Haberdashery Counter

It feels like a hot minute since I've made a miniature scene but when I got my hands on the Gypsy Soul Laser Cuts Shop Counter I was inspired to fill it up with a slew of wee things.

I decided to go with sewing and knitting bits and bobs... a haberdashery!

Isn't that a wonderful word?! In America a haberdashery sells men's clothing, but in the UK it is a shop that sells notions and other small items for sewing and making.

I've filled my counter with yarn and fabic, patterns buttons, a thimble and spools of thread. A mix of life sized and miniature items is fun visually (and I like to think that fairies would find full sized thimbles extremely useful).

I've used a 1 inch Sized Faux Book Box and Suitcase as display boxes for my miniature buttons, skeins of yarn and measuring tape.

If you'd like to see how I created this piece and the minis I've made a video HERE. But don't feel limited to creating a haberdashery! Create something that reflects you and what you love. Fishing and hunting supplies, candy shop, hardware store, jewelry store... you name it!

Here are all the bits I used to create this particular counter.

Store Counter (COMING SOON)

1 inch Sized Faux Book Box
Suitcase 1.6 Inch

Wooden beads

Graphic 45 Floral Shoppe paper
Sewing & Such Collage Sheet

Buttons
1/8" wooden dowel
Fabric

Craft Yarn/Thread
Cardboard
Mini Embellishments

Celestial Matchbook Faux Book Box

A dreamy little faux book box for you today.

For this project I took a Matchbox Sized Faux Book Box, and embellished it with stash scraps from the ALCHEMY and COSMOS papers from Stamperia

Working on small projects like this are a wonderful way to use up little leftover bits. It's also a fun exercise to use up stash bits that share a theme. I love stars and moons and all things celestial, so it was nice to collect those little bits and create something new.

Inside I added brass stars, a vial of starry tinsel, and loads of moony imagery all smooshed up together.

I don't have a full tutorial for this project, but I can offer a few tips to help you along.

• try using hockey tape to hinge the lid of the Matchbox Sized Faux Book Box This fabric tape works really, really well for books and bendy foldy parts in mixed media projects

• avoid adding too many embellishments to the inside of the spine, it will impede closing the box

• glue a length of ribbon to the front and back of the cover before covering with paper. It's a super simple closure for your book box.

Perhaps the most important tip I can offer is this: make something that celebrates YOUR interests. While I'm mad for stars and magic and moons, don't shy away from making something that honors your love of unicorns, or gardening, or jelly beans! Explore whatever tugs at your heart, no matter how kooky it might be.

All that said, here are the supplies used in this particular piece:

Matchbox Sized Faux Book Box
Cloth hockey tape
Ribbon
ALCHEMY and COSMOS Stamperia papers
Glue
Glass vial
Artifact Labels
Idea-ology - Tim Holtz - Story Stick
Tinsel stars
Glitter
Stamp pad

Tiny Winter Candy Cottages / Gingerbread Houses

I'm neck deep in holiday making and all of my non-crafty friends think I'm off my rocker. "It's so early!" Those with a makers heart know that now is the time to get your fingers working.

I am particularly pleased with these little winter cottages.

Pretty stinkin' cute, right?! I think they're even more adorable as a tiny village.

These cuties are made with Gypsy Soul's 1 to 12 Gingerbread House, placed on a little wooden round, with wee bottle brush trees and tiny candy and a sprinkling of snow.

I've finished off the roofs with snippets from the Tiny Shingles Sampler.

Want to make your own? Pop over HERE  to see how I assembled these sweet little houses.

Here are all the supplies I used putting these cuties together:

1 to 12 Gingerbread House

Tiny Shingles Sampler

small wood rounds

Mini Candy Canes
Polymer Clay Red Swirl Peppermint Cane

miniature bottle brush trees

green flocking/grass/terrain

faux snow

straight pin
glue (white glue and super glue)
acrylic paint

*Note: tweezers are VERY helpful with this project

The Little Mystic's Hutch

Although I've always been interested in the magical, I've never been one for crystals. Lately however I've been admiring a number of Instagram accounts that share these gorgeous pictures of crystal grids. Shiny stones laid out in pretty patterns. They're enchantingly beautiful.

