Thame Dolls House & Miniatures fair

For the first time in several years we've managed to attend a Dolls house and miniatures fair (the last time we went to one was Miniatura about 5 or 6 years ago).  I've not been able to give my half built Greenleaf Westville the attention it needs for completion as for many years I was studying while working, then we moved house and have had lots of decorating to do.  However now, with just a bit more full size house decorating still to do, I can at last justify turning my attention to miniature home building.

On Friday my younger daughter and I dusted and tidied the Westville.  Some of the furniture and the family were at home and my little girl loves to sneak into my room and rearrange the family and play with them (she is always careful).  I looked through all my furniture boxes to remind myself of what we have already for the house and had another think about the proposed/half built extension and whether to go ahead with it.  The jury is still out on that question, however I'm determined to make some inroads with the house in the coming months.

Yesterday we made the journey to the Thame Dollshouse and Miniatures Fair.  My husband enjoys miniatures so was willing to come (and drive) and my little girl was very keen (big girl stayed at home doing holiday homework). I had a strict fairly small budget as I mainly wanted to attend to get some inspiration and had a couple of particular stalls I wanted to visit.  My little girl had a small amount of birthday money and some pocket money to spend.  We agreed that we would look around the entire fair before buying anything and we stuck to this.  The organisers had very helpfully published the floor plan and list of stallholders in advance on their website, so I printed this out and had it with me when we arrived (they did have printed versions available and my girl used this so we had two floor plans).

I had a useful conversation with Celia of KT Miniatures. I showed her the earliest photo I have of my Triang dollshouse and asked her if she could identify the wooden piano - despite the darkness of the photo she was fairly convinced it was a Barton and that the china bath which I no longer have looked 1930s, the lead bath the dolls house now contains is apparently 1950s.  KT Miniatures had some vintage dolls houses for sale which we admired and some adorable jointed bisque German dolls of the 1930s.  I ended up buying one of them (she is only 2 5/16" (60 mm) tall.  I will make her some clothes and put her in my doll cabinet.  They didn't have a Barton piano unfortunately, however I shall keep looking.

My girl was enthralled by Sandra and Pamela's stall (Tower House Dolls - Diminutive Dolls & Toys) and decided that we would come back to them for her pocket money spend.  When we did my husband had a conversation with them about glue and the wheels on Pamela's tiny doll carriages while I took my time choosing which kit to buy.  In the end I bought a Wicker Toy pram kit and a mini baby for it which I will dress and my girl bought a tiny ballerina dressed in red which she has named 'Lily'.

I drooled over Little Trimmings wares but didn't buy anything - I've bought from them online and will do so in future, but it was lovely to see they stock some very fine ribbon, various kits and fabrics and miniature buckles.  I also loved the two stalls with miniature plants and flowers, I had bought a flower kit from one of them at Miniatura and as I haven't made it up yet, I couldn't justify buying another just yet.

We loved the wide choice of miniature books by Dateman Books - I'd seen their website online so was really pleased to see their tiny printed books properly.  They have 1/12th scale books and larger sizes for bigger dolls.  I bought 'Little Women' for the Sasha dolls.

The displays of miniature scenes by the local club was very interesting, some lovely work.  I didn't take photos of any of them even though I had the camera with me (in fact I didn't take any photos at the event at all as I wasn't sure if stallholders would like it and I didn't see others taking photos).  We bought 2 raffle tickets (but didn't win anything) and my girl played the Tombola and won some miniature ice creams.

We admired the Mini Mundus kits stocked by Jennifer's of Walsall, the Grand Piano is amazing and I'd love to make this one.  We saw wood flooring at a couple of stalls at the fair, however I was keen on the Houseworks flooring Jennifer's of Walsall stocked, though they'd run out of the colour I wanted (so another online purchase in due course).

I spent ages at Jane Harrop's stall, she had so many lovely kits to choose from and it was hard to decide.  In the end I bought two kits, her book of children's toys (35 different things to make) and some tacky glue.  However I think I'll be buying online from her as well once I've made up my current collection of kits.

The Barrel horse kit (the Little Wooden horse) and a go cart kit from Jane Harrop

Glue, book and kits bought from Jane Harrop

Ballerina doll, Wicker pram kit and baby doll from Tower House Dolls

'Lily' the red ballerina and the miniature baby from Tower House Dolls

Sasha doll scaled book from Dateman Books

I had to buy 'Little Women' for the Sasha dolls

My tiny bisque 1930s German jointed doll bought from KT Miniatures

Now I need to get working on the Westville house...

Big and little house moving

Since returning from the SA adventure the dolls and us have had a hectic time because we moved house 2 weeks ago.  Not far, but everything still needed to be packed up and with the amount of stuff we'd accumulated after 18 years in one home (including the addition of 2 daughters, 3 dolls houses, lots of play dolls,  as well as my husband's hobby things) this was a mammoth task in less than a week.  Our former neighbour kindly allowed us to put the dolls houses in her spare bedroom so we didn't have to move them with everything else, but I made sure all the doll family came in our car rather than the large removal van.

Since the move we've been very busy unpacking boxes (we have approximately 2,000 beloved books), flooring the loft, putting up beds and finding places for things in our new home, so it wasn't until Sunday afternoon that we were finally able to go and collect the dolls houses and put them into their new positions.  The Triang has gone in my younger daughter's bedroom, so that her Christmas expanded Polly Pocket collection is able to make the most of it, Mrs Harvey's shop has gone into my elder daughter's bedroom and my unfinished Greenleaf Westville now lives on its special table in our bedroom.  As yet the 2 larger dolls houses are unfurnished, as we've got further decorating to do to the full size house so there is no point unpacking things only to put them away again soon afterwards.  But having the Westville in my bedroom is a constant gentle reminder that I started building that house about 21 years ago and it is about time I finished it!  However for the past couple of nights tiling the full sized bathroom has been my main focus and I'm rather tired tonight, so the Westville will have to wait a bit longer before I can give it my attention.

We've got the TV set up so haven't missed an episode of Dancing on Ice since it started 3 weeks ago, and nor have the play dolls!  What is more there is a new addition with skates to the play doll line up and he belongs to me. I'll keep you guessing though, as I haven't taken photos of him yet.

Welcome, and dollshouse is home again!

Two followers in one day!  Wow.  I've got 50 people following this blog - I'm amazed and pleased - thank you everyone.  The two newest followers are:

Núria blogs in Spanish and is creating a shabby chic house, though also uses playmobil figures to good effect.  She blogs at http://mininuris.blogspot.com/

Traci at Random Aspects blog http://random-aspects.blogspot.com/ also has an etsy page http://www.etsy.com/shop/goodlifeminis.  She has some very interesting projects (such as her Greek house), and is just about to start another one (restoring a colonial farmhouse)

Welcome to my blog Núria and Traci. 

I'm especially pleased today because we collected my half-built Westville Greenleaf dollshouse from storage this afternoon, and although I won't be able to spare the time to do much to it within the next month, I can at least now feast my eyes on it again, dream and plan ;-)  For the moment we've got our full size house off the market, as we work out whether our finances can stand the strain of a mortgage (we currently own our home outright, which is a comfortable position to be in).  If we do think we can afford something better, we may put the house back on the market in the Spring, but in the meantime there is no point paying for storage, so we're bringing our clutter home again!