The Olde Abbey ~ Part 3

Before I start rabbiting on about the exterior stonework, let me first apologise for the lateness of this post. I had said I would be posting part 3 of the olde abbey on the weekend and it is now tuesday, but I have been busy with the 'bill - paying' job!! and have been too exhausted when getting home at 9.15 pm to sit and concentrate on this post!!

Anyway, here it is, I hope it will be of use to those of you who want to give stoning an exterior wall a go.

The stone compound we use is from Bromley Crafts, their website is,
http://www.craft-products.com/dolls-house-brick-stone-tiles.asp

You will need fast tack positionable glue, (which we buy from our local store) a brick or stone stencil and the brick or stone compound, both available from Bromley crafts. The compound arrives in a dry state and you mix it with water to form a paste. You then spray the stencil and lay it on your piece to be stoned. Hywel uses a decorators wallpaper scraper to apply the compound and then once you are happy with the cover, you gently pull the stencil upwards and away. After a quick wash and dry of the stencil, you repeat the process again until you have finished your piece or need a tea break!!


















When all the pieces are covered, we leave the compound overnight and then give it a light sanding down, which can be dusty, so it's best to do it outside. The finished stone can then be painted or aged as you wish. You can see from the top photo that I have started to age the stonework on the Olde Abbey. I used acrylic paints to add the darker grey stone and moss effect. Then, when you are happy with that, you give it a little coat of clear varnish to seal it and your done!

A little tip, use non-yellowing clear varnish if you don't want to darken the finished stone colour.

Wizards store for sale on Ebay

The wizards store is back on for sale on our Ebay page. We advertised it for sale a couple of weeks ago, but had no takers :-( ... but I think it may of been a bit early.
I have also taken better photos this time and added a back counter because I felt the inside was missing something. Now I worry that the back counter doesn't match the other counter, but I am sure that if whoever buys the store, that's if it sells, gulp!! then maybe they could use it elsewhere if they didn't think it matched either. We will have to wait and see.....

Sorry about the poor picture quality for the counter, I didn't put this pic on Ebay because it is a bit blurred and I took it so many times and still this one was blurring!

On the counter is a bottle of 'snake oil' and a decanter with the remnants of used snake oil. Next to that is a scroll, perhaps with snake oil instructions! Then there is a glass jar of 'Toadflax' a dragon drawing, a silver thingymejij and an open book. All made by yours truly, apart from the silver thingymejij, that is! I have also put some scrolls in the shelf. So, you can see, I have been busy today, time to settle down on the sofa and watch Merlin now.

The dragon watches over the counter....

and the inside of the store.

My witches corner and halloween

As promised, here are some pics of my witches corner that Hywel made for me last week. He made it from scraps of wood lying around the garage and an old redundant window! The witches corner only has two sides, so it will be great to use as a background for photographing my halloween miniatures and also for the two little monsters indoors to decorate for their halloween festivities. He based it on the witches hut/cabin that he made a few months ago and which will be going on sale shortly. The walls are roughly covered in pollyfilla and then aged with the good old teabags, as usual and the floor has been covered with cherry wood floorboards.


















As you can from this photo, I have started to add some little books and a bench. What do you think of my book shelf on the wall? It is a commercially bought plate rack, which I stained and it fits my witchy books perfectly. There is also a little rat showing off his behind, as he pops through hole under the bench!!


















My little pumpkin teapot, an impulse buy on Ebay that I couldn't resist :0)

















Talking of Ebay, I have opened a new Ebay business account purely for my handmade miniatures. It is also called Bearcabinminiatures and my first few listings will be listed at 99p. Has anyone had any experience of using an Ebay business account? I was reading their policies and noticed that if you make things to sell on Ebay, it should only be through a business account, so I took a deep breath and opened one. I had 2 Ebay breaches a couple of months ago, the first was for putting in the heading 'As new' and the second for saying that 'if the item sold elsewhere before a bid was placed, that I reserved the right to withdraw the listing'. So rather than risk a further breach, I thought I had better open the new account. On the plus side, I am easier to find now, my blog, Etsy and Ebay all have the same name, but on the negative side, I am back to 0% feedback :-(

















Above is a little taste of my upcoming halloween miniatures. I only sell spooky miniatures at halloween and I have great fun making them!

