What Wonderful Kind Friends Part 3!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This mornings post man bought a part 3 to my blog posts!!

Firstly a HUGE Box addressed to Lola, should have seen her face again, she hadnt even finished getting ready for school , hair all uncombed but she just HAD to open it! The lovely Janice from http://onbeingaminimum.blogspot.com/ had sent Lola a whole range of goodies to help her on her way to getting all her list together for her Brambly House. Full of mini furniture and lots more she was over the moon and will be posting it all on her blog later after school !
Janice thankyou so much for your kindness and for my treasures too. In the box was a tub for me so I wouldnt feel left out full of beautiful little witches perfume/ potion bottles , just perfect for me as its one thing I hate to make, I just get glued up every time so thanks Janice they are perfect. Not only that but also some precious little mandrakes for the conservatory too. SO thoughtful!
Another box arrived with my new Hats I ordered from Kat from her new creations on Etsy. I couldnt resist the new weaved hats and bought the shell sea witch hat, and a similar one with feathers, and one with roses. They are all simply beautiful thankyou Kat, and also Kat had popped in a gift for me of little witches slippers, in leather with little fringes and buckles, OOoh love them! None of my witches have shoes so a great new addition. A bag of fruit and a hat for Lola too, thanks Kat your a star!

Today I'm making something for Lola and also up in the loft trying to get things to sell to save for some mini purchases Im desperate to add to my collection. The loft is heaving with things and although I hate listing on ebay needs must , so off to work!!
Thanks again girls!!

What Wonderful Kind Friends Part 2!

A Couple of days ago the postman came again! John is like 'What have you been buying now!' and I'm sure doesn't believe its just my pals spoiling us all the time and I haven't actually bought anything! !!

Well this time is was 2 parcels, one for Lola and one for me!! Lola was absolutely chuffed to bits and her little face lit up when she opened u her goodies but you can read about that later on her own blog!
The parcels were from the lovely Michelle http://wwwmichellesmadworld.blogspot.com/ and her super Mum Jill and were packed with lots of exciting minis for us both!

My parcel had the most fancy, witches hats, ideal for my 'Witchy Hollow ' hat shop project. I have loads of Kat's hats as you know, they are incredibly addictive and I bought myself another set last night, my finger just zooms to that buy it now button when Kat starts on a new style of Hat!! So to complement them beautifully are these new hats made by Michelle and her mum Jill. Arnt they wonderful!

Michelle also gave me 2 little boxes and made me 2 fancy books for the Potter house! She knows how much I love books and anything wizardy or spooky! One has a jewelled spider on it and the other a spooky face coming out of the cover! I LOVE them!!

So huge thank you and hug from me to you both for all your time and kind thoughtfulness!

Blogging is such fun and we have made such kind, talented and generous friends and everyone is always willing to put themselves out for you which in this day and age is such a rarity. Its why we love this hobby so much too!
THANK YOU !!!!!!!

Thanks to everyone for their comments on the Swap with Ara. Yes i can make things when I want to but for 3 reasons i tend not to as much as I should!
One, I have little time with 3 little ones and 2 teenagers to run around after!
Secondly, Im lazy, one of my many faults!! and Thirdly, as i've said before it gives me so much pleasure to include my friends work and talent in my projects and not just things Ive made myself! Its abit like cooking a Sunday roast! I can cook a lovely one and everyone else eats it up and loves it to bits but I dont enjoy my own meal and would much rather get taken out for dinner! lol!!!

Also just to say apparantly some peoples dashboard arnt updating my blog posts as they go on, so you may have missed recent posts as they arnt all showing up.

More Pics of My Dormouse !

Lola and I are fighting over the PC to do our posts for you, if you havnt checked out her fair report yet please do, it has some great pics and she has been busy compiling it!! She loves to write!
Here are 2 better pics of my new Dormouse by Jain Squire, superb isnt she!! Oooh I so want the rest of the set badly now. When Jain and Julie get back, I may have to give them my wish list!!!
Mad Hatter ( 1 for me, a different style for Lola!!!!!!!!!!!!)
Mad March Hare
White Rabbit
Cheshire Cat
The Red Queen
The White Queen
The Caterpillar

That should keep them both busy. Now I just have to go raid Johns garage again for more car bits to sell....shhh dont tell him!!!!!

