Welcome to the Doll House!

I've been waylay-ed from dollmaking by doll house making. The past few days I've been painting! First, I picked colors for the rooms from a swatch book of paint colors I picked up at Colonial Williamsburg. Wythe House Blue for the Merriman's bedroom, Ben's room and the trim in the parlor; Palace Chamber Yellow for Elizabeth's room and Felicity's room; Williamsburg Whitewash for the parlor walls and kitchen. But, wouldn't you know it, when I got to Home Depot, their paint mixing computer couldn't read my swatches (too small, they said). So I had to reselect all the colors from swatches they had. Came pretty close, luckily. God Bless You, Ralph Lauren!

The past couple of days, I've been trying to paint fireplace inserts on foam core board. They look a little cartoonish to me, but Dan and Emma think they're sweet, so they'll have to do for now. I'm such a bloody perfectionist!

The Merriman's room is looking sweet. Dan is going to put wood floors in every room, along with crown molding (something simple), baseboards, and chair rails. The parlor is scheduled for paneled wainscotting. Saturday, Emma went to a birthday party all day, so I hunkered down and made ruffled seat covers for some little chairs that sit in front of the Merriman's bedroom fireplace and extra pillows for their bed in a matching fabric. Eventually, they're going to get a ceiling mounted canopy over the head of their bed.

Meanwhile, I continue looking at sweet little items on Ebay to embellish the house (and kitchen, mostly). I found a sweet little vintage coffee grinder, some cast-iron cauldrons, and some wonderful pewter pieces for displaying on the fireplace mantel. Have I mentioned that I made several bits of food for the dolls using paper clay and faux painting? They've got a turkey, a ham, apples, pears, butternut squash, carrots, potatoes, cheese and several loaves of bread.

I wish everyone could come over and play (or at least help with the painting!). I'd be happy to serve tea and cucumber sandwiches!

Nina

You might have guessed that my other hobby -- besides dollmaking -- is collecting and costuming American Girl dolls. But it's actually a little more than that. My daughter and I are creating a doll household based on Felicity's family -- the Merrimans, who lived in Colonial Williamsburg in 1775. As you can see, we have the traditional Felicity and Elizabeth dolls. Putting together the rest of the family was a bit more challenging. I chose My Twinn dolls to portray Mr. Edward Merriman and Mrs. Martha Merriman, Felicity's parents. Mr. Merriman was a "special friend" being sold as a girl named Kelly on MyTwinn.com. Kelly got a queue, a waistcoat and a pair of breeches. Now she's Mr. Merriman. Mrs. Merriman was an Ebay purchase. She has long reddish hair and beautiful blue eyes. She's one of the prettiest dolls I've ever seen. She came in a t-shirt and skirt with no shoes. Now she's fully outfitted with a shift (made from a vintage piece of linen), petticoat, and two caracos in beautiful colonial-era prints (I made her the second one yesterday).

I searched far and wide for dolls that could pass as Felicity's younger sibs -- Nan, 6, and William, 2. Both are Vanilla-scented Carolle dolls with soft cloth bodies and vinyl heads and limbs. William started life as a girl. Nan looks a lot like the girl who played Nan in The Felicity Movie (did you know she is the real-life daughter of Marcia Gay Harden, who plays Mrs. Merriman in the film?). Of course you did.

Ben, Mr. Merriman's apprentice, also was tricky. I finally settled on Benjamin, a Faithful Friends Doll by Heidi Ott. Ben is blond, but could be rewigged. He got a queue, a new pair of breeches and a signal whistle. He still needs a waistcoat. Ben wears Felicity's black colonial shoes and Felicity wears a pair I bought from another maker on Ebay. The Ebay shoes fit Felicity, but not Ben. Felicity's shoes fit Ben. You do the math.

Since my daughter and I have many more American Girls than just Felicity and Elizabeth, we had to create rolls within the Merriman household for all of them. So, Samantha became Annabelle, Elizabeth's snooty older sister. Addy and Nellie are the kitchen maids. Kirsten and Jordan (my daughter's Look Like Me doll) are the nanny's for Nan, William and Polly (played by herself in the cradle from AG).

Now for the piece d'resistance! My husband is building us a house for the Merriman family in the basement playroom (our basement is primarily hobby space -- it houses my art studio, my husband's wood shop and what was previously a playroom for my daughter). In reality, the playroom was a chaotic heap of forgotten toys! The dollhouse is a much better use of the space.

So far, we've planned and built the house room by room. There are six bedrooms, a parlor and a kitchen. The horses reside nearby in a slightly enhanced AG stable.

I have seen a few American Girl dollhouses (all custom made by avid hobbyists) online. In fact, I was inspired to do my Merriman Family house by the work of the three sisters at Our Dolls and by an exhibit of antique dollhouses (A Child's Eye View) at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum at Colonial Williamsburg (plus my own semi-latent love of dolls and dollhouses). I intend to furnish the house impeccably in the Colonial Williamsburg style (and you wouldn't doubt it if you knew me--although I have to make allowances for what's available)! We're building fireplaces this week!

More later, plus pictures of the dolls and the house in progress to come!

Needless to say, Elizabeth was more than happy to accept Felicity's invitation and the girl's enjoyed a pleasant (albeit slightly messy) afternoon of baking and tea.

Felicity got dressed as quickly as she could and hurried downstairs to await Elizabeth's reply.

It was a fine, brisk fall morning when Felicity arose. She quickly slipped on her mules and silk dressing gown and set about deciding what to wear and what to do on such a beautiful day.

Pulling her favorite red toile dress out of the clothes press, she held it up to herself in front of her dressing table mirror. "This will do nicely," she said to herself.

She laid the dress on the bed and sat down on the floor, pulling out the little Noah's ark her grandfather had carved for her when she was just a baby. She set Mr. and Mrs. Noah on the deck, raised the little ladder, and carefully put the animals in pairs, biggest (elephants) to smallest (pigs). But she grew bored of this rather quickly. What would she do with such a fine day?

Finally, she sat in her writing chair and jotted a note to her friend, Elizabeth Cole, inviting her to come for cookie-baking and tea in the early afternoon.