I know I covered portions of this project in my frantic, before Christmas, posts. Now that things have had a chance to partial settle down, (yeah right) I’d like to show you a start to finish how to on building your own dollhouse.This dollhouse, and another I started but didn’t finish, was created from store bought medicine cabinets. We didn’t buy them, but they originally came from Walmart or some other big box, project in a box, store.
These two cabinets were destined for the burn pile, but I rescued them. I’m so glad I thought to use them as dollhouses, it worked out perfectly.
Make A Childs DollHouse
Ugly, right? It gets worse before it gets better. When I say these medicine cabinets were on their way to the burn pile, I meant it. The shelves had long ago fallen out, the doors were warped, the back was coming off. The whole thing was in terrible shape.
Didn’t I promise it would get worse? UGH! I don’t know what made me think I could paint the doll house interior and make it look like it did in my head. That thought was a disaster waiting to happen, especially since I HATE to paint. (that’s a little known fact because I LOVE paint, but the physical application.. I got a problem with that ) Clif installed new shelves for the doll house and then I had an epiphany, decoupage.
Before I got started on that I had Clif cut the windows. I can’t stress how important it is to cut the windows first. Cut the windows FIRST. If you don’t, when you decoupage you will mess up the interior.
Now, before we go any further I’ve got to tell you three things. First, I have never decoupaged anything in my life. Second, I have never made a dollhouse. Third, I have never made dollhouse furniture. At this point in the project I was really discouraged. Hey, I’m just being honest. Then, I learned something. Jade wasn’t going to be concerned with the paper matching up perfectly, she wouldn’t be concerned with whether or not the paper bubbled or all the little things I was thinking of. All Jade was ever going to care about was that she had a dollhouse. If I didn’t keep going, keep trying, she’d be deprived of that.
The curtains are tule I had from a tutu project. The rods are actually black coated jewlry wire that I bent to shape and curled on the ends. The four poster bed was made from a rice box, and covered with material. I wish I had a breakdown of the bed. When I make the next ones I’ll try to get someone to record the process.
The posters on the walls are from the back of a calendar, Justin Beiber of course, and from Cheyenne’s old J14 magazine. I cut and glued the calendar pieces straight to the wall. They weren’t in the greatest shape, but Jade loves Justin so much it doesn’t matter.
The stool is made from an infant baby food jar lid, the planter pot is a baby bottle lid protector, the dresser is a plastic soap box from some handmade soap I bought. in short, anything in the house can become whatever you want.
Here I am on the second layer, the kitchen. I decoupaged the walls and floor in this room as well. The walls and floor of each room received the same treatment. I cut the paper to size, painted on Elmers glue and stuck it up. I painted the dollhouse interior with polyacrylic for easy clean up and to protect the paper.
The cupboard is a cardboard box I made and covered on three sides with sticks. I broke my hole punch making those towels. The canister set is actually beads with buttons stuck in the top, and the plates are buttons also.
Sierra made this fridge from a Jello box. The cupboard sitting next to it was a joint effort between the girls. The doors are operable.
Heres where Tiger Direct saved me. We have long been fans of Tiger Direct and do all of our computer and electronics shopping there. Periodically TD will send us a catalog. I was so happy they did, because I found two TV’s that didn’t have anything printed on them. I cut those TVs out and glued them to cardboard.
Dollhouse’s are a labor of love and sometimes frustration. I stopped construction after the living room furniture because I want to be able to build future projects with Jade. We can change the furniture etc at whim because ti is constructed from cardboard.We installed lights and turned our attention to the outside.
The medicine cabinet turned dollhouse just looked horrible on the outside. I love products that serve double duty, so I came up with the idea to turn the doors into a felt board. I didn’t have felt large enought o cover the doors, so in a pinch I used fleece scraps. It worked out great. I stretch the fleece and hot glued it directly to the doors.
I cut felt pieces for tic-tac-toe and a variety of other little ods and ends. Now the kids casn play inside the dollhouse, and outside. The sides and top will soon get a few coats of chalkboard paint for even more play opportunities. I love it when we can come up with something that serves multiple purposes.
Check out of DIY Dollhouse lighting tutorial for step by step instructions on how we did it. See my video on making a DollHouse Couch inspired by my good friend Marty over at Do It Yourself and Save, and stay tuned for some projects I am really excited about for Jade, Cheyenne, and Ember’s birthday. Want to see a pic of the other dollhouse? I covered it in our Merry Christmas post. As always, Happy Crafting!
