One of my fondest memories of past Christmases is one where my daughter got her dollhouse. I had spent way more money that year that any other, and so I kept the dollhouse and a leather jacket for my son and didn't give it to them until the end of the day-after regular Christmas morning and grandparent visits and family get-together. I will never forget their excitement.

The cost of the furniture for the dollhouse was unbelievable. If I remember correctly, it was around $200 back in 1987, so make sure to budget for that.

We later purchased another already-furnished dollhouse at an auction, but she never loved that one like the first. She spent hours and hours of her childhood playing with it and still loves it. My little granddaughter feels the same about it. (Though DD gets a little irked when she plays with it). We bought the fisher price dollhouse for our granddaughter a couple of Christmases ago, and she also spends hours playing with that. It is incredibly well-made and detailed. You can also buy the furniture separately.

You might try ebay for the furniture. You've got plenty of time before Christmas.

How exciting!
Dee

3 seems a little young for a fancy dollhouse...but I may be mistaken. I have boys. I DO know that my sons LOVED their playmobil castle and such starting about ages four/five. (We bought it for Elder Son at age five, I think The Boy started playing with it when he was four.)

Regardless--sounds like a fun project!

Over the summer I read the book "Maine" and one of the empty-nest characters has a grand dollhouse which she decorates. It made me think of the dollhouse from my youth which I L-O-V-E-D! I remember so carefully making shingles from tongue depressers, cutting them with the xacto knife. When I saw your title I immediately thought "she must've read the same book & is also walking down memory lane!"

I bet this will be so much fun not just for your daughter but for you, too. I've sons, but I'm grateful to them when they're interested in something which lets me scratch a nostalgic itch ....

I'm excited for you both!

I looked for one when DD2 was younger, but they were so expensive and how to hide from her while putting it together. Then one day I was in our local consignment shop and saw a small one (made out of plywood) that hadn't been finished. It was the perfect size (two rooms on bottom, one large room under the roof that lifted up). Had a chimney too. It fit underneath an upside down large garbage can, so I was able to hid from her in the basement when she was home from school. I put shingles on the roof and a friend painted the exterior for me. I can take a picture of it for you, if you want.

I think it is a great idea. If your DD is anything like mine, 3 yrs. old was old enough for her to be given a gift of her own dollhouse. Not sure where you could find a pattern, but I would think a Google search might lead you to something you could follow?

Please don't forget to post a pic of the completed dollhouse, can't wait to see what your DH creates!

And if you start and don't get around to finishing it right away, don't worry. My dad started one for me and it just sat there half-done for years, accomplishing nothing but a vague feeling of parental guilt whenever he walked by it. Then one Christmas he had the brilliant idea of having a friend of his finish it by turning it into a stable for all the little plastic horses I'd collected. It was one of my favorite gifts ever.

Allison - of course we want a picture!! Just because we are nosey and just because I have a grandaughter.

I have my GD's Fisher Price here in my office (it doubles as the playroom). She's nine and I keep saying I am going to get rid of some of this stuff, but she actually plays with it when younger cousins visit.

Tuesday

When I was in elementary school I read and reread a book by Rumer Godden called Miss Happiness and Miss Flower, about a little girl who creates a Japanese-style house for two dolls she is given. My entire childhood fantasy life revolved around being able to do that kind of project.

When I was in high school our neighbor's son was a funeral director and she created elaborate dollhouses of funeral homes (!). They were very realistic and beautiful, not at all gothic or creepy, but yeah, they were funeral homes. She was a real character and a wonderful person who was proud of her son. I do remember that the furnishings were expensive and the houses were off limits to young children.

My own kids played with Playmobile and although I had a dollhouse made for them they preferred to arrange floorplans using blocks for walls and play from "overhead". They made elaborate setups and spent hours a day doing it until they were 11 or 12. Best money I ever spent--Playmobil.

I'd recommend you sweet talk DH into building TWO houses.
Your daughter's can be cute, but simple, and built without plans. Just be sure it's big enough for Barbie-sized dolls.
The second would be yours, from plans : a brownstone or something with charm and details: an heirloom!. We didn't encourage Barbies for our daughter, but she had some same- sized family( name forgotten)dolls, and her friends brought their Barbies to play. DH built a tall, simple yellow farmhouse. We papered it with gift wrap and furnished with WE R Toys plastic, and towel scraps, small boxes, etc. We had fun being creative with everyday items. She loved this house, but only for about a year or two. She was four.

