I’m not quite sure where or when my fascination with all things miniature began.
I wonder whether it was the love of my grandma’s button tin, lining up the buttons in various combinations as pupils in a classroom, bossing the poor buttons about - a much easier job than actual teaching, as I discovered some forty years later.
Or was it the visit to the model village, one Sunday when I was about eight? My dad worked twelve hour days, six days a week, so family trips out were a rarity, as they were for many children growing up in the fifties. One Sunday we were all bundled into the car and driven, for what seemed like hours (I’ve just checked - it’s still there - and it was only 30 miles away), to a model village in Beaconsfield. There was great excitement as we marched around the paths like giants, gazed at the cricketers, forever destined to remain mid bowl, mid bat or halfway to a catch; and cocked our ears to listen to the church bells with a wedding in full swing, tiny bride and groom clinging to each other with fixed smiles for the photographer, bridesmaids clutching their chipped and faded bouquets.
My brothers became bored and soon started to mess about, but I was absolutely mesmerised. Not only did I love seeing all these tiny scenes, but I actually wanted to shrink down and be in them. I wanted to tiptoe across that little bridge, pick up the miniature fishing rod and dangle it in the river to catch a tiny pot fish. I wanted to be in that school playground with the skipping rope that didn’t turn, holding hands with the children in a circle that never moved. I wanted to climb into the fire engine and switch on the flashing red light, have a nosy in the police station, run across the tiny fields and stroke the sheep. With hindsight, I realize this was an idealised view of England and its green and pleasant land, especially when people were still living on bomb sites, rebuilding houses after the war, and residing in prefabs. Maybe this was its appeal?
I remember that day as if it were yesterday. It didn’t finish with the Model Village but continued with a visit to a silk farm in the afternoon. What a feast of a trip that was, all the more memorable for being so rare. I’m sure the last thing my dad wanted to do on his one day off was view a model village, sit in the car with a picnic and go on to a silk farm, but I did tell him, several times over the years, how much that trip had meant to me.
I have always been an avid reader and at about this time I was reading ‘The Borrowers,’ a series of books about a family of tiny people who lived behind the skirting boards of a big house. They ‘borrowed’ things they found around the house to make clothes and furniture. Again, I was mesmerised by this magical idea and longed to find such a family in my own house. I remember dreaming that I’d shrunk and could get through the tiny door and into their miniature rooms, sit at their tables with tops fashioned out of buttons, on chairs made of matchsticks. I don’t know what it was but I was truly hooked.
Not long afterwards, my granddad made me a doll’s house, complete with carpets, wallpaper and even lights that switched on and off. I spent hours redesigning the rooms, moving the furniture about and positioning the family at the piano, on an armchair or in bed. And during that time I was completely and utterly lost in that tiny world. I kept the dolls house for years, and, when my children were old enough to appreciate it, out it came. I had high hopes of a repeat of my fascination but it wasn’t to be. Both sons and a daughter were madly into football. Small houses were of no interest, and even I had to admit it did look rather battered and dated.
I often took the children to the Model Village in Blackpool but I soon realised that it was more for my benefit than theirs. They were much more interested in getting an ice cream than looking at the tiny scenes, and, eventually, I had to admit defeat.
In one final attempt to convince somebody else to appreciate the magic of miniature I bought a secondhand dolls house a few years ago for the grandchildren. At great expense I fitted it out with furniture and a little family. I intended to redecorate and lay new carpets, but like many of my projects (and even our own house) it never happened. The family could live in squalor, I hadn’t got the time nor the energy for DIY. I positioned the house in the middle of the room, everything arranged beautifully. The grandchildren came in, asked what it was, and gave the family a perfunctory shuffle around before asking if they could watch Peppa Pig on granddad’s computer.
Now, I revel alone in my magical miniature world. I couldn’t get rid of the dolls house, it still sits in the corner of the room, and every so often I peer in, wondering what the little wooden family are up to. I’m sure I heard the sound of a tiny piano the other night.....
At Home with the Woods by Jill Reidy
In the middle of the night
As everybody sleeps
Mrs Wood climbs out of bed
And down the stairs she creeps
It’s time for more adventures
Outside the wooden house
She pokes her head around the door
As quiet as a mouse
Slippers on, she tiptoes out
Her eyes and ears alert
A wrapper here, a hankie there
Enough to make a skirt
She fills her little bag with bits
Scattered on the floor
Some raisins, grated cheese and crumbs
A meal for five for sure
She hears a snore, a bed spring creaks
It’s nearly end of night
Time to take her haul back home
Before the room gets light
The humans rise, descend the stairs
Those mice are back, says he
I didn’t sweep the crumbs up
Now there’s nothing here to see.
Thanks for reading......Jill
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