Doing It-Projects with CSBergman - Arts and crafts, writing, home and garden, dollhouse and miniatures, pets, and anything else!

How to Refurbish an old cat Scratching Post

This morning, as I watched my cats joyously scratching on their post, I realized that these posts were LONG overdue for refurbishing.

The first of the two- this post was refurbished about 10 or so years ago. Definitely needs the sisal replaced.

The smaller, more simpler of our scratching posts has been around through ages, surviving many cats. I replaced the sisal rope about 10 or so years ago, at least. It has absolutely seen better days. My cats absolutely destroyed it. But, alas, it has more life to give!

I started with a quick trip to Menards for replacement sisal. I bought 100 feet of the cheapest sisal rope I could find.I was careful not get anything too thin as it wouldn’t last long, nor too thick as it would be more difficult to work with.

After selecting a good rope (1/2 inch thick x 100 feet, as I used it on 2 posts), I got to work removing the old wrapping. I used my handy-dandy box cutter to cut off all but the bottom few inches of rope, as that section was seldom used by my cats and still seemed in fair condition.

I tied the end of the new rope to the end of the existing rope that was still in good shape. If your old rope is all bad, just tie a knot in the end of the new rope, then use a fencing staple to nail it to the wood post. I will show examples of this later on in the post.

I tied the end of the new rope to the end of the good section of old, and then wound the rope around and around the post, keeping it nice and taught so the pieces don’t overlap each other. Keep the coils nice and tight, and push them against each other tightly so they make a nice mat for the cat to scratch on.

Keeping the coils tight to the wood, keep them pushed close together as you wind the rope all the way up the post.

If you have a simple post like mine, don’t bring the rope coils totally flush with the top. I kept mine about an inch down to prevent my cats from pulling the topmost coil up over the top of the post and unraveling it all.

Keeping the rope tight, hammer in one of these awesome fence staples so it holds the rope tight to the post. Hammer it in good and secure so the cats can’t pull it out–give it a good tug to make sure it is really in there! After the nail is in, you can tie a knot in the rope on the other side of the nail and cut the loose end of the rope. The knot will help keep the end of the rope from sliding through the nail staple.

It should look like this (except hopefully a little neater). Notice the heavy duty staple on the other side of the knot, helping it keep the rope securely in place.

That’s one post done. The cats were scratching at it before I was even done wrapping the coils!

Here is the second tragedy–I mean post. They really did a number on this one! The rope has never been replaced on this 14-ish year old post.

My second scratching post was just awful! I hadn’t realized all of the damage they had done to the rope, as it was turned away from view. First I had to remove the old rope, as before. I removed all but the bottom few inches. This post was trickier as it has the platforms to work around. I ended up cutting the old rope as close as I could to the platforms, but a few strands were stuck where the post and platform connect so I just cut them close to the post, as the new rope covered up the tiny fragments of old.

As before, I tied the old rope to the new and began to wind upwards.

When I got to each platform, I ended up just winding the rope as close as I could to where the platform connected to the post and then continuing over the top of the platform, as pictured. I just focused on keeping the spacing of the coils as consistent as possible with the rest of the post.

I tied a knot in the end when I was at the top of the post, then used one of the fence staples to nail it in place on the post.

Finished post. The cats (I have 5) are already excited to use it!

I hope this article gives a better idea of how to recover different types of cat scratchers. My cats were very grateful and excited to have their posts repaired. Any questions or comments? Feel free to post in the comment section!

How to paint the San Franciscan Doll House to Look Haunted or Abandoned

Recently, I was at the local Goodwill store with my 10 year old daughter, and we came upon a very dilapidated San Franciscan dollhouse for only $15. I wasn’t very interested in it, myself, because I already have a very nice Victorian mansion (the Beacon Hill, see other posts), and the San Franciscan didn’t really interest me much. My daughter, however, fell in love. She told me she would trade my Bayberry Cottage house back to me if I got her this one. I decided to go for it.

As we bought it. It needed a LOT of work. Part of the roof needed mending, parts of it weren’t attached correctly, interior walls are missing, etc. Luckily a lot of the parts were there and just needed to be reattached.

My daughter is a big fan of my haunted Beacon Hill dollhouse, and plays in it often. She has been bugging me to repaint her San Franciscan to look haunted like my Beacon Hill. I LOVED painting my Beacon Hill to look abandoned, and relished the opportunity to try it again on a different house.