I added a slideshow instead of posting individual pictures. I haven't looked at it since we moved 6 years ago - only 1 room wide, but you could make the dollhouse any size you wanted.

Please don't judge me on the kitchen layout. ;D

I didn't measure, but it's about 24" tall and probably 12-14" square. I think she liked this size since she could grab the chimney and underneath the top floor to carry around her room or into the den. It is a tad heavy, but not overly. I put green felt on the bottom so it would slide on wood floors easily (and not scratch). The top stays open, but a stop of some sort could be added.

I think I bought all the wooden furniture at Michael's, as Hobby Lobby was not around back then. The fence was found in the Christmas section. I made the rug from needlepoint fabric. Bedding is just foam covered with fabric I had at the time.

I added the window box (also from Michael's). The "stone" on the chimney was drawn on with permanent marker.

The last picture shows the nursery furniture and vanity from the bedroom set. Didn't want to overcrowd the rooms today.

My friend that painted the outside also painted a tree on DD2's bedroom wall onto the ceiling and clouds. I don't know how, but I never took a dang picture of the room. :(

Here is a link that might be useful: Dollhouse Slideshow

If I had a nice big room to sit a doll house, I'd get one for myself and decorate it. I love looking at doll house furniture, some of it so detailed and lovely (high priced,tho)and then there are all the miniatures you can buy like vases of flowers, dishes, utensils, even teeny cans of food and books.

In fact yesterday in the mail I received the new Victorian Trading Company catalog for Autumn, and they had the most wonderful dolls for doll houses - a family and then there was a group of four called the Little Women, dressed in period costumes.

Have to add that I never had a doll house growing up, and I made furniture out of the leftover parts from my brother's plastic model car kits! Seriously. I still have some in a cigar box in the attic unless the mice have carried them away.

That is adorable! Thanks for showing.

Congratulations on the new grandbaby. I don't remember if you told, but is it a boy or girl? A little girl will get to enjoy that cute doll house as well.

Tuesday

What a sweet little dollhouse! I love how the flowers and tree with a swing are painted on the side.

Our first house was a Greek Revival built in the 1800's. My husband built a replica to scale of the original front section for my daughter's dollhouse. It had 2 rooms downstairs and 2 up with a full attic. He even included the dormers on the roof. He really got into it, although some of the finishing trim work was not completed. I painted and wallpapered the inside and spent way too much money on furniture and accessories. Since our kitchen was an addition in the back of our house, we just had that in a separate room you can buy at a doll house. You can get really carried away with a kitchen because they sell so many cute items for them. All those little dishes and tiny food items are hard to ignore. Like the American Girl dolls, a dollhouse was great because there was always some accessory you could buy for a birthday or Christmas present. Sadly, the dolls and dollhouse started gathering dust and are now packed away hoping a granddaughter will come one day and play with them.

This is one of my favourite places to visit - it's just a hop-skip-and-jump from my house.
I also bought a lot of stuff for my DD's dollhouse here, although we made a lot of the furnishings ourselves.

They also sell plans.

I remember cutting up advertising flyers (the stapled kind) into little books to fill the shelves, so that the staple stayed and the pages didn't fall out. :)

Here is a link that might be useful: The Little Dollhouse Company

Thanks. No, it was a boy. I may let him play with it anyway. ;)

I remember a childhood friend has a huge one in her bedroom. Barbie doll size, two floors plus an attic.

It would be easy to make one using a bookcase. I think AC Moore used to sell a dollhouse bookcase, and many took that and put a back on it, dressed it, etc.

I remember a little metal doll house I had, when I was young...but I always wanted a wooden, Victorian style doll house.

If your daughter is only three, I would consider having the Fisher Price doll house in her room, for now. That way she can PLAY with it all she wants to, without anyone worrying she's going to break anything. There's nothing worse IMHO, than having a toy you're not allowed to play with. My parents never did that...but I had a few friends, who had fancy dolls they couldn't touch. I always thought that was sad.

Allison- Neat doll house!

Ttodd- There used to be nice doll house kits you could build...and kit furniture, too. All wood and after they were assembled, you could paint them. Have you checked Michael's and other craft stores? Maybe you could 'share' the doll house (in your room) until your daughter gets old enough to play with it, on her own :)

Oh Allison it's wonderful! I just showed it to DH. Now I'm torn becuase I had also just shown him the FP one w/ exactly the same thoughts that LAvendar_Lass mentioned. I'll let him decide what he'd like to do.

