A Before and After

 This wooden birdhouse came from Matlock Miniatures. When it came, it was a little chunkier looking than I was expecting, so it sat in a drawer for a year. I pulled it out the other night, and hacked off the clunky perches. I cut up a wooden fan for gingerbread, and painted the whole thing white. The roof had some unfortunate glue spots that would have resisted stain, so I ended up using acrylic paint for that. While the roof was still wet, I added touches of moss and mold colors, and encouraged them to bleed across the wood. It doesn't show up well in photographs, but it's a nice base for any further aging I do.

I still need to add the birds, more weathering, and a few other details to make the dovecote  a little more realistic. I also need to fix the center bottom piece of filigree, which is looking very crooked!