A cupboard under the (new) stairs

A little more than a year ago I started making a straight run staircase for the cottage  (Building stairs). After a month I discovered some problems so I changed the staircase to one with a 90 degree turn both on the top and on the bottom (Struggling with stairs ...)
I knew I still had some work to do, especially since I didn't know at the time how to do the handrail and balustrade.
After I put the cottage together again last week, I spend some time researching that. There was the fact that the stairs consisted of different parts of previous made stairs and definately looked that way. Also I figured that the staircase didn't need a turn on the bottom any more ;)

I decided to make a new staircase (a) You already figured that out, didn't you? ^^
While I was at it, I thought about the space under the staircase. Being a huge Harry Potter fan, it wasn't hard to come up with an idea. A nice cupboard under the stairs with storage space for Bianca, as a wink to the Boy Who Lived ;)

Set photo by www.catterflyworx.com

So, after taking some measurements and checking and double checking I started all over.
I've used plywood for the side where the door will be. It's the same 4 mm plywood that I've used for all the cottage walls. The other side, which will be glued to the wall between the entrance hall and the kitchen, is 3 mm Balsa.

Just checking if the opening is still wide enough for the new stairs :)

The treads and risers are 2,5 mm Balsa. Most of the risers are already glued in place. The turn at the top was the hardest. And I needed to figure out where the bannister on the bottom of the staircase should be.

I'd brought some spindle, bannisters, handrail etc at WAM miniaturen, which arrived soon.

Now I have a better understanding of how to do the handrail and the ballustrade, though I've decides not to make it before I'll have checked if the staircase fit 100% next week :) That's when the walls will be glued together. Yay ;)

But I could already finish the door. This time with hinges, but not the hard (and realistic) way; I just put them on the outside. And even that was hard enough  ^^ Glued them with superglue and them I snapped the ends of the nails and glued the head on the hinges for decorative purpose only.

Next I experimented with colours and structures for that wall. Top is a mix of grey structure with plain white paint, middle the same with a bit of bird sand for more structure, and the bottom one has a bit bit of azure blue paint added.
Eventhough I liked the bottom one very much, it might be a bit too much structure for the small wall and door, so I've chosen the one at the top.
But I'll keep the other in mind, maybe for an outside wall?

I finished it off with some Balsa slats (1,5 mm), oak stained, and a door knob.

Maybe I'll decide later to do some aging on the wall, but for now I'm very happy with the result. Let's keep my fingers crossed that the staircase will fit perfectly between the other walls.
Monday my dad will come help me so the walls can finally be fixed in place. Very exciting and also a bit worrying (a)

Progress on the terracotta shawl

I thought I'd show you my progress on the new crochet shawl I started a week ago. Even though I've been busy working on the cottage doors (and I can't crochet for more than ten minutes at the time) I made progress :)
Still love the colour and the pattern a lot!

Last week

This weekend two dear friends came to visit me. It's a once a year visit and I had a great day. One of them gave me this marvelous little music box. The box is gorgeous, I think, and maybe I can place it somewhere in the cottage as a trunk. 

She'd also found me some spindels and stair-banisters. Very convenient since my cottage stairs still need those :)

And it plays 'Hedwig's theme' <3

Video by Invenio Crafts

Update on Hogsmeade house

It's long overdue, but I finally have figured out how to solve the different problems that kept popping up :) Or that's what I hope.

I figured that I could better change plans now, before the walls would be glued together. In the end it will be just a little bump along the road, right?
First there was the problem with the stairs.

 

Having solved that, I discovered that the doors on the attic landing would be very small and a bit too low, though that could probably work since it's a cottage, right? ;)
Also I thought it might be very hard to fit two beds in the room, with that roof above.

 It's exciting to see it in 3D once in a while 
(after 2 days the masking tape will come loose).

Due to all the problems that roof was bringing, I'd got the idea to make the lower part of the attic walls straight for about 10 cm, so there wwould be more room. For the beds, the doors and any other similar problems the bathroom would have. Kind of like the picture below. The floor between the two levels would be the yellow or red line.
I'd had to buy new wood, saw/cut new walls, and of course, made new plan drawings (a)

When I finally found the time and courage to work out this new idea, I came across a next challenge. One a more expierenced builder could have easily managed, but seemed too big for me :')

I'd forgotten the fact that a dolls' house is supposed to get open once in a while, and while I'd figured out how to do that in the first plan, I got stuck everytime I tried to figure it out with this latest idea :(

So, two days ago, I spend hours on the internet searching for other solutions. Got a new idea (a), made new plan drawings, and brainstormed with my friend Kim about it. She is my go to girl for all cottage related issues after all ^^

The idea is something like the picture below though my house will be twice as deep as this one.

The gable end (side) of the house would be;

Blue lines instead of red

So having finally figured out what to do, I woke up yesterday at 4 am, too exited to start to stay in bed :) I drew and measured, cut and glued, and when it was noon I was ready to get the masking tape (again ^^) and put it all together.
Tadaa!

