Gold has a magic like nothing else. The effect we get with gold leaf simply can't be duplicated any other way. It gathers light and reflects it back to the viewer. The lettering on our display booth already looked great when we painted them metallic gold but we knew that they would look ten times better when it was gilded. Today Becke got a good start on that task. The process is relatively simple. She painted two or three letters with a fast oil based size and let them tack up until they squeaked when we did the 'knuckle test'. Then she laid on the 23K gold leaf and burnished it with a special ultra soft brush. The letters instantly came to life - pure magic!
Fresh coat of paint!
We are still busy preparing our display booth for the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions EXPO in Orlando. We've now selected all of the models and artwork we are showing and everything is getting freshened upon for the display. A few of the models are getting a whole new coat of paint. One of them is a fun model of a submarine which I built a number of years ago. We hope to build it full size soon which will make it over fifty feet long!
Ready to test drive
We've all heard of writers who have 'writer's block' where months go by and they can't come up with anything to put down on paper. Once in a while I used to wonder if I would eventually run out of ideas. But I somehow doubt it. At this point I believe I'm going to have to live to be a hundred and fifty to get all of my current ideas built... and every day it seems even better ideas pop into my head. This evening, as I was working on the little trailer for the rail truck my brain was racing ahead to two large projects currently in the design stage. My thinking was being influenced by the project I was working on - this little trailer. As I worked I thought about what I would do different, next time... what could I do better, how could we ramp things up even higher. Plenty of ideas came to mind.
While I am absolutely delighted with how the truck and trailer are turning out, they are becoming less important with each passing day. My favourite project is always the next one... Just imagine!
