat jewellery finding which is hung by a length of chain from the ceiling.


Another new feature in the bedroom is this little chaise.  After re-arranging the furniture in here for the final time (I swear) I decided that it needed this extra piece to finish it off.  The chaise is made from stiff cardboard fully covered with brown silk.  I added a green cushion and throw to mirror the bed.  I'm still not entirely sure I've gotten this room right, but it will stay this way at least until the room's resident arrives and I can get her opinion.  Or at least see if it looks OK with her in it.


The Rec room lights made last week have been hung.  Like all my lights, they hang crooked.  (grrr)  Initially, I hung the lights lower to better illuminate the pool table, but this interfered with your view of the fireplace and did not look right.  Not too sure if they look right now either . . . .


The kitchen lights were made from polymer clay the same way as the Rec room lights, but weren't painted and were left as individual shades.


The most impressive light fitting of the house is the Dining room chandelier.  After a few failed attempts to make something even grander than this, I eventually simplified the design to be three rings of tube beads, each ring shorter than the last.  Like the bedroom light, these rings of beads were threaded onto a flat jewellery finding.


My next task for the house is to add the people.  At the moment they all look more or less like this:


The dolls are made of polymer clay using my people moulds.  Although I do have full body moulds I tend to make the head/torso separate from the arms and legs and often cut the torso off at the bust and use foam and pipe cleaners to make the body.  This gives the finished doll more flexiblity and saves expensive clay.


The most recent Dolls House and Miniature Scene magazine I recieved had a free 1/48th bed kit by Petite Properties pinned to the cover.  I couldn't resist putting it together, just to see how it looked.  The kit was easy to put together and surprisingly sturdy for something so small.  I didn't need to read the instructions to figure out how to assemble it but when I did glance over them they looked prettu clear and simple.  When I get around to making a 1/48th scale house (hey, now I have a 1/48th scale bed I need a house to go around it, right?) I will definately be looking at more of the Petite Properties kits.  They also do 1/24th and 1/144 and seem prepared to ship to a vast range of countries.  If you're not sure how small 1/48th scale is, here's the little bed next to the gigantic 1/12th scale bed of Bellrose house:


Hmmm . . . however it looks, I don't really have a thing about green and brown bed covers . . . .


Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Lights, Fabrics and Bubbles


The bathing lady I started last week has been finished by the addition of some foamy bubbles.


After the glue holding the lady in place was dry I used some cheap clear beads to partly fill the remaining space in the tub, reducing the amount of Scenic Water needed to fill it up.  The melted Scenic Water was then poured over the beads.  Before the water set, it was injected with suds made by putting a small amount of water and some detergent in a jar and shaking, then draining the water.  Scenic Water is a yellowish colour, so the resulting bubbles have a slight dirty yellow tinge.


 Next door in the main bedroom, the bed has been finished off by adding a brown silk throw accross the foot of the bed.


A green silk curtain now separates the bedroom from the doorway.   I still don't like the arrangement of the furniture in this room.


Downstairs, the Dining room table has been set ready for a feast.


 For this time period, a crisp white tablecloth would probably have been more appropriate, but with the pale, neutral walls this room was really lacking personallity and it really needs the strong colours of the blue silk table cloth.


 At the back of the Dining room, the blinds and curtains have been added to the windows.


 A ceiling rose has been added to the ceiling, ready to hang a chandelier from.  My first two attempts at making a chandelier have failed spectacularly, but keep watching this space.


The lights for the Rec room have been much more cooperative.  The shades were made from white polymer clay which was then covered in green Gallery Glass faux leadlighting paint.  These were then joined into a single unit with jewellery findings and a toothpick painted gold.  All that remains is to hang the fitting over the pool table.


 The Rec Room windows have been treated with blinds and curtains and the window seats now each have a cushion


So now it's back to the Dining room chandelier in the hope that my third attempt will acutally succeed.