After a lot of mending was done, i started putting on the first coat of paint. This is the beginning of the base coat of light gray.

First thing, I had to make a few structural repairs to the outside. I was lucky in that a lot of the missing pieces of this house were in a ziplock bag that came with it. I also had to take off and reattach a few pieces that weren’t put on correctly by a previous owner. After these initial repairs were done, we started painting.

I started with a base coat of light gray exterior paint that I had left over from previous projects. We worked it into all of the nooks and crannies of the siding, on all of the railings, and pretty much anywhere that we wanted to look aged.

After the base coat. In the background you can see the Beacon Hill decorated for Christmas. While my paints were out I was finally able to get that bright white trim at the bottom of it darkened to match the rest of the house lol!

After the gray coat is on, I let the paint dry thoroughly before moving on to the next step.

For the next step, I found it easier to use two brushes. I used one brush to apply a small amount of a dark gray paint. I wet the second brush with water (but not sopping wet), and then brushed it over the wet dark paint. My wet brush had stiff, coarse bristles that I used to scrub the ‘dirt’ into the crevices of the siding. I scrubbed the pigment up and down, back and forth, and all around until I was satisfied with its grungy appearance.

More grunge. It’s a little thick in this photo–I think I softened it up more later.

I continued the dark gray ‘grunge’ over the whole house until I was satisfied.

After the dark gray looked satisfactory, I moved on to the next color. I wanted more contrast, so I added JUST A BIT of black. Black is a very overpowering color and I did not want to overdo it. I applied it in just a few areas, particularly the porch rails, the trim above the windows, and a little on the porch floor where I felt there might be more dirt and rot accumulated.

With a small amount of black highlights. The black is also scrubbed in (using the same method as the dark gray) to keep it more weathered looking. (My daughter has her Pokemons in it already lol).

After black, I wanted a little green as wood can get a thin film of mold on it over time. I kept the green paint watered down a LOT because it didn’t want it very strong. Just a very thin hint of it is enough.

With some green added for mold. It is very watered down. I made it stronger in some areas for interest.

Front view after the green wash was applied.

Feeling fairly satisfied with the paint, I moved on to the shingles. As they were, they looked way too new for an abandoned building, so I needed to age them somehow. Luckily, I have this handy-dandy Aged Wood Accelerator from Varathane. This was purchased in the wood stain department at Menards. So far this product has come in handy for several of my dollhouse projects.

Here is a color comparison of the original shingles (bottom left) opposed to having them stained. A word of note- any areas of glue will not stain. If that bothers you, you could go back over those sections with a bit of matching paint. I wasn’t bothered so I just left them, as they weren’t very noticeable to me.

We were both pretty pleased with how this project turned out. Eventually we might move on to the interior, but for now it is a blank slate for my child to decorate as she pleases. Let me know if you have any questions or comments!

How to Make Ghosts for Haunted Dollhouses and Halloween Decorations out of Glass Figurines

Finished ghosts with glow-in-the-dark paint on them.

I have been wanting to make some ghosts for a while to inhabit my antique church. My church is a little on the rough side, so making it a bit haunted seems reasonable (without, of course, altering or damaging my church in any way). Anyway, this is a solution I really like.

I started looking for clear glass figurines, and finally settled on a nativity set.

These figures worked out perfect! The base is a bit hollow, so a battery operated votive candle can be used, if desired, to light it up (the figure in the upper left corner is standing on a votive candle.)

These figures will fit well in my church, as they are about the right scale for the building, and also they look holy. I decided that, for my purposes, I wanted them to glow by themselves instead of having them elevated by sitting on candles. The candles would work fine if I had them in different settings, but I like using glow-in-the-dark paint.

The glow-in-the-dark paint I use is just a run of the mill crafting paint that can be found in the paint aisle of many craft supply stores. There are different brands and probably any brand will work. I bought mine from Walmart. I also used a darker paint for shadows; I believe I used payne’s gray acrylic.

I watered down the payne’s gray and put layers of paint in areas I want to be shaded, just to add more definition to the form, because otherwise the clear glass makes it hard to make out details. After the shadows, I put on thicker layers of the glowing paint in the raised areas like the head and hands, shoulders, sleeves, etc.

After painting the shadows and glowing highlights.

