Happy Birthday Natasha!

After nearly a year of planning and working in secret, last Saturday was finally the day for Natasha's 34th birthday party and the unveiling of her kitchen room box!  

When she arrived at the house she was greeted with this gigantic gift wrapped box. I was so happy to have found actual blue chevron wrapping paper! I made it a lift off gift box with the room box and two wrapped accessory boxes hidden beneath. She had to keep looking at it for hours until it was time to open gifts!

When I asked Tasha a few weeks ago what kind of birthday dinner she wanted, of course she said she wanted to cook! She loves to cook and to explore cuisines from all over the world. When her and Brent went to the Philippines after college graduation, she even tried Balut!

Luckily, what she wanted to cook together this time was a little less exotic, though very spicy! We made Sheet Pan Pork Chops with Tapenade from Matty Matheson's Homestyle Cookery cookbook. It was so delicious, and for the folks in the family that like things hot - scrumptious!

Sheet Pan Pork Chops and Veggies, Tapenade and bread for mouth cooling.

Lex, Ande, Tasha (chopping herbs) and Brent.

Last summer I found a neat charcuterie set for Tasha. I asked her to bring it so that we could set up hors d'oeuvres. Little did she know that soon, she would be opening a perfect 1/12th scale charcuterie board made by Erzsebet Bodzas of Hungarian Miniatures!

We were all having such a great time together, by the time we got around to opening gifts it was VERY LATE! I had only set up a replica bottle of Tasha and Brent's homemade wine, two real blown glass wine glasses and a corkscrew in the kitchen. I wanted Tasha to see the kitchen for the first time without my decorating influence, if possible. She opened the big box and the two smaller gift boxes containing everything a kitchen needs for a real good start. There were no tears, Birgit, just a lot of excitement and a good bit of overwhelm!!! With Brent having to be up early for work the next morning, we agreed to have her come back to play the next day. 

Looking through the sliding "Glass" front wall.

Before she arrived the next morning, I had set up the charcuterie and a couple other small things. I gave her a better tour and some ideas about how to arrange the items on the open shelves and in the opening door/drawers of the island. She was still a bit overwhelmed about where to begin!

I suppose to a new miniaturist, it really is a lot to take in! She was excited that I included the octopus cornices and the art work!

Tons of artisan vegetables and fun, mass produced accessories.

Artisan fruits. She loved the split avocado, fuzzy coconut, cut lime and the peeled oranges!

Bags packed full of kitchen essentials!

Remember Phyl the orchid? She loved him!

She was fascinated by the tiny herbs!

She loved the octopus accessories!

Extra aprons are a must have!

Cookbooks in a kitchen? YES!

3D printed paper towel holders in a variety of colors.

A few essentials and décor items to add a splash of color.

Framed octopus art in various sizes.

Tasha loved the vintage linen patterns.

I introduced her to Roxanne and showed her what it would feel like to be a 5-1/2" person in the kitchen. The visual was really helpful!

I shared the blog links so that she could go back and look at the building and planning process from the start. Since Tasha had to drive all the way home with it, we didn't want to get it all set up and risk breaking anything. That means I'll get to go to Tasha's house soon for a mini play date! I can show her how to use the Museum Wax. long tweezers and the tricks to placing tiny things. She's got a crazy travel schedule for work the next few weeks, but I'll post update photos with the kitchen all set up when we finally get together.

Here is a photo of Natasha's Kitchen in it's new home. It will be displayed in Tasha's home office where she can take stress breaks to play.

I can't believe my baby girl is 34 years old, and that making a dollhouse for her 23 years ago is what ignited this miniatures passion and incredible journey for me! I am so grateful to be able to share this with her once again!

And so grateful to share it all with you! Thank you all for coming along on this mini kitchen journey with me! 

xo xo,

Jodi

Tasha's Kitchen - Nearing The End

No matter how many dollhouse projects I've done over the years, I always seem to forget just how long it takes to make the accessories. It feels like I can have an entire structure built in a week, but as soon as I reach the accessory stage, my progress slows to a crawl. I must remember in my subconscious, somehow, because I always seem to leave myself ample time for projects with a deadline. Since it's only the end of May, and Tasha's official birthday isn't until July 22nd, I think I can keep adding new ideas right up until it's time to wrap. Here's an assortment of what I've been working on, so far...

