China Shop - Creatin' Contest 2024

 Well it's been a while... I really didn't realize how long I'd gone without posting until I looked at the date of my last post. I've been dollhousing (notice how I create my own verbs) but I just haven't written about it.

I bought the kit for the 2024 contest. I'm still not sure if I'm going to enter or not.  I know exactly what I want to do with the kit. And I'm on my way there.  When you work for most of the year on one project it feels like a lot of energy for very little return. I'm just tired of being judged maybe?

I work a full-time job, just like most people and its mentally and emotionally exhausting sometimes. Like everyone else's job I imagine. I only really get to work on my miniatures during the weekends and sometimes not even a whole weekend due to other household stuff that needs to get done.

To put in a year's worth of weekends on a project, painstakingly researching and bringing that vision to life... Let's just say that I think I might be happier if I wasn't comparing my build to all the others that are entered. I think I wouldn't mind not getting even an honorable mention if I wasn't spending every free moment working on a build. That happened with my Chapel in 2022. I thought I'd 'transformed' the kit pretty well. I certainly didn't recognize it as the Welcome All Porch kit.

Which leads me to this year.

As I'm sure you've all seen by now, the kit isn't enclosed. I have to change that because cats. The Building Inspector is busy doing her thing beyond the Rainbow Bridge along with her Apprentice. But the cats I have are still curious. So its best for all concerned that I have four walls and a roof on all my builds.

I decided that I wasn't going to make myself crazy this year. I'm keeping it simple and easy to move, in part because I want to use it as a room box for displaying things for my Etsy Shop. I really enjoy making tiny sets of china so primarily the kit will end up being a china shop. Maybe with some pretty glass perfume bottles in a special section of their own.

So I started with the floor.

Then ran out of the right sized tiles so I pried some up and started again.  This time with a border of pine board flooring around the perimeter of the floor.

I've also removed the dividers for the small windows on the far wall and made one long large window. I like how high up it is, it'd be good for a bedroom window if I'd gone in that direction. 

I'm going with American Warm White for the inside trim and for the exterior trim Anita's Blue Fog. I've got the exterior door and trim already painted in the same colors. 

I thought about doing a bead board wainscoting but I thought with the hexagon tiles it would be a little busy looking. and I didn't want to add wood that I would only end up painting. Plus I'd gone through my supplies and I had some simple trim that would look nice as a chair rail but it wasn't made to go over the edge of a panel. 

So I used my painters tape for its actual purpose and primed the interior walls with gesso.  Then I cut some 1/8th wide half round to make simple panels.

The one area next to the door is narrower and I want to see how it looks with the door trim in place before I make a narrow panel for that area. 

So far I like how it looks. I've got some wallpaper that I'm going to use for the upper portion of the walls. 

The little bump out floor is simple pine boards and I'll trim out the doorway with the same trim as the window. But I won't put a door. I think I'm going to do a little curtain or something.

While I had the primer out I should have done the bump out walls but I forgot. I'm debating a small spiral stair up to what would be the attic storage. I have a mansard roof in mind and I think it'll look nice. Storage for the shop but no living space. 

I got a 'Fragile' stamp and I'll probably try to make little crates or something to have in the attic. We'll see.

For the exterior I've got some of the nice brick paper from Miniatures.com and I'll probably use that unless I get really enthusiastic about a plaster look. I've got the paper on the base of my shop windows already and I really like it.

More on those the next time I post.