It's been a while since I've posted; but in that time I have experienced a great success and a great failure. The success:
I FINISHED THE ATTIC!
I decided to start on the attic first for two reasons; I believe in working from the top down and it's the only room in the house I really have a complete vision for. In all the dollhouse magazines they have these gorgeous attics; the space converted into finished rooms and workshops.
 |
| Much like this. Cozy, innit? |
But I have never in my life seen an actual attic that looks like that. Here's a snapshop of mine for comparison:
 |
| Yes, that is a "Ninja Turtles" Van. No, you cannot have it. |
So I decided to go for a more "realistic" attic, starting with the attic stairs. As you can see in the picture below, there is a gigantic hole in the hallway ceiling where a pull-down ladder is supposed to reside. This didn't pose a huge problem as a kid, because I would always just have my Barbie dolls use mental telekinesis to propel themselves through the hole and into the attic. As an adult, I wanted a ladder (how far I have fallen).
So, I leap into the great expanse of the internet to track one down. It couldn't be too hard, considering all the weird things they make in 1/12 scale.
 |
| Yep. Totally a hole there. |
So, I leap into the great expanse of the internet to track one down. It couldn't be too hard, considering all the weird things they make in 1/12 scale.
 |
| Like this copy of the Declaration of Independence. |
 |
| Or this WORKING TV. |
So I was pretty confident in my ability to find an attic ladder. And I did find it. It looked much like this:
 |
| Very fold-y. |
The problem? The only dollhouse company that made them WENT OUT OF BUSINESS.
I scoured e-bay, dollhouse stores, and miniature forums to no avail. It seems that this company was the only company that managed to figure out how to master creating such advanced ladder technology and they took that knowledge to the grave.
I scoured e-bay, dollhouse stores, and miniature forums to no avail. It seems that this company was the only company that managed to figure out how to master creating such advanced ladder technology and they took that knowledge to the grave.
My very first furnishing task and already my plans were incredibly derailed. It was all very encouraging.
 |
| Dumbledore doing a very accurate impression of me at the time. |
Not to be outdone by this space-age technology, I came up with a plan to get my ladder.
Step 1: Buy a regular 1/12 scale ladder
 |
| Much like this one. |
 |
| The thug life choose us. |
We started by studying the pull-down attic ladder in my house for a good 10 minutes or so and then began to chop up and disassemble the ladder I had bought.
We fashioned hinges using scrap ladder parts and some extra electrical brads I had laying around.
We eventually found a good distance for the hinges to fold and unfold and we were anxious for our first test, pretty much convinced the entire thing would just fall apart.....
But; SUCCESS! Our design proved to be sound and our ladder folded and unfolded easily!
We double checked the height and added on another folded section.
With a working ladder secured (FINALLY), I started working on getting my attic ready to work. I wasn't 100% sure about what the flooring would look like in the end, so I painted the entire floor a dark base color so I wouldn't have to mess much with it later.
I created a mounting mechanism using some door hinges and spare balsa wood. Sometimes the most frustrating thing about working on the dollhouse is that I don't have a good store around me with dollhouse fixin's. I have to scour internet sites for whatever odds and ends I need, wait for them to arrive by mail, and hope and pray that the pieces are going to work for what I need. I've actually taken to ordering 2-3 different hardware pieces that could possibly work for what I need just so I don't have to wait a month to install something.
Since I don't have a spring mechanism to hold my door shut and in place, I settled for this 2-piece latch set.
So when I want to pull down the ladder, I just pull back the latch and the down comes the ladder!
Once the ladder was installed, I began to add beams across the floor. This involved cutting lots of balsa wood and gluing every piece down my hand.
Because I wanted my attic to have that 'I don't care' vibe, it was important to me to have insulation visible through and around the floor boards. Luckily, I had recently needed felting supplies for an unrelated project, so I got to work creating my own insulation.
This tool right here is pretty much the most intense felting needle I've ever seen. It has six wickedly sharp and barbed needles on a spring loaded mechanism that weaves layers of felt together in no time flat. Which is good, because the attic is very large and I had a lot of insulation to make.
And because all of my balsa wood beams were laid by hand and not what someone would call 'even', or 'properly measured', I had to custom cut pretty much all of the insulation to fit the space it was going into. This isn't really a huge issue though, because most of it is going to be covered by floorboards anyway.
I had a bit of left over insulation, so I decided to make some extra rolls to act as decoration in the finished attic. I got out my stamping supplies and some contact paper I have laying around (and yes, I am aware of just how many things I have 'laying around'. I'm a craft pack rat) and came up with a quick fake logo to wrap around the rolls.
Next, I had to cut allowances for my electrical cords to run across the floor.
With the cords safely tucked away, I moved on to creating my custom floor boards.
I used acrylic paint washes in a variety of intensities and colors to get a worn and water-stained look.
I then began cutting the edges roughly; to give the appearance that the attic flooring was just sort of thrown together out of scrap remnants.
My trusty marble cigar box lid is holding down the floorboard section while it dries. That box has become an invaluable crafting tool.
With the floor installed I moved on to putting balsa planks onto all the walls. This was an extremely labor intensive process because there are a lot of corners in the attic and to install the pieces in hard to reach areas I would have to stand facing away from the dollhouse and literally bend over backwards to see what I was doing to negotiate them into place.
I then added in rafter beams across the back wall.
