Teacup Cottage

I love dollhouses; bet you'd never guess :-)

This little dollhouse for the Teacup Spirits is made from a Michael's CD cubbie.  I had this collecting dust in my sewing room for a couple of years, just waiting for the right inspiration to do something with it.  After making a few Teacup Spirits, I realized it was the perfect abode for them, and their friends :-)

I painted the house with a coat of Gesso, to give a nice surface to paint on.  Then used primary colors for the outside, and white for the inside.  For wallpaper, I used scrapbook papers.  The only problem here was deciding what papers to use, and not end up buying everything in sight!

I papered the back wall only (make it easy on yourself), by cutting a pattern for the wall, then cutting out the paper to the pattern.  I glued the paper to the back wall by watering down glue to the consistency of cream, then painting it on the entire wall.

The windows (both inside and out) are trimmed with narrow ric-rac around the curved edge, and some woven braid along the bottom.

Soft rugs are felt.  I planned to embroider a design on each rug, but got impatient.  The design is penciled on the bottom side of the rug, if I change my mind :-)

Full of dolls and furniture!  The furniture is made from one of my all time favorite things to play with...wood findings from the craft and hobby store.  The bed is made from four tiny clothespin pegs (courtesy of Joyce!) and craft sticks.  The clothespin pegs make the four posters, and the craft sticks the side rails, head and footboard, and stringers.

The parlour furniture is SO simple!  Two 1 1/4 inch wood blocks are the base of the chair; the back is made of craft sticks cut to size.  The chairs are painted and embellished with lace and felt cushions.

The table is a wood disk glued to a wood flowerpot; painted and trimmed with ric-rac.

You can see how simple the chairs are, and the bed was not at all hard to make either.  The mattress is a length of Warm&Natural batting folded three or four times to make it nice and soft.  A crochet comforter is in order, I think.


It isn't too early to be thinking about Christmas, and this little dollhouse would make a delightful Christmas gift for a lucky girl.  You could make a Christmas cottage, a Gingerbread cottage, a seaside cottage, a Tudor cottage.  The possibilities are limitless; let your imagination fly :-)