wise craft

look closer

Have you heard of Uppercase Magazine? Dubbed as "a magazine for the creative and the curious", I have been purchasing individual issues locally at Assemble and I am hooked. What a treat each issue it. I finally ordered myself a subscription. I can't say enough good things about this magazine. The quality of the paper in your hand, the photographs, the stories and inspiration on each and every page. Janine, the editor and creator, is the tour de force behind the magazine, and the core contributors are some of my favorite creative folks on the web. Its worth every penny to someone like myself, who loves to see the inner workings of all kinds of creative minds. Every issue becomes a permanent resource for me.

I have had an Uppercase postcard (the one featuring several of their magazine covers in 1 1/2" x 2" size) sitting on my desk since I went to Tif's book signing, and because I love the Uppercase covers so much, I a couple for the walls of my dollhouse (which still needs finished walls, but its not as fun to do that part). These were originally gold Mayberry Street dollhouse frames. I pulled off the picture, gave them a quick coat of primer gray paint, and hot glued in the Uppercase cover images.15 minute project! (Love those!)

They look so nice with the new dollhouse-sized pouffe I got from PRD Miniatures.

ornaments and smalls

Are you getting tired of dollhouse talk yet? I'm afraid I've fallen off a slippery slope folks. During the day I may be hard at work on everything else, but any free time in the evening is used to shop/stock my new miniature abode. There's worlds of ideas out there, truly. These red chairs are going to be the dining room chairs, they are acutally tree ornaments from CB2's holiday line this year (I bought these for the patio). They are a bit larger than 1:12, but I'm going go with it, they look great with the table.

I chose a bed (wood painted silver, "faux chrome") and am now pondering what bed coverings I will make for it. I am staying well within mid-century style for this house, but I'm taking plenty of liberties too.

Fun dollhouse blogs out there-

Call of the Small

Modern Mini Houses

Mini Modern - Where I discovered the great tip about the CB2 ornament chairs.

 

halloween 2011 and little things

This would have been a great photo if the camera settings were right, my not-so-little bad fairy. We had such a great time last night with her and our large vanilla milkshake. Although we are totally lame for not even carving pumpkins this year.

Halloween is not my favorite occasion (I've lamented this yearly in this space) but I think last night was just about perfect as far as this particular evening goes. The neighborhood really played it up with great decorations and friendly folks (and good candy, I'm told). Trick or treat bags felt just heavy enough when we were done, and everyone managed to get into bed at a reasonable time.

I'm still collecting and doing a bit of decorating for the I'm a Giant Challenge. I really adore little things!!! These little goodies came last week, a hide rug and "original" sunflower painting, an Eames chair. I also have a "leather couch" and some other little things. I've decided that furniture pieces with faux drawers that don't open are not going to work for me, so I've been taking my time to choose the kitchen and bathroom pieces. I think I finally picked out a bed/mattress combo and when I get it I can decide what type of quilt I'll make. So many of the beds come with bedding already, but I want to make that. So much of the fun is the hunt for the perfect thing.

Who knows if I'll even come close to having it done by the date the challenge ends, but I'm having a ball anyway. Emma is getting in the spirit too (she has had her own dollhouse since she was 4 but its been stored away for a couple years). We have a studio date one evening this week to dollhouse craft and listen to last week's This American Life episode on Middle School. Can't wait!

 

peacock, and the spreading of feathers

The kind of thing that ABsolutely kills me when I'm shopping for my dollhouse. A tiny peacock portrait. Did you read that? A tiny peacock portrait! I think I have a thing for animal portraiture (if only this peacock were wearing pearls!).

I'm really thinking that I'm going to go a bit Hollywood Regency in my dollhouse decor. I'm so into sparkle right now.

But I have a huge aversion to the word "decor", why is that? Help me use another word.

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Its been a very out-of-sorts kind of week around here, which is why I haven't posted much. I'm very thankful for the weekend ahead and plan to regroup. I am currently working on some big blog changes, the first and most noticeable one is that I am phasing out my sponsor program (you may notice that the boxes are dwindling to the right over there). My sponsors have been so good to me, so supportive, and have allowed me to cover the various expenses that come along with having this blog and the time I spend here for the past 2 years. But the reality is, having sponsors means committing to a certain number of blog posts per week. My work on all things family-related, Story Trading-related, and wise craft-related are changing quite rapidly behind the scenes (in a good way!) and there may be weeks that posts just don't happen as timely as I'd like. My energy needs to be focused in the right way. Plus, I think you readers want to read what's really happening here, rather than me just filling space to create a blog post, am I right? Be assured the blog will not cease to exist, but it will change. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, I really have to thank these folks for their support, please pay them a visit.

Pink Chalk Fabrics

Paradiso Designs

Jototes

Vista Prints

Cards Direct

Fabricworm

Cooper Sewing Machines in the UK

hugs to all,

Blair

 

 

 

 

dollhouse, day 1

Dolls and miniature things at the wise craft house should start getting excited- I've started building this house! I know that once I start going and get the less-exciting, more structural type things done, there's doing to be major progress happening. That's how I work, I procrastinate and put off, then force mysef to start and am soon totally into it. As I've mentioned, I've already ordered wallpaper. Of course. I had that before I'd even laid everything out to get started. Several kinds in fact. Here's one I love that I haven't shown you (keep in mind how miniature this is and you'll squeal like I did). Remember, Peter doesn't live here-

Size-wise, this house is big. Much bigger than I realized. Peter cut out a piece of 36" square birch plywood for me (even sanded down the sides so I won't get splinters without asking, such a keeper). The walls will eventually get glued down to the base, but for now the walls only glued to each other. To store it I will have to slide it under my tall studio work tables, there's really nowhere else for it to go.