The bedroom will still be small for two single beds but after all the cottage is supposed to represent the one I describe in my story; a tiny house in Hogsmeade they rent just for the summer holidays untill Penny will go to Hogwarts on September 1st, and maybe mother Bianca, as the new professor, as well. So, they'll just have to make do ;)
I'm thinking of keeping the beds on either side of the fireplace though. That way I can put the door in the middle of the wall, right across the fire place and have place on both sides of the wall for cupboards or cabinets. Maybe even trunks by the end of the beds ^^

The stairs are now placed on the other side, and against the back wall. Being able to see the stairs is a plus, but it also gives more room on both levels.

So the next thing will be to check every wall, floor and roof panel for (measuring or cutting)  errors and mark out where exactly the opening for the doors and windows will come before  I'll remove the tape :)

Struggling with stairs, and walls, and ...

It's been awhile since I wrote a blog, but that doesn't mean I haven't been busy with crafting (for) my miniature cottage. So prepare yourself, because I hope to catch up on everything in the next couple of days ;)

First let me give you an update on the building process. After I found (a tutorial on) the kind of windows I want to make, it was time to make the openings.
I didn't want to use the jigsaw for this job, but I discovered that my hobby knife could cut well enough through the 4 mm wood. Wish I'd known that earlier ;)

Before I cut the opening for the stair well, I wanted to check if I had the measurements right , so I taped the walls and floors together.

That was a wise decision because seeing it that way, I discovered there would not be enough room (for a doll to stand straight xD) with the roof right above the stair well. 
So I needed to change the plan, or better yet, the stairs :') But boy, what a challenge! 
I decided to turn the stairs, but I'd still had to make a turn in order  for a 1/12 figure to have the right headroom.

The blue line is the stairs. 1 = original plan, you can see the problem :') 2 = better but still not good, and 3 is with a turn, so the stair well will be more in the middle of the floor.

I wracked my brain with that stairs problem for a couple of days.  Making those turns was a really frustrating thing, but I got there ^^ I figured out what I was going to do and found a plan xD

The stairs were driving me crazy anyway though. Had started over and over because one step wouldn't fit, I broke one or the glue hadn't been dry enough before I continued  :')

By the end of the week I had the feeling I was half way through, and I hoped the last bit would be easier now that I'd figured things out.  
I had to cut the precious stairs in half. It was a though choice; cutting one in half and saving a lot of time, or making a new one and keeping these for 'you never know when you need exactly such stairs'.

I spent almost the whole saturday making the other turn :')

And because I was very satisfied with the second 'turn of the stairs', I wanted to do the first part over (a)

I seemed to have gotten more stairs LOL The middle one is for the cottage in case you got confused.
 
I struggled with the stairs for hours the next morning. Thought I made a mistake with measurement, corrected that, saw another, etc etc untill everything seemed wrong and I wanted to scream (a)
So in the end I decided to continue with the first one (right on the photo above), which now looked a lot better all of a sudden *sighs*

Finally, after a long and enjoyable walk, I managed to put all the pieces of the stairs together.

On monday, while I was feeling good about having made the stairs, I started drawing new plans. And then I discovered a new fault.  If you can't have a stair well near the wall under the roof, then a door won't fit either :') 
So, more adaptions, and when I finally thought I knew how much wood I'd need to buy for the rest of the walls, I went to my dad again, just to be sure. Good thing I did, because we discovered a new problem, which I could solve by cutting/sawing 0,4 cm from the walls I'd already sawed *cried*

It took me untill the next day to feel up do that :') Afterwards I cut the between walls for the ground floor, and took another look at the stairs. 

I was afraid they wouldn't be staight, so I taped temporarily walls to the stairs and they looked straight enough ;)

I'll continue with the stairs when the house is getting to the point that they can be put into place :)

Building stairs

Before I could start building to house, I wanted to know how high the stairs where going to be. So last weekend I spent hours looking for stair measurements, found lots of tutorials as well and ended up making one :)
Most helpful was this one I found on a French blog, Les Mains Calmes, even though I don't speak more than a couple of words in French ^^

 I used 3 mm Balsa wood for the sides and treads, and 2 mm for the risers.

I managed better than I anticipated, and I felt a little bit proud for trying, because I thought I'd had to buy it . First I glued half of the risers in place. Once I'd figured out how deep and wide etc it should be, it wasn't that hard.

By the end of the day, I glued all the risers and half of the treads.

The next day I did the treads and sanded everything. For the photo it's in Draco's unfinished room(box) agains the right wall, but it will be placed in the entrance hall of the Hogsmeade house against the left wall.
Later I plan to make a handrail and bannisters on the right side to prevent Penny from falling down the stairs ^^ I'm fearless now ghe ghe