I drew the floor board design on the second and third floors just like I did the first and then I stained them. I then turned them over and painted them white since this side will be the ceilings.
After they are dry, I began putting in the walls. Follow all the instructions so you can put the walls in correct sequence or you will have problems later.
This part is very difficult. The walls are very large and they all go up with very little areas to hold onto and keep from falling over. Your glue will be wet so it will not adhere immediately. Each wall that’s put up, causes pressure on the previous one and more chances of it toppling over or coming out of place. Clamp with masking tape as you go along to try and prevent that from happening. Keep your eye on all of your joints, tabs and slots so you can correct any shift in position as you build. You don’t want your glue to dry on a misaligned part.
The instructions say to glue only when you're told but you don’t have to do that since you're not using hot melt glue. You can apply glue on all joints because it will take a while before you glue dries. This will allow for the parts to still have leeway as your building.
Don’t stop building until I tell you to. You must continue putting parts up before the glue dries and doesn’t allow you to have movement in the structure anymore.
Go over your floor joints with wood glue as you go along in your build. Leave the wall joints for later.
This process is very hard. You have to have patience. Reposition walls that come out of place because of pressure or hammering of other walls. You will need a hammer for this. Make sure all joints are tight and all tabs are fully in slots.
Since I’m bashing the tower top, I cut all of my tower sides at the third floor mark. The third floor will not have tower walls because it will be a gazebo instead. It's easy to tell where the third floor mark for the front panels of the tower are but not so for the side panels that have no windows. I had to dry fit them in order to see where the third floor begins and then cut them. I’m not sure how the slots of the third floor will be but we will see what havoc I caused when we get to that. For now, it's all looking good.
I didn’t throw out the cut pieces though. You never know if they will be needed because of some mistake. If there’s one thing that I’ve learned about dollhouse building is to never get rid of anything until it's all done.
Right after you put in the Third Floor Back section and right before the Second/Third Floor Stairwell Partition, you have to STOP. You can't proceed or you won't be able to wallpaper the dollhouse.
This presents a dilemma. Since you have to stop, your glue will inevitably dry making the structure loose its flexibility to move. If you don’t stop, you can't decorate the interior. If you try to wallpaper now with the glue wet so you can continue, your structure will fall apart. This is where dollhouse builders are caught between a rock and a hard place and the only thing you can do is throw your hands up and let the structure dry so you can wallpaper it. You have no choice. The finishing is more important than the potential struggle of a non flexible dollhouse.
The non flexibility will make it harder to put in the remaining walls and staircase but you literally have no other alternative. The only thing you can take solace in is that if all your tabs and slots are in correctly and your joints are aligned properly and tightly, the dollhouse should be able to take the pressure. You shouldn’t have too much of a problem down the line.
Mistakes:
I made some mistakes during this process which I had to fix.
1. I forgot to put in the Kitchen/Dining Room Corner Wall. No big deal, I was able to get it in there even though all the other walls were already up. I simply slipped it into place through the third floor. I hammered it down until it reached the first floor and the tab went into the slot. This happened because its very easy to skip a step on this long wall assembly process. Make sure you don’t skip anything as you move along. It's very difficult to keep the walls together and also read the instructions so take it more slowly and double check that all the steps have been followed in order.
2. I cut the wrong end of the Right Tower Side. Since it has no windows, I accidentally cut the piece at the wrong end. I had to mend it back together and cut it properly. This happened because I didn’t dry fit the piece first, as I suggested you should do, to see how it went before cutting it.
3. The top riser of the staircase fell out and I had to glue it back in place. The pressure of fitting it into place can break a piece. Make sure that your staircase is very sturdy and well glued and be careful when inserting it into place. If the riser would have fallen into the staircase, I would have had to make another one because it can not be taken out.