Of course, I have already purchased wood flooring that will eventually go down in some of the rooms.

My father-in-law recommended a 2 part glue to glue the structure together. Finding this took a few trips around town to hobby shops and craft stores before I finally found what I needed, but they had it at Gary's Games. I used Zap A Gap glue and Zap Kicker spray. Applying the glue to one piece, then spraying the kicker on the 2nd piece, creates a strong and very fast bond upon contact. Heed my words, fast and strong. I suggest wearing your gloves, a mask, and do it where there is ventilation, but it works great, I got all the the exterior walls together in about 30 minutes.

I love that this project is so far removed from everything else I'm currently working on. Or is it? The challenge will be the DIY projects I invision putting into this house. I've got really big plans. Scary big. Stay tuned.

Dollhouse sources I'm liking currently:

Itsy Bitsy Mini- I found my wood flooring, bathroom tile, and wallpaper sheets here, nice quality.

Gigi N Studio- some mid-century modern pieces, as well as other styles, all handmade, lovely.

Miniatures- There's tons of cute basics on this site.

I'm also trolling ebay.

More soon!

officially obsessed

I mentioned back in January that my father-in-law had found a dollhouse book that my mother-in-law had stored away, and had cut the pieces for a modern bungalow dollhouse for me, and a gypsy caravan dollhouse for my sister-in-law, as part of our Christmas gifts.

Christmas! That's how long its been sitting, in pieces. Shameful, but true.

So when Amy tipped me off to Emily Henderson's recently unveiled "I'm a Giant, Blog Challenge", I thought about it for an hour or two. Which, really, I needed to do, because there are always ten thousand other things to do, right? "Sorry girls, can't make it tonight, I'm really making headway on my dollhouse!"

Thinking of this challenge got me re-energized about putting this dollhouse together. I decided I would officially declare one day each week as dollhouse day, that will help me organize my time and be able to fit it in. Plus, I think it will be fun to nuture my creativity this way, it'll give me something completely different to focus on for a few hours.

I've spent all weekend looking at different websites and creating different decor ideas in my head (even though that's several steps away, its still fun to think about), and I'm a little all over the place about how I want to decorate it. So much dollhouse decor still has a very old fashioned feel to it, not exactly what I'm thinking (unless I'm willing to shell out more money, and I'm just not there yet). But in the wise craft DIY spirit, Emma and I are going to make as much as we can to go in it. Looking at the decor as a series of mini-DIY projects is helping me focus in a little more. The central theme of my decorating scheme is simple.

I'm just going to pretend that Peter wouldn't live there.

That's going to open up the flood gates and I just might get very girly! Check out the dollhouse wallpaper I secured-

 

I'll post the progress here and finally fill up that dollhouse category that's been sitting so lonely and empty. The first part of construction will be the hard hat part, lots of smelly glue and clamps, as I put up the walls. But after that its making, crafting, scoring the right furniture, making a teeny weeny quilt .

Anyone else doing a dollhouse?

small and adorable

One of the places we visited while in Victoria, BC this summer was Miniature World. I wasn't quite sure what to expect, maybe little things to see in a little room?, I didn't know, but I was very interested and we were definitely in a sightseeing mindset. The minute we walked in I was saying miniature profanity to myself for not bringing in my camera. The detail was amazing and I think Emma and I "squee'd" out loud quite a bit. Ian was quite impressed with the minuature outer space display and its incredible detail, Peter was loving the old military scenes. All of it was pretty incredible, but then again I really love miniature things like this. I want to remember the highlights for when I finally get to pull out my dollhouse. (Sorry, these are grainy camera photos.)

I'm dying, miniature toile wallpaper!!! (Notice that tiny hot water bottle.)

I loved the rug in this house (I had to snap these pictures through the windows, no cutaways of these rooms). I need to incorporate some needlepoint, maybe a minuature hook rug, some sort of floor cloth in my house.

I love how over the top this room is. Look at those ornate picture frames.

 

I think my house will have to have some type of bearskin rug, I LOVE THIS!!!

The fairy tale section was quite over the top and full of fantasy.

my favorite part was the scene of the seven dwarves. Above ground-

And then below ground in the diamond mine-

modern bungalow

One of the most thoughtful gifts I received at Christmas was from Peter's dad. He precut all the pieces, ordered the window starts, and gave me the plans to build a mid-century bungalow dollhouse from a wonderful book Peter's mom has, The International Dolls House Book.

Right now it doesn't look like too much really, a stack of wood, some windows, trims, and random tiny things like doorknobs and hinges. This is a true barnraising from scratch. First I'll have to build and assemble it, then paint and decorate it. There are some plans in the book to make furniture too, I may actually play with that, we'll see how long the structure takes.

And all this will be with Emma's help of course, she's like the dollhouse fairy when it comes to the world of teeny tiny things. She has already said I should paint the tiny cuckoo clock I bought for it a bright green, like the one I did for holiday).

My sister-in-law Jen got the pieces for the Gypsy Caravan, so we rewatched some Carnivale over the holidays, purely for research. I love that series.

I've created a new category for Dollhouse here on the blog so you can follow the progress. Once I move into the basement and claim it as my studio, I'll have room to work on this and spread out a little, so I'll be posting some progress regularly. So excited!

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I wanted to thank ParentMap for featuring the tissue Valentines with Emma's classmates in their Valentine projects in their 15 Valentine's Day Crafts for 2011. They have compiled a list of wonderful projects, very doable with kids.

Thank you to Rhythm of the Home for featuring some of Emma and Ian's handmade Christmas gifts this year.

I am way behind on answering emails, if you are waiting on an answer from me, don't worry, it's coming!

Happy Monday!

B