It's a small world

Well, COLD happened. It always does, sooner or later, and this year, it sure was later. I mean, here we are in November, and we're just now starting to get the Autumn feel?! It's a good thing, really, the change to the cooler weather...it's just that...I hate going out to The Gabby House when it's cold like this. And this is nothin' compared to a month from now when there could be snow and ice on the ground...YIKES!

Yes, I have heat out there, but I keep it to a minimum; just enough so things don't freeze. But, to actually play out there I need to crank the heat up for a good 20 minutes or so before said playtime...and in order to do that, I have to go out in the cold, into the the cold Gabby House, crank the heat, and then come back in the house to wait for it to warm up out there.

I know, I know, we all should have such hardships to complain about!

Since I haven't been out to play in The Gabby House for quite some time, I have been playing with my African violets in my house. Now, you may think African violets have no place being in a minis blog, but you know what? There are such things as MINI African violets..(see photos above). The three plants pictured are Allegro's Winsome Pink, Baby Doll(with no blossoms) and the trailer is Pixie Blue. I apologize for having so little bloom on these plants; that's partly due to my recent monthly grooming session, but mostly due to the fact that I just got the idea to post photos of these plants in this entry!

The definition/description of a mini African violet is that it must be less than 6" around. In a show the judges actually use an embroidery hoop (6")to ascertain whether or not a particular plant is eligible for a ribbon. Also, generally the size of the leaves are smaller than a standard A.v. Pretty much, if you buy an A.v. at a local supermarket, or garden center, you will most likely be buying a standard; rarely a mini. ( For anything unusual, you really need to mail order from some of the A.v. vendors that are online.)

I don't know when I'll be getting out to the Gabby House again; Prolly not til I get in the winter mode and get used to the cold weather. I do have a project I am planning to begin soon, here in the house. I'll talk more about it in my next post, when I also will tell you a little about the miniature show I went to a couple of weeks ago.

Give Me One More Shot

This is sort of a P.S. To the last post. As you may or may not know, I am not a computer whiz...hee hee, and I seem to have a great deal of trouble loading photos to show with my posts. This last go 'round, I was only able to load 4, I think, but I have two more that go with that subject. Here they are.

I looked through my posts pertaining to the Birdhouse house, and I can't find any thing about how the gigantic snake that's hanging out in the back of the house came to be there. I may have told my sister, but now I'm telling you.

When I first began to work on the house, I was trying to fill in gaps with Paperclay(not Celluclay.) I had a long, thin line rolled out to fill in a gap that ran along the length of the back,(where the back wall came out.) One minute it was a long thin line of clay, and the next, when I looked at it, it had morphed into a snake! I did nothing to this piece of clay; I didn't put a crimp in his tail, I didn't make his eye; they both just appeared. Really. All I can think of is that Rene (my ghost)played a trick on me.(He used to use one side of the Gabby house before it was the Gabby house as a work shop.) Who knows, maybe he still hangs out there from time to time.

And no, this is not a story to get you in the mood for Halloween! But anyway, I like the snake, so he's staying. I guess you could say he's like a guard snake to Polly and Pauly.

The other photo is a close-up of the roof. I just used broken pieces of shingling and just glued them on. Again, the shingle material is just stained that way; I don't do anything to it.

Ok, so that's all I have on the Birdhouse-house. Now back to our regularly scheduled Addams family house, A.K.A. My creepy dollhouse.

Deja Vu

I know you've seen the before photos before, but since all good home re-habs should have before and after shots, I now also offer the after photos. Not bad for a little $3.49 birdhouse I bought at Michaels, eh? Ok, so it's not 100% yet; I have a little touch up to do on the snake, as well as the base of the house, but it's pretty much finished.(Yaaay!) And I do mean finished.

Is It Over Yet?

Sometimes I hesitate to post photos of stuff that I haven't finished, or still have to work on. Since I usually work on more than one project at a time, however, it sometimes seems as if they'll never get done. But if I were really strict and didn't show you WIPs,* then you'd never get any photos! And anyway, very often, as we all know, a project might never really be truly 'finished,' so I might as well show you the struggles along the way. It is after all, about the journey, isn't it?

The only trouble with that, is, is that I am very slow to accomplish anything. I dilly. I dally. I paint. I re-paint. I painted this staircase three different times before I decided on its final colors!!! ( And I still have to touch up the 'wood' part.)

*Work In Progress

Our House

I've been trying to find another occupant for The birdhouse-house; I just didn't want Polly to live alone. I bought another Polly Pocket, but there's only room for one bed, and even if the other Polly Pocket was her sister, I didn't want them to sleep in the same bed. ( I cannot imagine sleeping in the same bed as one of my sisters.)

Unfortunately, the 'community' of Polly Pocket seems to be Amazonian in their approach to life; it doesn't have any guys in the group, so I have had to 'invent' one. Introducing...Pauly Pocket. Pauly is Polly's boyfriend, and although he doesn't live with Polly all the time, he's a frequent visitor. Very. Frequent.

( I'm still not totally happy with Polly & her beau living here. I think they're a little small for the place. I might move them to another house...when I finish it.)

I got you, Babe

Yes, she certainly did. it seems Kate from
http://girlsavage.wordpress.com has tagged me. Yeah, I definitely feel like a cool kid now, myself.

O. K. So here's the deal. I write out 6 things about myself...and then tag someone else. 6 someone elses, in fact.

1.I read about 1-2 books a week.

2.I have a dog and three cats.

3.I am a pretty good shot with a bow and arrow.

4.I have lived in four different states, and about 15 different towns.

5.I laugh at everything(especially myself)

6.I love to play the slots at casinos.

Hmmm,uh, all have is Gina...so I tag Gina. What say you Gina?

(Just so you know, this is not a usual post. We return to our regularly scheduled blog tomorrow, or, whenevah.)

True Colors

Yesterday I was in Michaels', and what do you think I found? a tub of 18 clear squeeze bottles to put paint in. And it was on clearance for less than $4.00. There were two tubs left and I bought both of them, giving me 36 bottles in all. The only trouble is that each bottle is 4 oz, and all I need is 2 oz. But that's o.k. I can actually see what the color looks like easily. Plus, no more I-forgot-to-flip-the-bottle-lid-shut scenario.

I 'posed' the bottles around the picture, just because I like it. It was a book cover off a book by an author who wrote inspirational fiction more than 70 years ago. I loved reading her books when I was a young woman; still do.

After I had transferred a lot of the paints into the bigger containers, I began to paint the birdhouse-house! Wheee! The basic color is dark olive green, and the window trims are purple. Then I have gold trim in there, too. I goofed, though, because you can see where the white of the walls I installed inside show in the windows. I remember Miss Gina mentioning something about painting something a while ago, and making sure the unpainted side did not show out the other side thru the windows. There's no way to fix it, unless I put trim inside the windows as more window trims....that's a lot of fuss, tho. As The English call it, that's getting 'fiddly.'