Our Love of Books both big and Small

John and I both love books, we have many many bookcases full! John loves the old ones, and scours charity shops and car boot sales for lovely old books he remembered as a child!
He loves to have the bookshelves full of old, beautifully covered antique books.
I do too, but being a miniaturist I eye them up , not just to read or to just admire but with a different motive in mind!!

Alot of these old books make fantastic and cheap miniature books. One book can make me up to 20 or so mini ones with beautiful covers!

Now dont get me wrong, alot of these books are far too precious to cut up , and it would be sacrilege to do so but now and then you find the odd one with faults with it like a damaged spine or writing in it etc
Yesterday John came home pleased as punch with a lovely old copy of Jules Verne's '20,000 leagues Under the Sea', an old Boys book.
Straight away I was eyeing up the gorgeous cover, red with black and gold detailing and the pages were gold leaf. 'Don't even think about it' he told me. Hmm spoil spoilt!!

Anyway I wondered why it is was so cheap at £1.49 and on looking at it abit closer found the reason to be half the pages had fallen out so big chunks of the story were missing

Yippe so that meant I could have it, no good to have a unreadable story after all!
So last night whilst watching Midsommer Murders, i got out my wonderful Hobbycraft laptop workstation, turned on the little halogen light and got to work.

I have read a tutorial that suggest just using thick old book covers to cut strips off, using the outer edge for the book spines for mini books that are just to be put on shelves . The edge of a thick covered book of about 2 -3mm just then looks like a book spine when on a shelf and you can decorate with a gold pen to make the detailing on it. . But with such a wonderful design for a cover, I ended up carefully peeling off the entire fabric cover, then using cardboard to make a new book sleeve and covering it with the material. Here's some pics of the process and how some of the books turned out.
Once the cover is made I then cut my pages. The outer edge was gold leaf so this gives a great effect for the mini books! Thats part of the beauty also as the pages are already aged and stained so no tea staining process necessary! Im so lazy anything for quickness and ease!

Cutting paper straight with just scissors is a nightmare as you cant get all the pages even and lined up! I need to look into a guillotine or some sort of cutting tool. If anyone makes books and knows of an easy way to cut paper evenly Id be thrilled to learn from you! Instead for now I just measure my book page size, cut a chunk of paper with scissors and then cut into the width of paper I want. I then glued the spine of the paper pieces onto the spine of the book, pressed while drying between more real size heavy books and voila , here are a few I made last night!

The cover should give me about 10 books I reckon. These will go on Dumbledore's shelves. I'm going to need loads so I am going to be buying some as well as making some myself as I get bored easily lol!

So now I need some more great books like this, in shades of red, blue, brown etc with exciting covers such as this one. Car boot season is starting so Ill be on the rummage for them!

John has a remarkable book about Lawrence of Arabia which has the most beautiful cover in cream and gold with wonderful embossed designs on the cover but I wouldnt dare touch it!!!!!!!!

I forgot to take a pic of the book before beginning. As always , too impatient to get started , but the picture here is more or less the same book in blue. My favourite book I made is the tall thin one with the entire '20,000 leagues under the Sea' on its cover. This was the part of the book spine originally.
I have also cut out the larger title portion on the book cover with the same writing and glued it onto a piece of card. I'm now going to frame this and it will be used as wall hanging. Goodness knows where but it looks good!

For once I have enjoyed making the little closed books. I love to make open ones. I recently spent a bomb on some new paper for making these , to have thinner pages but the paper came and was virtually the same as my own printer paper so what a waste of money. If Nikki is reading this, i think making mini books, both open and closed would be a great subject for her wonderful Question and answer blog as I only know my own way of doing it and find some bits quite tricky. I'm sure there is an easier way to make both open and closed books and would love any tips or tutorials to help out. In the mean time these will do and were fun to make! hope you like them.

