er for all the delight she has missed by not
making it herself. Of course some things, such as cups and saucers,
glasses and bottles, saucepans and kitchen utensils, must be bought;
but almost all the really necessary things for house-keeping can be
made at home.

Dolls' Gardens

One advantage of making the dolls' house yourself is that you can
arrange for it to have a garden, a provision rarely made by toy-shops.
Grass plots can be made of green baize or other cloth of the right
color; garden paths of sand sprinkled over glue, or of strips of
sand-paper; flower-beds of brown paper, and the flowers of
tissue-paper and wire. A summer-house, and a dog-kennel to hold a
china dog, might also be added (see p. 241), and, if you have room,
stables.

Garden Chairs and Tables

Garden seats and tables can be made of cardboard and cork. For a seat,
take a card two or three inches long and not quite as broad. Mark it
right across, lengthwise, in the middle with a sharp knife, and then
half fold it. This will make the back and seat. Glue the seat to four
slender corks for legs and paint the whole green. To make a table,
glue four cork legs to a strong piece of cardboard.

The House

A dolls' house can be made of almost any kind of box. For the simplest
and smallest kind cigar boxes can be used and the furniture made of
cork, for which directions are given later; or a couple of low shelves
in a bookcase or cupboard will do. Much better, however, is a large
well-made packing-case divided by wooden and strong cardboard
partitions into two, four, or six rooms, according to its size. A
specially made box is, of course, best of all; this should be divided
into four or six rooms, and should have a sloping roof to give attic
room for boxes and odd furniture. The house can be stained outside or
papered a plain dark color. One or two windows should be cut out of
the walls of each room by the carpenter who made the box, and there
must be doors between the rooms. A piece of thin glass cut to the
right size can be fixed on the windows at home. But before this is
done the house must be papered. The best kind of paper is that used by
bookbinders for the insides of the covers, because the patterns used
are so dainty and small; but this is not always easy to get. Any
small-patterned paper will do, or what is called lining paper, which
can be got in every color. The paper must be very smoothly put on with
paste. Always start at the top