Schoolhouse - my family hated when I embarked upon a new 'box house'! ALL of my mom's wrapping paper would disaappear, she would always have to buy new white Christmas tree lites since I wrapped them around the ceiling of each room, the SORRY! game pieces always went MIA as lamp bases to all of the toothpaste lid shades.

lavender, I remember having a metal dollhouse- it came with plastic furniture- (are you talking about the late 50's, early 60's?) I loved it so much. Unfortunately I had to share it with my sisters :)

I think it's a great idea and how cool that your DH will build it! I'd look around online for some designs. Please be sure to post a pic when it's finished!

I dug this out of the box in the attic just to show you guys. This was given to me when I was little from friends of my parents. Their daughter (was close in age to me), passed away from a rare disease as a child and they wanted me to have it. I don't remember if they built it for her or someone else did. I'll have to follow up with that.
{{!gwi}}

The inside looks rather gutted and could use some prettin up. :)
{{!gwi}}

Here's a bag with all the wood furniture. The front door is in here too. The people are a wee bit creepy looking but I didn't know or care as a kid. :)
{{!gwi}}

Allison - I really like that house!

I loved my Creative Playthings doll furniture...I still have most of it. (It went through my sisters as well. Sometimes being the oldest is a drag.) We had the Creative Playthings unit blocks and I used to build "rooms" with those. I never got the dolls out, though. I liked re-arranging the rooms I created. hmmmmm....

Here is a link that might be useful: Creative playthings dollhouse pic

My Dad made me a doll house when I was 5 or 6 (I still have it and could take a photo of it, if wanted.) It opened in the front with two rooms down and two and a bath up, with a stair case and attic, as well. It has little glass windows, too, and a working front door. The bathroom had plastic fixtures. A very fifties-style house, but not really MCM, even though my Mother was much taken with MCM decor.

The best thing about my house was that it had real, working lights. There were center-mounted (flashlight) bulbs in each room and you turned them on and off by inserting copper rods in sockets up in the attic. The power source was an 8(?)-volt battery, so no electrical shock issue.

How I loved that dollhouse!

My younger sister had my Mother's childhood dollhouse and it was one that opened from the top, much bigger than mine, but I liked the front access of mine better. (Ironic that I now live in a rambling farmhouse and she lives in a modern house - our dollhouses were exactly opposite.)

I had a few pieces of commercial, ready-made furniture, some home-made chairs and a sofa, but was encouraged to make my own furnishings, which was a never-ending job as my skills and need for versimilitude gradually increased over the years. I learned about painting, wallpaper hanging, color choice, sort-of upholstery-making (mostly glue or staples), etc., and a bit of woodworking. I had cupboards with tiny piles of folded sheets, little blankets, and embroidered table cloth and napkin sets all hand sewn by me. The kitchen had tiny glass canisters of real flour, suger, etc., a few pieces cookware, dishware and flatware, a bit overscaled, but treasured none the less.

I pounced on any small packaging material or item that came into our household to repurpose into doll-house stuff. I even made tiny burlap sacks of real rice for my pantry and once made "bread" loaves from flour paste, baked hard and painted toasty brown and even tiny papier-mache fruits. I made hand-dipped "candles" buy dipping carpet twine in jelly-makers parrafin for a candlelabra I made from shiny, twisted solder wire for my dollhouse's DR table.

I think I must have come by my enthusiasm genetically as my maternal grandmother had a small, but apparently profitable, home business during the Depression designing and handmaking upholstered dollhouse furniture: sofas, chairs, ottomans, etc. I recently came across her account books, the master patterns and a box of cut, but unassembled fabric pieces (all wonderful Depression-era textiles). She sold her work to fancy toy shops in Pittsburgh, Phila., DC, and NYC. The upholstered furniture in my dollhouse was likely made her, something I don't remember knowing that at the time. However as soon as I opened the boxes which contained her business matters and fabric samples, I recognized them at once.

L.

I had my DH build my DD a dollhouse for For Christmas ( she had just turned 4). I had him do just a simple bookcase style house - she loves Barbie dolls so we made it all "Barbie-sized". Then we gave her wood furniture as gifts ( it is expensive and DH has had to fix a few of the pieces). I made a fireplace for it and sewed little pillows etc. She still plays with it ( she is 5 1/2) but she also loves the pre-made Barbie castles etc. I love seeing all the dollhouse photos -I'll have to go find the photos I took of my DDs......

Homemaker, thanks for the link. I'm enjoying browsing through their pictures.

Sheesharee, what a sweet house that is with all of the trim.

