Found a new store!

Hi, all.  So, I've gotten to go to a bunch of mini stores on this trip.  I don't have all my goodies with me because I'm currently at an adorable bed and breakfast in Friday Harbor, WA.  However, I do have two from a recent stop.  On the 7 or so hour drive from Idaho to the San Juan Islands, I slept most of the drive.  However, when I woke up, I was in the old-fashioned German town of Leavenworth, WA.  It was great!  Anyway, I was told that there just might be a mini store in this small town.  I remember that a similar town, Solvang, CA, used to have a mini store.  I used to go there once a year on the way to Disneyland.  Then they got rid of the store :-(.  Anyway, so I decided to take a look in this town.  I walked into a store that I thought was a toy store.  It wasn't, but it did have a dollhouse.  I asked the woman if there were any miniatures, and she told me to go downstairs and sure enough - there was a mini section!  I got this little pitcher and water basin with a windmill to remember the town by, and a set of monkey wrenches for my work bench.  I'll post more pics of the other recent purchases when I get back.  I'll also show you what I made out of an old, cracked, muddy pellet gun ammo case.  Cya!

P.S.  Want to see a map of mini stores?  Visit my custom map at http://writtenbyangela.t35.com/www.Writtenbyangela.t35.com/Mini_Map.html. 

A new store and some baked goods

Hi, all!  Well, as I mentioned, I'm currently up in Idaho which has given me some time to work on little baked goods.  Before I get to that though, I want to show you what I got at Handcrafted for You (http://www.craftedforyou.net/).  I didn't even know there was a miniature store in that area (Oregon City).  I just so happened to be reading American Miniaturist and saw the listing when we were only five minutes away.  So, we stopped, and of course I had to buy a few items: little glass jars, a desk lamp, and glassware.  If you're in the area, come stop by her store!









I've been mini baking quite a lot.  I'm glad I decided to bring my clay!  Earlier, I posted my two-layered cake and my bundt cake.  Yesterday alone I made the lemon cake (my new favorite) and a slice, my friend's famous Vanilla Bean Cake with chocolate frosting, apple pie (those crossing strips were hard to do!), chocolate pudding, a loaf of bread, a plate of chocolate fudge, a doggie bone (which was approved by my boyfriend's dog, Missy), chocolate covered cookies, and peanut butter cookies.  Today, I made the little dresser from a kit I got.  I had to make some adjustments for the drawers to open, but it turned out fine.  I'm still not quite sure how I'm going to paint it, but I'm thinking of a Better Homes and Gardens inspiration.

Anyway, I think I'll do more mini baking today.  Any suggestions?  There's a Better Homes and Gardens baking magazine upstairs, so I may take a look at that for ideas.

Hope you like the goodies!








P.S.  Though I've been doing miniatures in some form or another for about 10 years, I haven't really sold my work.  I'm interested in starting to sell.  Any advice on what selling sites to use?  Thanks!

Miniatures from the movie "The Aviator"

Hi, all!  Well, I've just arrived up in Idaho, and I'm already on my computer to write up this blog.  Here I thought I wouldn't have any material for a new blog, but I do!  Today, my boyfriend wanted to go to The Aviation Museum in McMinnville, Oregon.  I'll admit, planes are not exactly my thing, but I made sure to look at everything.  To my surprise, they had the miniature models that were used in the movie "The Aviator" with Leonardo DiCaprio. Here are some pictures of the airplane hanger that they made for the movie.  It appears to be in 1:12.

 

Here are the photos they have explaining the process of using the model and a green screen to create the final effect.

They also had the Spruce Goose model.  Here's a close-up of the model complete with dolls of the actors inside.

Here's a shot of the model (right) with the real Spruce Goose.  That plane is huge!

I'll write again soon!

Score!

I went to the Miniaturist Pot Luck and Flea Market today in San Mateo, CA.  I got SO MUCH stuff!!!  Here are photos of the things I got.  I even found dishes for my mini food creations which I've been looking for.  So here's a run-down of what I got (I'm actually curious to see it listed out like this!):

- 4 tubes of paint (2 gold for my Dad which aren't pictured)

- a dress form (actually the proper size)

- a radiator

- an electric Tiffany ceiling light (for my kitchen)

- an electric Tiffany table light

- an electric ceiling fan/light (for the teenage room)

- a seat cushion with ties

- metal plates (2 small, 2 big) and pans (1 with spatula) and serving dishes (1 large, 2 ice cream bowls)

- an electric dome light (for the master bedroom)

- an electric gold candle light (came with two amber glass covers, but one broke)

- a doggie dish

- an upholstered stool

- a multi-color mop (from a grab bag)

- a spilled can of paint

- a pretty embroidered dolly

- an electric desk light

- a candlestick with holder (I'm putting the surviving amber cover over it)

- two shovels (for my mom's potting bench)

- a spitoon

- a weird copper stopper

- a metal alarm clock

- lemon slices

- a rug

- a small dresser kit

- a laptop lap desk kit

- an electric gold ceiling light

-an electric dark brass table light

And the cost of all these items? $12.50!!!!  Yes, you read that right: $12.50!  The electric lights were $0.75 each, but when I brought them all up to pay for them, she only asked for $3 total.  They wanted to get rid of their stock which was lucky for me because I got great prices!

