Door Knob and Porch Pillars!

In my stash, there was a set of leftover drawer pulls from making one of SDK's fantastic kits last year, so one became a a door knob for the front door of House 1 today. I'm positive I have more drawer pulls/micro beads, but so far haven't located them. I have enough in the set I found for the front door of all three houses, so at least they'll all match.







After that short burst of fun, it was time to make pillars for the porches. In an excess of caution given the roofing debacle/s, I then re-counted the pilot house to make sure I had enough.  Sure enough, one per house short. Since I had the material and it goes pretty fast using the handy-dandy wire-straightener and template Michael custom-made for me, I then made more pillars, just in case. Lots more. (In the back of my head is dancing the concept of putting together a house all of all the bits and pieces I have. Not sure I have enough parts to pull it off, but it could be a a fun challenge.)

Feeling productive, I started putting in windows and frames on House 3, which is still not very photogenic and gets less fun the longer it lasts. Still, keeping the houses roughly in the same sequence of construction makes sense to me, so long as the first one is far enough along to prevent pitfalls on the others. Along the way, I turned to Michael for advice on the structural issue that has been delaying construction. He, of course, had a splendid idea we'll try out soon. Here's a sneak peak of the first installment.

Onward!

Yo-Yo Mode

There was other stuff going on today that I figured would prevent me from taking up where I'd left off yesterday so I thought I could sneak in assembling the roof for House 2, since it was already completely shingled. The roof goes together so pleasingly and quickly, I figured I could do that in between the other stuff—and take good step-by-step photos for the instructions, in the event that anyone else ever tries to assemble one of these houses. Ha.

First, I discovered that, somehow, I shingled the wrong side of not one, but TWO roof planes. I still have no clue how that could have happened, especially after my vigilance from the first time that happened on House 1. Still, it was fairly easily recovered from, as the intact pieces fit pieces in House  3 that hasn't yet been started. Now, I only hope that the new shingles winging their way to me from home match the color.   

After shingling those two planes (again), the assembly did go pretty quickly, and the process is indeed very pleasing. Still, it was frustrating, to say the least, to find that I'd AGAIN made a pretty fundamental error, and one that I was on the lookout for, to boot. The roof is complicated, but not THAT complicated. Still, it's neat to see the two completed They look great, even when you know how much I goofed up in the process. 

Mailboxes! (And Some Other More Boring Prep Stuff)

 All three houses have flooring on the first and second floors, plus flooring set aside for the sunrooms. I got a little carried away with the accuracy thing and made it so the flooring on the first floor matches the way the real flooring runs: front to back until the kitchen and sunroom and then side to side there.

House 2 has all its windows and curtains.

Next up: bandboard and brick. By the time I have House 1 dressed with those, the moment of truth will have arrived for the lighting and testing the new approach to the bays.

For fun, I made mailboxes to match the one by the front door and put them on all the front sides.

This shows the mailboxes on House 1 with curtains, House 2 without curtains (they were there by the end of the day), and House 3 without windows (yet). Now, I'm thinking about how to get a flag in the right scale. I have something that will work as a flagpole, so only need a flag now. Suggestions?

Sunday: Still More Painting

I realized as I was assembling the roof for House 1 that the roof and attic plane would show under the gables, and consequently should be grey, not the white I used as primer. I've already touched under the gables of the completed roof, but that was sort of a retrofit, and doing it right meant painting the others before starting assembly.


Since I was going to be painting all of the roof planes for Houses 2 and 3, I went ahead and painted some of the bits that will be needed for porches, like railings, the header for the porch, and the decorative corner trim where the sides come together.












Plus,  and this didn't escape my notice, having painted railings made possible finishing the roof of House 1 by installing the bit of railing on the small gable. Not having that in place has been bugging me. Of course, it's just a bit too big now, since the original measurements didn't account for the shingles (sigh), so as I was working on the railing, I realized I need to shave it a bit to make the fit just right. Or come up with another solution. Still thinking about that one... so it's built, but not attached. For now.