When I come back from KDF, Ill show you other things Ive made recently.

Off now to see if I can buy Lola a new outfit for tomorrow, well a girl has to look her best!!

My final Fantastic Doll before the Show

Well I did tell you all, Id be really naughty and bought 3 dolls before the show, so here he is, the 3rd of my wonderful new dolls to show off to you all!
Here is my very own Dumbledore made by the incredibly talented Jain of Giddy Kipper Dolls of course!
When Jain returned from Minitura she posted a picture of her stall on her blog and I thought I could spy him amongst the dolls.
When I emailed Jain she told me , yes she had made a Dumbeldore for the show and he had created masses of interest but lucky for me had not yet sold! She was going to take him to Kensington but I didn't want to loose out on him if I couldn't get there in time so treated myself early!
Now I always have had a picture in my head of how Dumbeldore would dress and I have never cared for the costume designers choice of hats for him in the films as I like a wizard to be a wizard and have a pointy hat, I'm funny like that! So although he had a small cap like hat Jain very kindly agreed to please this fussy woman and rehat him !
I think he looks fantastic , I love his robes and he has fantastic boots on too under his robes!
He comes complete with this fabulous owl podium with candles for when he is in the Grand Hall!
Here he is by his desk. I was waiting to show you a picture of him by his new desk and chair that is being made for me but it is not yet finished so for now he is at home as the room is!
I love him to bits thank you Jain. Both he and the other main characters will be the only ones true to the books in the house as all the other professors are my own characters as I would have them if I could create my own for a book!
Lots of plans for that room still. as I say , new desk and chair coming. And then the huge wall to wall bookcase with a secret! And of course all the many books for the shelves I have yet to make, though not my favourite pastime, I prefer making ones that are open .

In the last few days I have been busy making miniatures but none that can be shown yet! I have been making something little to pop in with the giveaway prize winners parcels for their houses/projects. All should be ready to go tomorrow to you all!

Also a most exciting swap with Ara for her Adams house and my Sweeney house. Our last swap was so wonderful so I emailed Ara to see if she wanted to do another. We both finished about the same time and were both over the moon with what we had made. Like little children we were emailing each other to say how happy we were and how well the creations had gone!! I found this one of the most rewarding miniatures Ive made to date as it is very exclusive to Ara and her project. Normally any wizardy, spooky items I make can be put in a range of houses but this is only suitable for Ara's house! It was one of those things that you find difficult to part with and Ara felt the same with hers to me too, so we are both really excited for the postman to come! Should take a week to 10 days I suppose, wonder who's comes first! I do hope it makes it there in one piece as some parts were quite delicate! So all top secret, no clues, you'll have to wait and see !! Swaps are such fun!


I am busy writing a list for Kensington today, though I'm sure once there it will go out of the window and my heart will choose what it likes!Hope what little is in is in my pocket matches that though! I have not got as much as Id like in my fair fund but what matters is I'm going to my first ever fair which to me is incredibly exciting, and have the added bonus of meeting so many people that I can only email or blog to, for the first time in person!! That's the biggest treat of all! Oh and Kat and I are very much looking forward to what the restaurant cake stand has to offer with our coffee too!
Will be taking my camera so will come back with lots of pictures I hope and also I hope some goodies too!

And the Celebration Giveaway Winners are............................

Drumroll please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Congratulations to not 2, but 3 blogging friends on our 200th celebration giveaway!

Firstly I put in all our 204, it is now, followers names into a random name picker website . I could not face writing out the names onto pieces of paper as Lola wanted me too for picking from a hat!!!

So the Lucky winner is Christel Jensen of http://christeljensen.blogspot.com/
Christel please send me your postal address for me to send on your miniature projects book and Dolls House World magazine and I do hope you have fun reading them and find lots of useful information for your many wonderful projects. Christel makes the most beautiful of Miniatures and I hope the articles in both magazines give her some new ideas to try out that we can all see!

