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My First Orchid Kit Is On It's Way!!


kat57

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I mentioned ita couple other places, :D but I will soon have my first Orchid kit,bought off of ebay today! Yay!! So,I will be asking questions soon of veteran Orchid-ers-and I know there are quite few! I'm kinda scared-haven't even finished my little Ashley,yet! But I have wanted this house from the first!! I do wonder-are the windows hard,or just look complicated? I'll be looking at builds here and all over the net,but-does anybody have any favorite exterior color schemes for this house?

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Kat, every one of us who has built an Orchid -- and we are legion! -- has a favorite color scheme. The point of the whole exercise it to find YOUR favorite and go with it. When I'm auditioning colors for houses, I like to pick up the cards in the paint stores that show colors in various palettes or themes. It helps me focus on what goes with what. I don't always end up using those colors, but they act as a starting point.

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Well,I realize it's old hat to you and Holly and others who've done a bunch of houses. I haven't. I'm excited-this my first Greenleaf house. This kit is alot different than anything I have ever done-which is nothing compared to all of you,I realize. I know I can go read the blogs and am grateful they are there. And I can leave here and can get all kinds of color ideas off the internet....I was just excited.....

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Here is a great on-line tool for picking color schemes https://www.sherwin-williams.com/visualizer/#,

You can upload a photo of your home, room, or in this case, the Orchid, right into the visualizer and do the colors right on the actual house. We used it when choosing paint colors for our big old home. It worked great.

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Oh,well,that explains that! lol I don't do anything like 'uploading' on the computer! I hesitate to admit that,and it is not something I'm interested in trying to do yet,but I do appreciate the information. My younger son tried to put some photos from my digital camera onto this secondhand computer,but wasn't having any luck and he usually knows what to do! So,once he or my other son has time to try again,we'll have to see if this will work. Thanx,Selkie! Anyway,I guess I asked the wrong question-I wanted to know what colors you other owners of Orchids liked about yours-and yes,I've been having fun looking at the galleries. :)Thanx anyway.

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Hey there Kat~ I get it about wanting current Orchid conversation. I love the Beacon Hill Next Generation topic. Now if I just had time to work on mine :)

Good luck with your Orchid. My current house going into dry fit, hopefully tomorrow is an Arthur. I'm building one alongside a friend. You can join us with your cousin if you like :)

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The windows aren't hard-just follow the instructions in the package. (The Orchid was my first kit, too. ) So many colors work with this one--you'll find your combo. I started with leftover house paints because they were my choices for the real house, and I already liked them.

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Color schemes? The kits tell me what they want and I try to oblige within reason. I "hear" color as well as see it, so I come up with sometimes "different" combinations. The first Orchid I built (for the Team Orchid building team's blog) wanted to be a small store owned by Asian immigrants, so it's color scheme was red, white and blue (almost every one of my dhs has a blue front door). The white plastic version is a Christmassy house, so it's color scheme is red, white and green. The hot glue built Orchid I found falling apart in a charity thrift store before we moved has upgraded front door; you can also upgrade the windows to working windows, should you so desire, which sometimes involves cutting the openings bigger to fit and adding shims on the inside or installing them over siding on the outside, since Houseworks upgrades are made for 3/8" thick plywood carcases.

Also, Kat, I am an hour's drive away or less, via I-10.

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Oh,well,that explains that! .... I hesitate to admit that,and it is not something I'm interested in trying to do ..... - I wanted to know what colors you other owners of Orchids liked about yours-=

You don't have to upload anything to "play" with the color tools. You can select a house from their pictures that is similar to what you liked and switch the colors around til you are blue in the face. If you know how to point and click, you can do it. No computer expertise is needed.

I have an Orchid - not 100% finished but it is a pale yellow with white window trim and dark green accents. I don't think any of my album pics show the exterior. It is part of my Garfield Bash of 4 houses, a conservatory, play structure, and an outbuilding.