In keeping with the magnet theme in this project, I decided to make the window cornices attach to the wall with them. I built the basic cornice boxes with a strip of magnets imbedded into the wood supports, and a corresponding strip of wood with magnets to attach to the wall above the window. I made two so that Tasha can have a couple different colors and patterns and change them out as she gets the urge to play. 

One version is teal, her favorite color, and the other navy to keep with her original vision of her dream kitchen. I think I've mentioned a time or two how much she loves all things octopi. I hope she's tickled when she sees these!

I added faux corresponding blinds with complementary patterns to the cornices.

Here's the magnetic wood strip that is attached to the wall above the window frame.

And here is each of the cornices in place. These magnets have been so much fun to work with in this project!

I made a wee coat rack shelf to fit between the wet bar and the ovens. There's a couple hooks and a shelf where she can display framed art or kitchen accessories. I made a couple aprons to hang on the shelf, one in teal and one in blue.

I also made her some cookbooks. I got her an Insta Pot pressure cooker for Christmas year before last, along with a book that had tons of recipes. She loves it and uses it all the time. I knew I'd have to make one in mini for her kitchen, too. I bought the Matty Matheson cookbook for my son last fall as a "just because you're awesome" gift. He loved it so much he brought it to Tasha's and they cooked the steak recipe together. She said she'd never cook steak any other way again and ordered the cookbook herself the next day. The other two cookbooks are very science-y, which she will love. She is getting the real life sized Science Of Spice book for her birthday, too. Don't tell! ;O) I made one of them open and with flipping pages that she can use to set up scenes in her kitchen.

Thanks to Megan, I got the courage to put the hydrangeas in a vase with "water". She reminded me about UV resin, and I had forgotten that I had a bottle and the UV flashlight waiting for a turn in my supply drawer! Thanks Megan! This task was done and perfect in minutes, no sweat, no mess, no worries!

Next I made up some linens - these can be placemats and napkins or dish towels and dish cloths depending on how you hem and fold them. I'll let Tasha decide how she wants to utilize them. I also made one more apron that Tasha can wrinkle up and lay on the counter in a cooking scene.

I knew I wanted to include a variety of octopus art that Tasha could display and exchange on the shelves or walls. Once I had them found, saved and printed, I needed several frames.

Once again the 3D printer came to the rescue! I made a variety of sizes and each has a recess in the back so that the art seats inside the frame.

Some are printed on watercolor paper, some on canvas paper, depending on the desired effect. I also put some in bold colored frames, and some in white to let the art be the star.

While I was making some wee plant markers for the herb pots, I decided to make a simple paper towel holder in the extra space. I took the measurements of a simple design from Amazon, then converted them to 1/12th scale.

I painted them in different colors so Tasha would have a variety. I had some cardboard straws in my stash to use as the centers for paper towel rolls, then just had to make them. I cut the cardboard straws into one inch lengths, cut real paper towels into one inch wide strips, glued the "cardboard tube" onto the end of the strip and then carefully rolled them up, securing the end with more glue.

In thinking how best to present the project to Tasha on her birthday, I decided it would be the most fun for her to open the kitchen room box absent of accessories. Then she can open and marvel at all of the wee items individually. She can decide how she wants to set things up in her kitchen, and together we can have an epic mini play date! I can teach her how to grab things with the tweezers I am including, and how to stick them with the mini hold wax I am including, too! I'll definitely get pictures and share them on the blog, and Instagram and Facebook since I won't have to be sneaky anymore.

And in other exciting news, Russ and I were able to get our first shots of the Pfizer vaccine on Mother's Day. They had us drive the car right inside the Tacoma Dome! Now, I have been to one of Tasha's graduations in the dome, RV shows, Monster Truck shows, concerts and even a gun show with my dad. But never did I ever think I'd be driving my car inside to receive a vaccination for a pandemic. May we all live in interesting times, right? Rusty and Woodson even went along to lend their moral support!

We go back for the final dose on May 29th. Two weeks later we'll be celebrating life again with the whole family at a big ol' barbeque! I expect we'll be squeezing each other just a little tighter and a little longer than we ever have before!

Hope life is resuming again, too, for all of you! 

xo xo,

Jodi

P.S. I have temporarily turned off most comment access due to being hit on several pages over several days with escort service spam. Hopefully, they will get the hint and slink off to other dark corners of the world. I will turn the comments back on on my next blog post, which may be next week. Life is crazy busy right now and I have not even had time to catch up on everyone's posts myself! Hopefully, this weekend!!!