Wednesday, July 21, 2010

My New Dollhouse

5

I'm so excited I can barely contain myself. I'm going to try to make this update as clear as possible, but with my current state, it may not make complete sense. Forgive me.

About two weeks ago, I purchased an Ikea Wardrobe from Craiglist with the intent of making it into a dollhouse for my American Girl dolls (big shouts to Zak). I paid $30 for the wardrobe, in white, with two doors and no other furnishings. The doors are normally $60 and the wardrobe frame is normally $90, so I felt like I got a great deal. Today, Afner and I went to Ikea to pick up the shelves I needed, plus some lighting for the dollhouse.


I debated a lot about whether to get white shelves to match the wardrobe, or to get wood colored shelves, since the shelves were going to be the floor of the dolls room. I thought it would be cute to have hardwood floors. After considering for awhile, I finally settled on white. Shelves cost $25 for a 2-pack, and I needed 3 shelves, so I had my 2 sets of shelves loaded up and ready to pay. I, however, love to check out the "As-Is" section of Ikea on my way out, so we made our way over there. Lo and behold, there were 2 packages of the shelves I needed, in a dark wood color, for $2.99 each. The only reason they were so cheap is because they were in a discontinued color. Well, I loaded up the shelves, Afner pushed the cart back and we returned the white shelves. I was soooooooooo excited. Instead of paying $50 for shelves, I paid $6, and they look great! I also got some really cute lights, 3 in a pack for $20. Afner (aka the world's best boyfriend) wired up the girls' rooms for me. Here is my finished result:



























The apartments. The top floor is Samantha's (but Felicity is squatting there for awhile), the second floor is Addy's, and the bottom floor is Josefina's.
























Josefina, enjoying her new place



















Addy in her room



Now, the dollhouse is far from finished. I hope to collect lots more Now, the dollhouse is far from finished. I hope to collect lots more furniture and accessories to furnish the rooms. Tomorrow, I'm going to check out some wallpaper scraps so I can cover up those ugly holes in the girls' walls.



5 comments:

  1. So.... I completely love it! Soooo glad you got wood colored shelves to be the floors.... but the question that's burning in my mind right now is....

    How did you decide who got which floor? Cause I feel like it's like bunk beds and everyone wants the top.

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  2. Yeah, excellent deal and excellent doll house builders! There is still a lot of work to do but the first images look really good! CONGRATULATIONS!

    :)

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  3. Hi!
    It´s a great beginning! Congratulations and good luck in the search for adequate furniture!
    Kisses from Holland.

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  4. OMG!
    I'm loving the dollhouse! Besides, an american girl doll is like #2 on my doll wishlist, so I love to see that those girls are being spoiled! CONGRATULATIONS!!! I bet it will look amazing when it's all done! That's something we HAVE TO see!!
    About the Juanita's eyes... well, i've done it, with one Anita, but it's one of the hardest things I've ever done. First you have to rip the dolls head off, then you have to take out the eyes, this is how you do it. YOu have to heat the head (mostly around the eyes) with the hairdryer it takes like 3 minutes on the highest temperature, or you can boil some water and then put the doll's head in water for around a minute then put on some gloves (to avoid getting burnt) introduce your fingers in the dolls head (through the neck) and try to push the eyes out (its really hard and it may take you several attempts before succeeding), then you can see what's wrong with the eyes and decide whether to fix them or change them. To put them back I recommend you to put some liquid soap around the eyes, so it's easiest for the eye to go back to it's place.
    Hopefully that will work, I've already done it and it worked with my Anita, she had a permanently closed eye, and now it opens and closes everytime, besides, I put some transparent nail enamel and now her eyes shine as if they were new ones!

    Hugs!

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  5. Thanks Malisha! I will try your advice on my Juanita Perez dolls. I tried to remove the head of my Prima, but it started to rip her neck, so I stopped.

    Which American Girl do you want to get? I highly recommend them, they are beautiful dolls :)

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