The brickwork is next

Glad the inside is finished, so I can get on with a different task.  I have now started with the brickwork on the outside as you can see in the picture:

I am not overly happy with the quality of the bricks, but will have to live with it....  In normal circumstances I work with a layer of paperclay which is 3mm thick, but since I decided only afterwards to work with clay I realised too late that my window frames should have been at least 4 or 5 mms thick.  With a flat layer of clay it doesn't matter, but when you have to carve out bricks it makes all the difference. Now my layers was less then 2mm, which is far too thin.  The thickness and therefore the texture of the clay is very important when you do your carving, as is the dryness.  Too wet and you drag your clay, too dry and you can't carve anymore.  In this case I couldn't get the texture right and in most cases I carved right through the layer of clay until I touched the wood.  So, I hope that when it's painted it will look a little bit better then it does now.  I know, it doesn't look too bad, but it's not my standard of work.  :-)

Inside I had to work with the two different clays, because I was running out of the Creative Paperclay and the last packet I had I wanted to keep for the outside walls.  So I had to finish of one wall with the other paperclay.  I am glad I had foreseen the problem with the colours, because it is now apparent that the other clay is more grey then white.  If it's going to worry me when it's all dry I might just put a light coat of paint on top, but I'll wait a while before I take that step.

I am also glad that paperclay is so forgiving.  You can do almost everything with it and repair mistakes.  Now, that is what I call great!  I said last night that I was going to try something different, and I am glad I have been able to make repairs.  I wanted to stencil a nice edge with flowers along the ceiling, but I didn't have the right stencils for it.  Then I thought I'd stencil a bit next to the dormer window on either side.  Well, that didn't quite work.  I think the old paint I have for stencilling has dried out too much, so I got some more paperclay and pasted that over the top, just like when I repair cracks.....

Next picture shows you the other tiles that I have framed so this tile picture can hang on the wall next to the door.  I thought I'd allow myself a picture with flowers in a flower shop.

And all this will have to do for the time being, because tomorrow I am going to pack and take of to New Zealand on Friday.  I am going to the Dollhouse and Miniatures Convention in Auckland with a friend from there and then on to stay with her for a fortnight.  we'll have a great time, I guess, because we'll have a lot to talk about and a lot to mini together.  So, will see you back after the 5th of November.

But, before I go I want to quickly welcome a few more followers (not all new, because with 3 blogs you tend to see well-known names...), but at least new on this blog.  A warm welcome to:

Teresa Martinez at Tiny Ter Miniatures
Natalia at Scarlet Sails Miniatures
Karin at Mini Ramblings and Musings and
rmartedal for whom I cannot detect a link.  If you have one, please let me know and I'll add it on.

That's all for now.  See you around in a few weeks' time

Marion