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Dolly Find!

newdesk
I went and did a little thrift store shopping with my cousin when he was out here a couple weeks ago and I found this cute little vintage desk from the 70s! It works great in Edie’s room, and then I was able to move the armoire down into the nearly empty living room, yay. Besides the desk there was some other furniture that came packed together with it, which were a beige armoire and vanity set complete with seat, as well as a small table and chair. These toys were made for a type of doll that was produced back in the early 70s and turned out to be perfect Pullip and Dal sized items because they are a little more oversized than the Barbie furniture and thusly are a better fit due to the added height of the head size on Pullips and Dals.

Anyway I got the whole bag of toys for only $5.00 at my local DAV, so I am going to highly recommend thrift store shopping to search for doll clothes and furniture. The DAV and AmVets are better though than your run of the mill Goodwill because they have more toys and they are packed in plastic bags. Goodwill seems to only have a lot of larger toys. Also it is possible to find bags of dolls/doll clothes as well. I saw a pack of doll/doll clothes there that I was tempted to buy for $3.00, but the bag was heavy on the dolls and had less so much clothes. I think there is a certain amount of luck and timing to get a good find, but when you do it will totally make your day! It totally made my day to find that little desk, which subsequently I researched online and came to find that it is actually worth around $50-$60 these days! (O-O)!!

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Dolly Find – Eraser Miniatures

crazerasers

Ack! I realized that I have been neglecting this blog! Lately I’ve been trying to focus a little more on my comic work, so it’s making my other hobbies suffer. I am hoping though to be able to have a chance this weekend to play around with my dollhouse and the new miniatures I have gotten for it. Then maybe I can post some pics! I also have a DIY Pullip Bed post I need to make at some point as well…..Anyway on with the eraser miniatures though.

I found these “crazerasers” in the Easter section at Target the other day. They are around with all of the Easter Basket toys. Anyhow these are the perfect scale for Pullip & Dal, and they are cheap at only $1.19 a set. Besides the two sets seen here they also had a bathroom item set, some sports sets and another food set that I have forgotten about. Now as cute as these are there are a couple drawbacks, but I think the drawbacks can be forgiven for the cheap price. Drawback one is that the little separate pieces, like the sausages in the fry pan, actually have a little nub underneath them which plugs into a hole in the skillet. If you, like me, do not want the nub, you could just carefully carve it off with a Xacto blade since they are erasers. The other drawback is that they are going to need some trimming, as some pieces will have a little fringe at their seam edges from the molds. Again though that is easy to take care of with an Xacto blade.

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A Word on Dollhouse Flooring

dollhousewoodfloor

I though I would share with you a couple tips/techniques when dealing with wood flooring for your dollhouse. First of all there are lots of different types of wooden dollhouse flooring, but I am dealing with Hobby Lobby’s Mayberry Street pine wood flooring. This flooring does not come with any stains or lacquer on them. The unlacquered floor you can tell from the pic above is lighter and also duller than lacquered flooring. Now you can if you want, just install the unlacquered wood floor, but really it is going to be better to lacquer your floor. First of all the color becomes richer when you lacquer and also it helps to protect the wood…not that you should be getting heavy foot traffic in your dollhouse or anything, lol. Besides that it also adds a polished and realistic look to the house.

As for laquering your flooring, there are two ways you can go about it, you can use a brush on varnish, or use a spray lacquer. I decided to go with the spray since I already had some available, and I felt I could get more even coverage with the spray. As you can see from the pic above I used Krylon’s Triple Thick clear spray, and it took about two coats to get the coverage I wanted. I think it also did a nice job of bringing out the color of the wood as well.

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Pullip’s House – Nearing the Finish Line

dollhouseprog10

Here is another overall project shot of the house. It’s been a couple days though since these pics, so I have even more done now than the photo shows. As I think I said before, it’s all the small detail work now, trimming out the windows and the rooms.

livingroom

I shot this pic of the finished living room with the flash. I wind up working on the house off and on all day and then take progress pics at night. Unfortunately taking pics at night isn’t the best of things. Anyway the flash made the aqua paint seem lighter than it actually is.

frontdoorfin

Here is the front door area. I wanted to have working doors on this house and also some windows you could open and close for photo ops, and well fun also! Some of the windows I am framing out though are not hinged. I am also not putting any type of fake glass in the windows, because I am just not that fond of it, however as you can see from my photos I have been adding the detail of wood sashes as it makes things look more charming.

I can’t remember what I’ve already discusses by way of working with hinges, so if I repeat myself forgive me…The doors are hinged using 1/2 inch hinges. These were attached with screws and are very sturdy so these doors can be played with, without any fear of them coming off. The windows on the other hand are only 1/4 inch thick wood so I’ve been having to make do with small 1:12 scale brass hinges. These are the type of hinges that you have to nail in with tiny brass nails, and not surprisingly they pull out easy. I’ll be frank, using the 1:12 scale hinges for playscale is sucky, because they are not durable enough and can’t handle the stress of the larger windows and the repeated usage. However because these hinges were all I could find to hinge my windows, I’ve been having to deal with them, and I can share a few tips with you.

My first tip for working with the 1:12 scale brass hinges is to start your nail hole with a straight pin. By starting the hole with a straight pin you create a channel to get it started and thusly it makes it easier to hammer those tiny blasted nails in. Secondly you’ll need to use a nail set to really get them in there good. My second tip, and probably unorthodox one, is that once you have your hinges in place, and you know that everything is functioning, you can very carefully put a dab of super glue over each nail to be sure to secure your hinges extra tight to the wood. You have to be careful though because if you accidentally get the glue in your hinges you will ruin it. I generally do one side at a time and prop it up so that if the glue starts to run, it will run away from the middle hinge part. I imagine there is a possibility that you could try to forgo the nails altogether and just superglue the hinges on, but I thought perhaps glue and nails might be sturdier. My final piece of advice is to inset your hinges. I inset my hinges by using a dremel to gently shave out a small patch of wood where my hinge will set. I also have a preference for H hinges as they cover a little more area, but you may have your own ideas of what you want to work with.

Well, that’s it for now. I’ll be sure to post more progress later even if it is a little late.

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Dolly Find – Porcelain Claw Foot Tub!

dollyfind-clawfoottub

A couple days ago when I was looking at the Sunday ads I noticed a little bath gift set that was all contained in this little porcelain tub. I decided to go investigate it to see if it could work for Pullip, and as you can tell, I am pleased to tell you that yes it does! Pullip fits inside the tub as long as she has her knees up, which is good enough for me, and really the back is high enough that even her big head can rest against it as she reclines. Since Dal is shorter than Pullip I am wondering if it would work even better for her. Either way it was a nice find for $9.99, and it is porcelain, though the feet are not metal, they are just painted porcelain. I scored this item at my local CVS, so if you are in need of a dollhouse tub, you might go check it out!