Lighting up a house

After a conversation with Connie from Miniatures and More, I came to the conclusion that I needed to teach a class on how to wire LED lights.

To support this I decided to create a new project that would show off tiny LED lights well.

After thinking through a few options, I decided on a false front for a house. So I went searching on my favorite clip art site Stock Unlimited, and found a nice drawing.

Nice, but needs a lot of work to cut with a laser

So I went to work in my favorite drawing program Sketch. Eventually I got something that looked like this:

Massaged to cut with laser

This also includes several ideas I had to make the project more fun to build and own.

So I cut the pieces out of ⅛ inch Medium Density Fiberboard (MDF) from Crosscut Hardwoods in Seattle.

More parts, and smaller than I first thought

Ok, so now I am ready to start assembling.

First I will put the stand together.

Stand Parts

.

Pretty simple, There is a front and two sides.

Stand

Now I will add some decorative trim pieces to it.

Trim

Luckily I had left myself a mark where the awning is supposed to go.

Stand with trim

I also add the door on the back to give it a little depth.

Stand with door part

Simple enough to glue on in the opening in the trim.

Stand with door.

Next I will assemble the front of the house. It will sit out from the stand a bit to give it some depth.

Front parts

The small piece was a bit of a pain to glue.

Front assembled

Ok, now to glue the front to the stand.

Front and stand parts

Simple enough to glue. I had left lines, and the door for placement.

Front on stand

Now we just need to add the tower.

House and tower parts

Just have to put the tower half way onto the house. Probably should have put some plastic or paper in the windows... will do that next time.

From the back

Looking pretty good

The holes in the back are the places we will feed the LEDs through.