A Winter's Tale

For some reason the last few weeks have been full of thoughts as to "what comes next" and I'm sorry to day that I'm no further forward than usual. I did start work on a desk-sitting test track scheme using what can only be described as "cork board technology" but even that has proved to be flawed in testing - I clearly haven't learnt the lesson from 'Upcycle' about length vs desk size...

However, I had a welcome distraction when studying my daughter's winter term homework sheet - "create a winter scene". My mind seemingly switched to diorama mode as I wondered what could be done with materials already to hand. She then told me they had been learning about Joseph Farquharson at school and that provided a few ideas that shaped the final model.

What has resulted is a study in cat food box, polystyrene, wood filler, PVA and some snow scatter that I actually received as part of a well thought out 'secret Santa' present last year. She got involved at all of these stages of scenic development, with varying levels of help!

Detail touches include a length of Peco flexible fencing, a length of twig as a log, cheapo 7mm scale figure, a hare from the spares box and 'Olaf'. The trees and bushes are sea moss, sprayed brown and then when dry sprayed with hairspray and scattered with more snow powder (mostly achieved by little hands under supervision).

The reindeer wrap was added as a novel finishing touch (and because covering the print on the box was taking several coats of paint). Just to prove that this started as a cat food box:

Filling the box with polystyrene (mostly sheets and blocks) didn't take a lot of time or effort and it was carve-able the next day, including cutting the box sides down to shape. I think this would prove to be a useful method again if an "instant" diorama was required.

Colin