Station buildings in n scale

Who knew that micro scale could be so much fun?

Here are two of the three buildings on the platform at Grosmont Station.

1:144 scale ticket office

Well, here I am, scratch building a 1:144 mini! Isn't it interesting the paths our lives take us down? :)

I'm using sheet styrene molded to look like clapboard, plus tiny windows and doors by Tichy Trains.

And I'm thinking about making tiny hanging flower baskets so I think I'm officially round the twist ...

Some nice things in the post!

My husband and his brother are paneling the ceiling in our real living room ( I wish it could go as quickly as things can in dolls' house scale) so I haven't been able to do much mini-ing.

But the post has brought some lovely things. I received my order from Sue Cook today - more on that soon. My new front door is going to be amazing, and I'm really glad that I rethought the approach I was going to take.

And I got these brass jewelry findings from a seller on eBay - they're little beehives or birdcages, just over an inch high. Whatever they were meant to be, they're going to be painted black and turned into lanterns for the attic. I think they may actually look quite convincing ...

I've been working hard on sorting out my workroom upstairs, and last week the kids and I moved their dolls houses up there. It was nice getting some order imposed on the chaos there!

N gauge buildings from kits - engine shed

Okay, so this isn't dollhouses, but it is scale modelling. My husband David and I are working on an N gauge railway layout based on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway.

N gauge varies a little in scale, from 1:144 to 1:160.

David has finished laying the track and it's now time to start planning and building the structures.

We ordered an assortment of building kits by Metcalfe. These are card kits, die cut and scored for easy construction.

And the construction is easy! We spent a pleasant afternoon working on the engine shed for Grosmont Station, which will be two Metcalfe kits connected end to end.

Here are some photos - more soon!

More bricks!

Today is Knitwits and I hope to post some photos of the kids' projects, which are coming along so well.

Here's the first bay of the main house this morning - almost done!

Bricks coming along on dollhouse front!

Yes, it takes a long time to apply individual bricks - this is the result of two evenings' work.

I'm mixing the excellent brick Versi Slips from Richard Stacey with two other colours home made from sandpaper - a paler and a darker.

Second front door on William and Mary House

On Thursday I cut the second door front for the dolls' house, and cut out the window openings. I've decided to go with two windows for each of the rooms, partly because it's more typical of the period and partly because it'll cut down on the number of bricks I have to apply!

I added the quoins and have just now finished making and painting the waist.

It gets more like a real dolls' house every week!