Miniature doll houses don’t have to cost a fortune (wood ones can cost hundreds of dollars, and even plastic ones can cost a lot.) You can make them out of cardboard for very little cost. If your children are crazy about little dolls or animals, but you are not crazy about how much they cost, just buy a few of those expensive items, then supplement them with home made items. My middle daughter loved Sylvania animals (in the photo above), so I purchased one or two new items each birthday and Christmas, then made the rest of the items myself. To make houses like the ones in the photo, cover cardboard boxes with contact paper or glue colored paper on the outside and inside. (Paper with small patterns will look like wallpaper.) Painting is not a good option because cardboard does not look very good when it is painted. To make more than one floor, either glue 2 or 3 identical boxes on top of each other, or cut floors to fit the insides of the boxes. Each floor board will be stronger if you cut 2 pieces of cardboard and glue them together with the corrugation running in perpendicular directions. Cover the floors with wood colored contact paper or dark brown paper. Glue cardboard strips along the sides of the walls to hold each floor up (as in the photos above.) Be careful when you measure where to put these strips--if one side is lower than the other, the floor will be at a slant! Cut windows and doors, if you like, but they won’t be missed if you don’t. The park between the 2 houses uses a dollar store Christmas tree that really helps it look like it is outdoors.
Christmas decorations:
The ground floor of this house is a pizza parlor that has Christmas bells taped to the ceiling. The second floor is the living quarters with a chenille wire wreath on the left wall, and a dollar store Christmas tree branch wreath on the back wall. The flat roof provides a porch, though it’s hard to see through the “wrought iron” fence (plastic lace in the gift wrap section of hundred yen stores.) You can see the porch a bit better in the photo above. The blue chairs are from a hundred yen store stacking game.
How to make the furniture:
The second floor table is made with a square wood scrap glued to a round knob pedestal. The easy chairs are made from a block of wood on the bottom, a narrower square of wood for the back, and 2 short lengths of dowel for the arm rests. I painted them white with blue dots.
Christmas decorations:
The ground floor of this house is the living room with a tiny tree in the corner--a spool of thread is the tree stand to hold it upright. A bead wreath hangs in the window.( This is a quick craft project for your child--push green and red beads onto a chenille wire and form into a circle.)
The second floor is the dining room. There is a silver chenille wire swag on the left wall with blue bows and a silver bell. The wreaths on the second and third floors are branches cut from a dollar store tree that have been shaped into wreaths with tiny bows added.
How to make the furniture:
The sofa on the ground floor is made the same way as the easy chairs (see instructions above.)
The second floor table is made with a square of balsa wood glued to 4 square dowel lengths. The chairs are 2 squares of balsa wood glued to each other--no legs! Sorry you can’t see the bed on the top floor. It has a square headboard and footboard glued to the rectangle horizontal piece (see the diagram on right).
Seasons > Christmas > Decorations for the home > Girl’s Bedroom > Ideas for using dolls > Doll Houses Decorated for Christmas
base block for seat
narrow block for back
dowels for arm rests
Easy chair, front view:
base block for seat
dowels for arm rests
Easy chair, side view:
Bed, side view
Seasons > Christmas > Decorations for the home > Girl’s Bedroom > Ideas for using dolls > Doll Houses Decorated for Christmas
supports for floors