In order to make the figure glow, you need to hold it under a light, shine a flashlight on it, or just keep it in a well-lit place for a while to ‘charge’ it. The glow won’t last for very long before it needs recharging with a light source, but it is still fun.

The same figure standing on the battery operated candle. It still looks spooky.

As viewed through the broken window of my antique church. This church is featured in another of my posts if you would like to view it in more detail.

How to Make Realistic Barrels for a Dollhouse Saloon

A few barrels in the storage room of my saloon dollhouse. The pallets they are resting on are from the local Dollar Tree.

While working on my saloon dollhouse, I decided that it needed some barrels in its storage room. I wanted a few, and I wanted them to be open inside so I could use them to store extra accessories for the action figures that I am using to populate my saloon (I mean, do the Ghostbusters actually need to have their ghost fighting equipment while playing checkers?). I discovered that my requirements would not be easy (or cheap) to find, so I would try to make them. While I was pondering this challenge, I happened to glance at what my child was drinking, and the solution presented itself.

Little Hug Fruit Barrels! The empty containers look just like little barrels!

I took an empty container and cut off the top, just above the ring that says Cash Refund information. Next, I sprayed it with Rustoleum #2 spray paint, which contains a primer for painting on plastics, and holds up pretty well.

Top portion cut off and primed with Rustoleum #2 spray paint.

I painted both the inside and outside of the barrel with the spray paint, then waited for it to dry completely.

Next I dug out my acrylic paints to paint on top of the Rustoleum. I use the Rustoleum as a base-coat primer to help other paints adhere to the plastic surface. If I had just painted the acrylics straight onto the plastic, the paint would easily rub off, but the primer helps prevent this. I used a mixture of different browns and blacks for the wood and bands.

After the paint was applied, I decided that I didn’t care for the writing along the top, so I chose to cover it up with a band of thin leather I had as scrap. You could also use cloth, or even cardstock.

Thin strip of leather wrapped around the top to cover the raised lettering. It also helped to reinforce the top lip. I then painted the leather to match the other bands.

Next I wanted a lid for the barrel.

I cut and glued a piece of thick string as a lip along the inside of the barrel, about a quarter inch below the opening. This will give the lid something to rest on so it doesn’t keep falling into the barrel.

Lid cut from thick cardboard. I put a small hole in top, so that I might eventually make a metal hook tool to help remove the lids.

I happened to have some very thick cardboard material left over from something, and decided it would make a nice sturdy lid. I cut out the shape I needed and then trimmed it to fit easily inside the top of the barrel, but not past the inner lip I had created with the string.

There are other possibilities–I could add a beer tap, or maybe a rack for the barrel to rest on. Thanks for looking! Feel free to comment or ask questions.

How to Make Slate Shingles for a Dollhouse out of Vinyl Floor Tiles

First Period Style house with completed shingles.

For my white First Period Colonial style house, I had removed the old shingles (see original post) and hadn’t decided what type of shingle I wanted to put on it. I had always kicked around the idea of slate shingles, but wasn’t sure how to proceed with that. For one thing, real slate shingles for a dollhouse would be very expensive, not to mention hard to find. Also, they would add a significant amount of weight to the house and would be difficult to attach. Finally, after a bathroom flooring project, I came up with the perfect, cost effective idea. I would make my own ‘slate’ shingles out of bathroom floor tiles.

The tiles I chose are from Menards, and are very thick linoleum. They are textured and colored to look very similar to slate.

Close up of the tile I chose. They are nice and thick and will have some substance on the roof.

The back of the tile, in case anyone wants to use the same ones.

After selecting the tiles, I had to cut them into squares. I wanted them to be random widths to they would add some interest to the project, so I didn’t use any real measurements when I cut them. I used a scrap piece of wood as a cutting board so I wouldn’t damage any surfaces.

Scoring with a box cutter, using a ruler as a straightedge.

To cut these tiles, I held a ruler as a straightedge and used my box cutter to score a shallow mark along the top of the tile, in the area I wanted to cut. The knife does not need to cut all the way through the tile. It is important to note that you need to score it from the DECORATED SURFACE of the tile, so that when you break it you will have a nice, clean line. If you score the back and break the front, the cut will be jagged and might peel off part of the decoration.

After you score the front with the knife, hold the tile in your hand, decorated side up, and use your fingers to snap it along the cut, from the back side. It should break pretty easily.

Cutting the tile’s paper backing after the front has been snapped.

