Dolls in Pink Dresses

 Just two more doll pictures from this week.

Kavi and Samantha!

I love classic birthday Samantha with her pink striped dress and teddy bear.

The dress Kavi is wearing photographed pink-ish, but is obviously orange. It's gorgeous on her!

I had sandals for her, but they kept falling off. I was kind of hoping that her bare feet wouldn't show in the picture. Oops.

Low Brow China Headed Doll

 My much second older cousin Willard collected antique dolls.

I remember visiting her house and being jealous of the beautiful dolls in their glass cases.

I brought my American Girl dolls to show her. She said she might think about getting one, but I am not sure if she ever did or not.

Which is to say that I was thrilled to find this low brow china headed doll at an antique store for $45.

There are a lot of reproduction antique dolls out there. I am reasonable certain that this doll is an antique. I am not so sure about her dress. The fabrics look modern.

I love her pink boots!

My grandma said that she "had a little china head doll that she loved." 

I wish I had asked her more questions about her childhood doll, but I always imagined it being one of these dolls. They were produced until 1940, so it is certainly possible.

Amazing Addy Thrift Store Find

I found a Molly wearing Addy's prototype dress at the Salvation Army, the one that never has anything good, that looks like the land of lost hopes. 

The one in walking distance from my girlfriend's apartment, so I joked that we are going to have to start taking romantic walks to the thrift store to look for AG stuff. 

Anyway, it took me a couple of months to take a picture.

I was absolutely thrilled! 

I sill need to get a picture of Molly. She is all cleaned up, but she still has loose limbs.

I have had some amazing thrift store finds in my time, but this one is definitely one of my best.

Doll Photos

 I am trying to take more pictures of my dolls! I try to spend five minutes a day now changing an outfit or taking a picture in the backyard. It helps. 

I don't have to wait to have enormous amounts of free time to do something with the dolls!

Jess looks gorgeous in everything. She is the Doll Most Likely to Be on Cover OF Vogue and Then Become a Therapist.

I got Gwen's dress at the thrift store for $14! I love it so much!

I am not sure which dress this is that Danielle is wearing, but it's giving me 1920s vibes.

I'm going to put it on Claudie and Phryne Valancy too,

Joss is ready for summer!

I think that the Squishmallow looks like Jip and would be perfect to pair with Samantha's modern dress.

Speaking of which, here is Astrid modeling Felicity's modern dress. I love it. I want all four of them at this point.

I am just concerned about how difficult it will be to repair them when the elastic wears out.

Saige and Sam are modelling Cowboy Cool, as always. 

Sewing Project Ideas

 One of the projects that I would like to make some day is a doll-sized version of Belle's library gown with really lush fabrics.

Belle's my favorite princess, and this is my favorite of her gowns. Even if AG makes it, I am not sure I trust them to do it right.

Original dress:

Inspiration:

Thrift Store Find

 I found this at the thrift store this week!

It's a Disney doll, maybe Cinderella, wearing the A Girl of Today First Day Outfit shirt.

I actually already have this shirt, but for $2, it came home with me!

I think the crown might fit AG dolls, so that's a bonus.

I'll donate the doll back to the local thrift store that benefits the community.

Zuru Mini Brands Create Masterpieces

 I am also rapidly developing an addiction to Zuru Mini Brand Masterpieces.

I did a minor in art history in college. I love art history.

I just love these tiny cute doll-sized pieces of art!

(I wrote a 20 page paper on Botticelli as my honors project my senior year of college. I was so proud of that!)

The frames are very pretty too. I have seen people make the frames look even better by using paint markers on them.

These are probably best scaled for AG mini dolls or 1/12 scaled dollhouses.

I feel like they can work for AG too. You could prop them on a mantelpiece or on a desk. 

Or, as you see here, on a bookcase.

I just wanted to share if anyone was looking at these and wondering what the scale is!

Zuru Mini Brand Books

 I love books, and I love minis.

I do have a bit of an addiction to the Zuru mini brand books.

These are too small for AG. They are approximately half the size of AG books.

