Tutorial: Easy blind curtains

I love to accessorize!  I think every miniaturist enjoys the decorating part of any new scene - I certainly enjoy it more than the building process, even though I do enjoy putting up wallpapers!

Since I have tiny windows in the beach hut, I wanted to craft some miniature curtains - blind curtains, in fact, that don't require any complex work with fabrics, for which I am totally useless.

This was my first time crafting blind curtains, so here is what I came up with.  I think it is a very easy process, even for newbies to the hobby.

Materials required:

1. Your choice of fabric - I used a printable nautical fabric from Véronique
2. Scissors / cutter
   
3. Pencil
4. Double sided tape
5. Ruler 
6. Fine sand paper
   
7. Toothpics, or skewers - depending on how wide are your windows

1- Measure the width of your windows to determine the size of the rod you will be using.

2- Take your toothpick or skewer and mark this measure.

 

3- Cut to measure your toothpick/skewer using the cutter or an old pair of scissors

4- Sand the edges of the toothpick/skewer

5- Cut a strip of your fabric the width of your rod.  If you used printable fabric like I did, remove the paper backing.

6- Cover part of the strip with double sided tape.

7- Remove the coverings and place the rod at the beginning of the strip.  Make sure it is properly centered and straight.

8- Start rolling the fabric carefully, to make sure there are no wrinkles and that you keep the rod as straight as possible.  When you reach the end of the double sided tape, you are finished!  Trim any excess of fabric if necessary.

Congratulations!  You made your curtain!  

I have 4 windows, but for now I made just two curtains to try the technique.  Now that I have seen it works, more will follow!

Now get creative with decorations for the fabric: lace, trims, ribbons... Anything that you like!  Since this are for a nautical beach hut, I am leaving them as they are.  Have fun!

Luxury bed linens for Kassandra

Even though the bedroom of Kassandra's summer home is finished, she still isn't pleased with the bed.  She still does not know if she will keep the mahogany bed, or if she will replace it for a much modern black metal bed.

But in the meantime, she said her current bed looked awful, and she has been busy perusing the webs for a nice coverlet.  Given her taste, she has difficulty in finding fabrics she likes, specially modern ones.  However, she found on Facebook (yeah, she is on Facebook, although I do not know who taught her how to use it) a lovely seller from which she bought a nice bedding set.

Today it arrived, and she asked for help in dressing up the bed.  So first we took the bedding out of the bag and tried it on for the effect:

She wasn't happy that the current bed cover was visible underneath the pillows

So, we decided to take it all off again, and start a complete makeover.  We took the mattress out of its place, and stripped it of the bolster.

The bed, as it came to us.  The linen is all wrinkled too, argh!

Then we ironed a piece of red satin fabric (it was remnants of when I used to make wedding ring pillows). 

It is a gorgeous fabric!

We cut it to measure, and we took out the glue gun to fix it in place.  It was easy enough!

So shiny!

It was piece of cake to dress it up with the quilt and the pillows!

Even though it is a different red and a different fabric, Kassandra is happy with the final result

An inviting bed to rest on! I wonder who gave her the flowers, and what is inside that MAC bag...

The gorgeous bedding came from LTW Miniatures.  She makes lovely bedding sets for single and double beds, and pillows too.  Go check her out!

New Magictail tail skin!

So, since I am using my Magictail so much I decided to order a new tail skin, as birthday gift to myself.  You do know you can order tail skins separately, right?  I wanted to order a new one to have as a replacement, since Magictails are made of swimsuit fabric, and eventually, all swimsuit fabric gets ruined by chlorine.

Well, since I was doubtful between the Marina and the Arielle the first time I ordered, I chose an Arielle skin this time.  I ordered it on January 27th, and it was already here on the 31st.  Here are some pictures of the two tails together:

Monofin on the blue one

Monofin on the green one

Fluke detail

Compare colors

Comparing sizes

The blue one has stretched a bit with the use

As you can see, there is a noticeable size difference between the two.  I contacted Kirsten Söller to check if there was a mistake with my order, although I did not think so.  Everything was marked very clearly with my chosen sizes; the monofin fits perfectly, and the tail fits me.  I was informed that there is a tag inside the tail skin with the size, and indeed, mine is size L.  So you can see that tails stretch quite a bit after some use.  I have had the Marina for almost 2 years, but I have used it a total time of maybe 2 months of daily use, about 3 or 4 hours per day.

Both tails are not similar in color.  The Marina is definitely a darkish blue with shades of black, and the Arielle, despite having shades of turquoise, it has a predominant soft green color.  I love them both, but the Marina is still my favorite.  I will probably buy more blue skins when mine has been completely worn out.

I will shoot a video comparing the two shortly.  Stay tuned!

*UPDATE*
Here is the promised video.  Enjoy!

Crafting with my mom part 2

Yesterday, after finishing the cloak, my mom entered a sewing frenzy and decided she wanted to make a dress for her dollhouse. Something simple, but recognizable if layered over a bed or ironing board. She made a lovely black velvet dress with spaghetti straps. When she finished, she decided the burgundy taffeta fabric looked much more interesting, and she made this dress:

Isn't it lovely? Well, she made a matching capelet too:

After that, she decided that she did not want the black dress anymore, so I took it for me. And she was so nice as to make another one for me, this time in burgundy:

They both hang now in my closet. I went online after that to order some nice wood hangers... I'm waiting on them :)