I chose to keep the paper backing on the tiles as I went, at least until I was done cutting them. Otherwise (I used self-adhesive tiles) the sticky backing will make them stick to the cutting board and cause some difficulty. Anyway, because I kept this paper backing on, I had to make an additional slice on the back of the tile to cut the paper after I had snapped the tile.

I cut the tiles into long strips, about 1.5 inches wide.

After my strips were cut, I cut them into smaller sized shingles. I used the same method, scoring with the knife (except for this cut I didn’t use the ruler as a guide as the cuts were so short and it was pretty easy to keep them straight), and then snapping them into small squares. I started out leaving the paper on the backs of these smaller pieces, but after a while I found it went faster to just peel the paper off after they were cut.

Next comes the fun part.

Gluing the shingles. The glued edge will be laid pointing towards the roof’s top, so that it makes contact with the wood part of the roof. The bottom edge that isn’t glued will be overlapping the shingles below it. If I glued the whole shingle it has more chance of dripping glue onto the shingle below it.

After my shingles are cut, and the paper backing is removed, I dabbed a little glue on one end (because the sticky backing isn’t as sticky as I would like it to be, and I don’t want my shingles falling off), and started installing them on my roof.

This roof has an opening for the attic, so I had to work around it.

When installing the shingles, start from the bottom and work your way up. Overlap them a little bit, so that the next row is hanging over the one below it slightly. In real life, the cracks between the shingles won’t line up, to help prevent water from leaking into your house, so keep them staggered. My shingles are not straight as I wanted a more primitive look.

Just keep going until you cover the whole roof. In the sections where my attic ‘door’ is, I made sure to keep the shingles around the door out of the way so that it will still open. Then on the door itself, I let the shingles overlap the flap just enough to blend into the shingles on the rest of the roof, which helps camouflage the door but without hindering its functionality.

Finished roof (but this is on the other side of the dollhouse).

Once I was done, I cut tiny strips of shingle and glued them along the top to hide gaps where the shingles of either side meet. (Not pictured). I had initially planned on painting the edges of the shingles to get rid of the white edge, but I feel pretty good about how they look as-is. These tiles were heavy, so they do add a bit of weight to the house, but they sure do look good, and I am sure they are lighter than real slate would be. Feel free to comment with any questions or suggestions!

How to make an Old West Saloon Dollhouse out of a Duracraft Deluxe Victorian Mansion

Immediately after I brought it home.

This house was an unfinished kit that I bought on Facebook Marketplace. It still had the instruction manual, plus an old sales catalog from Frank’s Nursery dated 1982, with this kit circled. I am guessing that was when it was purchased, and it had never been finished. It has a lot of dust on it.

Something about this dollhouse makes me think of a large saloon and brothel in an old west town. We just finished watching the old ‘Deadwood’ series (HBO) and I can’t help envisioning Al sitting on the upper porch drinking his coffee. When I found this house available within easy driving distance, at an affordable price, especially in its unpainted state, I dove for it!

After the porch railings were finished. It looks more like a saloon to me now!

The first thing I did was finish the porch railings. The kit hadn’t been completed, and fortunately they included the instructions and the unfinished parts. It was easy to follow the instructions and install the porch rails.

Once the railing was installed, I turned the house around to focus on the inside. None of the inside walls had been installed, so the inside was a blank slate, which is great for me and my saloon intentions. However, without the support of the inside walls, the floors had sagged with time. I think someone probably used it like a shelf, which would have added to the problem. I decided that it needed some support, but I didn’t want any extra walls to break up that glorious open space on the bottom floor, so what to do?

I bought some fancy decorative wooden trim from Menards and glued it along the front edges of the floors, where it sagged the most. I clamped it until the glue was dry. I used pieces of wood to brace it up as it dried to it wouldn’t sag anymore. This would work temporarily, but I knew that it would be weak over time if it didn’t have some better support. Before I could add any extra support, however, I would need to get the floors done on the bottom floor.

I also cut one of the front windows bigger, making it into a door. I bought a swinging bat-wing door on Amazon and glued it in place, but there is a gap on the top that will need to be repaired.

The kit came with flooring strips (YAY) so I worked at cutting and gluing them down. I kept the lengths staggered so there is no pattern to the wood that would draw the eye, just like a real wood floor. The pieces were so thin that the wood glue I used made them curl up in some areas. I weighed them down with heavy glass cup holders until they were dry.