And the winner or should I say winners of the Name Choosing prize and the great Alice books are

Jody from http://peachblossomhill.blogspot.com/ for the fantastic and so suited name of Gertrude or Gertie for short!! We all just loved it and think it suits her down to a tea!!!!

Reading through the posts with the great suggestions I also loved the suggestion by Jamie of http://creepycreations.blogspot.com/ for the last name of Hagood as she is a good witch after all. So as I also think she has a touch of the wee Scot in her I'm going to call her Gertie Mc Hagood!!

Hope you all like it, she has a very big smile on her face so I know she does!!

So please both of you send me your postal addresses and I will put your prizes in the post to you. Hoping the volcano ash doesn't delay them too much to getting to you all!

Jody, I know you and Joanna will love the book, it has some lovely pictures in it! Jamie, I know Kaylie will love the book, I went out today and bought another for you as just couldn't have the one name without the other, it suited her so well!
Thank you all for taking part, I'm sure there will be another if I'm lucky enough to soon add more Dolls to my collection!

Now as to why Gertie McHagood has a link to Alice in Wonderland in the first place!!

When I bought Gertie, Julie sent me an email to say that in my parcel was a little stowaway! Totally bemused I opened the tiny package of tissue paper and was completely taken aback to find Julie had given me the most beautiful and thoughtful gift!

Here she is, my very own miniature Alice! She is in between 1 12th and 1 24th scale so she really is a full size Alice that has drunk some of the shrinking potion!
Julie put in a delightful note from Alice herself telling me that she had sat at home on return from Minitura feeling sad and lonely and when she saw my blog posting on having a tea party, she demanded that Julie send her off to me in time for it!!
Well, Not only is she in time, Alice will be helping me plan and create the tea party table setting so watch this space for all that to come!
In the mean time today I made a stack of books and placed on it a stool( this will be for the Dormouse eventually!) for Alice to sit on for you all to see! Isn't she precious. I was quite emotional at such a kind and generous gift so thank you so so much Julie! Alice has very good home and cant wait for more of the tea party to come to life! I'm sure she'll send you all an invite when the time is right!!

That was fun!!

The Best Hats Ever!!

I love love love my new hats from Kat the Hat! Check out this beautiful Blue and purple steampunk witch hat and also the wonderful brown colour one with a netted train. Thank you Kat, these really are superb and my witches Hat shop will look all the better for them! Will be fiddling with the window display soon with pics to show.
I did have another hat but it seems to have disapeared..........I wonder where to!!!

2 more days til the name game giveaway is chosen so keep those names flooding in, more than 1 if you like! I will be asking my girls which name they think suits her the most!

Thankyou all for your lovely comments on Lola's blog, she is over the moon and I can see lots of postings as its really given her confidence and shes eager to get going! Your all great!

Our Daughter Lola's New Blog! Please check it out!

Well after much nagging I have finally got around to setting up Lola's new blog dedicated to her Miniature projects.

Princess Lola's Miniature Diary http://princeslolasminiaturediary.blogspot.com/

Lola is 8 years old and therefore all her posts will go through me as her Mum to make sure everything is A, OK! But Lola will be coming up with all the ideas and writing the posts herself.
She is an extremely good writer and English is her best subject at school together with art so that artistic streak she has picked up and love of anything to do with crafts and miniatures must be inbred! She is always on the PC writing stories and poems and has wanted to start a blog for some time.

When I bought her the little 2 story room box recently we thought this was the ideal project for her to start blogging. At first she fancied a hat shop but it was too big for this and has now acquired an old room box of mine for this very theme, so that is still to come! Not any old hat shop but a fantasy style one full of wild and wonderful designs of hat.

But the subject she has chosen for her New 2 story room box is the Brambly hedge Mice! Lola has the set of books and these inspired her to make this project a little mouse house!
So if you'd like to watch the makings of this and Lola's other projects and musings please make her day and follow her blog