A look through one of the attic windows at the in-progress build.
The inside of one of the attic windows. Lots of balsa cutting involved here.
With all the flooring, walls, and trim installed I was ready to start staining the entire attic.
I used the same process that I did with the floorboards; acrylic paint and water. This is a pretty good in-progress shot; the staining really adds a lot.
As a finishing touch I created pull strings for the hanging bulbs I installed (once again, with things I found laying around my full-scale house.)
Finished string light.
And here's the finished attic!
I love this corner right here; I think that it looks pretty true to life!
But, if you set your Wayback Machines to the beginning of this post, you'll remember that I mentioned I also experienced a great failure to dampen my success.
Sometime during the process of working on the attic, the electricity in the right half of my house decided to go out. And the worst part? Some of those electrical lines are run through the attic, so the most direct way to fix them is to pry up my attic floor.
We fashioned hinges using scrap ladder parts and some extra electrical brads I had laying around.
 |
| You can tell by all the holes at varying distances that we were absolutely no trouble with this step at all. Nope. |
We eventually found a good distance for the hinges to fold and unfold and we were anxious for our first test, pretty much convinced the entire thing would just fall apart.....
But; SUCCESS! Our design proved to be sound and our ladder folded and unfolded easily!
 |
| Fooooooold... |
 |
| Unfold! HAHAHAHAHAHA! |
We double checked the height and added on another folded section.
 |
| Lookat that glorious 's' folding action. Like wooden poetry in motion. |
 |
| These were the left over ladder scraps. We tried to use every part of the buffalo, but failed. |
With a working ladder secured (FINALLY), I started working on getting my attic ready to work. I wasn't 100% sure about what the flooring would look like in the end, so I painted the entire floor a dark base color so I wouldn't have to mess much with it later.
Next, I began the work for mounting the ladder. I cut a piece of balsa board down to fit into the ladder-hole. It was tricky getting the exact size, because I had to have wiggle room on all the sides for it to sit flush into the hallway ceiling in the floor below.
I created a mounting mechanism using some door hinges and spare balsa wood. Sometimes the most frustrating thing about working on the dollhouse is that I don't have a good store around me with dollhouse fixin's. I have to scour internet sites for whatever odds and ends I need, wait for them to arrive by mail, and hope and pray that the pieces are going to work for what I need. I've actually taken to ordering 2-3 different hardware pieces that could possibly work for what I need just so I don't have to wait a month to install something.
I scrounged up some waxed twine and beads from my craft closet to add on a pull handle.
Since I don't have a spring mechanism to hold my door shut and in place, I settled for this 2-piece latch set.
Once the ladder was installed, I began to add beams across the floor. This involved cutting lots of balsa wood and gluing every piece down my hand.
Because I wanted my attic to have that 'I don't care' vibe, it was important to me to have insulation visible through and around the floor boards. Luckily, I had recently needed felting supplies for an unrelated project, so I got to work creating my own insulation.
This tool right here is pretty much the most intense felting needle I've ever seen. It has six wickedly sharp and barbed needles on a spring loaded mechanism that weaves layers of felt together in no time flat. Which is good, because the attic is very large and I had a lot of insulation to make.
And because all of my balsa wood beams were laid by hand and not what someone would call 'even', or 'properly measured', I had to custom cut pretty much all of the insulation to fit the space it was going into. This isn't really a huge issue though, because most of it is going to be covered by floorboards anyway.
I had a bit of left over insulation, so I decided to make some extra rolls to act as decoration in the finished attic. I got out my stamping supplies and some contact paper I have laying around (and yes, I am aware of just how many things I have 'laying around'. I'm a craft pack rat) and came up with a quick fake logo to wrap around the rolls.
 |
| I decided to go with 'best' brand insulation. |
 |
| The finished rolls. |
With the cords safely tucked away, I moved on to creating my custom floor boards.
I used acrylic paint washes in a variety of intensities and colors to get a worn and water-stained look.
I then began cutting the edges roughly; to give the appearance that the attic flooring was just sort of thrown together out of scrap remnants.
My trusty marble cigar box lid is holding down the floorboard section while it dries. That box has become an invaluable crafting tool.
With the floor installed I moved on to putting balsa planks onto all the walls. This was an extremely labor intensive process because there are a lot of corners in the attic and to install the pieces in hard to reach areas I would have to stand facing away from the dollhouse and literally bend over backwards to see what I was doing to negotiate them into place.
I then added in rafter beams across the back wall.
A look through one of the attic windows at the in-progress build.
With all the flooring, walls, and trim installed I was ready to start staining the entire attic.
I used the same process that I did with the floorboards; acrylic paint and water. This is a pretty good in-progress shot; the staining really adds a lot.
As a finishing touch I created pull strings for the hanging bulbs I installed (once again, with things I found laying around my full-scale house.)
Finished string light.
And here's the finished attic!
I love this corner right here; I think that it looks pretty true to life!
But, if you set your Wayback Machines to the beginning of this post, you'll remember that I mentioned I also experienced a great failure to dampen my success.
Sometime during the process of working on the attic, the electricity in the right half of my house decided to go out. And the worst part? Some of those electrical lines are run through the attic, so the most direct way to fix them is to pry up my attic floor.
So, I'm taking a little break from fixing it to brainstorm alternate solutions. But boy howdy does that *hurt*.
