Tough Work!

Most people hate certain things like going to the dentist, or the tax man, or even to the grocery store...my own personal Hell is having to go to the Scrapbooking Store.  Ugh!  I am not hating on you if scrapbooking is your hobby, so please! no nasty emails!   I just hate the Scrapbooking Store because it's merchandised by vendor, which is so lame --do scrapbookers really care what "label" their puffy glitter paint is?  Who cares?  It's not like they have Chanel puffy glitter paint, or teddy bear stickers by Lanvin....Wouldn't it make more sense to put all the bridal crap together and all the Halloween crap together?  No, let's merchandise by vendor so we'll have Halloween crap in seventeen different areas! 

It just gives me a nervous break-down walking in there!  Plus, it's located in the same Mall that the Department Store where I work in Display is at.  And I'm off this week, so the last thing I wanted to do this morning was hop the train and head to the Mall. 

But the Entrance Hall of Merriman Park needed a nice ceiling paper so off to the mall I went.

After wandering around aimlessly for what seemed an eternity, I settled on white card with a subtle, embossed pattern.  

Ceiling rose by Sue Cook Miniatures

You might also notice that the lights are hung.  But don't get too excited, most of them aren't working.  I tried. I really did!  I even figured out how to remove the plugs (there were no directions on the packaging).  When I pulled the plugs apart, I could not believe how miniscule the wires are!  Some of them seemed to have lost the 'bare' part of the wire and I couldn't figure out how to strip the casing from the wire --they are so fragile!.  I tried putting them back together anyway but of course, they didn't work. 

Sorry about the glare! 

None of the four wall sconces work.  But I did manage to get the chandelier fired up, believe it or not!  (Thanks Ray)!  Ray suggested I put a little 'junction box' in the floor above to keep some extra wire in case I need to take the fixture down to service.  A 'trap' in the flooring will hide the box.  Worked great!

Not content with the walnut stain on the door!  I'll have to try again on that...

In spite of the disappointment of not being able to get the sconces working, I'm pretty happy.  I think I'm at the point where I can start gluing stuff down permanently.  But I'm debating whether or not I should pick out some of the moldings with gold...and if so, do I use real gold leaf or is gold paint OK?  I'm also a little worried about making the mitered cuts for the cornice --I've done it in 'RL' but never in small scale!  But I'm sure I'll figure it out. 

Martinis coming up!