Dolls houses in a shoebox are a wonderful travel activity, take away toy for holidays, table activity, quiet time or room play idea or highchair activity for younger children. They are very portable, simple to make (these examples were created by my 5 1/2 and 8-year-old daughters) and the possibilities for open-ended imaginative play are endless. We will be making them with a group of girls for our 8 year old’s birthday party next month and with a little bit of preparation, they will be an easy craft to engage a group of young ladies for a couple of hours.
I will be adding some miniature food (novelty erasers from a discount variety store) plus a couple of ceramic ornaments to use in their little houses and the girls will create the furniture, make wooden peg doll babies (instructions in my next post) and decorate their rooms.
The furniture is made from balsa wood hot glued together with beads for legs and felt pieces for cushions. We cut up cheap plastic bead necklaces to decorate the top of the chairs. A jar lid glued to a plastic shot glass and covered with a circle of fabric and ribbon forms the table. The mirror is a piece of CD surrounded by beads and glued to two shells as the base. The lamp is a small craft stick with a large wooden bead on top and a circle of card cut to form the lamp shade. It stands in a wooden circle that came with the sticks.
A printed clock face glued to a plastic disk, plus some old tiles from a board game with miniature photos inside, decorate the walls. Photos and magazine pictures of outdoor scenes give our rooms a view.
The girls were able to wall-paper and “carpet” their boxes, plus put together all the contents in a couple of hours and with a little more preparation our party guests should be able to complete theirs in an hour and a half.
Lots of fun for all ages and a lovely gift for any little girl.
Other posts you may like:
Wooden clothes peg dolls house furniture
My next post (still to come) on simple peg dolls from pipecleaners and wooden beads.
Filed under: Crafts | Tagged: 8 year old girl's birthday party craft, blanket time, dolls house in a shoebox, found and common household items, highchair activities, home made and hand made, home-made Montessori, homeschooling with toddlers, how to make your own dolls house furniture, instructions for children, kids, table activities |
angathome 
These are just adorable! Jenni x