Street-side

A case of elephants and dunces

Have added the remains of the garden wall for next door

and left a pile of damaged timber in the garden

down the other end of the street I’ve started on the paving …

At the gate end of the street there is the problem of two floating pieces of wall; the left-hand end piece (which I’ve already knocked off once) and the piece the other side of the gate which abruptly stops at the cut for the slice of house.

For the end piece, along with that very strange-looking red brick blob on the pavement, I’ve added a garden planter on the other side

both placed in the hope that they will provide a wider base for the next time I swipe at it with an elbow – though it might help if the planter reached the ground!

The street and the step with the big, big drop

Stepped pavement and one big drop for any unwary mini off the main curb out into oblivion

The curb is made of two pieces; I’ve rolled the top of the curb pieces to overlap the vertical pieces and give a generally softer look at the edges

It’s a long way from here to there

and from there to here

(Going to have to put something or someone on that red brick lump on the pavement I think)

Talking about brickwork, next door’s walling is built from mountboard faced both sides with textured paintwork.  I’ve inserted into to the top edge of the foam thickness bits of brick and tile to try to give the impression that the core is built from brick and plastered over.

Paving

using left over packet tops (1 mm card) from way-back when I used to make puppets

I’ve gone for stone slab paving in the street, though S thinks it looks more like crazy paving than anything, that is until I showed him on Google satellite view exactly what it was supposed to look like.  Sad to say that all the first sections of the pavements/sidewalks on most streets around where we lived have been tarred over, but the rest of the streets are very much the same.  I’d entirely forgotten about the odd sizes for curb stones though.

This paving that’s needed for Nostalgia Close is just one long strip that I felt needed a little ‘interest’ for the eye, hence the strange stepped up bit by the gate (health and safety not being a main concern in mini-land).  To keep me concentrated on the job in hand I needed some ‘interest’ for the mind and so I’ve scattered many an elephant and dunce along the way.  What am I on about?  Well, I do remember as a kid we were supposed to be careful about not stepping on the cracks but more interesting was that, if a slab of paving went right across from wall to curb stone – a dunce – then you had to jump over it.  Also an elephant had to be avoided in the same way (I think).  An elephant being one large, squarish slab with two or three small ones to fill in at its side, one above another or two very small ones side by side in place of one of the smaller.

An elephant

Which is why I was a little put out when I found, via satellite view, that the end paving of our street had been tarred, because there, just before the ankle-turning turn from one fairly steep slope onto the steep slope of the main road going down to the left, were to be found one dunce followed by at least one elephant.  Talk about one giant leap for …!  But, alas no more.

However, I’ve given the local mini kids a real problem.  Directly outside their gate is a dunce and to one side of the gate, just one step on, there are two elephants together and, of course, there are both dunces and elephants all along the line.  Have fun little ones, it beats hopscotch any day.

Up the ladder

and down the chimney

Not an earlier than usual Christmas but I have started on the up laddering and down chimney-ing.

Bricks falling out

Bricks falling in and surfaces shearing away.

Stubs of chimney pots and general bowing and cracking up at the top

Sticky fingered and having fun 🙂

Check-list first and then playtime

To do list:

• check for any damage from hammering and pins piercing through re guttering and down pipes
• see what has fallen, rolled or generally dislodged itself ‘cos of all the moving and hammering
• check all parts of lighting
• clean everywhere

I can happily report that the first two items were all OK, nothing having fallen or rolled around and, above all, no pins sticking through where they shouldn’t – thank goodness for the double skin construction.

That left the lighting and, (with fingers firmly crossed as no pins might be showing but who was to say that, despite careful placement, one or more hadn’t been knocked through any wiring)
I lit up Nostalgia Close.

Am I feeling lucky

Main ‘L’ shaped chunk of house, still in the fanned open position

and the slice of the house with the trailing cable to the ‘mains’

Luckily all seems to be working from front to middle.

The sitting room/lounge was the first room made and, with the exception of the standard lamp, needs mains for the wall and central lights, but the bedroom and attic above it are all battery lit.  The trailing extension and the mains connecting end are stored in the downstairs hallway when the house is fully docked so it doesn’t get in the way and isn’t trapped and damaged, while the stub end of the sitting room connection stays with that room.  Very messily done, I know and I’ve learned a lot since then, but for the moment it works for me.

Best check the back

Along the back of the property there’s a full height hinged panel giving access to …

bathroom

and kitchen

Phew! 

That was all such a relief that I could not resist just playing around.

At least that’s my excuse for the following views 🙂

Side of house all lit up

and again with the workroom light off.
Nice to know that, if you’ve left the milk out, you can find it at night 🙂

Hiding round the corner from the porch at the foot of the stairs – teddy bear telephone watch

Through small front bedroom, and over the landing to the bathroom

Through floating main bedroom doorway to landing, making sure that temperamental lamp is still working

and through the doorway of the back bedroom to that bathroom again

Through kitchen door down the entrance hallway

and one of my favourite views even though it’s the one that can only be accessed by camera, through the dining room hatchway to the kitchen

I enjoyed that and am now set-up to return to the work on the chimneys and the next door walling, then I’ll do the cleaning through out.

Crack open the egg

Earlier today, before closing the door on the Potting Shed, I reckoned it would be a good idea to check I hadn’t left the parts of the house docked in case they’d stuck together with the matt varnishing work and also to have a first look at what damage/dislodging might have been going on while pins were being hammered in on the outside, then I could draw up a list of works to do for the next session.

I had left the two pieces parked together as it turned out and had to jiggle the slice of house a little to separate it off.  (Memory of sieve these days.)

What I got when the slice came free was a bit of a fan shape. Reminds me a little of the Victorian cardboard pop-up houses

 

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Link to an example of reproduction of Victorian/Edwardian pop-up house