Bye for now, Julia x

The Old Abbey ~ Part 2

Hywel has been busy in the garage laying the floor - the miniature floor in the Old Abbey that is!! I couldn't decide whether to use floor boards or have a flagstone floor, so poor Hywel patiently laid out the floor boards, fashioned the walls around the base so that I could an idea of what it would look like when all put together and ... I wasn't happy with it!! Good job he hadn't stuck them down was his only comment!

So, next he mixed up a tray of grey mortar compound, spread it over the base and left it to harden overnight. Yesterday, I marked out the flagstones, sanded it all down to give a worn, patchy look and sealed it with clear varnish. It looked great, but.... it didn't look right against the stone exterior walls. Too much grey.... so it was removed with a lot of mumblings and huffing and puffing from Hywel....oops!! (The garage is attached to the house and the door between the kitchen and garage is always open, so I cant escape the mutterings, if I do try, they get louder, funny that!!)

Then last night, the mutterings from the garage turned into a 'I am doing the floor and you don't get a say in it this time' Huh, I haven't been well, I am allowed to change my mind.

Anyway, I hate to admit it, but his new floor looks fab, he cut the floorboards in half length ways to make them thinner and then arranged them in a pattern. The photo doesn't do the floor justice, it does look good, (don't tell him I said so though) Once varnished it the pattern will be more visible and it looks much better against the stone exterior walls.

Next weekend, the Old Abbey blog post will be all about the stone exterior walls.

Below is a taster........

For anyone interested in Miniature churches, there is a fabalous website http://www.miniaturechurch.co.uk/ and they now have a blog St. Hilary's Miniature church

The church was made by Vic Newey and it has loads of wonderful residents and tales to tell.

Feeling off colour, normal blogging will resume next week!!

I have been unwell for the last few days with a virus, so it's been just me, our dog Maisey and a well comfy settee!! No miniatures have been stitched, so with nothing to show you all, Maisey stepped in and posed for the camera. (I cant do a post without a photo!!) I have had a few ideas though for future projects and I am thinking of running a little Halloween competition just for fun, the 'prize' being one of my halloween cushions. I would run it up until a fortnight before halloween, so that I could post the prize to the winner in time for halloween. Anyone interested in participating? It would be my way of saying thanks to all you out there who have made me feel so welcome in blogland :0)

Hubby has been busy in the garage, he has made a me a wonderful, little witches corner out of scraps and offcuts of wood. It will be great to photo my minis in and to use as a little scene for our children to decorate for halloween. When I get the chance I will take a photo and pop it on the blog. Well, that's all for now, I will be back with more news and photos next week.
Julia x

The old Abbey ~ Part 1

Before I start rambling on about my new project, I thought I would show you photos of an earlier church we made. It was a lovely church, but due to lack of room, we sold it earlier this year. It went to a lovely new home in America, where thankfully it is well loved. The exterior was old stone which I had aged and mossed and the front porch had real lead! All the stained glass windows were hand painted by yours truly and boy, did they take months! There was even a little hedgehog, sitting by on the grass on one side :0)

Inside, Hywel had laid real floorboards and I made loads of little trimmings, etc. Of course, I didn't sell my little vicar, who was made for me by Julie of Bellabelle dolls. He will take up residence in the old abbey once it is completed, although the abbey will be smaller than he is used too!! (due to the lack of space) The abbey will be just big enough for a couple of pews down each side side and of course the pulpit. Big enough for a lovely christmas display, but small enough to fit on my sideboard!

As you can see in the photos, the work on the old abbey has begun with the windows being stained and the inside walls have had a rough coat of pollyfilla. We use ready made 'shops own' pollyfilla, which is cheap enouigh and we roughly apply it with an old knife. Once dry, we then 'wash' it with cold coffee to give the old aged plaster effect. At the moment, I am trying to decide what to put on the floor. Originally, it was going to be floorboards again, like the old church, but I quite fancy old grey flagstones, I will have to have a play around with the both and then decide. The roof will be cedar shingles again, as they look the part and can easily be mossed and for the inside Hywel is busy cutting and aging wooden beams.....