Barbie Condo - Recycling An Old Bookcase.

Take a small bookcase and add a triangle made of plywood to the top for the roof. Make the triangle the dimension's of the bookcase. Add a back made from plywood or old shelves. Now decorate as you would any dollhouse. You can use gift wrap for wallpaper. Small scraps of carpet for the floors. You can add walls to make smaller rooms.

The plastic Velveeta box that they sell for storing Velveeta can make a pretty bed by cutting out sections of the box leaving the corners for legs. Make a pillow and a bedspread and hang a small cup hook above the bed and drape some fabric down. Old fabric napkins work well for this as some of them are pretty damask.

1 and 2 liter bottles can be used to make chairs with big bead legs. Take contact paper and cut into squares and make windows on the sides and backs of your rooms. A permanent black marker can be used to draw on the panes.

Now turn the Condo around and paint it to look like a building. Paint or contact paper the front. Add a front door and windows. You could then mount this whole thing on a industrial lazy susan so that when she is not playing with it all she has to do is turn it around. Add doors with hinges to close off the front if you like. Old wood can be cut into shingles for the roof.

This could also be made into a fort type structure for a little boy and his action figures or a fantasy castle for other dolls. Be creative and think out of the box.

By Debra in Colorado