Mouse in boot

This week I didn't have much time for miniatures. On October the 28th we had the worst storm in our country since 1976, or 1990, depending on the expert talking. How wonderful living on the border of a forest can be, that day was quite frightening. Two trees close to the house went down. We were very lucky: we had almost no damage. A little bit more to the right or left, and it would have been so different.

We already had a list of trees that are close to the house and form a potential risc by being too rotten, too high, too alone or having too shallow roots. This week we hired men to bring all those trees down. They left the wood and branches were it fell, we'll be clearing garden ourselves, leaving us with firewood for at least 5 years. 

But I have been playing with Fimo. Not much success though. Our previous house had an old, but very good in-built oven, but we couldn't take that with us. We have a combined oven/microwave, but that oven can't be set to a temperature below 140º C. So I bought a new oven for my cabin. The first time I used it for food, which came out totally black... I checked the temperatures on the display with a thermometer. If the display says 50º C is it actually 140º C, and 100º C is actually 200º C! I haven't checked what the highest temperature of 250º C does, it could be a real clay-baking oven!

Anyway, I decided to use our kitchen oven to bake the Fimo, opening the oven door every time it got too hot. But it didn't work very well. The Fimo isn't hardened well enough. Two mice and a little birdie broke. I just got one mouse left. It is ment to live in one of the boots of my conservatory. I've made the boots from Fimo and fabric some years ago.

The sooner I bring my oven back to the shop, the sooner I'll be able to work with Fimo again. But walking down a city street carrying a heavy oven is not something to look forward to...

Probably a bit late, but does anyone go to the dollshouse fair in Assen tomorrow?

Have a nice weekend!
Marit

Almost a year has past...

...since my last post. And what a year!

A year ago I posted after a long absence as well, due to my health problems (chronic fatigue syndrome). I predicted that I would get time to live again in the next year, one way or another. I saw two options: getting healthy or losing my job. And guess what: I did both! 

I started a health program for people with chronic fatigue or pain in January. In my case my body had to deal with a lack of vitamin B12 for a very long time (years), and it has been solved quickly (weeks) with injections. The idea is that the brain can't deal with that, and stays in protective mode. The method is to start at zero, and doing a little bit more every week, little steps so the brain can see that the body can handle that. Only steps forward, never back. And it worked!

In the meanwhile we moved for the second time: from our temporary home to a very small, old house surrounded by trees. Our new house is 200 km from where I worked, and I had a little apartment where I stayed 3 days a week to go to my job. I liked my job, I loved my colleagues, but the director has been very non supportive towards me and my illness, to say it mildly. He has found ways to lower my wages multiple times, but instead of telling me that, he would do that behind my back, without telling my manager either. Most ways were probably not even allowed by law, but find a way to defend yourself when you have chronic fatigue syndrome...

So when I was healthy again, I still struggled with having to work in the same building as the director, as well as living half of the week somewhere where I did not want to be. The worldwide crisis was the solution. Someone had to go...

So here I am: in good health, in a new beautiful environment, searching for a new fun job, starting a new happy life, a country life. :)

But enough of that. Our new house is beautiful situated, but only has one bedroom. There are two small rooms adjacent to the living room (2x2 m), where we both have a little working area. This is mine. The desk opposite of the one in the picture has my computer on it.

 

Coming from a normal size bedroom as a hobbyroom, this is too small. I have no room to display my dollshouses or to keep all my stuff. And I may not have been able to make things, I did gather a whole lot of materials and ideas over these past few years! The solution is in the garden:

It will be absolutely beautiful after it's been painted in pastel colours. But it's not ideal. It has a gas-heater, but I won't be able to keep this place frostfree during wintertime. We have plans to isolate it, as well as we have plans to extend the house, so I'll have my perfect room in the future. 

And this is what makes this place so special to me: as I walked up to the cabin to make this pictures this morning. I saw a deer at the end of our garden. Do you see it to? You can see the leg and white tail left of the tree, and the smoke of its breath on the right.

It heard me, so he ran away. It was the male who I see here more often. One of his antlers is shorter than the other. This is him too, captured by our wildlife camera:

 I started working on the conservatory again. This is how it looks now:

The lower walls are finished now. And did I show you mister mole?

He wouldn't be so happy if he knew what I do to his real life family... I don't like it myself either, but I tried the mole-friendly traps, and they just don't work.

I hope my next post will be sooner :). And thanks for your patience, all those followers who stayed, and I even gained followers!

Have a nice week!

Marit

X-mas house part 10: outside

I didn't succeed in getting my little Christmas House ready before Christmas, but the winter is not over yet. In fact, it still hasn't started, just one night of snow, which was also the night our central heating stopped working... Here some pictures of how it is now:

The little light clamped at the side of the door is made by my husband, could he be infected with the miniature virus as well?!? It's really lovely, better pictures of it will come in a next post.

I love those lighted pots in 1:1.

The snowman excist of 2 styrofoam balls, with fake snow glued on them. He still needs a face and clothing.

And here is how I made it:

The path is made of airdrying clay. I used a pattern-sheet to make bricks. Let show that a bit closer:

See? This sheet is bought, but a lot of packages for food have texture as well, similar to tiles.

While drying I fitted the grass.

It comes from a shop for model trains. I choose the darkest shade, but I still think it's too light of colour. So I make a mixture of water and watercolourpaint, and spray it on it, as brushing affects the texture of the grass. I use an used and empty hairspraybottle, as the paint will block the nozzle eventually. 

When the clay was dry, I painted it a brownish greenish shade, trying to get a mixture of colours. Then I applied darker colours between the "stones", a very easy job, as the paint flows into the channels.

The stonework itselve got a reddish padding on it.

The dried result.

The snow shovel was made of a tealight cup...

... and pressed carefully into some more airdrying clay at the borders of the path the snow shovelled of the path.

Then fake snow was glued all over the place, except for the cleaned path. The thingie in the grass is the lightbulb for the pot of the Chrstmastree.

The pot was made of a piece of plastic foil, painted in white, a plastic bottle-cap to wrap the foil around, and a border made of a tealight cup, using pattern-scissors and a punch.

The end result.

I wish I could visit some of your blogs, but I don't get the pages loaded. I didn't get into my account at first as well, and it took 6 times to get the pictures uploaded. So now I first get some sleep, and hopefully tommorow blogger will make me a happy blogger, instead of the grumpy blogger I am now!

Marit