Bungalow Dollhouse: Summer

 

Season number 3! My seasonal bungalow dollhouse is enjoying the last few days of summer.  I finished the gardens and switched up the grass for the change in season.  I'm very happy with how all the flowers and plants came together, it was a mix from talented artisans and a few I made myself.  If you missed the previous posts about this dollhouse, you can find them here.

This summer scene really started with the miniature hanging flower baskets by Artisan Kraig Councell of Creative Eye Miniatures. I contacted him back in March and they were worth the wait!  They are so realistic looking and lush.  I wanted them to shine so I didn't add wreaths to the doors this time like previous seasons.  He also made me the purple listhanus in the garden as well.

You might remember some of the plants from prior projects, I've been collecting for this garden for a while now.  I started with the delphiniums and hydrangea from Petite Fleur Minis and then added a variety of plants from SDK miniatures this spring.  I especially like the gardenias and the daylilies they made me.  I choose to go with ready-made plants, but I've seen Jodi (myminiaturemadness) and Robina (myminiatureabodes) make incredible gardens with their kits.  The pansies are from Debbie Ohm miniatures.

The rest of the trees and shrubs are from hbs miniatures, model builder's supply, and Michaels.  

I tried to keep my plants all in the same blooming timeline as best I could.  I was aiming for late summer.  I'm not a gardener in real life, but I have to say I really paid attention to the neighbourhood gardens this year!

Towards the end, I realized I needed a few more flowers and plants to fill out my garden, but time was not on my side.  My fellow Canadians know you really have to plan out your builds if you want things to arrive on time from the USA.  And I was down to the last couple of weeks of August!  So I tried designing and laser cutting my own designs.  I made the cosmos, marigolds, cone flowers and some susan's.  They turned out pretty well... but also made me really appreciate how good the artists are that I bought from!

The flower bed was made the same way I did the fall garden last year and the outdoor roombox before that.  I use a faux soil from the hobby train shop by woodland seneics.  I left a lot of the soil loose to be able to cover the plant bases and I also cut holes in the foamboard base to allow the plant bases (the part where the wires are glued together) to sit so it wasn't a super lumpy garden.  

These are some of the photos I posted on my Instagram stories when I was working away:

Also in case you have forgotten about the winter scene... eight months later and I am STILL vaccuming up snow dust off the dollhouse!

I love how it all come together!  Everything is still very temporary and can be moved to another project.  I like that I can reuse things, but it does make it much more delicate and frustrating to work with.  So let's enjoy these photos while this lasts!

The backdrop was more of a challenge to find this season surprisingly.  I ended up going out to a nearby park and taking a photo.  I took it to Staples and got it printed on my usual 36x48 engineering print paper. 

Originally I had only planned to do a combined spring/summer scene, but once I started working on the plants all I could think of were daffodils and tulips, so I do think I'll be back again next year for spring. 

Now onto fall again!  I think that has to be my favourite season!