Can't wait to see your photos, jenny. That sounds really special.

Lirio, you are a wonderfully descriptive writer!

ttodd, I wanted to share my experiences with you.

My mom and her husband (only grandfather my kids knew) built each child a dollhouse. And let me tell you these were not your ordinary dollhouses. They started out as a kit, and as in real life, there were lots of upgrades. He absolutely loved woking on them. There is copper flashing, shaker roofs, gutters,etc. My mom decorated the interiors, and they were incredible. Each girl got one (different years), and then they made my son a horse barn.

Everything was electrified (I highly recommend that for the lights!)

Here is the only downside. They are huge. They are a pain to store when they get older. My kids are 23,21,and 19. They are not in homes of their own yet, so we are storing them, but they will take them eventually. They are on rolling platforms, so the kids could push them up against a wall, and then roll them out when they wanted to play. I have quite a love/hate relationship with the dollhouses. Of course the love far outweighs the hate.

My mom passed away about 11 years ago, so it is really special to see what she did.

Oh, and both of the girls had a box of Christmas decorations (including lights) to put up on the outside of the house as well as the inside. Also had a Spring collection of things too, to decorate with flowers, etc.

btw, while we are getting the house ready to be sold, they have all been removed to a friend's house. I think my house looks bigger now without them in there!!!

I read a story once about a little girl who had a feminist mother who encouraged her to play with trucks, but the little girl secretly built an elaborate doll house in the shelves of her closet - made everything herself out of found objects.

I had a dollhouse i started building in high school. Assembled it, finished the outside, began to work on the inside, and got frustrated when it became clear that i should have planned and executed the electric as i was assembling it. I ended up damaging things i had done so carefully as i tried to do the electric. So my advice would be, do the electric before finishing the interior.

My friend with only sons just gave me her childhood dollhouse for my daughter. So we are planning this as our winter mommy-daughter hobby.

Because she's only three (little tornados), I'd wait on the home made doll house and get her one of the pre-made one's for her age. They're not too expensive and the best part is they don't break.

Then when she's around 4 or 5 and more responsible, that's when dh should build her one.

3 year olds are so fickle, they love a great toy one day then ignore it for a month until they rediscover it.

Your dh could still start building it though, and when she's ready to really appreciate it, then give it to her.

Below is a link for a ton of options. I wrote and built projects for Miniature Collector magazine as well as doing workshops. Depending upon how "involved" you get into building, it could go simple or complex. Would recommend simple for a 3 year old. The furniture is fragile and pieces involved could be small and a bit dangerous if broken.

Link below has tons of options. You could start with one room and grow. Some kits actually have separate rooms which can be built along the way and merged. Many times this type of project becomes our own obsession.

Also, check for local miniature clubs. There are houses avaialable for sale. The 1/12 size has gone to the background due to size and a lot of these are being let go of. Plus, sadly, many who worked in this size are passing away with the family having to find new homes.

Yes I too remember the tin houses, my father built me the first "real one" with lights and a favorite stair case. At 3 I was making them from cardboard boxes and items like metal spice cans and cocoa cans for kitchen appliances. True memories of childhood.

Kits are available from Hobby Lobby if you have one near you.

Here is a link that might be useful: Dollhouse options

Memories....when I was a little girl (a loooong time ago), I had a metal doll house, and wooden doll house furniture. I know I'm alot older than most of you on the forums, but does anyone else remember those? I remember playing with that doll house for house on end. That's when toys were meant to encourage imagination.

Saw this today, and thought I would link. So cute! With all the scrapbook papers available, wallpaper choices are endless.

Here is a link that might be useful: Eclectic Dollhouse

I have found that hobby lobby usually has really good deals and sometimes even eBay and Amazon for complete dollhouse kits and furniture.

just type in on your search bar for dollhouse building kits and you may come up with some unique ideas that way.

i've been working on that same project for a couple of years now or you can also check your library I forgot about that!

DH & DD built a dollhouse from a kit when she was around 7. It was an ornate 2 story Victorian - our home then was a plain single story. Although the style was different, they painted and stained the siding, roof, , trim & door the same colors as our home's and used wallpaper scraps from our real rooms for it.

DD loved working on it more than she enjoyed playing with it when it was done. Looking back, it may have been what sparked her interest in woodworking and construction. She is a capable DIY'er now, as comfortable & competent using hand & power tools as her Dad & DH.

We stored it in the attic for years and it is now having its second life with our granddaughters. We brought it to the lakehouse & it's among the favorite rainy day toys.