Monday, March 21, 2011

Tiny dollhouse doll

So far I've collected a few little animals from around the house that seem to like living in the dollhouse. But I wanted to try my hand at making my own little people.
As you can see from my needle book blog, I've been working on dolls lately. I've been trying different patterns, such as the vintage patterns of Edith Flack Ackley, and working out some of my own.

And now I've finished my first dollhouse doll! I've added her to my Etsy shop - she's here. She has a lovely purple floral Liberty dress and lace trimmed petticoat. It was hard to cut into some of my precious Liberty fabric, but it was just so perfect for this. The lawn stays in place nicely. Not every fabric will work on such a small scale. I was happy to find this tiny lace amongst all my trim. These supplies are gathered up by me over the years and every now and then the perfect project comes along.

Monday, March 14, 2011

Strombecker kitchen set

Well once again in the interests of putting the cart before the horse, this is the furniture I bought for the kitchen which has yet to have the floor finished. These pieces are from the 1930s, a wooden table, chairs and stool set made by Strombecker.

After I bought it I found out that this set sometimes comes with a little floral decal on each piece so I'm sorry they don't have that, but they're still so charming. I love the vintage green colour and the detail of them, they're quite simple but still nice.

I can't decide whether or not it would be ok to paint flowers on them myself. They aren't particularly valuable or anything but I don't like to mess up something in its original condition. I thought if I painted them they would have a bit of that Tynietoy style that I covet. 

The little bowl is actually from a tiny incense set. I keep finding little things like this around the house that I bought at some time because they were tiny and nice. Then finding that they'll work perfectly in the dollhouse!

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Details

I've been doing various odds and ends on the house, but not really finishing anything. I keep doing little details like putting logs into the wood box when I should be getting the shell completed.

I need to touch up the stairs before I put that outer wall up, and that's the next step before doing the roof and other additions. The stairs had some primer and paint spilled on them - as I've already said I should have added them in later - and after sanding that off I need to add a fresh coat of polyeurethane. I'm waiting for a warmer day when I can air out the room afterwards.

So I think I'm kind of stalled a bit! I've also spent a lot of time on bits of furniture that aren't done yet. Although I did finally sand, prime and paint the living room floor.
I also bought some baseboard trim and thought I would try that out. But I realized I would need to add the door trim first, and the instructions say to add the door hinges before the trim. Which means getting the doors ready and figuring out the hinges. So I just tried out the baseboard on one of the plain walls. I love how it looks!
Adding the mitred corners is a bit trickier but I found a good little saw at a local hobby shop. I wasn't sure about going in as it seemed to be mostly boat, airplane and car kits, but they had lots of handy tools and the man I talked to had helpful tips and used to work on dollhouse furniture himself.

So that's the update for now, I really am going to finish the shell someday, but it could take a while!

  © Blogger template Simple n' Sweet by Ourblogtemplates.com 2009

Back to TOP