So- growing up, I was OBSESSED with playing Barbies. My BFF and I would play and play not only for hours, but days on end! Seriously... we played 3-4 days straight several times growing up. We didn't have all the coolest Barbie houses, so we had to use our imagination and make houses out of items that were laying around. We used pieces of 2x4's that were cut down as vanities. We used Dixie cups to hold up the vanity and they also doubled as stools. We made school books out of notebook paper. We used our pool table as their school. The pockets were their lockers. WE WERE CREATIVE. Looking back- I would NOT CHANGE A THING!!!
Now-a-days, the kids want to do EVERYTHING electronic. iPods, Kinect, Netflix, Moshi Monsters, iPad, etc. etc. etc.... I am hoping to instill the power of creativity in my girls. Now Addison is already 10-going-on-16, and Jenna is 8 1/2. We are truly in the thick of the Barbie-playing years. In a few years, my girls will start to outgrow Barbies. (Honestly, if I didn't step in now... they would outgrow these years in a matter of months.)
You see, I blame myself for their lack of desire when it comes to playing Barbies. When I found out I was blessed with two daughters, I quickly got all my old Barbies and all their belongings and gave them to my daughters. They were at the ripe old age of 3 and 4 years old. (Take it from me... that's too young to appreciate the value of ANYTHING.) Needless to say- those "keepsakes" were quickly ruined. We gave up Barbies before my oldest turned 5.
Once we were past chewing off Barbie's feet (a stage that Jenna was in for YEARS!), we slowly started re-introducing Barbies back into the girls lives. They would get one or two for a birthday or Christmas present. They would get a few extra changes of clothes. Nothing over the top. No furniture and not enough boy barbies for sure. (Seriously, can three Barbie's all be in love with the same Ken? I think not.) So the girls never really wanted to play Barbies. They were not equipped with all the fun gadgets, boy barbies, and clothes that I had as a child.
Which brings me to the reason for this post... For Jenna's birthday this year, I am going to MAKE her, (Yes... you read that correctly..) a Barbie House. I am super excited about this project. I went out today to get supplies. I hope this present is memorable for Jenna and means so much to her that she will want to pass it down to her daughters one day.
My grandparents made a dollhouse for Addison when she was a baby. I requested it, of course. My grandfather loved constructing dollhouses and my grandmother decorated them. Hand-painted rugs, walls, pictures, furniture, curtains, etc. I was so thrilled to receive this dollhouse. We do not use this house because it has too much meaning now. We used to display it in our finished basement, but now we just keep it in storage. (If a dollhouse is displayed, it is too hard not to play with it...) My grandfather passed away a few years ago and my grandmother took a turn for the worse. She is still with us, but is not the same spunky grandma she used to be after her many strokes and heart attacks. That dollhouse is so meaningful. It reminds me of them. I am so grateful that I will be able to pass that down to Addison one day.
How fair is that for Jenna though? So, that is why I decided to make my own dollhouse for her. I am making it super sturdy so she can play with it and make memories with it. Then, when she is older, she can share that love with her own daughter.
Stay tuned for updates on the dollhouse. I will be posting them here. Completely from scratch... completely from the bottom of my heart.
Her cute faux fur rug in her bedroom.
Here she is chilling in her room.
Cute mirror collage on her bedroom wall.
Hanging out in the family room waiting for her friends to come over. (Or waiting to go to her wedding???)
I then found fabric scraps I had on hand and LOVE. Cut the fabric so it overlaps the cardboard. (You will hot-glue the fabric onto the cardboard back in a few steps...)
That's about how much I overlapped my fabric...
I had this on hand. Poly-Fil is awesome! Just pull some out for now.
I used about this much. Now- place the stuffing inside the fabric. Place the cardboard on top. You are making a sandwich of sorts. Wrap the fabric over the cardboard while stuffing the filling in.
It should get to this part. The filling is underneath the cardboard. The fabric is wrapped around. Hot glue the fabric in place.
Now- fold up the bottom and hot glue in place.
Finish by glueing the top piece of fabric. The back of the pillow looks horrendous. Who cares? Check out the front...
Yay! We made a cute pillow.
Here is Barbie's daybed with three pillows.
This is what my chair looked like at this point...
I measured Barbie in her chair to make sure the chair-back wasn't too big.
I covered the chair in fabric. (This particular fabric was an old shirt of Addi's that I cut up because I absolutely loved the fabric and she had stained and ripped the shirt. My kids are hard on clothes- what can I say...)
I hot-glued the fabric onto the cardboard. Voila! Here is a chair!
Barbie's sparkly bathroom wall-
Now, we are in the living room. Here is how I made a table for FREE. (It is not the prettiest thing I've ever made, but it serves it's purpose.)
This coffee table is just a rectangular piece of cardboard with a piece of scrapbook paper on top. The legs are just long strips of cardboard folded so it makes a square. I then hot-glued the "square" legs onto the table.
The couch was made very similarly. The only difference was the actual couch-part is a huge rectangle folded in half and covered with paper. The cushions are just paper cut out to look like cushions. The background wallpaper is my fave.
Once the shelf is assembled, (Or you get one cheap enough without having to make it...) you can start to decorate. I used scrapbook paper with lots of texture. I also used Kraft Craft-Bond to help adhere it. This is the kitchen "wallpaper."
This is the carpet I put in for the living/family room. It is actual dollhouse carpet. I went to a specialty store. I'm sure you can come up with alternatives. I was tired at this point and liked the way this looked. I wouldn't suggest using paper of any sort because it will not hold up well as floors.
This is the kitchen flooring I put in. It is "tiled" floors, again from a dollhouse store. I have seen others use peel and stick linoleum (that you would put in a real house) in their dollhouse. It works well. Again, I just decided to go with the easy way!!
Here is the shelf before I decorated it. Looks pretty good for a homemade bookshelf!!
They had a "Father Christmas" figure there. Jenna only wanted to see him because he handed out candy canes. The kids thought it was funny that "Santa" was Korean!!
