We seek him here, we seek him there

 The last few weeks I've been pottering occasionally in my dollshouse room, trying to turn the Chinese glass globe dollshouse into something I could live with.  The actual house was far too naff to pretend to be a serious dollshouse, so it just looked wrong in the glass globe - not to mention the imminent danger of all the 'snow' falling out the open back.  I'm talking about this ornament which you haven't seen for a while.

I removed it all from the glass globe and tried to think how else I could display it while still hiding the electronic circuit board that controls the lights.  Pawing through my box of bits, I found some old ribbon spools and realised that I could combine a couple of those into a suitable base.  So I did that, painted the new base and decorated it with ribbon, and cut a window in the base to access the electronics.  The lights had stopped working which I had assumed was because the impact-activated 'knock switch' must have got hit when we had the flood, and the lights had exhausted the batteries.  But I found a loose wire which had broken off the circuit board so thought that must be the fault.

I glued the house onto the spool and started adapting the surrounding trees and fence to fit onto the spool.  I realised the yellow outdoor bench was over-sized so I cut the legs shorter.  But when it came time to glue the bench onto the front yard, could I find the bench?  No I could not.  All miniaturists know the drill: you search your immediate work area, you search yourself in case the item is sticking to your sleeve or has fallen on your lap.  Then you carefully stand up and start searching the floor directly underneath where you are working.  Then you move the chair and get down on your knees and start looking in every direction.  Then with a torch.  Then you start looking further afield in case you have accidentally kicked said item into a distant corner.  Then you start accusing the cat, and walking randomly around the basement in case it was sticking to your clothing but then fell off at another location.  

Eventually after about 10 minutes of fruitless searching, I gave up and decided I would have to live without the bench.  I returned to the house and to puzzling out the electrics.  Of course the minute I turned the house upside down (I had already looked under it previously), there was the little yellow bench nesting in all the wires hidden inside the cavity.  How? 

Sadly the lights seem to be kaput.  I had ordered fresh batteries, and I re-soldered the broken wire.  The circuit board/battery pack are working because they will light up a spare bulb.  But none of the three bulbs in the house itself will light up.  I can't see any broken wires, so I assume they just burnt out after the flood. As they were glued in while the house was being assembled, it would be difficult and destructive to change them out.  So I've just left them for now, but it's disappointing.

Anyway, it looks a bit more like a cute Christmas ornament now.

I finished the second Hope handbag this week, in a pleasing colour combination that I quite like. I shall have to find a use for this one, perhaps as a knitting bag.

An unusual craft project this week was to repair the cat's scratching post.  After about 18 months, these become so shredded and broken that I usually order her a new one.  DH suggested that maybe I could buy more sisal twine instead.  This indeed turned out to be a thing, with Amazon selling 'repair kits' for scratching posts.  I sent off for a skein of twine and was able to rejuvenate her post with a bit of hot glue and some staples.  She has a tall post so I was only able to recover the most damaged section at the top, but she seems quite happy with it and used it right away. 

The Autumn hand-painted yarn socks have made it past the heel so a sock is within reach.

Other than that, I've worked a bit on the Little House cross-stitch sampler, finished hand-quilting another block on the 25-block Applique Quilt, and I've made a hesitant return to my Bucks Lace Butterfly mat.  It's been quite hard to pick the latter up after a break of several months, and I've been wishing my past self had made better notes on such fundamentals as how long to cut gimp threads to go around the butterfly wings. But I'm slowing getting back into it.

A real treat this week was to book almost all of my leave allowance at work, since for the first time ever I am not having to hoard leave like a miser - due to planning to quit/retire in the autumn. I don't even need to save leave days for christmas, hee hee hee.  Since I haven't taken much leave during the past year, I had quite a bit saved up.  So I've applied for a week every month from June to September and am looking forward to it.

In other news, I've had a letter inviting me to make an appointment for my vaccination.  When I went online to look, the nearest centre was several miles away in another city so I haven't booked yet. DH had his done in our town, which I would prefer.  The website says to keep checking back for new appointments so I will try a few more times to see if I can get something closer that won't require DH to take as much time off work to drive me.  But it feels like progress to have the opportunity.  I wonder how long it will be before DS gets his?  Hopefully before his office re-opens and starts pressuring him to get back on the train.

Have you had your jab?