2023 PROJECT NO. 1…TOADSTOOL HOUSE…

Post by **Howard** » Sun Jan 01, 2023 1:47 pm

Greetings to all…

It’s a new year and time for a new project…this one was inspired by a vintage greeting card I saw online…see the top left of the completed house picture below...

I thank our forum friend, Steve, for getting me interested in making the little fellow who lives in the toadstool house…here’s a link to the topic thread he started…https://www.cardboardchristmas.com/foru ... it=putzish

The house body is a tapered cardboard tube…sorta like an upside-down paper cup…see the PDF below for patterns for the major pieces…

(Note…these free patterns are provided for your personal, non-commercial use)…

The top is a ring of 3/16” thick foam board glued to a chunk of foam about 1” thick and sculpted with a craft knife and sandpaper…I added a layer of paper mache using paper kitchen towel before priming and painting…the white dots were painted with the tip of 3/8” wood dowel and a pencil eraser…

The fence is crepe myrtle twigs…a gnarled length of tree branch was used for the stump…base measures about 5 1/2” square x 3/4” thick…the holly branch came from Hobby Lobby…I'm going to add a small gray squirrel to the top of the stump shortly...

I’ll be posting additional construction details and photos…stay tuned…

Howard…

Post by **les** » Sun Jan 01, 2023 2:41 pm

Happy New Year Howard!!! What a wonderful bit of whimsy!!! Love it!!!

Post by **maria** » Tue Jan 03, 2023 11:13 am

This is just wondrful!

Post by **hjcb0203** » Tue Jan 03, 2023 11:27 am

Oh Howard! This is such an adorable little house. I will have to figure out a way to make it weatherproof so I can add it to my gnome garden.

Post by **Howard** » Tue Jan 03, 2023 3:57 pm

hjcb0203 wrote:Oh Howard! This is such an adorable little house. I will have to figure out a way to make it weatherproof so I can add it to my gnome garden.

Hello…regarding waterproofing…I read somewhere…(eons ago)…that there was an outdoor garden train model railroad display that has structures made of twigs and cardboard…to preserve the structures they immersed the entire thing into a bath of clear outdoor decking preservative and let it soak…after the bath, when the piece was thoroughly dry, it was put on display on the layout…I have never used the method and can not say it works or for how long…a similar method on a small structure would be easy to try…
Howard…