When the floor was laid, I cut some square wooden dowels to make a bracing framework across the middle of my floor. Eventually I can make some sort of fancy corbels or something to spruce it up, but I am confident that it will help to brace the floor above just as a wall would. In this picture you can see the trim I added above the doorway to cover the gap–it wasn’t quite tall enough, so I added a strip of leftover flooring above that. It seems to blend in the with the wood of the walls enough that it works.

Next I need a bar.

This was made with leftover fancy trim from what I used to brace the edge of the floor, plus jumbo craft sticks and square dowels. I used small round dowels, cut in half length-wise, for the round edges on the ends.

Bar in place, with a couple of dolls posing. I built some narrow shelves around the doorway to the back room, lining them with alcohol bottles I found on Amazon and Ebay. The mirror behind the shelves is from the back of a mirrored phone case I bought at dollar tree. The foot rest at the bottom of the bar is made of coffee stirrers (I shoved round toothpicks inside for support) and pieces of square dowel. I bought the spittoons on ebay.

This is where I’m at right now. I plan to get more dolls. I want some bored dancing girls, some patrons playing cards, rooms upstairs, and a storage room behind the bar. Stay tuned!

What my Haunted Beacon Hill Dollhouse Looks like on the Inside

This is my haunted/abandoned Beacon Hill dollhouse. Its main resident is Ash from the Evil Dead, who is visible on the front porch, enjoying a smoke and a beer with his zombie friend (hey, it’s make believe, darn it!)

This is my Beacon Hill, which has been featured in past posts. It is, of course, a work in progress, much like my other houses/structures. I work on different projects sporadically as my time, interests, and supplies allow. I thought today that you might enjoy seeing the insides and some of the modifications I have made to it. At the moment it is decorated for the winter, with snow on the roof. The snow, by the way, is just a fuzzy fleece sweatshirt that was cut into pieces and laid on the surfaces.

Ash (a Neca action figure from the Evil Dead series) with a glass of beer and cigarette that were purchased on ebay. His friend is a zombie that I am guessing could be from the Walking Dead but I really don’t know. Their metal lawn chairs were from Dollar General, in the Fairie Garden section.

So, for the life of me, I cannot get this image to upload in the correct orientation. It is tilted sideways for now until I can figure it out. Anyway, this is a full view of the back. I keep it covered (at least the bottom couple of floors) with a piece of plexiglass that is velcroed to the back of the house. It helps keep out dust and cats.

A closeup of the kitchen. I have a metal Roper range (and love it so much!), a Dee’s Delights wringer washer, a (I believe) Reuter’s kitchen sink, a wooden chopping block, and a Peripera makeup refrigerator. (I might paint that sometime so it looks more like a realistic vintage fridge. ) One of my ‘broken’ windows fell out and I didn’t catch it before taking the photo.

Dining room. I cut a small storage under the stairs. I still need to make a door for it. The front doors of the house still need to be re-attached, but for now they look fine as being caved in, as though it was broken into.

Here is the living room. I have a denim-covered couch that I love, a leg lamp (it is actually a night-light version of the famous Christmas Story lamp), and a few other pieces of furniture. The white chairs are my version of old fashioned table chairs. They aren’t finished yet.

Upstairs sitting room. It is occupied by my child’s toy kitties lol!

Bathroom. It is also occupied by pets. I used watered-down paints to dirty up the appliances a bit, and also the floor. I am still working at painting the trim brown. It was all white when I bought it, and, while it looked very nice, it just didn’t give me the ‘old house’ feel that dark wood has.

The back of the roof tower. It didn’t originally have a door, so I cut and added one. I might add a ghost in there eventually. I made the shingles out of jumbo crafting sticks, by cutting the rounded ends off and overlapping them.

This was originally decorated as a nursery, but I am converting it to a secret room. I made a shallow book case to block the entrance (will eventually add hinges to it), and then managed to find a vintage METAL spiral staircase kit on ebay! This is, perhaps, my favorite feature of this house, so far. I painted it black, and then used some brown paint to add a little ‘rust’. I used a rotary tool to cut the hole in the ceiling for the stair opening, and then patched around it with cloth and glue. i plan to paint over it when I eventually repaint the room, and make the loose cloth look like falling plaster.

