Questions for a Q&A video

Sorry about no video last week, we had a wild windstorm that took out our electricity for about 18 hours. By the time we were back up and running I was soooo cold it took a couple of days to feel warm again. Then on top of that I managed to get sick. Before you ask I am feeling pretty much back to normal now, just trying to get caught up with Thanksgiving tomorrow. Yikes, I am not in any way ready but I will pull it off. No matter how far behind I feel like I am I still manage to get it together by dinner time.

Anyway, enough of me rambling. The reason I am posting is that I want to do a Q&A video for next Sunday so I need you guys to post some questions for me. I posted on the Facebook group last week and got some really good ones but I would like at least a few more. So please my friends post some questions as comments to this post and I will film on Saturday afternoon.

Thanks so much and a very Happy Thanksgiving to all of you that will be celebrating tomorrow. You will never know how thankful I am for all of you!

Dollhouse Miniature Gravy

Watch the video here.

This week are making another item for the dollhouse holiday dinner table, some gravy to go with those potatoes from last week. I mean really what dinner would be complete if you had mashed potatoes and no gravy??

This is another really simple project. The first step really is to figure out what container you are going to use to house the gravy. I chose to make both a saucepan of gravy and a gravy boat to put on the table. You could use any container that you have as long as it is bake-able. I left the clear coat of Triple Thick off the gravy boat this week so that I could add it after I was done with the baking since the Triple Thick does tend to bubble even at the low temperatures we bake the clay at.

To get the gravy we are using just a couple of materials some Translucent Liquid Sculpey (TLS) and some oil paint to color it. I used both some burnt umber and a touch of white paints to get a nice gravy color. Remember the baked color will be slightly darker than it appears when you mix in the TLS. The TLS looses some of it white color as it bakes.

After you have the amount of gravy in your container(s) just bake according to the directions on your TLS bottle.

When completely cooled coat the gravy and the container with some Triple Thick as desired.

I love how this looks when done and put on the table in the dollhouse.

Dollhouse Miniature Mashed Potatoes

Watch the video here.

This week I thought it would be fun to continue filling the dollhouse table for the big holiday dinner.

Of course mashed potatoes are a year round favorite, at least at my house they are. I would bet if you asked my son to list his favorite foods mashed potatoes would be very high on his list. I think if I made them every week he would be a very happy boy.

So since we love them in real life I figure the dollhouse dolls probably want them too. And this is such an easy dish to create that I know you will be able to make a lot of them.

I used to make my mini mashed potatoes by simply putting a wad of white clay into whatever container I wanted to use and try to manipulate the top surface to make it look like the real thing. The problem was it never really looked realistic. It always looked heavy and flat and way tooo solid. Then about 10 or 15 years ago I was reading one of the British miniature magazines and found this method for making the mashed potato. I couldn't wait to get home and try it out. (I remember I was sitting at the ice rink at the time waiting for my daughter's lessons and classes to get over with) I have made mini mashed potatoes this way many times since and they look so much better that it is worth the extra couple of steps.

To prepare you will need to have a bake-able container for the potatoes to go into. I don't know if you noticed in the video but the finish on my container bubbled a bit in the oven. I was able to salvage it with an additional coat of clear finish.

You will also need to pre-bake a chunk of white polymer clay. The brand really doesn't matter for this, I used plain old Original Sculpey but any white clay will be fine.

You will need to use a nutmeg grater (or something similar) to make a pile of very fine clay shavings/dust.

Now you need to give some color to some liquid polymer clay. For this particular project I prefer TLS but any liquid clay should work just fine. You need to make the TLS a cream color. To do this I use oil paints, a bit of white that has been warmed up with a tiny speck of yellow ocher.

Mix a small amount of the tinted TLS into a portion of your grated white clay. I like to not use all of either part at first so I can add either more TLS to thin the mixture or more grated clay to thicken it. Work it together until you have a mixture that resembles real mashed potatoes. Once you are happy with the texture and you have enough to fill your container go ahead and put it into the container.

If you are going to want a serving spoon in the finished mashed potatoes it must be put in now before it is baked.

When you are happy with the way your potatoes look bake them according to the directions on the TLS (or other liquid polymer clay)

Once the container is baked and cooled it is ready to display.

I love how these look when they are finished.

Of course you can also make some small mounds of potatoes to put on your doll size dinner plates too.

Dollhouse Miniature Cranberry Sauce

Watch the video here.

This week I decided to start getting into the holiday spirit and take on one of my favorite side dishes for the holiday table, cranberry sauce. This is super easy to do for the dollhouse and this is just one of many ways I have made this project.

This time I am using some clear Gallery Glass glass paint in clear, some red craft paint and some no hole mini marbles in red (garnet) I usually use a red glass paint but I found that bottle had dried up since the last time I used it so I improvised by coloring the clear with a red craft paint. Since they are both acrylic based paints this works just fine.

Other times I have made this in the past I have used a cranberry colored nail polish it works just as well as the glass paint.

The advantage to the glass paint is that you can add shavings of cured polymer clay if you want to make your doll's cranberry sauce a bit fancier. Since nail polish and polymer clay don't play nicely together you can't do that with the nail polish. Also I didn't have a color that I wanted to use in my nail polishes.

You can use any mini bowl you desire. The one I used this time is from the last batch of metal minis that I purchased. Use whatever you wish. I have shown on previous videos how to treat these metal minis so I didn't go into much detail on that this time. If you don't know what these are or how to work for them check my channel for the metal minis video I did a few years back.

To make the cranberry sauce is so easy. You simply mix the red paint with the glass paint (remember it will look pink at this stage- don't panic) then add the little beads and stir. Place the desired amount into your serving dish and wait for it to set up. If you want a serving spoon in the finished bowl you will need to add it now.

Allow plenty of time for drying/ curing and you are done.

That was really easy wasn't it?

This same project can be made with any of the liquid polymer clays. Use a tiny drop of oil paint to color the liquid clay then mix in the tiny beads, put it into your bowl and bake. Depending on the brand of liquid polymer clay you use you might need to give it a glossy top coat to make it look wet.