Farm House

 I didn't get much done on the farm house this week.  I've been working on Christmas gifts and exchanges.  So much to do, so little time.  This week I decided to make our television.  I was about four when we got our lovely black and white television.  Back in those days unless you had a great antenna you could only get two channels.  My older brother talked my Dad into letting him build an antenna.  He was ten years old but an avid reader of Popular Mechanics.  So we were lucky and got a few more channels.

I started by making the box.  Old TV's weren't 70".  I think ours was 13".  Then I made the inside frame for the picture tube and made some legs.

I think the most difficult part was making the curve for the tv tube.  My brother fortunately knew that it was an admiral TV.  I made a mid 50's Admiral TV.

I stained the cabinet a dark wood color.  It probably was actually wood in those days.  Remember the test pattern anyone?  I think sometimes we saw the test pattern more that we saw TV programs.  But, I do recall watching Walt Disney, Ozzie & Harriet and George Burns.

Once this part was finished I only had to make the rabbit ears.  

This was one of the quickest farm house pieces of furniture I've made yet.  Unlike the wringer washer which took a very long time.

Farm House

 Today I am going to post the wringer washing machine I made.  I'm sure that this wringer washer is not exactly like the one we had but it is close enough.  I did try to take pictures all the way through but I didn't quite make it.  I keep forgetting to take pictures.  So this is the start.  We had a square wringer washer.

I put the two pieces together and did a lot of sanding to round the corners.  As you can see here I put the agitator in and started to build the arm for the wringer part.

The next part that I made was the wringer part of the washing machine.  Fortunately for me I was able to follow, mostly, the design by Kris Compass on 1 Inch Minis.  I love everything she does.

We had a shiny tray for guiding the clothes through the wringer.  I tried several approaches to that part and mostly without much success.  I finally made the tray with Fimo and covered it with shiny tape.

You can see here that I added the two arms for selecting the wash cycle.  In the final pictures you will see the electrical cord, the hose for draining the tub and the wheels on the bottom.

 

Overall, I like the wringer washer and I know it will look great in the farm house.

On another note, remember the leprechaun door I made going down to the basement of the house?  Well, I did fix that door since no one in my family is a leprechaun.

I am going to start working on putting the first floor of the house together.  I am somewhat afraid of doing this step only because I have been building by the seat of my pants.  Who know if it will go together right.