The spiral staircase leads to a tiny greenhouse on the roof. I made the greenhouse out of a fancy metal cage that once held scented potpourri. I covered it with clear plastic that I salvaged from plastic food containers. The fence in front of it is a work in progress that I am still figuring out. Eventually I hope to make it encircle the rooftop.

The upstairs hallway. The ceiling needs to be patched where there was a gaping hole leading to the tower. Since I made the tower an actual room, I need to put a floor there for it. I bought the bookshelf on ebay, and now I need to stain it and add books and decorations.

Ash’s bedroom, top right room, with a skeleton friend.

Pennywise in the guest bedroom (middle floor, right side). Pennywise is a Neca figure. He has balloon dog christmas tree ornaments as props, and a giant praying mantis as a dinner guest. I like to position him in fun areas, like in the closet, peeking out a window, etc. Behind him is a small glass display case that I am currently pretending is a large fish tank, with ‘Safari’ brand deep sea fish in it.

This is the progress I have made on this house so far. There are still projects left to do before it is ‘done,’ but, in reality, I will probably always find more things to do with it. It would be fun to add artwork sometime, or black-and-white photos, and I would REALLY like to make a basement that I can set the whole house on top of, with a stairway that leads outside, like some of the really old houses have. Then I could make a boiler and laundry room, and make it damp-ish looking and creepy–an ideal place for Pennywise to hide. Hmm…

Updating a 1980 DollHouse to Look more Realistic (and Eventually 1970’s-style)

Outside view (As I bought it.) The paint was just AWFUL!

This house spoke to me for one reason or another when I found it on Marketplace. For some reason it feels older to me than the 1980 signature on the bottom. I have seen other, older houses that share the same basic shape but have different porches or a balcony on the window. I don’t know if it was built from a kit or maybe (and more likely) from plans. It has handy dandy wheels on the bottom and rolls so nicely!

The first thing that had to go on this house was the atrocious paint job. I cringed each time I looked at it. I swear someone decided to ‘spruce it up’ with chalk paint before listing it for sale, and they painted it so sloppily i just… well, I just had to fix it.

First I tried a little acetone on a cotton ball to see what exactly was underneath the paint. Was there some grand finish that begged to be restored? No–it looked like it was just white paint underneath, and it would be a mess to clean off the old paint just to get it back to white. I could just paint over it.

It took me a while to decide what I actually wanted to do with this house. I had plans for a saloon at some point, and a 1920’s style house party, with flapper girls and a grand banquet. My first thought was to make this a saloon, as the covered porch might be made old-west-ish, I suppose, but then just a week or so after I brought this house home I discovered a saloon-of-my-dreams house (actually it is a Duracraft Deluxe Victorian Mansion) that will make an awesome saloon and brothel. So this one will be my 1920’s house, and I think I am happy with that decision.

I started with some new siding to try to spruce up the outside. My mother had just re-sided her dollhouse with craft sticks, and I liked the result, and so I decided to try it myself.

Jumbo craft sticks with curved ends trimmed off (using miter shears). I used hot glue, applied only to one edge of the stick.

I used jumbo craft sticks, cutting the curved ends off to make them squared. Using hot glue (or I am sure that wood glue would be a better choice, but with a bit more patience needed for drying), I glued one long edge of the sticks at a time, overlapping them and keeping them staggered so they looked randomly applied.

Start at the bottom, doing one row at a time, and work your way up, overlapping the rows just slightly. Also try to keep the stick lengths random so you don’t form a pattern that will distract the eye.

After I got the siding done, I cut some sticks length-wise to make slimmer window trim, and then glued them in place over the siding.

Once siding and trim were in place, I painted it white. It took several coats of paint to cover the wood and especially the black porch, but I am much pleased with it. I haven’t decided what to do with the roof, so for now, it will remain messy black. I will probably paint it, maybe like slate? I’ll have to do some research.

The porch still troubles me a little. I want to get more of an art deco feel, but something that will still fit in with the rest of the house. I am considering railings and corbels, to fancy it up a bit. Of course it still needs doors and windows, but that will come later.

I haven’t done much on the inside, yet. I am really hoping for some sort of grand staircase, but somehow without cutting into the wood floors. Hmm. Maybe a freestanding staircase that can be moved around? Lots to consider. I will, however, add a railing to the second floor so I can have guests leaning on it and looking down. And also, perhaps, a speakeasy in the attic. So many ideas!

