Yo Yo Garland

One of my Blythe friends, Susan M., send me a wonderful fabric pack of charm squares, and I knew EXACTLY what I wanted to do with it:  make a yo yo garland for my Blythe doll house!

Where did I get such a fabulous idea, you ask?  From Mollie Makes, one of my favorite crafty magazines! I love the magazine, and I love the name.  (Hmmm...maybe I should rename this blog Leslie Makes...)

I cut the fabrics into 3" circles, then sewed under a small hem and pulled the thread tight to make each yo yo. Then I lined them up on my kitchen table and, working a few at a time, I applied two drops of Aleene's Quick Dry Tacky Glue to the back of each circle.  I cut a long piece of baker's twine and pressed it into the glue to finish the garland.  It was dry and ready to hang in about an hour.

I have one tip that I want to share with you:  DON'T apply the glue in the center of each yo yo like I did, because then  the garland won't hang flat against the wall.  I learned that too late!  Instead, put the glue about 1/3 of the way down from the top of each circle, and you won't have to resort to tape on the back of your yo yo's to make them hang flat.

My finished garland is so pretty!  I love the colors in this package of fabrics!

Here's where I put it. This is the newest room in my dollhouse bookcase, and it was looking pretty bare and boring. It isn't finished yet, but this garland has made a big difference in the feel of the room.

Yo yo's aren't just for dolls, you know; you could easily make a garland of larger yo yo's to accent some part of your home.  They would look cute over a doorway or mantle. If you use yo yo's in your house, I would love to hear about it!

Tiny Books

Last week I ventured away from sewing to try my hand at bookmaking...TINY bookmaking, to be precise.  These are perfect little dollhouse props, and they look incredibly realistic.

I found the covers on Jim's Dollhouse Pages (Jim also has a ton of other things you can print out.)  I printed them onto card stock, then glued them to pretty book-related scrapbook paper so the inside of the covers would look nice.

After the glue was dry, I cut them out with my X-acto knife.

To make the pages, I used an old dictionary I got at the local library.  (People donate used books and the library sells them, $1 for hardbacks and 50 cents for paperbacks.  I've gotten some amazing books that way!  A few of them are too good to craft with, and I save them for photo props.)

I measured the covers and cut the book pages just a little smaller.  Working in stacks of 10 sheets, I sewed them along the folded edge so the pages wouldn't fall out after gluing.

When I had enough of the page sections sewn to fit perfectly into the fold of the cover, I put a heavy line of glue in the cover and pressed the pages in place.

To keep everything from shifting while drying, I used a mini-clothespin.  (The bobbin is there so you can see how small the book is!)

And there you have them--books fit for a dolly! Now to make a bookcase...

Bookcases Aren't Just for Books

I love bookcases!  We have quite a few of them in our house, and they hold a lot more than books.

I have two Blythe dolls who were in desperate need of a place to "live". I've seen some interesting dollhouses made from bookcases (like this one on LA Weekly), so I decided to clear off one of the bookshelves in our family room to make a little place for Grace and Bonnie.  Below you can see the progress I've made on their humble abode.  I've only finished Step One: Walls.

I didn't want to apply anything directly to the bookshelf that was permanent, so I used foam core board and scrapbook paper to build three free-standing walls.  I hadn't worked with foam core board before, and I was surprised at how easy it was to cut to size with an X-acto knife. I can imagine making a lot of things from this crafty material.

Here are the bookcases, below.  As you can see, they actually hold  very few books, so turning one shelf into a dolly apartment isn't really that far-out.

The dollhouse is looking rather bare, though, isn't it?  The chair and ottoman in the picture are both actually pincushions; I've had the chair forever, and I received the beautifully-made "ottoman" in a craft swap from alwaysinmyroom on Craftster.  The next thing I have in mind is to put a couple of pictures on the long wall, using some ATC-sized wooden frames that I already have. I just need to come up with some art to go in them!

A little more furniture might be in order as well.  I can see that Grace and Bonnie may end up playing Musical Chairs to decide who gets to sit when they are tired of standing...in fact, things are starting to get a little tense already...

So tell me, dear reader, what's on your bookshelf?