Chasing the Creative Spark

Demo on the dollhouse began today. I peeled off carpets and cloth used as wallpaper, pried out staples from a staple gun….some of those were really in there! And I peeled off the shingles and woodwork my sis had added when she brought the house home for her daughter. She had done a good job and a lot of the work was really tough to remove. Especially the shingles, and I would have left them but I envision something on a smaller, less rustic scale.
When I peeled off the cloth from the bottom right room, I found vestiges of my old house. The walls had a damask pattern on them left over from my old red velvet cloth ‘wallpaper’. That room was the height of style to me as a kid. My dad had salvaged some parquet flooring from somewhere, and that was once the floor of my dolls living room. When I saw that fancy red pattern on the walls I had to run my fingers over it and smile. While pulling and tugging at my sisters well installed handiwork, the bottom wall dislodged a little. I can see the whole house will need some structural tweaking, but suddenly I had the idea of taking out that lower dividing wall to open up the lower level into a ballroom, and maybe just reinstalling part of it as a column or something.
The column area in the front is weak too. I thought about removing or remodeling those, but they are too much a symbol of my childhood dollhouse, so they will stay. I was looking at England country houses for ideas about how to style my house, but it’s tricky. My pitched roof clearly indicates a simple country house, a la Chawton Cottage. But only the grand houses or fancy lodgings have the columns. So I have to compromise a little.
On another note, last week I bought the book “The Artists Way” by Julia Cameron. I’ve heard great things about it and love it so far. Next week I’m going to start the exercises. It is set up as a twelve week program to help unlock your creativity. I think of myself as a pretty creative person, but like most of us there is a lot holding me back. I constantly feel too busy, but then I look at time I waste that could be channeled better. I really need something to spur me on, or if anything just to give me time to have fun mentally, like a grown up recess.

Pictured above, the dollhouses as we got them, Christmas, I think it's '73.

Here, the interior and exterior of the dollhouse before renovation.