12/26/2022 UPDATE: I’ve been toying with different ideas for a while on this one. After initially writing this post, I came across a different house that I want to make into a flapper girl house, so I wasn’t sure what to do with this one. I decided to try a 1970’s theme. I repainted it gold for now, and plan on adding shingles. Here is an updated pic:

I have also added a lattice handrail made from tin ribbon. I might add triangles of that ribbon into the upper corners of the porch posts for decorative brackets. I have toyed with the idea of painting the trim brown but I don’t think I can bring myself to do it.

The idea for this house is now to decorate the inside with golds, browns, oranges, and greens to catch some of that 1970’s feel. I always loved the show “That 70’s Show” and hope to recreate some of that.

How to Update a Toy Dollhouse Barn to Look Weathered and More Realistic

Barn after a lot of modifications.

This barn was once part of someone’s railroad table. I had been looking for a good barn project (I love old farms, especially the barns, especially when they once had horses in them. I am a now-horseless horse-nut).

This barn was originally made to sit flat on the ground, but I wanted a lower level with livestock pens, more similar to my grandparents’ bank barn. In order for that to happen, I would have to build a base for it to sit into.

I started with a good plywood board for the base, set the barn on top, in the position I wanted to permanently affix it in. I traced out the barn’s outline.

Next I decided on the locations of doors and marked them with a pencil. I then cut lengths of square dowel to fit the walls, leaving open spaces for the various doors. I built up layers of dowel, alternating overlaps in the corners for structural strength, gluing them down as I went.

Original version of barn, sitting on top of its new base. I forgot to make the windows, so I later disassembled a few areas to cut out the windows and then glued it back together.

When the bottom of the barn was as tall as I wanted, I customized the dowel placement so the original barn would sit comfortably on it without moving. The main upper section of the barn is not glued onto the base, so that I can lift the top original barn off and see the inside of the lower level.

With trim on windows and doors and a little paint added.

I used halved craft sticks to add trim around the windows and doors. This helped to give the edges a more finished look.

I didn’t like the original shiny red finish, so I sprayed the barn with two coats of Rustoleum 2x gray primer and paint to prepare it for acrylics. However, when I started painting, I discovered that the texture just didn’t seem right. The barn’s smooth wood was too flat to look like real barn wood, even with painted texture. I ended up using a pallet knife to apply a thin coat of wood putty, then scratched into it with the edge of the knife to give it texture.

One end painted. Also with some shingles applied.

I decided to make my roof look rough, so I staggered the cedar dollhouse shingles on the roof. I started out painting the shingles first, but finally just put them all on and then painted afterwards, as it helped to keep the colors coherent.

I used a mixture of browns, payne’s gray, and black on the wood, with a tiny bit of green for highlights.

This is a closeup of some of the texture from wood putty under the paint. This was before I was finished painting.

In case you were wondering, the animals are mostly vintage Auburn Toy Company plastic animals. I used to play with similar ones at my grandparents’ when I was a child. When I made arrangements to get this barn, I glanced at marketplace and found these animals for sale, and was able to snatch them up. I almost cried when I found them, as I haven’t seen any like them since my childhood. I have since found others on Ebay.

I have plans for further projects, including a small milk house/barn hill, beams in the hayloft, and possibly some horse drawn machinery. I think it would be cool to make stalls for the animals and milking stations. Stay tuned!

My One of a kind Antique Church Model Dollhouse

It even has a little wooden church organ!

Lots of damage on this side. Most of the tissue paper windows are gone.

This structure is actually an old model of a long-gone church. It was reportedly made by an early boyscout troupe. The couple I bought it from says that they purchased it online through an auction, and that it was damaged during shipping. They didn’t remember what state they bought it from– possibly Wyoming or Wisconsin. They had made a few repairs, but this is what it is, now.

The stained glass windows are actually made of old tissue paper, that might be original, as it is brittle and discolored, and has remnants of some of the (I think) original paint on it. I also have discovered some tissue paper pasted to the floors in designs. There are small pews made of varnished cardboard, and a ‘priest’ made from a small Kewpie doll :).

I don’t plan to alter this piece. My ideas include placing clear plastic sheets on the floor to preserve the papers (they are flaking off and look very messy). I also would like to make a few clay pigeons to perch around inside and out, to give it an abandoned feel. I may add a tiny paper wasp nest and an owl.

I made a cardboard base that is covered with fake turf, and have been working on a tiny graveyard for the background. I will post pictures when it starts coming together.