January 2, 2011 - Day 2/363 to go!

Today was a dollhouse construction supply shopping day. A trip to Home Depot for painters tape, brushes, and to check out the Behr paint sample I picked online that was to become the colour for the siding on the house. I found out today that the paint colours online are not even close to the colour of the sample in the store. My "French Yellow" online was more a pale lemon yellow which is definately not even close to what I wanted. I was lucky enough to find just the right colour...."Bagel", and purchased one of the little Behr testers. I have to say whoever came up with the tester idea was a genious. No more trying to stick lots of paper paint samples together to get a decent sized sample to stick on the wall and then still have to guess...and hope....that it will be right once you invest in a gallon. I was surprised to find out that Home Depot only seems to sell wood stain in quart contains and not the small cans.....so that meant a trip to Home Hardware. I got my wood stain, some latex gloves since brown stain on fingers isn't very attractive, and some more....sandpaper!!!

My only construction today was to reinforce with glue the joints on the foundation. I want this house to be able to withstand a hurricane or at least a few car trips. I did cut out all the parts for the first floor staircase.....35 pieces needed to get from the first floor to the second floor. As I was cutting them out I kept saying to myself ... "Sandpaper is my new best friend"! Yup, I'm still in the brain washing stage of my sandpaper adventure.

Tomorrow will be wood sealing day for the foundation bottom and I'm going to try staining the first floor side with walnut stain. If it goes well then I won't be quite as pressed for time to make some inlaid wood floors. If it doesn't go well or at least look half decent, then I'll have to start thinking about the flooring in more detail. I've also decided if it looks good, then I'll do the second floor and third floor before I assembly the house.

I might also get to Staples tomorrow to get my hall wallpaper copied. Yes, I make my own wallpaper and I will need to paper the stair wall before I can install the staircase.....but, I'm getting ahead of myself a little (actually a lot).

I'll let you know how my "sealer" works since I'm not using the 50/50 Shellac/wood alcohol method that Greenleaf suggests.