Doll house construction

         

               Doll house kitchen cum dining

I have unofficially added a middle name to my already long name. It's scavenger. My kids have also noticed this new trait of mine and store tic-tac boxes so I can use them as dustbins for the doll house.
About a year ago, there was a semi violent upheaval at home just because I decided in one of my cleaning sprees to throw the cardboard boxes and mounting boards that model cars come in. The usually peacable man I live with was practically frothing like a volcano demanding to know why I couldn't throw my things out before throwing out his. A modicum of peace was restored by getting the house keeping supervisor to sift through the thankfully segregated waste and retrieving the offending mounting plates.
I was in a state of bemused shock that a fully grown man still wanted modelling cars and their mounting plates too.
I have now however had a kind of rebirth. Gone are the days I would throw out my credit card statements (without even reading them). Now I store those plastic thingies that come in pizza boxes and fashion stools out of them. I, have now become that fully grown woman who obsesses over doll house furniture.

Nicely played Karma!

In his last life my husband surely was a squirrel. He has a habit of squirreling away odds and ends and knowing exactly where they are five years later. I must have been a bear. I like to sing " bear necessities". Wait! Bears don't sing?
Oh well!
Anyway, the contrast couldn't be greater; I have been known to walk out of my clinic with the mouth mask still dangling off my neck. I have also passionately argued that the important document that was in my custody had been safely kept away in the drawer while the offending document would be lying blissfully in the side pocket of my spare purse unaware of the havoc it was wreaking in my life

Anyway to come back to the monster house construction. I got the by now mellowed down better half to give me a crash course in carpentry.
Using plywood left over from our home remodelling three yrs before (I told you I married a squirrel), I started the construction with excited kids and a resigned husband by my side.
Steps in construction:
1. Cut equal sized pieces for the two side walls.
1.5. Make cut outs for window or doors if you so desire in the side walls of the house.
2. Cut the plywood designated for the floor to the dimensions you desire. I would suggest keeping it a little larger than the ply for the side walls, so that it projects out in front.
3. Cut the ceiling plywood of the ground floor to the size of the bottom ply.
4. Nail the plywood pieces without injuring your finger.

5. Measure and cut plywood for the centre partition and nail it.
6. Cut plywood for the centre partition for the upper floor, longer than the two side walls if you want a sloping roof
7. Nailing this is a bit of a tough ask. So what I did was that I took a strip of ply ( or you could even take beading) about equal in width to the partition thickness but extending longer both in the front and back.

I nailed this strip to the partition wood with headless nails

So the red strip of wood you see below the centre partition on the upper floor is what is attached to the centre partition.
8. Note that this projects both in front and behind, making it easy to nail it to the underlying ply.
I used the gap at the back as the space for a doorway between the two sides of the first floor
9. For the roof, cut two pieces of wood slightly longer than the distance from the center to the side walls, to give an over-hang.
10. Nail it to the center partition and the side walls.
11. Finally cut out the plywood for the rear wall and nail it.
Hopefully the structure is stable, your sanity is intact, your fingers are undamaged and neighbours still friends after all the noise you have made.
If all the above are true for you, you can put down your tools and celebrate with a brownie fudge ice cream.
If fingers are sore, keep them in ice for a little while and then have an ice cream.
If the neighbors are sore, stand in front of them and polish off the ice cream.

I might have made stupid mistakes like forget to make cut outs for the window and balcony on the side walls, not that I'm admitting to it.
If the above does happen to you, not that you would be so foolish, I suggest you use a drilling machine and  drill holes at regular intervals and then join the holes with a hand blade.

Suggestions for people who don't possess a cutting machine:
1. Go to your local plywood shop and ask them to cut wood for you of the required dimensions.
2. Write to me and ask me to make one for you, ofcourse after transferring suitable amounts of cash into my account;)

In my next post I will show you how I made the roof and if I feel enthusiastic enough, maybe I will show you how to make some furniture. Or if you are tired after all this effort go out and buy the furniture. I won't judge you. At least not to your face.