A Dollhouse Story- Remodeling A Vintage Dollhouse | Part 1

Earl’s Dollhouse

The women in my family have an endearing admiration for dolls. My nan has always had porceline dolls that she sets out at Christmas or baby dolls that she sits in the corner of bedrooms, as she can’t bear to tuck them away.

When I was a child, my mom bought me the Holiday Barbie every Christmas. When I got older and no longer wanted to collect them, she freed them from their boxes and threw them a holiday party in the china cabinet. Now, every year, she gets the newest Holiday Barbie, and adds her to the party. The Barbies stay there until after Valentine’s day, when they get carefully layerd back into a tote, stored away for another year.

As for me, I’ve always dreamed of having a wooden dollhouse to display at Christmas. When I was a child, I had the typical Barbie dreamhouse, but as I grew older, I longed for the kind of dollhouse you saw in movies. Albiet, usually these were horror movies, and the dollhouses were haunted, but I digress. I wanted one.

Kris is a model railway enthusiest, and we’ve considered buying a dollhouse kit to build together, but I always put it off, as dollhouse kits these days range from $500+ and it wasn’t an expense I felt was necessary.

Last month, we were at a thrift store here in Fredericton, when I saw a dollhouse sitting on a shelf in the back room. I brought Kris over to see it, and he asked the employee if perhaps we could purchase it. The dollhouse wasn’t on the main floor yet, and we didn’t know the price, but I figured they might put it out for us if we asked.

Kris got the attention of the lady in the back room, and she very rudely told us that it wasn’t priced yet, and the pricing person was on vacation. She seemed beyond annoyed that we asked about it, and even moved the dollhouse to another corner of the back room, where we couldn’t see it.

I hate confrontation of any kind, and knew if I didn’t get out of there, I would probably cry, so we paid for our other items and left.

A few days later, I was at work and could not stop thinking about this dollhouse. I messaged the thrift store on Facebook, and asked if it was priced yet, and if I could purchase it. The person who replied advised that they called the pricing lady for me, and she said I can have it for $15.

I was thrilled, and as soon as work was over that day, I went straight there to get the dollhouse. When Kris got home, he carried it inside for me, and I noticed some writing on the bottom.

We love thrifting, but being able to know the history of our find was a special surprise that we weren’t expecting.

I decided to post our find to the Facebook group “Weird and wonderful second hand finds that just need to be shared”. Within an hour, the post had hundreds of likes and comments, and someone from the group actually FOUND Earl’s family!

Earl passed away in 2013, almost 10 years ago. We learned that during his life, he served 30 years with the US Army and received numerous medals and ribbons including the Bronze Star, Meritorious Service, Army Commendation, Purple Heart, Good Conduct, Army Occupation (Germany), National Defense Service, Vietnam Campaign, and Vietnam Service.

In the comments of the post, his children and 2-3 of his grandchildren showed up and gave us some history surrounding the dollhouse.

We learned that Earl made dollhouses for all of his grand daughters, and many of them still have them today. Erika, the little girl who owned this dollhouse, moved to Nova Scotia with her family, and brought the dollhouse with her. When she outgrew it, the dollhouse got sold, and she kept an even larger dollhouse that Earl made her.

Erika even shared a few photos of the dollhouse when she owned it. It was white with pink trim.

The dollhouse when Erika owned it.

After they sold it, it was bought by the second owner, Daryl at an antique shop in Halifax. He gave it a little makeover by painting the trim navy, and gifted it to his neice Meagan. As far as we know, Meagan was the last owner, however we haven’t found her to ask about the dollhouse.

Earl’s family has expressed that they are happy to see the dollhouse live on, and are excited to see what we do with it.

To follow the progress of making over the dollhouse, I created a TikTok account just for the house. You can find it HERE.

So far, the only progress we’ve made with the dollhouse is freshening up the white paint, and picking out new trim. I’ll be making an update on the progress we’ve made soon!

Once complete, we look forward to decorating the dollhouse for Halloween and Christmas, and displaying it on my great-grandmother’s antique hutch.

If you’ve wanted to buy a dollhouse, or another childhood toy - this is your sign to go for it. You’re never too old.

D