DIY Dollhouse – Day 2

A busy weekend moving a sister one day, and babysitting a nephew the next, meant not much time for crafts. But managed to get some time in to get some more done.

Last update all pink bits where done, so now it was time to do the white. I found the white a bit harder to use (which is not surprising, white is never easy to work with) You may find you need to add a few extra coats to get the look you want. If you run out of paint any white acrylic paint will do. Or even house paint. Actually how cool would it be if you painted your house to match the colours of your own house!!

There is a fair amount of work to be done in painting all the bits, there are a lot of bits! But that is just due to the detail in the house. It could just be a plain house that was easy to build, but instead it is a cute little house full of character and style. So the extra work is well worth it I say.

Once all the pieces are painted and dried it’s time to start assembling the house. The following steps is how I did it, and what thoughts I had along the way. But ultimately this is your kit and you can put it together which ever way you think is best.

First I took the bottom floor and added all the 7 sides (four across the front, two sides and one centre panel). Make sure to secure the panels in place using the little “c” clips. If you find these hard to get on you may need to check for any snags stopping it sliding on.

Once the sides were done I added the second floor. And then moved on to the little trimmings as per the picture on the left. If you put the second floor ceiling on before these you will find it hard to get them in.

Next comes the second floor ceiling. I spent a bit of time here making sure all the joins where pushed in as far as they could around the house. You certainly have to use a fair bit of firm but gentle pressure to get some of them in.

Now on to the decking. I did the top level first and then the bottom, but that made it a bit hard to get the bottom level posts in, so probably easier to do the bottom level first.

The top level decking floor was probably the hardest part to get in. You have to slide it on to the slot at the corner of the house and then push in at both sides to get it to lock into place. So take a deep breath and take it nice and steady and it will get into place before you know it.

I have also assembled and put the two stairwells in place. I have not glued them down in any way as they will most likely need to come out when the printed flooring goes down (note that is way you can see I have not painted the centre of the floors – no point in wasting paint on an area not seen)

Right your house by now will be really starting to come along, so lets get to work on the roof.

Best to add the front wall pieces (with the round windows), the centre divider, the small white triangle and the roof top with its trimming. And that gets you up to the point as in the picture. Then you can add the other half of the roof including the bay window and the chimney. I love that the roof has been cut out so you can see into the bay window and up the chimney. All these extra details really make these houses special.

And speaking of extra details – they come next. You have lots and lots of white and pink trimmings to add around the house. The ones that need to be glued on, like the window surrounds, really go on very easily. The glue holds them well while it sets, so you only need to hold for a few seconds before moving onto the next piece.

And last comes the window covers. While the rest of the house is very sturdy and wont need to be glued, these window covers will definitely need to be glued down to stop them falling out. But I want to make sure I can get the printed flooring down easily enough before I do any glueing. Just in case I need to take it apart again.

And that is it, house is fully assembled. And I am super happy with it. It is just as cute as the pictures on the box. And I feel very proud to have put it together.

Through the assembling process I have seen that I have missed painting a few pieces (like painting the underside of the roof white to make the ceiling in the bathroom) so I will finish those bits now. It certainly pays to keep a bit of paint spare for the end to touch up some bits.

So now comes the fun part – building all the items to go in the house. And to get you started you get a super cute teeny tiny bathtub and toilet. How cute are they! It’s like your moving in gift

I was in the lounge this morning and looked up to see the dollhouse had been moved from the kitchen table to lounge floor. My Mr4 had decided it was the perfect house to display all his trash buddies in! LOL

That’s all for now, thanks for reading and happy crafting!