Hi all,
When my mom went to dental school (I was nine when she started, 13
when she finished), she bought me a dollhouse kit to work on, because
I was nine years old, and it was going to be our first summer apart.
This was the summer of 1978, and the kit cost around $75.

At nine, I really wasn't ready for a project of that magnitude. I
punched out some of the pieces, painted a few, then packed it up and
put it into my parent's basement, where it stayed for the next 12
years. Fast forward to winter of 1990-91, and I was on winter break
from my senior year in college. I got a wild hair to work on the doll
house, and so built most of it over Christmas, and then put the
finishing touches on it over spring break.

It was beautiful. Slate blue paint, white trim, dark blue shingles,
white inside walls, varnished floors. I was 21 years old when I
finished it. I never collected any miniatures for it or anything, at
that point it was the joy of building it that was important. It sat
in my parent's basement covered in plastic until the fall of 2003
(wow..another 12 years - hard to believe 24 years went by since I
started the project). I always planned to get it, but it was big and
cumbersome, and we don't tend to have space in the car when we drive,
and flying with it would be a nightmare. I wanted to give it to my
daughter when she was old enough. Someday.

But last fall, my parents house was destroyed in a fire, and the
dollhouse with it. I found a similar dollhouse online, and made a
claim with my parent's insurance. A similar dollhouse, fully finished
like mine was, would cost around $700.

Now here's the hard part.

If I get a cash payout, I'd get around $175 (75% depreciation). If I
choose to get a replacement, I get a budget of around $700. Here's
the hard part:

I really don't have space to store a dollhouse right now, and my
daughter is much too young (she just turned two in december). I could
have my mom order it, and she'll store it, but we'll have the same
problem of getting the darn thing to me when the time comes.

I could get another kit which is more storeable (and I could get a
fancier one this time!), but I don't know when I'll ever really have
the kind of time it takes to build another dollhouse. It would be a
neat project to do with my daughter when she's a bit older, but it
would take a long, long time.

My husband favors getting one of those wooden block dollhouse by plan
toys, (See http://puffins.com/planpg06.html for an example) which
aren't cheap. But they are for younger kids, and my daughter would be
outgrowing it at just about the time a real dollhouse would be
appropriate.

My husband says that girls who had dollhouse really never played with
them, that they all thought they were cool, but mostly they gathered
dust, so he thinks that would be a silly thing to do - and the plan
toys dollhouse for younger kids are much cooler. My stepson thinks I
should take the cash payout.

What do I think? I really, really wanted a dollhouse when I was a
kid, and never had one (owning a kit doesn't count!). I played with
the ones my friends had. I remember them playing with them to some
extent, but at least as they got older, they really did gather dust.
I also looked forward to passing my dollhouse to my daughter. So what
I want to do is order the one I like - fully put together, and figure
out a way to store the darn thing. But, if my husband is right, and
they mostly don't get played with, I really have to take that into
consideration.

So, first, what do you think I should do? And, for those of you who
had dollhouses, did you like them? Did you play with them?

Cathy Weeks
Mommy to Kivi Alexis 12/01