In my previous tutorials, I showed you how I measured my table to make a custom fit table playhouse and how I installed my door and windows. In this tutorial, I'm going to show you how I put it all together.
For this project, I moved my sewing materials upstairs to the table I was making the playhouse for. It made it easier to check the fit and was the perfect (custom) size to spread my fabric out on while I worked on the door and window placement. Pretty handy!
I have some other playhouses in mind, and I'm thinking I should take the opportunity to make a second one... to give you a little inspiration beyond my little Gingerbread house and to quell the disputes at grandma's.
I've included a couple of templates in the Table Play House pattern to use to sketch out your own ideas.
Make a Cozy Cottage by simply changing the color scheme of the house from Gingerbread brown and royal icing white to bright cheerful colors for the walls and trim and an earthy gray for the roof. Either solids or prints would work well. For a shabby chic cottage, use cast off vintage style blankets or quilts and trim the roofline with wide lace trim or cut handkerchiefs or doilies in half along the diagonal. As a finishing touch, fill the window boxes with bright fabric flowers and maybe add a few applique flowers along the bottom edges.
Laura Ingalls was a childhood hero of mine and I would have loved to have a log cabin playhouse to set up house for my Charlotte doll that me and my grandma made and to cozy up with my Little House in the Big Woods book. To turn your playhouse into a log cabin, pick out a brown fabric for the walls and before you install the windows and doors, apply an off-white bias trim in horizontal rows to look like the chinking between the logs. Use a darker green, red, or gray for the roof.
For your shining knight or little princess, how about a castle playhouse? You can leave the shape of the doors and windows as they are or if you are feeling particularly creative you can change them to a have a pointed or rounded top. Make the walls and roof of the castle in gray or other stone color and piece the trim together with squares of cloth in various stone colors to give it the appearance of stonework. For added detail, applique assorted groupings of rectangles in various stone colors on the walls to echo the stonework on the windows and doors.
For Lord of the Rings fans, change the shape of the doors and windows to circles and trim with dark brown fabric to mimic timber framing. Make the roof in green, the walls in an off-white.
As much as the boys are enjoying their little playhouse as it is, I think the Gingerbread House looks a little plain. In our next tutorial, I'll show you how I dressed it up to give it a more festive curb appeal and Holiday flair!
I have had a lot of fun working on this playhouse for my grandsons, it's not often I get to sew something for my boys and it was such a treat to see them get excited over something grandma made for them. I think I will make up a couple more of these for Christmas presents for them to play with at home. A log cabin would be a great place for them to hang out with their stuffed bears and foxes and I can only imagine the adventures they would have in a castle playhouse during our cold winter months.
Happy Holiday sewing everyone! See you next time.
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