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The Orchid is so cute! This is the place to find Orchid's by the dozens. I was just wondering since I am getting into building in quarter scale if there is a quarter scale orchid in the village sets........be right back I have to check! Can't wait to see yours!

Oooo I checked, the GL Pine Village has a tiny quarter scale Orchid! I need it! LOL

Holly you were right........I need all three villages to make the one containing everything I want!

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...Holly you were right........I need all three villages to make the one containing everything I want!

Mwahahaha! And if you have a model railroad club nearby you will be VERY popular!

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LOL Holly! There might be but I haven't heard of one. I haven't lived here that long and am still discovering what's in town. Mostly a lot of high dollar art and artist stuff. I wonder if there are any miniaturists? There's only one newspaper and it only comes out once a week. I keep looking in the classified but never see anything about miniatures.

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Morgan,I had to re-read the 'cousin' line,but yeah,they are cousins,aren't they?!Okay,thanx! Kathie and Gloria -Okay,that's another question:house paint or craft paints? I've used craft paints because it's just a few cents a bottle,and it's what I have and with stucccoing my Ashley,the paint seems to spread farther-not using as much,I mean...Should I invest in real house paint,at least for the base color?Then I could use craft paints to accent? Holly,thanx for the locale reminder,and I hope I get the right message from this kit. Ashley Kit #2 is screaming at me from under my bed now-white with green accents,so far. But that would be pretty on the Orchid,too,with yellow,or a blue door....Yikes! Trish and Selkie,all I get is a black screen,so it must not work for my moniter,according to a tiny note at the bottom. This computer is a hand-me-down from sons' grandparents and some stuff still has to be figured out,but thanx! Roxy,I love the 1/4 scale villages now and didn't really know about them before you got so excited about them.Thanx! :) Fun stuff! Janet,yes,as you can probably tell,I am so excited!! :)

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You can also get the little sample jars of interior patex paints cheap at the hardware stores, which are really a nice deal for us miniaturists. The Habitat for Humanity ReStores in our area carry a lot of the Cabot stain colors in the small cans.

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Thanx,Gina! And Perry and Holly,I'll check the hardware stores next time we get to town-they're about the only kind of store that I can stay in and really enjoy browsing for long anymore,due to my fragrance allergies. Holly,I hadn't heard of the Habitat Restores until you mentioned it before-I'll have to check that out,too.

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Kat, the Orchid is such a wonderful house! There are so many possibilities. Hannah chose her color combination to match a pillow she had just quilted because she loved the color combination so much. My sister was apprehensive about how it would work out, but it's just great! For my houses, I go to the paint store and get a number of color swatches I like. I cut out rectangles to represent the window frames and put them over the house color so I get a feel for how they will look together. Same thing with the contrasting colors. I make thin strips and attach them where the trim would be. That way, I have all of my colors together represented in the way I would see them.

I use Behr interior paint. I buy a quart of the main color in satin, and buy the trim colors in the sample sizes which only come in eggshell.

I can't wait to see your Orchid as it comes together!

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Yeah,I am so anxious to get it and put it into dry fit! I am a little bit worried about the windows-my Ashley's window frames are so plain and simple (I'm actually trying to give them more character). But,still,the Orchid's window frames are one of it's best charms for me! Chris,I will try putting the paint chip strips up as you suggest. Thinking about the earlier suggestions to use a Sherwin-Williams feature to try out paint combos-which I couldn't access on my computer-I did use a feature on my digital camera to 'paint' basic colors over a picture of the Ashley-I had completely forgotten about that until just now! But the camera feature's colors are limited,and doing it in real life will be good. Just a note about me,maybe to understand why I lack confidence and why I may be so annoying about all this: I have done some mini vignettes and Christmas themed roomboxes,yes,and I'm doing the Ashley as a pizza place. But in real life,at age 56,I have never had a brand new house built or even remodeled and only had a voice in repainting the house I used to live in one time in 27 years,so this is almost as exciting and fun to me as it would be for someone having a real life house built! Is that crazy or what!?

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