Thrift Score.

On Monday, I stopped at the local thrift store to find some items for a Halloween costume and stumbled upon this.

Mondays are 50% off days so this grain silo was 99¢.
I took it to the studio yesterday and cleaned it up. Here's a shot to show the scale.

 I was probably not warm enough for spray painting, but I did it anyway.

Next, I have to weather it a bit and add some rust and such. I may even rig up some kind of interior for it. Just in case the players want to explore the inside. ;)

Weathering done. Thinking about altering the door to be closer to mini height.

Making Fences

I'm currently working on scenery that can be used in a modern (or wild west or even post apocalyptic) setting or fantasy setting. Standard stuff like these hand made fences.

Choose your post. I grabbed a rubber banded bundle of 15 of these at a yard sale for $1.00.

The guy tried to tell me they were hand carved. I looked them over and I asked him if the bar code on the bottom was "hand painted". Anyway...

Cut them to the desired size.

I recommend sanding them to give it a flatter edge. It'll help keep them straight when you base them. I, also, recommend grabbing a sander like this. It's nice. I bought this beauty (the Sand-It) online at www.micromark.com. I also grabbed a Duplicate-It. Which I recommend.

Then I soak them in a watered down black paint bath. You don't have to leave them in there for very long. Also, as a side note, you don't want to mix up to much as the mixture starts to stick after awhile.

Set them somewhere to dry for at least a few hours. You don't want the water interfering with the glue. If you're in a hurry, set them under a lamp to speed up the drying process.

I am currently working on a more sophisticated version of this (I have a tray that I've glued a ruler too and plan on getting some double sided tape to lay down). But for now the duct tape dopes the trick just fine. It helps keep things lined up and makes it MUCH easier to glue together. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one to have an issue with objects sticking to my fingers better than the glue can hold.

Add your glue drops.

Then your fence pieces.

Clean up the excess glue.

And place something heavy and flat on it so it dries straight.

When it's dry you can trim off the extra over hang of the fance and add your bases ( I use clear plastic, post on that coming soon). And add any extras at this point, like grass, bushes, tall grass, etc.

And finally...

Some Random Stuff

Here are a couple of posts that I wasn't sure how to fit in with other things. So, Random Stuff it is.
First, here's my cheap solution to tall grass for miniatures.

Yep. That's a big Barbie head. I got it on a half off day at a nearby thrift store. So, it only cost me, like, 99¢. I tried dying some of the hair green but it didn't really work the way I wanted it to. I'm going to try some green ink and see what happens.

It works better than the kind you can buy in the package at a hobby shop because you can hold it with one hand and cut it with scissors in the other. The head and base keeps everything in position for you.

Look at my train tracks and you'll see the "grass" in use.

Next is an O scale train car that I picked up cheap because it was missing one of it's doors.

I dug into my box of plastic parts and found something workable, then added an edge to it so it would fit in the groove on the side. Lastly I had to glue a long piece of plastic to the bottom to keep it in place.

I may revisit this and add some extra pieces to give it some more "character". Actually, there's no "may" about it. I will. Cuz it bugs me now...

I did manage to keep enough glue out of the groove so that it still slides open and closes. Sometimes it's the little things that keep you going. :)

My Hobby Lobby score.

Went to Hobby Lobby looking for a 1/43 semi truck and found a bunch of scenery bits on sale.
I mean, come on, $3.60, you can't go wrong.
I'm really looking forward to putting these on my table.

I called my parents and had them grab some from the stores near them in Michigan. 24 more packs at $3.60 a pack.