A Not So Painted Lady

I am up early this morning--my favorite time of day. I hear the wind blowing, signifying an approaching cold front that will cool things down and maybe bring some wind. We've had record heat in in Northern Colorado for September, not really unusual for it to be so hot this time year, but summer certainly is winding down and we can feel it this second day of Fall and we are glad.

I have a garden full of ripening tomatoes that I will turn into homemade spaghetti sauce. I've never made spaghetti sauce, but I am going to give it a try. My daughter and I made lots of salsa the last two weeks. I had planned on picking tomatoes today, but it may be too windy. We'll see.

Then there is the San Franciscan Lady. What a mess. The Lady has not gone together as neatly and perfectly as she should have. As it turns out, this is a very difficult build for a couple of reasons. First the kit has already been--what's the correct word--compromised by the previous owner. She measured correctly, but glued some pieces together wrong, so I have had to order new pieces. I think I wrote in the last post that I found the pieces of lumber on eBay and have ordered them twice, but the vendor also has a store, Manchester Woodworks. The eBay ordered coming from Minnesota, arrived in record time, so I have gone to the web store now and ordered the interior window casing that does not come with kit.

So, I am taking a break from the Lady. I have some decisions to make.

 Flooring

The kit comes with flooring, very, very thin uniform strips. The instruction booklet says that there is enough for one floor, but as I laid out the flooring, I was able to cover all three floors and there will be enough the the half fourth floor. The instructions say to lay it out vertically across the floor before the the walls are installed, cutting it sections and using a round tipped object of pound in indents to represent nails. Modern flooring is tongue and groove and skips the nails. So will I. The flooring will go down nicely until I get to the bay windows, so I tried another pattern.

 Horizontally, the bay windows seem less fussy, but there are still tiny spaces that will need to be dealt with.




I am thinking that this pattern will be less fussy and I can add the walls without putting them on top of the flooring.

The nice thing about this flooring is that it can be cut with scissors. I will make a paper template, I think, of the bay windows to figure how to cut the strips. Next I have to decide how to glue them down. The instructions say not to use a water based glue because it will cause the thin wood to curl, instead to use rubber cement. Good thing that I'm working in the garage where it is well ventilated.

The final decision: how to finish the floor. I may leave it unfinished so that Jen can distress it however she wants. I wish this flooring material were more universal and available. It looks to be a lot less work intensive than craft sticks or even the sheets of flooring that I buy from Hobby Lobby.

Your thoughts?

Window Trim: Finishing the Interior Walls

I've ordered 1/2 inch wide casing for the windows. I hope it works. There are fifteen windows and two doors to trim. Won't that be fun! I will not do mitered corners and I may prime them so that Jen has a good surface to work with. 

The Tower

The iconic Painted Ladies of San Francisco attract attention and garner admiration, I think, first for their colorful painted exteriors and then their architecture. The bay windows and the tower are the main attractions, I am sure. Assembling the tower is so tricky, especially if you follow the instructions and that may be where the first builder made her big mistake and gave up when she glued  the posts together wrong. As a result, I had to order posts more from Manchester and glued the two inner posts the way the instructions showed, except I made a mistake, too. So I cut more wood and instead of gluing the two posts center left, I slid the siding in one post and taped then side the shortest piece of siding onto the other post and taped them together to get the correct angle--finally--so that the posts would fit.

Thus I ran short of the post lumber and the two center pieces are short, so I'll not glue anything in place until it is time to assemble the tower. Typically the rest of the posts in the construction if cut according to directions were cut too long, so maybe these will fit. I may be ordering another #5-76 piece for the posts. This piece will fit at the back of the tower behind the top row of windows and will be installed once the roof is in place. It also has to be trimmed to fit in place. That will be an interesting cut.

The Tower Roof

The directions say to tape the eight triangles together then place in a coffee can to glue????

Looks like a tower.

But what do I do with this piece? 

So here is my vintage coffee can that I have kept for years. Before the major coffee makers such as Floger's went to plastic, coffee came in these great decorative tin cans. Today they can be found only in junk stores. I keep my parakeets' seed in this one.

I looked at the drawing in the instructions and couldn't figure what size of can was needed, especially since the instructions weren't specific as to size of coffee can.

Now I know how the pieces go together

I think the Tupperware® will do quite nicely when I begin gluing pieces together.

So here she stands, waiting for me to take the next step. Flooring perhaps. I'll cut a paper template for the bay windows and go from there.

The roof will be a major install, but I will do the flooring and window casings first.

The Cranberry Cove

This is six year old Lily's house that she picked out herself. She asked me the other day if I had started her house house and I had to say no, but that I had it out of the box. So last night I taped the first floor together. It is going to be so easy to assemble compared The Lady. The plywood is lighter, and thinner than the MFD that the Bellingham is made from and much smoother than the stamped plywood for the San Franciscan that is brittle, dry, and splintery. 

On an ending note, I went downtown to get my nails done and pay the waterfall and decided t walk Main Street--two blocks long😂.  The second block on the south side has 3 antique stores, one new clothing store, a bar, and a cafe. The second block has the beauty shop, the automotive store, another antique store, an art studio, and a church--in the old grocery store. 

Anyway.

The one antique store, Jen's Antiques, has two adorable dollhouses in the window. I know she put there there to lure me in. She is closed today, but you can bet that I'll be there tomorrow. My daughter has already told me that I can't buy anymore houses, but I told her I can if I want. Depends on how much and how cute. One is 1:24. I'd be tempted to buy that one. And they are furnished. I assume they are from the same place. I'll let you know, later.

Thanks so much spending time with me. I love that you visit. Let me know what you think by leaving a comment. I am an ad free blog and I don't share any information with anyone. 

Have a great week.