Yes I am organized... today.

The top holds empty boxes for mailing.

The top shelf has the MH1 bathroom, a box of plastic Marx type stuff. and a basket of too large scale furniture.

The green box is food and dishes.

The blue box is plants, pots and gardening items.

Then a little plastic box of china.

The next box is for art, curtains and books.

Then I can't remember. HMMMMMMMMMMMMM

And the box of children and babies.

The next shelf broken furniture parts.

The next box is Christmas.

The last box is clothing and bits of material. Oh and this is where I keep body parts, wigs and jewelry.

The blue basket is empty in case I have to take items to one of the houses.

The green basket is all extra women dolls.

The blue basket is all men dolls.

The bottom most shelf holds linoleum, wall papers, flooring paper and other papers.

I keep a skeleton crew in each house. Basically my houses are owned by a females then all the men, children, babies, and others are accessories. :) C

Continuing up the stairs

So...up those stairs is a bookcase with the Gottschalk up high out of reach of little hands

The kitchen roombox lives there.

And the 1940's cardboard house.

Turning into the little room off the bedroom we find the Hacienda the Victorian House and the 1920's-30's house.

By the bed is the Colonial and Christian Hacker dollhouses. They are the ones I play with the most.

This is my shelf. My daughter gave me the plastic boxes and baskets.

This is my desk with my favorite tools. Good old museum wax and most importantly...my glasses.

This concludes the tour. I forgot the Marx 50's tin Colonial that is under this desk and the Imagination Dollhouse which is on the Diningroom table for photographing. I have to go my grandddaughter wants me to get down a princess dress for her. C

Living in your Collection

I used to keep one dollhouse out and the rest in the attic.

Then the houses became more complex.

Then more expensive.

Top: Bliss dollhouse on a tall thin chest.

Bottom:This is the Christian Hacker staircase I am not using in the house right now. I think it stands on it's

own merits as a sculpture.

Then the houses took over. After looking at how others keep theirs I decided I could not dedicate a whole room to them, but had to disperse them throughout my whole house. These are pictures of my livingroom

I have 6 in here now. 2 Triangs on a glass cabinet filled with other bits and pieces.

My new puppenstube, the MH1and the Eagle hexagonal house reside here.

They are very popular with people, although I had one guest walk in and tell me the MH1 was his favorite and as far as he could see "The Christian Hacker was kindling"....

"You just think it's too wedding cake like, " I told him. "That's because it was made for the FRENCH MARKET in the late 1800's".

Sometimes it's hard not to become a docent and offer an historical tour. I also feel like a mother pushing forward her ungainly child who is not as appreciated as her smarter sibling if people ignore a certain house. If anyone even gives me a look I bring up the collection of a friend of mine in New Mexico. He collects tricycles. Vintage tricycles.

I have to admit one of the reasons I like displaying the Imagination dollhouse by Marx is because so many people start to play with it. It is so colorful and easily accessible to people I guess.

I keep the oldest antiques up in my room.

I'm not sure what I think of this yet, but they are so cheerful and I think I am passing them off as art, which of course they are. The other benefit is avoiding hoarding. They aren't hidden in the attic and it is clear to me each house only needs so much. One of my goals is to pass on duplicates I collect when I buy lots and items I'm through with.

More about that later. C

Theory of Relativity

I am not a purist about scale in the dollhouse. I like to mix it up.

I think it also looks authentic to juxtapose different scales when making an "antique" scene because manufactured items were not as readily available back then and little girls used what ever they had giving the rooms a charming almost whimsical look

Marx, Tootsietoy, Strombecker. Shackman sofas






Wikipedia gives a very good explanation of scale in it's dollhouse section. I m trying my hand at it.




1/24th is usually the smallest, some times used as dollhouses or toys in a 1/12 scale.
1/18th or 2/3 inch scale where 1 inch is represented by 2/3 of an inch
1/16th or 3/4 inch scale where 1 inch is represented by 3/4 of an inch
1/10th or where 1 inch = 10 inches, this is mostly European, with measurement in centimeters
1/12 or 1" scale where 1 foot = 12 inches
1/6 or 1 foot = 6 inches Barbie, Blythe dolls

OK, we all know how important understanding scale is when we buy a miniature... I STILL make mistakes and end up with a perfect item in the wrong size.

Super modernism usually keeps everything in scale to achieve the realism that is so good it makes you ask, is this real or miniature?

Update on Colette: I still don't know her whereabouts. I'm considering calling Nancy Grace... I'm afraid Pubdoll might be right, and she's off with "the young and the restless"... I will "toss" my granddaughter's room tomorrow when she is at preschool. We did find the phone in her dressup box. The box rang.

My first adult dollhouse was purchased in the 1980's

for my two daughters. It came from our local dollhouse shop. It was a replica of our colonial house in Northern California. Many scenes were made there and jokes were played too. I'm sure my daughters will tell you how funny it was when I would arrange messy doll clothes and toys on their dollhouse bedroom floors when their real rooms were messy. OK I asked them and they asked me what I was talking about. Well I had fun.

Our golden retriever, Korey, even had a part in the experience. Korey would sneak up to the dollhouse and delicately remove the doll representing our youngest child with her mouth. That little girl was outraged. Korey never took the mother doll, or the father or even the elder daughter. It was as if Korey knew who she was alpha to and she was a VERY beta puppy. So don't ever think the dollhouse is being ignored. Everyone's paying attention to what's going on in there!

That dollhouse is now in the garage. My next one is another story:

How did this happen to me?

Well I have eleven houses and no, I'm not a real estate magnate. Ten of them live in mine with me. I collect dollhouses. I read Dollhouse blogs too. My only problem is I never met a dollhouse I didn't like.
1:12 scale was my gateway dollhouse. Now I'm collecting 1:16. Modern? Colonial? Victorian? I collect 'em all. Vintage? No problem. Antique? No problem, but my budget... This blog is to help me stay organized and connect with other collectors. I might just need a sponsor too...