I'm so excited to start working on little projects with my new purchases, but I'm leaving for Idaho tomorrow, so I won't be able to see most of my purchases, but I'm bringing some of them with me to work on.  I'll probably also be visiting my favorite stores up there, so I'll have other blogs to post along the way.  I'll miss California though.  Still, it should be fun.  Anyway, talk to you soon!

Cake, anyone?

Hi, all!  So, I'm going to a Miniaturist Pot Luck and Flea Market tomorrow. (Which reminds me, I need to do some actual baking!)  It sounds like it could also include some swapping, so I thought I should have a few more items to bring with me to exchange.  So last night, I popped in a season of Alias, and started my mini baking.  I made a bundt cake and a two-layer cake.  To display the two-layer cake, I also made a cake stand.  Once again, my Easy-Bake Oven worked great to cook my little clay sweets.  Hopefully, I'll have some fun minis to show tomorrow.  See you then!

Kitchen renovation

Hi, all!  So, my favorite room in my little house is my kitchen.  I LOVE mini food!  It's my favorite miniature accessory.  I'm slowly working on renovating my other rooms, but I couldn't help but work on my kitchen a little bit.  See, I need to start redoing all my walls.  I used museum wax (big mistake) to hold up paintings and shelves, but it leaves this icky residue on the walls.  The package says that you can just scrub it off with warm water, but that doesn't work.  I've decided to simply redo all the walls and switch to that nice white puddy that really does come off nice and clean - and it holds things very well.  Anyways, I've been looking at wallpaper and borders online.  I found this great wallpaper, and today, I printed some out and redid my kitchen.  Currently, my kitchen is in a state of being a "buffet line" for Thanksgiving dinner.  All my chairs have been moved into the living room like we usually do when we have over a lot of company.  What do you think?

Fixed up ugly furniture

Well, I've been working on the Christmas swap item (so excited for this Christmas swap!!!), but I can't post photos of that or say much about it until after it's received!  Another project I've been working on is fixing up some pieces of dollhouse furniture that I got from the dollar store awhile back.  They originally had this horrible pinkish/red gloss on them.  With the table, I painted the legs brown and used Mod-Podge to make the newspaper collage top.  I'm going to put my 144th scale dollhouse on that table with a little stool next to it so it can be "worked on."  With the dresser, I decided to paint it green.  It was hard to get the paint to stick to that gloss, but the paint finally covered it after multiple coats.  Next, I used a toothpick to draw the little flowers.  I'm still not sure what I'll do with the dresser, but something will come to mind.

I'm attending a Miniaturist Pot Luck and Flea Market this Saturday, so hopefully I'll have some fun photos of that to share soon.  Talk to you all soon!

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween!

Hi, everyone. I hope you all had a great Halloween. I made costumes for my boyfriend and myself - we were Han Solo and Princess Leia from Star Wars. He made our blasters, which turned out great! I also displayed the Haunted Mansion project I made last year. The mansion is made completely out of paper. For more photos, visit www.writtenbyangela.t35.com and view my mini blog section. Talk to you soon!

James and I as Han Solo and Princess Leia.  He takes all my mini photos for me - including the one above.  Happy Halloween!

Minis for sale!

Hi, all! I'm selling some minis, so take a look!



I made these little holiday placemats last year, and I'm selling the set for $20 plus shipping costs if applicable. Here are some more photos of these 1:12 scale placemats.


































I'm also selling little custom masks. Here are some examples of ones I've previously made. If you'd like to order a custom mask, or a mask based on one of these, send me an email at writtenbyangela@yahoo.com to discuss pricing.

A workbench from Shellie's classes

Hi, all! Well, yesterday was the miniature party at Shellie's Miniatures. My mom and I went to take the five classes to complete the secret project. My mom is not a miniaturist, but she likes crafts, and it was a nice mother-daughter day. Last year, we made the Halloween scenes out of basic materials. Imagine my surprise when I found out that we were going to make these adorable workbenches! I've wanted a garage complete with a workbench so that I could make miniature scenes of building dollhouses. This was exactly what this project was for. We made the workbenches (the peg board is a circuit board from Radio Shack - I've always thought that that would be a great mini peg board too), the little dollhouse, and all the items for the "building of the dollhouse." The little metal tools were provided too, but they needed to be painted. Here are some photos from the project.



This was the first class we took. We made the dollhouse out of balsa, glued the image on, and painted the edge.










Here's my mom's and mine. Her bench is the clean, pristine bench that she's considering making into a garden potting bench. Mine is the aged, well-used one. I just love making it messy!






Here's two other examples of the teachers' benches.




































Here are some shots of my work so far, but I'm going to be doing a lot more. Plus, I hope I can put it in a proper garage soon!