The Thanks I'm Giving

Today I had an epiphany. Wholeheartedly I realized that my wonderful 28 year old daughter is all grown up. I never had any doubt about her, because she has always been the kind of person who will take on any challenge and excel at it. I am just so proud of who she has become.

She is a beautiful and vivacious chemistry nerd, but when she graduated Summa Cum Laudy from Portland State University I was still kind of worried about her street smarts. With school and pursuits of the mind she is excellent. But real life? I guess it's normal for mom's to worry. We always see our kids as our babies. How would she manage her adult life? Beautifully, that's how she's done it!

She commutes each weekday by bus or train to her job downtown where she plays with things like pipettes and lasers. She's using her love of chemistry and her analytical mind to help make the world a better place. She has Blue Apron delivered a few times a week, so that when she gets home from her long day saving the world, she can make a gourmet meal for herself and her fiance, who is an engineering student.

Today she stopped by with a car load of groceries. Groceries for the Thanksgiving dinner that she is going to make at my house. She is so excited and organized about doing it that she sent me her meal prep and grocery spreadsheet. It just tickles me! She's been like this since she was 3. She had to know everything about everything and then master it all. Remember when you were excited about cooking Thanksgiving dinner?

She shared a blog post with me that she said inspired her to master Thanksgiving. I thought all of you might also get a laugh out of it. Heck - maybe you'll even use the spreadsheet! Just plug in the time guests will be arriving, and the spreadsheet tells you when to start cooking! :0)

Thanksgiving For Nerds

This year part of the Thanks I will be Giving, is for the opportunity I've had to raise such an amazing young woman. Thank you my beautiful girl, for growing into such an incredible gift to the world and to me!

Shapeways Store Now Open!!!

As some of you know, for several weeks I'v been busy learning about and iterating 1:12 scale items for 3D printing through Shapeways. I started out designing each piece for my Alki Point project. I thought it would be so much fun to decorate with stuff I actually made. I quickly got carried away! It is amazing that we now have the technology to create a piece on a computer, then actually see that idea come to life!

So far, my print tested inventory includes many lighting and plumbing fixtures, furniture, and decor accents. Before I made my items available to everyone, I wanted to make certain that they were:

1. Printable with no issues.
2. Looked in person the way I envisioned.
3. Were perfect 1:12 scale.
4. Functioned the way I intended.
5. Were used in an actual project where I could take "in Action" photos. I am still working on that!

This took a good deal of time and financial investment, but was well worth it! I feel confident in my designs, and have made them available in my Shapeways store. In the iteration process, I keep certain principals in practice so that my pieces are affordable. This means in the rendering photos you may see items stacked on top of one another. Saving printer space means the item costs less money. For items with many small parts, like my brunch set, Shapeways prints them inside of a material sack (sintershell) so that no pieces are lost. I have many more items in production or just waiting to be print tested, so check back often to see the new designs.

If you see an item that says First To Try, that indicates that it has not been successfully printed yet. Not to worry! There are a series of checks that have to happen even before an item is allowed to be available for sale. Once an item has met that criteria, it can be placed in my store. Once an item is ordered, it goes through another series of printability checks. If it does not pass, you are given a refund. Fortunately, none of my items has failed! Everything I have ordered has come in ready for me to paint, finish or just display!

I'd love to hear your constructive (please) feedback and suggestions for product improvements. If there is a need for an item that I have not filled yet, please tell me about it! I love a challenge! It would be so wonderful to see photos of how you used these pieces in your project. We are such a creative community, and everyone's ideas just tickle me!

A ~G-I-A-N-T-I-C~ ~T-H-A-N-K~ ~Y-O-U!!!~ to Alice for being my first customer! I am just so grateful that you believed in me! :0)

Thanks for stopping in!


My Miniature Madness Shapeways Store

Ramping Up For The Holidays

I've been supremely lucky to have extra free time for the past few weeks. I have taken advantage, and really enjoyed working on projects, reading blogs, and just being in an overall relaxed atmosphere!

But, that's all about to change. Coincidentally, both my job and the holidays ramp up at the same time. Tomorrow is really my last slacker day for a while. Work and getting the house ready for holiday guests will take precedence over my mini life.

I've gotten enough done on Alki Point to see it begin to take shape. Once I made the decision to order the textured white scrapbook paper for the wall covering, I kind of found my way again. It is 12" x 12",  80#.  I love the texture, it went on easy, and painted up really nicely. Now I'll have a good supply for future projects!

Framing side of wall

Knowing that the paper was on its way, I went to bed Monday night thinking about how to construct the bedroom/bathroom separater wall. I needed it to conceal the future bedside lamp wires, so I decided to construct it like a RL wall. Well, sort of. I don't think my studs would pass inspection. There are really no fire breaks in it, but hey, it does the job, right?

Wall in the jig

I knew I would put wallpaper on the bedroom side, but I wasn't quite sure about the bathroom side. I debated; should I order more tile walls from Shapeways, or do something else? In the end I decided to use more of the flooring strips I used on the upper portion of the bathroom and kitchen walls.

Wall after constructing

Wall with paper and newly mixed paint color

Speaking of paint... The grey sample I ordered (Behr Paramount from Home Depot) was really too dark for such a small space. I mixed it with white until I got more of a silvery grey. I decided to paint only one accent wall in the living/kitchen area, then the partial wall behind the bed.




This photo shows the bathroom side of the partial wall. I am still trying to decide whether to leave it as is, or add a piece of plexi as a see thru wall. I guess I'll know once I cut the plexi for the shower and see how that looks and installs. I'll be using two part epoy to adhere it to the White, Strong and Flexible tile wall and shower pan. That's what was suggested on the Shapeways forum, so I'll let you know how that turns out.






It was a little stressful trying to decide how to finish the flooring strips on the walls. I tried a little grey stain on a sample piece, but didn't end up liking the way it looked. Too uniform. I might as well have painted the wall grey.

I wanted some texture, and to mix the modern elements with a little shabby and reclaimed. I tried a little light grey acrylic wash, but the water was really raising too many hairs on the wood. I could sand them after, but I found that most of the color also sanded away.






Then I thought I might just paint them white. After I applied the second coat, I'd lost most of the wood slat texture. Oh poop!

So, I searched again for my favorite inspiration photos, read a couple RL whitewashing articles, and decided to try my luck doing a little sanding after the second white coat was thoroughly dried. I loved it! So that's what I did!





Here's the dry fit, and sadly, this is where my progress will most likely stop for the next couple weeks. I'll try to sneak in a few hours here and there. Shhhhh!