Review of the Valentine residence

Well hello everybody,
  Guess what? I finally figured out how to turn the brightness down on my camera so that it doesn't wash everything out so bad, Yeah! When my husband and I moved a couple yrs. ago we packed up the instruction manual to the camera and now we have no idea where it is ( don't you always seem to lose something when you move? argh!! ) Anyways, my hubby found the on line manual for me, yeah Hubby!! So what does this mean to you, you ask? Well I thought I would review the houses since I can take better pictures now, you know ones where you might actually be able to see whats in the rooms, Hee Hee!! I also have changed a few things since I first showed it to you, because all of my houses are a work in progress. I thought I would start with the Valentine house since it is the first one my husband bought me. As you may recall it was an anniversary gift and since our anniversary is Valentines day, it became the Valentines residence, It's located at 214 Anniversary drive ( OK it's actually in my bedroom, but play along with me Ok?) Well this kicked off a whole new passion for me and I am completely smitten with doll houses and miniatures now!! As if you didn't already know this, Hee Hee, sooo... with out further ado, here we go

When we bought this house it already had wall paper in it, so I chose to just work with what was there since Hubby wasn't to keen on removing it. This was challenging since they didn't all coordinate with each other and since I wouldn't have chosen some of them myself.

This is an overview of the whole house, I do hope to add electric to it at some point.

Downstairs, you have the kitchen to the far right, I've added all those pots on the back wall since the last time I showed it to you, they all came from  the lasaur restaurant in Paris, I bought them from Ebay

 The downstairs hallway and the dining room.

Some things have changed in the dining room. I took out the console table and mirror that used to be on the left wall and moved it to the living room/ parlour, I put that long table there, to hold their dishes and I need to get a tea cart for that wall and a mirror.

Second floor living room. The piano is made from a music box that my husband built some longer legs for and now its just the right size. The sofa and chair is the most expensive furniture in the house as it is bespaq, I've tried to do these houses on a budget and therefore I have to be a little bit creative. The rugs in the main rooms are made from scrap book paper that I added fringe or rope trim to, this worked great since I wanted to cover a lot of the floor because I felt the paper someone had chosen before me was just to dark.

 Second floor landing- I used velvet ribbon for stair runners.

 Elizabeth and baby Darlene's room, I made all the bedding.

 Woops these pictures got a little blurry huh? I wish they hadn't because there are some cute toys on those shelves, Oh well, I'll have to try to take better pictures of that in the future. Just when I was feeling so proud of my picture taking too, Hee Hee.

This is Victoria and Conrad's room on the third floor and I have to admit that I love this room, it just looks like a big Valentine doesn't it ? I made all the bedding in this room also and the tester over the bed is made from a box lid covered in lace and fabric. The picture over the wardrobe says, to my Valentine :-)

Upstairs hall way, the paper is the same pattern as the other landings but in yellow? guess they ran out of the other color?

 The bathroom had this blue wall paper but I am not that crazy about blue, so I decided to add the purple and tied it together with the  shower curtain fabric. I made the shower curtain stand from a coat hanger- by the way I'm not much of a seamstress, so I cheated and used fabric glue for all curtains and bedding, Shhh.. its our little secret OK?

 I painted the Dresser and mirror to match. It was quite easy to find pictures and such that mixed purple and shades of blue together.

These are the residents of the house, this is Dr. Conrad Valentine and his lovely wife Victoria and their two girls Elizabeth and baby Darlene and this is the staff ( minus the butler Mr. Dobbs, still haven't found him yet )

Left; Abigail the house keeper,  center: Sadie the cook,  Right: Annie the nanny. Well that's all of the Valentine house.
 I have a sneaky feeling I better go see what Celestine is up to!
         Celestine, what are you doing?

Celestine: I'm Trying on Clothes Darling, a girl needs more than one outfit to wear, yes?

Uh.. Celestine I already told you that most of Barbies clothes are too big for you and would have to be altered to fit.

Celestine: Well there you have it darling, Barbie is not as perfect as America has made her out to be, you see? I am considerably thinner, No? ( Well yes, more like Twiggy, but don't tell her I said so! )

Me:  UHM ....well what I want to know Celestine, is who's going to clean up this mess?

Celestine:  Well not me darling, I mean after all, I am just a doll and I cannot clean up messes!!

OH MY!

Well now Celestine has gone silent and is staring at me blankly... I suppose this is her acting helpless?? ( I'm not buying it, are you? )

Yep she's definitely giving me the silent treatment now-

I guess I better go, because it would seem I have a mess to clean up ;-)

Till next time, love and blessings to you all,

Teresa and Celestine