I'm afraid I have several boxes scattered throughout the the basement. She's aware of them, but out of sight, out of mind. I do occassionally finish one though, and that makes her happy (although with two cats and a 4-year-old this creates problems of its own). I've even been known to bring home the odd ribbon from model shows, which makes her even happier.

On the rare occassions that I do get a new kit, I don't advertise the fact, merely slip it wordlessly onto the hobby desk to await my attentions.

I guess I am lucky that my girl friend is very understanding... (well.. don't have all that many kits yet).

But I thought I offer all you guys some help :-) - I am buying those boxes from you at half the price.. should still end up enough for a new washing machine or one of those highly important curled-hair dryers. Just add the intangible benefit of peace to that and you make a great deal here

Yea verily, the intricacies of modeling and marriage are enough to befuddle anyone! I have a very understanding wife, who like others above have stated, would rather have me stockpliling styrene than swilling drinks in a, ahem, gentlemen's club, shall we say. I rarely catch hell for it, and just this weekend I achieved the coup of astonishing her to a state of momentary speechlessness. I spent several hours opening boxes and cataloguing kits, and came up with several dozen things of the aircraft persuasion to dispose of. This makes room for more tanks, as well as generating $$ for same. This makes her very hapy, as she has watched with some horror at the mounting pile and concluded long ago that A) I'd never have time to build them all; and B) she would have the unpleasant task of sorting through several hundred pounds of plastc, resin, and crap when I die several decades from now. See, the assumption was that the pile could only get bigger. HAH! Fooled her!
My deepest sympathy to those of you who actually catch flak for this. I've been married for nearly 17 years, and at worst I get a minor grimace and rolled eyes. And the obligatory "Yes, dear.." when I spout off the reasons why I just HAD to have this or that widget. Hey, I let her spend as much as she wants on her gardening; she lets me get away with high crimes of plastic and only holds the leash a little bit on the cars. Works for me...
Greg :-)

Man, do I recognize this topic of conversation. My wife is pretty understanding, but I do get the rolled eyes routine when I come in with another kit. Her criticism is fairly consistent. She thinks 1) I will never build all the kits I have, and 2) if I do build them (as I swear I will) then she doesn’t know where I’m going to put them. As far as the time factor, I try to do a lot of building at the kitchen table, when she’s in the family room right next to it. That way, we’re close enough that she’s happy. Actually, the only time I’m really down in the “model room” these days is when I’m using the airbrush.

Mike

I guess I'm pretty lucky... Last time I brought my girl to a modelshop, she found a kit that she thought I should buy... in addition to the other kits I had picked out.

I'd like to quickly point out that there is indeed a difference between wives and girlfriends in most cases.

What was indeed an amusing and quirky hobby to my then girlfriend, is a budget item and household issue now that she's my wife. :-)

Which is why I try not to advertise the existence of the boxes of unbuilts if at all possible. Keep 'em out of site and out of mind, and if at all possible use cash.

-Pablo

Billy, I go through that everday with my wife. So you are not alone!!!!

Everyone seems to say that you should slip the model into the house quietly and most of the time that probobly works, but in my case that is almost impossible. Joint checking plays hell with trying to buy things on the sly. I have actually tried to listen to my wife's requests to stop buying new models and build the ones that I have because my kit collection has grown to almost 80 now. I even impressed myself with my new found self control by going to AMPS 2002 with a budget of $550 and not buying any new kits; just reference books, pe, Friulmodel tracks, gun barrels, and some resin update sets. The only problem is (sssshhhhh. she doesn't know this) that a couple of those 'resin update sets' are conversions that will require me to buy a few kits to convert. See I've found my way around things even with joint checking. It's all a matter of how creative you are.

Her indoors is pretty cool when it comes to buying the kits only i don't seem to have enough vision when i go to the store(probably because the range is so small) and normally come home with a paintbrush or two. I tend to buy only from the net now but don't quite have that rip open the box when you get home feeling!
HELP ME TO SPEND MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!PLEASE lol

I have the perfect response... whenever my wife looks at all my unbuilt model kits sitting on the shelf and starts to complain - "Why do you need so many - you can only build one at a time!".... I simply march her into her closet and point to the four dozen pairs of shoes she has! Then i ask "Why do you need so many - you can only wear one pair at a time!"....

While she has shot me a look a time or two (for fighting with unfair 'logic') it has NEVER failed to get her out of my studio and out of my hair!

And of course my f"ultimate" fallback that I keep holding as my "ace in the hole" is... "at least I make MONEY selling my models when they are done... you only throw away your shoes when you are done with them!"

You guys will probably hear the explosion the day I drop that bomb!

Keith

My wife is always on me about buying more and more stuff!! will it ever stop?