Few Unscheduled Days Off...Best Laid-Plans And All That!

My best-laid plans have not gone entirely to schedule these last couple of weeks or so, and in the end I decided to take a few days off. Hence the original planned listing of vintage stock never got off the ground, apart from an Amersham dolls house (now sold)...

and this late 1940s/early 1950s Tri-ang No 50 dolls house - which at the time of writing this blog is still for sale.
CLICK HERE TO VIEW

Life can be complicated can't it? Well it is certainly is here. Am still waiting for the birth of first grandchild - now a few days overdue, and although there have been a few moments in the last couple of weeks including daughter in law being admitted to hospital with high blood pressure, all calmed once again and she was allowed home.

Then after Easter as I embarked on one massive decorating spree of upstairs bedrooms (I love decorating), a spanner was put in the works when builder friend came around to inspect some worrying cracks and newly discovered damp patch just where desk with computer is situated in downstairs room. Turns out there are exterior brick problems that need sorting - am very much hoping they are nothing major and at this stage builder friend assures me that he "thinks" they are just minor but felt that they definitely need attending to. So instead of coming in a few weeks time to decorate that room that will be my new "studio" ie. workroom, he is due to come next week ...I appear somehow to have jumped the queue in his very long client list! Therefore I will need to embark in stripping all wallpaper from this room as a matter of urgency, as I had agreed originally with builder friend to do this...but that was when I had thought that I'd have several weeks to complete the task:) So although I hope to undertake some listing of antique and vintage items to the website this week,  I will only be able to do so as and when I can. As always, you will be able to see at a glance, photos of any new additions at the bottom of my Home Page.

Meanwhile  after much pondering, deliberating and getting the views of family and friends....I decided to go ahead with the purchase of a large circa 1920s Scottish dresser with lower drawers and upper glazed display cabinet. It is now here and I love it...I  can't quite believe it is mine! The twiddly turned pieces down each side are beautiful and quite unusual. I got it from a wonderful local antique pine dealer - CLICK HERE  TO VIEW WEBSITE. Ken delivers all over the UK and even overseas would you believe! The drawers will be filled with the contents of the old filing cabinet which has seen better days, and the glazed cabinet will give extra display options in my new "studio".

In between the mayhem going on here, as baby was still showing no signs of arriving,  I finally decided at the last hour to go to Kensington Dolls House Festival last Saturday in London with one of my miniaturist friends. It was a fabulous day, plenty of absolutely gorgeous miniatures to feast our eyes on and it was super to catch up with so many old miniaturist friends too. It made a change not to have any pressure in having to purchase materials etc, or anything in particular as has been the norm in recent times, but with no workshops in the offing at the moment (I have not given up totally on the idea and still pondering on these) and with no other immediate projects to create either, I had great fun in making four purchases purely for myself.

Handpainted mantel clock by Victoria Fasken

Handpainted ornate resin clock by Lenda Boswell

I purchased two clocks for my own vintage style clock shop.

Miniature farm set by Franzes Paradise of Switzerland

Miniature giraffe by Reina Mab Miniatures of Argentina

 The other two purchases were tiny toys from overseas traders for my vintage style toy shop.

 One day I will do another blog about my shops but for now here are a couple of pics as they are at the moment. 

I made this to sell at Thame Fair earlier this year but I just couldn't let go of it in the end as it was a one off,  inspired by a miniature building that I saw at the Bethnal Green Museum Of Childhood. The back slides out for access.

The quirky vintage style clock shop's stock is as you can see, rather sparse of clocks but I am looking forward to filling it to the brim with a combination of real antique clocks plus vintage style artisan miniature clocks.

The antique style toy shop has been featured on here before and is filling up nicely indeed - CLICK HERE FOR FULL STORY. Am rapidly running out of shelf space and am going to have to put some thought into further shelving and maybe some hanging rails. It is very difficult to photograph as the there is so much reflection on the front glazing but when the additional shelving etc. is in place I will attempt to properly photograph once again for this Journal. This structure was the original prototype of one of our workshops we ran a couple of years ago and I love it. There are so many stories attached to lots of the pieces in here and a friend suggested documenting a detailed list of contents,  which is a brilliant idea and which is now on my long "to do " list.

Well I am hoping that the next time I blog on here my very first grandchild will have arrived safely. As you can tell...I am rather excited!!!!!!
Celia