They are however, perfect for mini dolls or for 1/12 size dollhouses.

They have text inside that you can read with a microscope.

They're really cute and fun and addictive! Each surprise ball comes with three mini books and costs $8 to $10.

They also come with a bookmark and another accessory, like a cat, a candle, a lamp or a bookcase shelf.

I had a friend wondering about the scale, so I realized that I should share a picture to give people a better idea.

I would also like to point out that the dollhouse is not even done yet, and it is already making it easier to do a quick photo shoot!

Dollhouse Floor Mistake

 It's a good thing that I decided to lay out the dollhouse to see how it would fit the space.

I seem to have accidentally ordered two different colors of wood floor effect contact paper and used both of them, without noticing.

OOPS.

I am glad that I caught this. I prefer the darker flooring color.

I was able to order another roll of contact paper in the right color. 

Otherwise, this mistake would have really annoyed me. 

This is a relatively easy fix, and I found it in good time. 

I just wanted to share this in case anyone thought I was an infallible crafter. It's good to know that everyone makes mistakes, right? 

Dollhouse First Floor Mock Up

 I haven't put the dollhouse together yet. I still need to do the windows and curtains.

But I am impatient, so as I cleaned out space in my sewing room, I put together a mock up of what the dollhouse will look like on the first floor, and how the furniture will fit inside.

This is the carport. I want it to be a garden/ spot for toasting marshmallows.

I bought Blaire's garden on Facebook Marketplace for $30 for this purpose!

I have Kit's chicken somewhere, I should let her hang out with the silkie chicken.

I got the pots of lavender at the thrift store.

I am not going to put in the hot tub, so there won't be a second story over this space.

This is the parlor.

I customized the fireplace that came with the dollhouse kit. The couch is non-AG and came off Marketplace. Maybe someday it will get replaced with Rebecca's couch. The issue it has is that the back of it doesn't look very good, so it needs to be up against a wall.

The Turkish rug is a mouse pad!

The little vase on top of the fireplace came from the thrift store.

I wanted Rebecca's sideboard, but it looks like it won't fit. It's a good thing I didn't spend $200 on that on ebay.

Here is the library, which was formerly the kitchen.

I made almost all of the tiny books. The vase is from the thrift store. The Turkish rug is a mousepad.

I made one mistake. When I looked at the room dimensions, I thought that two of these bookcases would fit side by side. They won't. I must have mistaken the height of the room for the width of the room. So that's a little disappointing, but it's a cute cozy room.

I am looking forward to finishing the dollhouse!

There will be a lot more little knickknacks added to the decor when it is finished.

I am definitely hanging pictures on the walls as well! I haven't worked out HOW yet, but it will happen.

New Accessory for Dollhouse- China Dogs

 I'm kind of excited for this one!

I have loved Anne of Green Gables for a long time. This is thanks to my mom, who fell in love with the series around 1994 and got us all the books for Easter.

The first book started a little slowly for 1994-me, and Anne was a little too mischievous, but I did learn to lover her. 

In Anne of the Island, when Anne is in college, Anne and her friends rent a house. Anne loves the antique china dogs that sit in front of the mantelpiece. The dogs are named Gog and Magog and are green and white.

The dogs are later gifted to her as a wedding gift.

I just realized that Anne's dogs were probably Staffordshire china dogs. I started digging around to see if I could find a mini version, and I found blue and white Staffordshire dog salt and pepper shakers.

Link to purchase

I am glad that I spent all that time customizing the fireplace. It will be worthy of Gog and Magog!

Painting the Dollhouse Entrance

 The front door of the dollhouse is set in a wall that is plain grey plastic.

I guess it has modern vibes, but I thought it was ugly.

It has a lot of gadgets, including the door, a working light, a doorbell, an alarm, a doggy door, etc.

All of this would make it really hard to wallpaper over.

So I decided to paint it instead.

On the inside, I painted the grout and the doorway antique white.

I was so worried that I was going to ruin the whole thing!

Then I painted the bricks a brick red, and the doggy door brown.

In some cases, several layers of paint were needed.

