Having completed about half of the plating for the upper hull with my eight-year-old daughter – Ember – I was itching to get back to finishing it off. I loved when the lower hull was complete, the sense of completion, a sense that the look of the ship was right, it had both Ember and me smiling from ear to ear. However, I also knew that this just would not be possible. The last installment had seen me go through every last plate I had put aside from previous issues; there wasn’t a single one left. There was no way that there would be another twenty plates inside one magazine, which meant that the upper hull would be staying incomplete for some time yet.
While I shouldn’t get too frustrated – the Millennium Falcon is obviously going to be finished by the end of this project – I couldn’t help wanting to finish the major part of the ship that we had spent so long completing. I can completely appreciate that the hull pieces are large, feasibly you can only get one or two in per magazine, but I still wanted to do it now! Clearly, I don’t have the patience of a Jedi!
With my frustration waning, I had a look through the magazine to see what we would be doing and if I needed to prepare anything for myself and Ember. The first thing I noticed was that I needed nothing from this installment’s bag, but everything from the last issue. You would think they would just switch the bags so at least one of them matched. The magazine was adding details to some of the smaller plates that would be added. Fairly straightforward: clip, file, glue. Now while I was tempted to try and do a second issue, I was also very conscious of the fact that last time we had done some clipping, Ember had accidentally clipped a piece off that I’d had to reattach. She had never done this before but after our two-month hiatus, she was struggling to remember how to do things. Rather than plow straight through the magazines, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to slow down and work with her, to help her embed those skills and make sure we were doing it right.
I had also made a purchase since the last time we had done such intricate gluing. Ember knows with these parts of the build I can get a little frustrated with the small pieces going here, there and everywhere. To help and possibly encourage Ember to have a go herself without the fear of getting superglue on her hands (can’t possibly think why she thinks that would happen), I had brought a set of precise tweezers. Whether they would work as intended I’m not sure, but every photo of this issue’s build had those same tweezers, so I’m hoping they will make our lives a little easier!
With nothing more to do, it was time for Ember and me to go from working on the large overall piece to the small, minute details that this ship housed. As soon as I pulled out the tweezers, Ember’s eyes lit up! She was very impressed and recognised them straight away from the photos of the magazine. I’m extremely grateful I brought them as when she saw what we were doing, Ember wasn’t keen to cut the pieces off the sprue. I could see her face; it was because she’d cut the wrong piece. We sat down and did a few together but she was much more wanting to do the glueing parts now. Well, that was one problem solved, another created!
Ember loved using the tweezers and it was really good to see her so confident gluing pieces together. This simple barrier between her and the glue did so much for our building time together that I wish I had bought them sooner. She was happy to file pieces and then was very clear, using the tweezers as a pointer, to which holes the pieces needed to fit.
It was really good for both of us, I could see that something she would usually be afraid to do, had taken on a whole new fun level. I’m glad I didn’t try to get us to do a second magazine. Doing the one meant we could slow down a little, take our time and enjoy the experience, rather than trying to rush through and do as much as we could. In a lot of ways, it might be a good thing that we did the smaller details rather than carry on with the hull. Confidence gained will have huge consequences going forward. Ember no longer needs to be afraid of gluing her fingers together. As much as I liked this brief interlude, I’m very much hoping we can get back to the hull. I don’t want to rush things… but I also want our ship completed!
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