Day 4 - mailbox and mail

We will be featuring tiny holiday projects every day until Christmas! This is the December 4 project. Check back tomorrow, Day 5 for tiny candy canes or you can start from the beginning, Day 1 with shrinking your favorite books!

Your dollhouse family will be receiving lots of cards and packages this month. Here is how to make a tiny mailbox, packages and cards.

I made a box out of cardboard and painted it red. The hinge is two strips of felt, colored gold with a paint pen.  It would also be easy to paint and alter a matchbox for this mailbox.

For the letters you can print out envelope templates at the awesome Jim's printable Minis page. I found them to be on the large size so after pasting them into a word document multiple times just adjusted them to different sizes. He also has wonderful printable newspapers, sewing patterns and even a globe!
The packages are tiny scraps of wood wrapped in thin paper and decorated by myself and my children. A tiny stamp set would be very useful here but we improvised out own postal cancellation stamps with thin sharpies. 

A Tiny Cage for Spot

Our dollhouse has a resident dog, little Spot. I decided today to make him some tiny accessories, starting with a doghouse. I began by deciding how big a house I would need. Based on Spot being on the small size I got the measurements for a doghouse and adjusted it for the 1/12 ratio. I came up with a house that would be 2.2 inches square.

• go to Ideogram and use their box template maker to generate a pattern 2.5 inches square (or the size of your choice.)
• print out the pattern and cut it out.  
• trace the pattern onto thin cardboard. (I used a Triscuit box, but a Milk Bone box would have been even more appropriate.) Save the paper template for the roof.

• Cut a half circle out of the cardboard for a door. You can do this freehand.
• Cut out the rest of the cardboard pieces and score on the fold lines.
• To assemble, glue one or two edges at a time and use making tape to hold the piece in place while it dries.
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• make a roof by using two of the squares from the template and adding a triangle. (See photo.)
  
  
• the roof goes on last. it should fit over the bottom part. I glued it and used tape to hold it on while it dried..

                                  

• I painted my doghouse with multiple layer of acrylic paint. I went with the old standby red and brown but you could match the doghouse to the dollhouse for more cuteness.

• After I painted the doghouse I thought it looked sort of flimsy so i wound up gluing over the side and roof with felt and fabric. I think it looks much better. you can see both finishes in the pictures.

Add a sign and your tiny dog has a tiny house!