Coffee Shop

In the last few months, I've started buying a few things here and there for the coffee shop, including a pay phone, and some sweets. I love the carrot cake because I've made real life carrot cupcakes with little carrots on the top (I love to bake and eat anything sugary). The walls will one day be full of fliers and ads and a menu, of course, but all that is up now is a picture I cut out from an Allposters catalog urging the patrons to "drink coffee". I also put the sign up and named the coffee shop. It's called the 71A cafe, after a coffee shop near my house called the 61C cafe. The 61C is named for a bus route which I take every day. The 71A is a different bus route in the part of Pittsburgh I used to live in, which is cooler and has a "hipper" vibe, and this coffee shop is somewhat inspired by the one near my old apartment, so it is named for that bus which I loved to hate for 5 years.

Soon, for Christmas, I will be visiting my parents in eastern PA. They have an A.C. Moore there and I'd love to get another one of these Houseworks shops because they are so easy and fun to build. I told my boyfriend that maybe we would make a Steelers/ Pittsburgh sports team store and it would be all black and gold and that would be really easy to fill because we could print off alot of stuff from the internet (giant Big Ben cardboard cut- outs and the like!). I'd also like to make a bar, because I am part of the time a bartender.

Emerson Row

A while ago, I found the apparently much sought after Emerson Row dollhouse on my local Craigslist for $20! Luckilly, though I wasn't the first to email about it, I was the first to pay, so the house was mine.

A nearly 30 year old kit is kind of a pain. All of the pieces were there, however, a 1/8" plywood kit and a 3/8" MDF kit are completely different things. Early in the building process I cut my finger with an Exacto, bled allover my parquet floors, and kind of put it off for a while. As soon as it got cooler out, though, I started to work like crazy!

The kit box:
My "work" area (which is mostly the floor!)

The shell, so far (and you would not believe how long it took to get this wood to cooperate!)

My attempt at paperclay stone for a foundation (still needs to be painted):

My attempt at paperclay bricks (still need to be grouted/ aged):

I'm still not quite sure what the inside will be furnished like, though it will be contemporary. I have a wealth of ideas but not really any other wealth so I'm trying to be kind of frugal with this one.

I'm back!

After a break from mini-ing (moving, then summer, and vacation, and getting back to being busy and responsible at work) now that it is fall, I can't stop. We went to the Pittsburgh dollhouse show last month, and ever since then I've been spending a few hours a week on mini things. First, I finally got columns for my Georgetown, which were super difficult to find (finally got a bunch from England) and put up my corbel brackets from forever ago.

Then I painted the edges between th rooms on the back of the house to make the whole thing neater. And then I "varnished" (i.e. modge-podged) the wood floors to make them a little bit shiny. Then I put in all of my new goodies (I got a lap-top, a little bonsai, some food... and my favorite, a stand mixer for the kitchen.)

See the stand mixer? It came white, but I painted it teal to give it that $400 Kitchen-Aid look. In the foreground you can see my espresso machine (from a suggestion from Mini MC).Christmas is coming up! Like my invisible dollhouse people, I had better get shopping!


The bathroom finally has towel racks :

See my new lap top?
A great bonsai plant in the living room and a coffee table stand in until I get a real one (this is the back of some case, but hey, it works for modern decor, right?)