Blog 10  –  Starting the 2021 CC kit

Soooo…..the HBS Creatin Contest 2021.  The kit?  The MiniTown Studio Shell kit – I shall put up a picture here.

Before going any further I just want to consider how we use these kits from HBS for this competition.  There are no guidelines or rules about how much of the kit we should or should not use in our entries. 

I have to stick my hand up here and admit to being quite negative when viewing entries from past Creatin Contests where it is difficult to see what part of the kit has been used.  I seem to remember one that may have only used the door.  Now, while not ‘illegal’ I have to say that to my mind the challenge comes from using the majority of the kit.  Obviously, as a disclaimer here, this is MY own opinion and I do understand that others may have a very different point of view which is absolutely fine by me. 

Given that this is my opinion you can imagine my horror when I read one comment on the HBS post announcing my Hic Sunt Dracones as the ‘Grand Prize winner’, querying where the original kit was in my entry. 

The exact comment was “Why start with a kit when hardly any of the winners look anything like the kit?  Makes me not want to even try because I would be thinking only in terms of the kit.  This seems like a wide open contest.”

Of course, I replied and stated that if she looked carefully she could see I used everything except one window.  I also mentioned the houseboat that came first place – the kit is extremely well hidden in plain sight and again, pretty much all of it was used.

So…..for the 2021 kit I will be using the majority of the kit – which shouldn’t be too hard given that it only has 3 walls, a roof and a mezzanine level.  Of course I will be making alterations and perhaps even additions but I seem to think that’s the status quo.

As with the 2020 kit, I had my idea firm in my head well before the kit arrived.  As an aside, postage from the US to NZ is utterly ridiculously expensive, even without tracking, so this may be my last attempt at the contest unless I win enough to cover the kit and postage in this year’s competition.

However….I digress.  The kit arrived YAY!  And with almost perfect timing I completed the Finnish cottage.  So after cleaning and tidying, I have been able to launch straight into it.

No matter how many projects I do, every single time I worry about the order that I do things in.  This project is no different.  In fact given that at this point my head is elsewhere (we’re purchasing land to build our next home on) my head is even more muddy than normal.  I often lay in bed at night, when everything in my head is so perfectly clear and concise and wish I had an app in my brain where I could write lists, posts etc as I lay there thinking about them.  Anyone else think that’s a good idea?  Anyone good at creating apps?  Brain surgeons??

Okay, moving on.  My CC idea this year is one that I LOVE!  And like with my Dragon cottage, there are aspects of this build that will require me learning something completely new.  It’s like having a series of small projects that will eventually lead to one large one.  Some of these small tasks are more interesting to me than others so I have already worked on about 3 different items while planning another three!

I made the door first.  This door, or at least the window of the door has been in my head since the inception of the project.  The part I was most excited about was making the blinds!!  I mean really?  Lol – yup, I had spent nights lying in bed considering how I was going to make them.  I even watched a YouTube video showing how blinds are made thinking that perhaps I could make a miniature version of working blinds.  Yeah….nah……especially as I wanted them to be pretty broken up and run down anyway.

I was a Scout leader and for one national Jamboree I was the Troop Leader.  I had to purchase some waterproof type plastic/material stuff for each patrol to make their own banners from.  Thankfully I was able to squirrel away some of the left overs and this is what I used to make the blinds.  It’s not a hard plastic/canvas/material but firm enough to hold it’s shape.  I cut strips, ran cotton through each side and glued each piece in place.  It ended up being a pretty easy job.

The door has had many layers of paint, a little paint crackle and a lot of sanding.  However I’m pleased with how it turned out.  The name on the door “P.M.P. Stamps” along with the description and phone number, I created out of vinyl using my Cricut Maker.  Yet again the machine earned it’s place!

The door sign is actually a tribute to my very dear Uncle who passed away end of January 2020 mere days before his 84^th birthday.  He was like a grandfather to my kids and was a very important member of our family.  The initials are his and he had a massive stamp collection.  The phone number is actually his birth date and year of passing.  Bear in mind that here in NZ we put day/month/year.

I love hiding small details like this in my projects.  It’s not something that anyone else will pick up on but it’s meaningful to me.

And so, I have one finished door for my project.  Interestingly the door, a standard dollhouse door, does not fit the doorway of this kit either width or length-wise.  So it will require creative thinking to make it fit – although really, it’s not a big deal for us is it!  That’s one of the joys of being a creative – we think outside the square and sometimes our ideas may be quirky, but they work!

That’s it for now.  I’ll probably discuss the floor that I’m currently working on in my next blog….but who knows.  I may receive other inspiration for inane chatter before then.

Please remember to leave me any questions or comments and I’ll be happy to answer when I can.

I feel like a need a quirky ‘sign off’……..so I’ll work on it….

Stay creative and enjoy your quirks,

Rebecca xx