The rest of the day was working on putting in the window glass for House 2. Didn't quite finish and still need curtains. The "glass" is all cut now, at least, and putting it on goes fast. Still need to cut and attach the curtains, and then House 2 will be ready for assembly, I think, as soon as I figure out where to drill for the lighting and get that done. Oh, and paper the floors. That will be tomorrow, too, I think.

Slowly And Surely

There's another reason for keeping the houses in sync that came to me today as I was working on House 2, inserting the doors and windows and their frames/trim. As I do enough of these, I'm developing facility with some of the tasks, and it only makes sense to capitalize on that as I go. As soon as the shingles arrive, I'll go ahead and shingle House 3's roof, for example. I updated the instructions as I went including some of the things I've learned about what works and what doesn't. I'm not sure the instructions will ever have much use after this, but it seems a shame not to record the information while I have it. I certainly have lost a lot between the pilot house and now, though I thought at the time I was taking pretty good notes. Live and learn! I didn't quite finish all four sides of House 2, but I made good headway. 

One thing surprised me a bit: I kept discovering more places that needed to be trimmed in the grey and blue around the edges. The gables,for example, including those on House 1's already-assembled roof. After adding that trim to House 2, I went back and trimmed up  House 1. Good thing I ordered lots of extra Bristol board for the bandboard and highlight trim... it looks like I'll be needing it.  I'll be ready for House 3.

The color seems ok, if not great, so I'm plowing ahead. 

Still More Painting; Friday's Progress

Most of this day was spent painting and repainting. I haven't posted many pictures of that because of color fidelity on different monitors, but am now declaring victory on this. The current color has to be good enough, despite all my frustrations with it. On the blue lid is House 3 with the trimmed back wall (minus the sunroom) from House 1 sitting on top for comparison. On the red lid is the back wall from the pilot house, which is probably a better color match for the real house. It's distinctly more beige and less pink than the color is coming out here; the only question I have is whether the current color of the pilot house is a feature of aging. It's entirely possible it started out the color of my efforts here, and faded over time. Maybe.  Either way, it's going to have to do; it's time to move on. Next up:  applying the windows, doors, frames, etc. on these two houses. I'm doing that both to keep the houses relatively in sync with each other and because the "answer" hasn't dropped out of the sky yet on the best approach to the lighting and bay window assemblies. 

Because I was so fretted about having forgotten the proper assembly order for the small bay on Roof 1, I went ahead and assembled its counterpart for House 2. Forgetting, of course, to put the window frame, glass and trim in before gluing the wings on the bay. Sigh.  I managed to get them installed after the gluing without too much difficulty and will definitely make a note for the next one that the trimming happens before gluing on the wings, which happens before installing the entire assembly into the roof. 

Finally, Roof 2 is all shingled!  So, one foot in front the other, progress is becoming visible. Yay!

First Roof (Almost) Done!

The first steps.
 

In progress. 

Since I'm still musing about what to do about the paint color, and I haven't done anything yet to plan the lighting (or drilled holes in the bases for the wires), I reverted to assembling the first roof. I went with the Blenderm surgical tape, and am at least so far really happy with the results.  I did add glue to the ridge lines when I added the ridge caps in part for added stability and in part because the ridge cap weren't staying attached very well. 





  

Almost done!

It went together really smoothly with the tape. Of course it helps that, by now, I truly understand the roof and how it goes together. Everyone else (and especially eldest daughter) in my family has a great sense of spatial and geometric thinking. Take my word, it didn't come from me. She put together the first roof, and if she hadn't, I'd probably still be struggling over it. As it is, now I get it and was able to assemble this without much stress.

TA DA! (note missing railings in front of small gable)

I remembered (belatedly) the order of construction of the roof beneath the small gable on the front of the house.  For the NEXT house, I'll do it the easier, smarter way that will probably have a better result. Live and learn.

I didn't install the railings because they're not painted yet, despite all the painting I've done. None of the railings (the majority of which are part of the porch assembly) are painted yet. They're very fragile and I didn't want to lose or damage them. When I'm ready to do the porch, I'll paint all at once. This is the completed next  to the roof from the pilot house, which does have the railings in front of the gable. 

From the top. Yay!!