Cleaning Really Makes A Mess!

Sadly, I have not been able to touch my mini projects in the last few days. Except to dust and clean them...



Knowing that we are hosting the surprise 70th birthday party for my aunt Jackie, I decided that my house really needed a deep cleaning. The kind where you pull out the washer and dryer to vacuum and mop, and where you actually pull all of the stuff off shelves and clean them rather than just dusting.

When this kind of thing comes over me, I tend to jump right into the rabbit hole. I decide to move stuff around to get behind and clean it. Then I paint myself into a corner because then I have to find a place for the stuff I'm replacing. My house is very full of stuff. And I thought it was so roomy when we had it built!

In the last two days, I have managed to get the front hall, staircase and landing, laundry and powder rooms finished. Today, I'll be lucky to get the living and dining/minis room finished.

Tomorrow, I may get the kitchen done. I have to pull everything off of the cabinet tops to wash. I also have to clean the fridge and freezer. I also have to oil all of the cabinets. I also have to clean the blinds and window. I also have to deep clean the wood floors. Oh sheesh! The kitchen might take until Monday!

That still leaves the family room, not to mention the entire upstairs! Which includes 5 rooms, 2 bathrooms, and a loft.

Georgie and Rusty don't seem like they are too interested in helping.

Wish. Me. Luck. I hope my body holds out!

The Fun Part

I'll tell ya, a few weeks back, when all I was encountering with the barn was one difficult problem to solve after another, I was worried that my enthusiasm for this project would wane, and I'd lose interest completely. I have been known to do this kind of thing in the past. Luckily, as soon as I started to pull out some of the things I'd already made, and also the materials to make the other things I'd envisioned for the barn, my excitement came back!

Here, I have permanently installed the sink unit, stool and rug.

One of the projects I'd planned to make for the barn kitchen was a no sew apron. I found a life sized pattern on a Google search, imported it into Publisher, re sized the pattern to 1/12th scale, then layered a fabric pattern (also found Googling) underneath. I have been holding onto a package of ink jet fabric sheets for a few months, and finally I had a reason to try them!

Here is the finished apron. You can see in the pattern photo that I printed extra material to make the pocket, and a matching color for the ties and neck strap. In Publisher, you can sample a color from any pattern so that it matches perfectly for the ties. I brushed fabric glue onto the material, then folded in half lengthwise, then attached to the main apron body. For the pocket, I just glued a seam all of the way around, then attached to the apron. I brushed a bit of the fabric glue all around the edges of the apron to prevent fraying.

Here is the apron hanging on the hook in the kitchen. I just want to shrink myself  down to five inches so I can wear it and cook in this little kitchen!

The fridge and cabinets are fully stocked with everything a little person could ever need in a kitchen!

I didn't want to waste the fabric paper, so I decided to make art prints for the bedroom at the same time. I found several different species of fir trees on the web, then gave them background color and frames also in Publisher. I just measured the outside and inside frame dimensions, then used this conversion chart to convert from fraction to decimal. I entered the decimal numbers into the frame properties in Publisher.

Printing on the fabric paper really gave the tree prints a nice finish - very similar to canvas. This technique is going to be awesome for other artwork in future projects!

I cut out card stock to mount the fabric paper prints onto. This made it so that it was very easy to then mount them to the frames.

I got the frames from miniatures.com when my generous daughter gave me a gift certificate for Mother's Day. I thought giving them a coat of metallic glaze would work nicely to match the other metal finishes in the barn. I like the way they turned out.

Here they are mounted in the bedroom. That bed is looking awfully comfy about now, and I'd like to get in it and take a nap!

The dresser is ready for little clothing. Maybe I'll make some little socks!

I'm not quite sure what I'll start on next. Probably the living room sofa and chair. I'll be using the method from One Inch Minis along with a couple House of Miniatures kits.

But first, that nap is sounding really good, and I know this guy is ready to snuggle!

Ever The Eternal Optimist...

