Tag Archives: diy dollhouse furniture

Make: Clothespin Doll Bed

Posted in Kids, Paper, Recycled materials, Stuff to make by

A while back, I fashioned a box-and-clothespin doll-sized bed for a library craft to accompany the many versions of Princess and the Pea that I read with my students. Then I tripped onto Ann Wood’s wondrous miniature creations. Those Lilliputian pillowcases in antique fabrics! The tufted tiny mattress! All the things Ann makes make me so happy.

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So . . . I felt compelled to make more little beds. Ann’s clothespin-framed fabrications seemed a little complicated for me and my characteristic impatience so I stuck with a simple construction: top of jewelry box or other small box covered in pretty paper with clothespins hot-glued to corners for bed posts. (My clothespins are “weathered” by the actual weather that they experienced on the job hanging clothes on the line.) I sewed small covers out of fabric squares and felt.

One of these beds now lives on a low shelf in my library. No one has noticed it yet (unless the kids are thinking that their librarian is bonkers and they don’t want to bring that up). I’m willing to wait them out. Who will discover the wee family tucked among the books?

 

Creative Kid: 3 Bears Chairs

Posted in Kids, Paper, Recycled materials, Stuff to make by

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This year in my library (FYI: my day job is elementary school librarian), the kids are making a storybook house from cardboard boxes and recyclables. Every week we add a room–Jack’s beanstalk-green bedroom, Little Red’s ruby-hued bachelorette pad, etc. Right now we’re working on the Three Bears’ kitchen, where a golden-curled interloper slurps up soup and breaks chairs.

The students do their creative best with glue sticks and dull scissors. But sometimes I help out on the sly. This is such a case.

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Armed with toilet paper cardboard rolls, scrapbook paper and my trusty glue gun, I happily spent an evening making three chairs–in varying sizes. I sliced and narrowed the toilet paper roll for Baby Bear’s squat seat, and sliced and joined two rolls for Papa Bear’s wide berth. (Mama Bear’s medium chair didn’t need adjusting. It was just right.)

I wish I had directions to share, but I don’t. In keeping with the spirit of our library project, I just winged it and left things in crude form. I will post photos of the storybook house soon though so you can see the kids’ imaginative handiwork. They amaze me.