Those patterns, colours, and crystals got me thinking about glitter and stardust and dreams and the Universe. Yes, all those things at once!

So I put together the 3 Panel Hutch, added some spindly legs and stars...

... and filled it with tiny gem stones.

Perhaps I'll make a life sized mystic hutch for myself in the future, but for now my fairies will not be wanting. They have drawers filled with stars, and loads of stones and gems, to weave some magic.

If you'd like to see the process of making this hutch, you can pop over to my YouTube channel to watch the video HERE.

Here are all the bits and bobs I used to create The Little Mystic's Hutch:

3 Panel Hutch
(UK shoppers visit HERE)
Wooden Table Legs
3D Star Spacer Beads
Flat-Back Gold Star Studs - 12mm
Flat-Back Gold Star Studs - 8mm

Blue/Turquoise scrapbook paper
Gold Star Sequins
Brass Moon
Miniature Tarot Cards
Various Stones/Gems/Crystals
Tiny Wood Bowls and various miniature bowls/vials
Paint
Glitter

Potages Cauldron Shope

I'm embracing my inner Potterhead once again and this time I've created a miniature version of "Potages" the cauldron shop located on the North Side, Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter universe.

I've used a 7 by 7 Corner Room Box as the base for my little shop. I've also added a
Double Window Ornate on both the inside and exterior of the 'building'.

The signage is are printouts pasted to thick board with small brad heads added to the corners.

Simple trims, which are just various sized strips of card cut from a cereal box, are a super easy way to create a finished custom look.

Wooden floor was created with coffee stir sticks, stained with washes of acrylic paint. And how perfect is that wallpaper with it's pattern of tiny spiders?! That's "It's Elementary" from Graphic 45s Master Detective Collection. Scrapbook paper makes excellent roombox wallpaper.

To fill my shop, all sorts of little cauldrons. I even designed some products for proper cauldron upkeep like wax, cleaner and polish. To be honest, those little packages put me almost a whole day behind... totally worth it :P You can download the collage sheet to create these at the bottom of this post.

Want to create your own Potages? Or maybe a shop from your own imagination?! I have a video walkthrough for creating the basics of this room that might help you in making your own masterpiece. You can find it HERE

Finally, here are supplies used in my wee cauldron shoppe:

7 by 7 Corner Room Box 

Double Window Ornate

Black Plastic Cauldrons

Metal Cauldron or Pot

Tiny Wooden Bowls
"It's Elementary" Graphic 45, Master Detective Collection

cereal box card

thick card

wooden stir sticks

acrylic paint

drywall compound

small metal brads

transparency paper

glue, glue, glue
Cauldron Shop Printable

Have fun!

Shamrock Chapel

There is a beautiful little church I visited while in Ireland, St. Finbarr's Oratory at Gougane Barra. A wee chapel situated on a bit of a jetty on a lake.

Looking at the Mausoleum Kit in my stash I was inspired by my memories of this place to create a miniature chapel of my own.

For the exterior stone texture I've used drywall compound and the Cobblestone stencil.

Tip: coat your stencil with boating wax to seal it and make it reusable!

I quite like the roof of this piece and the wee turrets that flank the two sides. For the saintly statues I simply painted some miniature figures used for railway models grey and popped them inside. That fancy it at the front peak is the top bit of a chipboard key from the Keys & Plates Shape Set

The windows are a stained glass image that I downloaded then printed onto a transparency sheet. Rather than cutting out individual windows, there is a piece that covers the whole windowed area. It's much easier and less fiddly if no one is going to be peeking inside.

And that spikey Gothic trim to the roof? I deconstructed (aka chopped up) a Gothic Border to add some vertical interest.