Soon after getting back from our two week camping adventure, I learned that the belated surprise 70th birthday party for my aunt Jackie (organized and funded by my aunt Terry) would be held at my house. On September 19th. That's two weeks from today. I have a lot of work ahead of me... A LOT!

Russ was also feeling very ambitious, so he agreed to help my brother Mike (Bulldog Construction), along with my son, Ande, do a roof replacement on the house of an old high school friend. This means it's just me & the puppies for the long Labor Day weekend.

I decided it would be a great idea to put the gardening and housework off until Tuesday. Three days of minis it is!

In celebration of the working loft lights, I decided to get the Sasquatch lamps out of their safely stored zip top bag and plug them in. After all of the issues I've had on this barn project, you'd think I would have expected something to go wrong. I kind of did, but ever the eternal optimist, I hoped... No. Such. Luck.

The plug on the left side of the room is having the same seating issue as so many of the other 11 plugs - by the time you drill deeply enough into the MDF, too much of the copper strip has been eaten by the drill to make good contact with the plug.

Unfortunately, it just so happens that the plug showed no sign of an issue before I installed the wood strips over the tape runs. Now the strip is covered, with the exception of the actual plug space. My only option is to try to carefully remove some of the plastic covering from the tape run under the plug. Then attempt to re-seat the plug and hope the new contact is sufficient and stable.

If this does not fix the issue, I may have to tear out some of the wood strips and try in a new area that hasn't already been excavated.

Oh Boy! Wish me luck. I'll update this post with photos and hopefully, good news later...

UPDATE

After peeling some of the plastic away and testing, there was still not enough contact with the copper/plug prongs. I was having compounded issues because:

• My dedicated mini glasses lost a nose piece pad and they hurt me too badly to wear them.
• My regular everyday glasses have wide earpieces. They do not fit well into my head strap, which I need to wear so that when I attach my 4x magnifier clip on lenses, the glasses are not pulled off of my face from the weight.
• I could not see well enough with just my glasses on. I tried the clip on, but the wall is set too far back in the loft so the clip on just made it worse.
• I turned on the flashlight feature in my iPhone, but having it and my hands in the tiny space only caused the work area to be in shadow.
• The room is really not wide enough to comfortably and effectively work on something so delicate and small.
• The barn is sitting on a table. The loft is naturally the second floor. That makes the room about 5'3" and I am only 5'5". I could not sit to perform the task. Between twisting my body to fit my hands into the space and attempting to reach the back, I experienced back spasms. I could only work for a minute or so at a time before I had to stop long enough for the spasm to subside. No progress can be made in that amount of time.
• I think I may have mooned my neighbor, as too late, I realized that in my acrobatic attempt, butt to the window, the nightie I am still wearing had ridden up exposing places that no neighbor should see. Not if you still expect to exchange pleasantries with them at the mail boxes.

At this point I just had to laugh. Once again, the barn had me by the short hairs.

Good thing I am very stubborn.

Rather than ripping out the wood strip (which I couldn't really reach very well anyway), I had an idea. What about adding some copper wire to make the brass post on the plug thicker, and therefore make better contact with the copper strip? I started stripping wire and winding it around the post. I quickly realized that today is not a good day to buy a lottery ticket, and that this idea was a bust.

Then suddenly, out of nowhere, I hear the long lost voice of my mini muse. "How about encasing the posts in an eyelet?"

Brilliant!

And then there was light! A real steady Freddy kind of light! And then I got excited and got all of the bedroom stuff out so that I could take a few moments and play! Oh how I love this part!

Here is the bedroom, lamps in and working! Lots of details to make and add, but man I am so relieved to have conquered the lighting issues!

Bathroom lights are hardwired in and working wonderfully!

Kitchen and stairwell lights are working! The necklace findings I found on Amazon have worked out beautifully for making pendant lights!

Garage shop lights turned out and are working great!

Entry, stairway and living room lights - check!

All lights now working, new wallpaper section is in - just have to cut out the window then reattach the window trim.

Grateful, grateful, grateful!

Now what's next...