Sunday, January 29, 2012

It is a beautiful cloudless, sunny day in Iowa  The temperature is trying very hard to reach 30 degrees, which is remarkable considering it is nearly the end of January.  Chuck and I have been working on the Thornhill for several days now.  All of the 'prep work' takes so much time:  things like sealing all of the wood surfaces, squaring all of the corners of each opening, and reading and re-reading all of the 'instructions' before diving in.  The instructions from Real Good Toys leave a great deal to be desired.  Chuck thinks I should 'write' my own instructions for construction of this behemoth and send them to Real Good Toys.  But for now, I am content in knowing that my Thornhill will probably survive a nuclear holocaust. 


The first photos show my 'peg construction'.  I am drilling 1/8" holes at every point where a nail would be required, and inserting a 1/8" dowel peg to hold the pieces together.  It has been my hope to have absolutely NO NAILS in this construction, but we will allow screws to hold the hinges necessary to create the openings on the mansion. 






The construction of the 'foundation' was fairly straight forward, and it was completed with no 'glitches'.



With the foundation complete, today we arose early to tackle the beginning construction phase of the mansion. Because both sides of the house will be hinged and open for access to the house, as will the center front panel and back panels, these parts had to be 'tacked' in place and then I used yards of masking tape to keep things in position.  We also decided to temporarily 'tack' all of the points where we will be drilling holes and inserting wooden dowels as construction 'nails'.  So, here are the photos of today's work.  I am tired, and I think Chuck is sick of my orders and complaints.  It must be very difficult for him to deal with such an anal person as myself.  I just have to have things done correctly!!!  Bless his heart, he didn't complain too loudly, and was a big help to me--especially when we had to lift the mansion up onto the foundation.  There it will stay for a few days so I can analyze my work, and work out the details of my next steps in constructions.  The first thing will be to strengthen the 'glue joint' where the floor meets the walls by drilling holes and inserting dowels through the outside walls and into the center of the floor.  I certainly am so thankful for Dremel and Black & Decker  rotary and hand tools.  They surely make my life easier when building miniatures and doll houses.




So there you have a day's work on the Thornhill Mansion.  It certainly doesn't look like much, but believe me, what you see constitutes approximately 46 hours of work over the past week or so.  I will be happy to get to the 'fun' stage.  That would be when construction reaches a point where floors can be inlaid, fireplaces built-in, stairways installed, and decorative finishes applied.  All will come in good time, but for today, enough done and enough said.  Now to step outside and breathe the nice clean crisp Iowa air. 

Dottye



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