Now Playing: "Dukes of Hazard, Third Season" - they're pretty cheap when bought used !
Current Mood : So Happy
Man, you would not *believe* the effort it took for me to get the same green as what's used here on the ‘fridge' part of the Blog here. Tripod evidently has it trademarked or something. Couldn't cut/paste it. PaintShopPro's ‘Capture' feature worked on everything except the blog, and trying to match the color by eye simply didn't work. It was always just a shade or three off, and I started to brew up a headache from the effort.
Why did I want this exact color so bad ? Well, look again at Thursday's image for "mood". Last time you saw it, it didn't match so well. It was too light, and when I tried again, it was too dark. Now it looks less like a coloring page and more like a magnetic paper doll on the ‘fridge'. Which is what I wanted. It isn't so glaring as the ones before it. Sure, I could make the images a transparent .gif, but that takes a lot of time and detail. Frankly, I don't want to spend more than five or ten minutes on the coloring pages. It's fun, and I like doing it, but I don't wanna spend time on it I could use to sew or somesuch.
I finally semi-cheated and went into the ‘change settings' feature and cut/pasted a preview image of the Fridge theme. After trying sooooo hard to make sure I couldn't do that on the actual blog, being able to on the image editor was enough to make me laugh out loud. Finally, I had my - well, actually Tripod's - well-guarded shade of green.
And today's image looks much better ! Well, yesterday I promised some belated big news. And here it is !
That's right. Yesterday afternoon, about 4pm, Beloved Hubby started my dollhouse ! He redrafted the pattern from Things to Make for Children (hmpft ! This dollhouse is for ME ! ), making it larger and more advanced. I'll have more photos up on the site Sunday or so. But isn't it fantastic ?!
I'll tell you a secret, too. The pattern in the book is not only wrong, it leaves off many key measurements. That's mostly why Beloved had to redraft it. They show the elevator (still to come) on the right side in the photo, but on the left in the design pattern. That throws a lot of stuff off. The roof patio's piece got cut incorrectly - the stairway's supposed to go the other way, back against the far side of the patio - but we put it on this way anyway. Then Beloved crafted this gorgeous spiral staircase to fit it. And I admit, it's my favorite part of the house so far. My dolls can 'climb' it perfectly.
Up until he installed that, the patio was my favorite. Believe it or not, we had that Lucite used for the patio railing already. Aside from a half-inch sheet of plywood, we already had everything else. Still to come are windows (we'll have to buy another piece of Lucite), a boxlike waist-high elevator, a hardwood wall or two, trim to cover the raw edges, and cabinets. Yes, cabinets ! He free-handed several flat-out gorgeous cabinet doors from scraps of maple last night, and he wants to make more !
Am I the luckiest woman in the universe ? I think so ! I have full access to about 63 partially used cans of professional-quality paint, at least a dozen more of stains and finishes, so once it's done, I can decorate any way I want. I think it's the most beautiful dollhouse in the world - just imagine what it'll be like by the time Beloved's done !
I've mentioned that he should refine the plans and sell ‘em. He's definitely changed it from the original by more than 35% ! Tomorrow, I'll have to post an image of the original plans - he's really altered them for the better. I have to ask if anyone would *not* love to have that staircase in their doll play ?
(sigh) So happy...but I've about run out of things to want !
