Im almost completed.  I still need to make or buy some door knobs, and build some steps for the front door.  I am sort of glad this house is almost completed.  I have a new idea of keeping with my Gnome Cottages when building houses.  After watching the new movie The Smurfs which was a cartoon i loved as a kid.  I want to start making little Mushroom Gnome Cottages, sort of like the Mushroom Houses in the Smurf Movie.  But my own take on them,  i want to be able to build a home quicker and have a line of different Mushroom Gnome Houses that i can produce to sell.  I hope you all enjoy the picures of the English Cottage.  Have a Happy New Year Everyone!

I think this is one of my favorite corners of the house, i really like the moss i added throughout the stones.

I tried to go very inexpensive for the interior, and i used paper sheets for scrapbooking from Hobby Lobby for the wall paper throughout the house.  Plus the ceiling is decorative raised paper.

I didnt have the money to buy a kitchen.  So i used some old cabinets i had, and one old stove, that i turned into the end cabinet with the tiled front.  I wanted a very old distressed look in the kitchen, so it might look like its been around for 100 years. 

The old stove i turned into the end cubboard.

I needed a light fixture for the new house, so i took a Christmas ornament off the tree and turned it into a chandalier for the dinning room area.  I just took off the crystals and wired three lights to it and painted it white, and some brown aging.

The first question that a friend asked me is were does the stairs lead to, because you would fall out of the house.  I said this is my interpertation of the house being cut open, and you are not seeing the whole house.  The interior of the home was small with no walls or anything, so i did the best i could and building walls to make room throughout the house.

I tried to get an old looking fire place, but the paint crakled a little to much.  But i decided to leave it the way it is.  I just noticed in this picture that i forgot to add the logs in the fire.  That will have to be a later project.

I actually had alot of fun aging the grandfather clock.  It was a light beige, and i added some white paint to crackle and then aged it with brown paint and scraped some edges.

I finally made alot of progress this weekend on my newest Cottage.  Last weekend I added all the paper rocks which took me about 3 days to carve the wet paper and try to make look like stones.  And all week for the paper to dry.  I'm not very good with the painting, and I continue to struggle with painting and making the stones look like stones.  I still need to work on the roof.  I'm trying to get a Hay look.  I spent about 3 hours painting the doors and windows Saturday.  I used a crackle finish to give them an aged look.  I think these stones are my best so far out of the other cottages Ive completed.  I used a different technique in how I applied the ground paper.  I hope you all like what if done so far.  Plus I got a little distracted today, and decided to build a bird house for the back yard, so the birds can have a house by the bird feeder.  You can see the Bird House I created below these photos.  I got a little carried away in the garage building the bird house in which I thought it would only take a couple hours.  But after seven hours of working I built it a little to big, and it turned out to be a BIRD MANSION.  Hopefully next weekend I can get it painted.  I'm thinking Colonial Red with a black roof and White shutters and trim.   

I hope everyone has a wonderful December and Christmas Holiday.

Merry Christmas!

Love Stan 

This is what happens when I think I'm bored, and I want to work on something other than my miniature houses.  I ended up using wood rulers for the shutters, and an old door that was supposed to be for on of my Gnome Homes.  I am so tired right now from working on this all day, I cant get up from the couch, which makes it perfect for me to upload these picures to you right now.

I plan to build it onto a big wood post with a bird feeder below the house.  Ill post more pictures when the work progresses next weekend.

Holiday Decorating the House

Sorry that I havent published any new miniature pictures yet!  I spent the past 2 weekends decorating the house for the upcoming Holiday's  I love to have it completed by Thanksgiving so I can relax the whole holiday seasons.  I think im almost done, i decided this year i wont put a tree in every bedroom.  Im getting to tired to complete it all.  But i just wanted to show you what i have been doing the past couple of weeks and what ive done with wrapping garland around everything and stuffing the garland with $ store poinsettas, and trying to be creative on the cheap side.  I will hopefully get a chance this upcoming weekend to work on my newest miniature home.  In most of my miniatures i love adding Christmas Staff to the miniature homes, it all derives from my love of Christmas and sort of represents how i would decorate my home. Ill post progress on the miniature house soon.  Have a great month everyone!