Pre-staining shingles: I do prefer staining my shingles before putting them on as I glue too heavy and glue does not stain well. I used two plastic containers that I got at a dollar store, or you could use old ones around the house and a strainer. I put the stain in one container and then shingles, only enough to be covered by the stain. When the allotted time was up, I strained them into the second container. This means that I had shingles in the strainer and stain in the second container. I then put more shingles in the second container and dried the shingles in the strainer with paper towels and put them on wax paper to dry.You keep doing this until the amount of shingles that you want are done.

Isabel-CT

Staining shingles: When I wanted to stain the shingles for my house, I bought two of those inexpensive aluminum turkey-roasting pans at the grocery. I punched holes in the bottom of one to make a "colander" and set it inside the other. I then poured in the stain and a bunch of the shingles and stirred them around a bit. When they were stained to my liking, I simply lifted the inner pan out and let the stain drain into the bottom pan where it was ready for the next batch of shingles.I spread the shingles out on newspaper to dry (it was summer so I could do this all outside) and repeated the process until all the shingles were done. Hope this description is clear to whoever needed the help!

Chris in Minnesota

Staining Shingles: Just a thought about shingles, instead of buying light colored shingles and then staining here is a method for making your own and achieving a very nice finish. First find a timber with plenty of colour preferably hardwood a dark red Maranti or something similar will do. Cut it into strips about an 1/8 of an inch thick by about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch wide, the width can vary they don't need to be of uniform width. Take a good third of the strips and scorch with a blow torch on one side of the strip working down with scorch gap scorch gap to the bottom. Now mark all the strips on the side of the strip that is going to be glued to the roof. A line with a dark marker pen from top to bottom. Sand the unmarked face and the scorched face plus the two edges of the strip. If you have a disk sander this is perfect. Most of the scorching will now have sanded away leaving intermittent dark patches down the length of the strip. Cut your strips into the length you require for you shingles. lightly sand the cut edges and fix to your house. Apply one coat of matt varnish to seal the shingles. When dry with a blue green and yellow water colour paint put the color on the roof to make it look like algae or moss as much or as little as like. To save time dry with a hot air gun or hairdryer. Now finish it off with a dark furniture staining wax not beeswax or pine wax it needs to be good quality dark wax. This method really does give an effective finish. Try it on a bit of scrap wood first it helps in learning how to blend the paint Most of the houses at http://www.dolls-house.net have unpainted or stained shingles but one or two have it and will give you an idea whether or not you would want to try this method.

John

Tile Floor: making tile: My club once made tile by using a grout compound.We measured what size our floor needed to be and then cut out this pattern on a piece of cardboard. Posterboard would be fine.

Then we spread the compound out all over this board, trying to make it an even thickness about 1/16th" to 1/8". Then let set for awhile, time will vary due to humidity, but you want it to set up but not get completely hard.

Now draw your grout lines in the compound.An old pen or toothpick can be used as a tool here. Use a ruler to guide you so they are even. Remove any extra that the tool pulls up. Now let dry completely.

To color we used artist pastels. Experiment with different colors.You can give streaks and lines with the points of the pastels or just color all one color by rubbing with the side of the pastel. Now you can shake off any extra chalk. Try not to rub unless that is the effect you want.

Now spray with a fixative. A gloss is usually your preferring surface since this is tile. Let dry, you may want to recoat 1-2 more times drying between each coat.Once it is completely dry at least 12 if not 24 hours, fill in the grout lines with spackle or other grout like substance. Let dry and then lay in place.

This is a wonderful method IMHO that gives you a world of possibilities. You can go simple or complicated and not the headache of individual tiles. It also helps when trying to match a certain color wallpaper for instance.

Preble in GA

Aging solution: I mix up a solution of half water, half rubbing alcohol, black India ink and burnt sienna acrylic paint. You don't need much India ink or paint. I am no expert on this, don't have a formula, I'm afraid. I just play with amount until I get the depth and shade I'm happy with. (*note - it tends to dry a tad darker). After the first coat is on, I add a bit of a pine tree green colour to the mixture and paint that on mostly around the base of building, concentrated at corners where the wood would soak up moisture in real life and also farther up on wall that would "get more shade" than sunlight.

I think I'm going to play with that vinegar and rusty nail idea along with the other stuff.......

Debi in Quesnel

Tarnishing metal: I have unintentionally tarnished copper brass items with accidental exposure to acetic acid (lemon juice, vinegar, etc), if the mini utensils are truly copper it ought to work, also the brass screws.

Olegator

Painting beads on Porch Posts: Susan asked about how to paint a thin highlight on a Porch post. One thing you might try is to take a large paper cup and cut a pair of small notches in the rim opposite each other. use that as a "rest" for the Porch Post. Set the Post onto the notches and slowly turn the post with the fingertips of one hand, while the other hand guides an appropriately loaded thin brush on the bead as it turns.

If you like that general technique, I'm sure that a more permanent "rest" can be fabricated.

Brian

Note from Anne: Brian has given you great advice here, Susan. I would add two more suggestions:
Hold your wrist rigidly. Move from your elbow. You will avoid wiggles and wobbles and have much more control.

Don't go all the way into the crease between turned shapes on the post. Stop just short of it, or else you will get paint up on the neighboring shape in places. (I hope this makes sense)

Note from Anne:

Turning Posts and the 'rest': I clip two clothes pins to the rim of a coffee cup. Rest the post between them, hold the post comfortably in the other hand and twirl it gently against the paint brush. I use this method to lay glued string on thin dowels to make 'carved' posts as well. The glass allows the post to spin without friction. Lay it on a proper sized bowl, across the opening - - again between clothes pins to dry without interference. This works for almost any item that needs twirling for paint, glue or embellishment.

Judie

Painting posts: I have the Bostonian doll house and added an extra large porch plus a porch for the upstairs. I wanted detailed posts also. I cut up several 1/4 inch dowel rods into about 3 inch lengths and drilled a small hole one end. I then cut the heads off of straight pins and glued one end of the straight pin into the hole in the dowel. Then I drilled small holes in the ends of the posts and put these onto the pins sticking out of the dowels(be sure to drill holes in the posts -- if you don't and just try to stick the pins in, the posts will split) This way I had something to hold onto(the dowel) while I painted the posts. I first painted the whole thing the base color and let them dry ( I used pieces of foam that you use to put flower arrangements in to stick the dowels in to let the paint dry). Then using a very small brush I painted on the trim colors. It sounds like a lot of work and it is tedious but this really did work well, and I am very pleased with the results.

Shara