I didn't mind if a little grey showed through on the bricks, though. I felt that it added realism.

On the other side of the door, I painted the doorway and the house number black. I painted the doggy doorway and the box for the doorbell brown.

I left some of the grey on this side of the house. I felt that it was okay for a house exterior.

I also added varnish on top of the paint. The paint I used was acrylic and chipped very easily.

I am not going to lie, I am very proud of this. 

It's not perfect, but it's a huge improvement over a dull grey hunk of plastic.

The other thing is, the paints that I used were paints from my grandfather. 

He used them to make toys for his grandkids in the 90s. It made me feel close to him, and it helped me to remember him as a warm, doting grandfather.

Dollhouse Curtain Rods

 Even the curtain rods were a project in this dollhouse.

All the reviews of this dollhouse complained about the curtain rods, and how the curtains wouldn't move smoothly.

They're basically unpainted blocks of wood.

So instead of complaining about them, I decided to work on them.

I have to overcomplicate everything for this project!

I sanded them down first.

Then I painted them brown.

I covered the brown paint with a very subtle gold sparkle paint. I only like it because it's subtle, haha.

Last, I varnished the curtain rods.

I need to attach them to the dollhouse walls, once I made the curtains.

I can either screw them into the wall, as the manufacturer intended, which would make them permanent.

OR I could mount them on velcro so that the curtains can be swapped out.

I don't really have any plans to swap the curtains in the future, but I might try the velcro anyway, just in case.

Anyway, the main idea is to have functional curtain rods that don't take attention away from other parts of the dollhouse.

Making Mini Books!

 I have been making more mini books for the dolls lately!

You can see that I am a big Agatha Christie fan. And she was so popular. Kit, Addy, Nanea, Maryellen... they could all read her books.

I am also a huge fan of Jessica Townsend's Nevermoor series. I can't say enough good things about it.

The Paddington book was inspired by a friend, and I have a mini to plush to go with it!

Tiny Bottles Thrift Store Find

 These beautiful tiny old bottles are vintage cologne bottles.

They're so pretty!

I got them from the thrift store.

I plan to use them for vases or receptacles or something for the dollhouse.

The one on the far right is vaguely heart-shaped. I thought I could fill it with red or pink water and use it as a Valentine's decoration.

The one on the left is a perfect vase.

The center one is perfect for a candy jar or something.

Dollhouse Fireplace Customization

 I SAID that I was going to work on curtains or windows in the dollhouse next.

Turned out that I was lying to myself.

I kept saying to myself that I could do the fireplace after the dollhouse was finished. But I couldn't resist.

I liked that the dollhouse came with a fireplace. It has a lovely fake fire effect. 

However, it looked super plastic. I knew that I could improve it.

I started by painting the bricks antique white.

The brick pattern was embossed on the existing plastic. However, since everything was white, it wasn't very visible. The paint made it stand out and look more realistic.

Just that on its own was a huge improvement.

Then I painted the bricks a brick color. They were so small that some of them are a little uneven, but I am telling myself that this adds to the antique effect.

I painted the logs several layers of brown and green.

I painted the back wall behind the logs black and the box under the logs black.

Then I started adding marble contact paper.

I liked the idea of the storage spaces in the fireplace, but it just looked too modern. So I closed over the front with a sheet of plastic and marble contact paper.

We all need whimsy in our lives, however. Before I closed off the storage spaces for good, I added a scroll with my name and the date, a treasure map, and a rubber duck inside. It makes me happy.

Here is the fireplace for now. I would like to add marble columns to the front someday maybe. 

I may also add some grey chalk behind the logs to look like ash on the back wall.

But for now, it looks great, and perfectly fitted for a Victorian dollhouse.

Bitty Baby Thrift Store Find!

 I found this Bitty Baby at the thrift store yesterday for $4!

She needs some cleaning up, but she is is pretty good shape.

She is the first of the "newer style" Bitty Babies that I have with eyebrows. I like the eyebrows.

I haven't given her a name yet.

She's my fourth Bitty Baby. I should get them out and take a group photo.