You can follow the process I went through making this piece with THIS video walk-though.  And here is the supply list of all the bits you'll need to create your own version.

Mausoleum Kit

Chipboard Shingles - Pointed

Chipboard Shingles - Half Scale Sampler

Cobblestone
Gothic Border 6 Inch
Keys & Plates Shape Set
Cabana Row Mini

Other supplies needed for this project:

Stained glass pattern printed on transparency

Acrylic paint

Drywall compound

Glue
Cross charm
Railway figures

The Butterfly Conservatory

On my trip to London last year I made certain to time my visit with the butterfly exhibit at the Natural History Museum. I made it just in time, squeezing in on the afternoon of the very last day. It was magic. Then again, how could walking among butterflies not be?!

This project, is a sort of homage to that memory. A pretty space filled with flowers and fluttery things.

This project may take time, but it uses  only a handful of supplies. The structure is a Small Conservatory. That's it. I haven't added any fancy embellishments (but don't let that stop you from adding some dramatic flair!)

Inside I've added miniature wooden pots packed with faux flowers and leaves. They aren't properly scaled and they don't even look like any particular sort of 'real' plants, but they give a nice floral feel and provide lots of texture.

Those paper butterflies inside are all from my English Fairy Garden collage sheet. I printed it out at 50% to scale the butterflies down to a more appropriate size.

I haven't glued any of the pots in place so that I can move those potted pretties around, and even change up the Small Conservatory completely if I want to!

Besides paint and glue, the last supply I used was a plain sheet of cardboard. I've used strips to create the 'wood' floor and baseboards inside the conservatory.

Outside, again, I used layered strips of plain card to create a subtle architectural element to the bottom of the structure. I also used the card on the roof of the building to hide the slot and tabs that hold the piece together.

And that's it! Just those few little bits to make something quite pretty. If you'd like to see how I put this project together, follow along with this walkthrough video.

And here is your supply list:
Small Conservatory

Miniature plant pots
Faux flowers
English Fairy Garden collage sheet
Sheet of cardstock
White acrylic paint
Glue (white and hot glue)

Happy making!

Darkly Delightful Bathing Machine for Grim Days at the Beach

The April showers might bring May flowers but right now they are making my landscape rather grim. Don't get me wrong, I am a fan of grim things and rainy days. Rather than fight against the current weather conditions, I'm going to embrace them and make something darkly delightful.

This little "Bathing Machine" is based on the 18th and 19th century change rooms wheeled into the sea by by-gone beachgoers. But what if the Adams' ancestors went to the beach? Or the Munsters? OR MARY SHELLEY OR EGAR ALLAN POE OR... well, you get the point. I'm sure they'd all visit the seaside on rainy days. I'd like to think they had a creepy little space for changing into their wading attire and doing a little fortune telling to see if the water was fine.

Gypsy Soul does have a proper Gypsy Wagon available if you're feeling more ambitious, but I like this little fella. It's a fun kit and there are LOADS of customization possibilities. Travelling snake oil salesman, a tiny portable library, a sideshow trailer... oooh, so many ideas!

Two tips I will mentions.

1. I am terrible at applying hinges so I glued my door in place and ajar. If you do the same, just be aware of the door placement so that you can still add the stairs.

2. I used the Chipboard Shingles - Half Scale Sampler for the shingles. One package is enough to do the entire roof. You might want to position the bottom row of shingles lower than I have. (Don't tell anyone but I think it would have looked a bit better with more of an overhang.)

If you'd like to see the process to create this particular piece, the walk through is available HERE.

And here are all of the supplies I used to create this version of this project: 

Bathing Machine

Chipboard Shingles - Half Scale Sampler

Round Table & 2 Chairs

Leafy Corners
Faux Metal Number Plates 1 to 25

Miniature terrain grass
Moss and faux flowers
Bead caps
Thin Looped Dresden Border
Black Zig Zag Dresden Borders 

Paper straw

1/8" doweling

Graphic45 - Rare Oddities
Acrylic paint

Glass marble