Dollhouse furniture review: Plan Toys

Welcome to another installment of "How to Buy a Wooden Dollhouse." A while back CSN stores asked if I wanted to do a review of some of their products. It didn't seem like too hefty of a task and since they had this awesome dollhouse furniture, I decided to give it a shot. Basically I was given a gift certificate and paid for anything over that amount. For the three sets, shipping was only about $8 or $9, not bad at all.

These sets are all from Plan Toys, a green toy company focusing on making safe, educational products. So not only do they make toys that are safe for kids and more than compliant with all regulations, they also manufacture in clean ways. I have not discussed reviewing products with the company. I'm doing this on behalf of CSN.

Scale: As you can see, these pieces take up quite a bit of space in the Ryan's Room dollhouse. I don't have a problem with that. We chose a small dollhouse on purpose. I will talk more on scale in a later post. The pandas fit in the furniture well but poor Papa had a rough time changing the baby's diaper. The Plan Toys and the Ryan's Room pieces are compatible in size. These pieces are a bit larger than the Enchantmints pieces I reviewed in a previous post.

Quality: Wow. These pieces are really well crafted. Superior. Not a splinter, not a single stroke of paint out of line. And there is a good bit of detail here without being too period specific (too bad those pandas look like they're about to join a cult. I'm going to have to sew them something more contemporary). The crib comes with a little mobile (see just up there on the left), the changing table opens up, the baby's outfit has an adorable hood and is so soft. I love the striped stroller and the vegetables, oh my! The vegetables are stellar. Such detail. You can take them in and out of their little rows and put them in the wheelbarrrow. The shovel has a metal head. I actually was shocked at the quality. While at about $18 a set, they are near the top of the wooden play dollhouse range, it is clear why. You do get what you pay for.

Overall, I'm very impressed by Plan Toys. I have seen their other, non-dollhouse toys and they are of the same quality. These fit well with the theme of our dollhouse and while the Calico Critters are a bit small in comparison, if they were wearing better clothes, you wouldn't even feel they were out of place. I will be making new covers for the bedding though. I am not too into the florals they've got going on.

I'm going to say a few words about CSN stores although I'm not required to. Shopping on the website was really easy. They had lots of different categories and everything fit in them nicely. They also made good use of sidebars on the left and breadcrumbs (some webspeak, yo) at the top. That is so important. They also have a price slider so you can limit to a certain range. Good selection of the eco-friendly stuff that I prefer my kid to play with. Oh, and get this, a friend told me that when she was remodelling her bathroom, if she found something cheaper somewhere else and emailed a link to CSN, they would quote her a cheaper price. Cool. I'm not sure if they are still doing that.

All photos are taken inside the Ryan's Room Carry n Play Dollhouse that we got at our local toy store. My mom also got the Plan Toys gazebo since Z had requested her dollhouse to have an "outside." I think we will have to put that together but all of the stuff above was pre-assembled. If you want to read my other dollhouse reviews, click here then scroll down to the bottom of that post for other two links.

Dollhouse furniture review: Enchantmints mushroom cuteness

So here is round one of furniture reviews for my "How to buy a wooden dollhouse series." After seeing this gorgeous fairy collection at our local library, I did some research and found out the whole thing belonged to a local woman who teaches fairy classes to girls. Super cool. She pointed me in the right direction and I was hooked.

This mushroom line is part of the Fairy Forest collection by Enchantmints. They are a US-based company focusing on imaginative products that are quality made, exceeding both US and European safety standards. So just to put this out there: they provided the sets that I am reviewing but that is not influencing my opinion of either the company or the products. I would have bought this stuff anyway (and have it on good authority that Santa is bringing the bathroom set to Meme's house for Christmas).

Scale: I'll talk more about scale among the other sets (Ryan's Room, Educo/Hape, Le Toy Van, and Plan Toys) later. These mushroom pieces are slightly smaller than the others we have. They are slightly larger than the Calico Critters (products I won't be reviewing unless my SIL gets them for her kid for Christmas). But I feel that these work GREAT with our pandas, as you can see in the pictures.

Quality: The quality of these pieces is very good. The painted pieces are especially nice. They are very cleanly made without a mess. The only thing I had a slight issue with the was leaf "rug" that came with the mushroom table and stools. The wood was cut a little roughly around the edges. I quickly took a nail file to it and now it's fine. I don't think there would have been any splinters but I just wanted to be sure. After some play, these edges will probably smooth out. For some reason, lots of dollhouse furniture dining sets come with stools. It's really hard to get dolls to sit on stools. In fact, I find sitting on stools to be a bit challenging.

Overall, I love these pieces. I think they are also a good value. The kitchen and bedroom set comes with five pieces for $15. The little drawers open and close -- the fridge door opens and closes easily; there is a little metal handle on the stove. The bed will fit perfectly in the children's room. The living room set is also very well crafted. No problems with rough edges on the stained (green leafy) pieces. I also think these would work well as outdoor furniture. My neighbors have a fireplace outside with chairs in front of it -- awesome for Fall evenings. Why shouldn't the pandas enjoy such bliss?

All photos are taken inside the Ryan's Room Carry n Play Dollhouse that we got at our local toy store. The furniture fits very nicely inside. And aren't these gnomes amazing?  For my other dollhouse posts, click here and here.

The Crystal top

 As soon as my Wonderland fabric arrived in the mail, I knew exactly what I wanted to use it for. I love how effortlessly it goes with the Lizzy House ducks.

I used this amazing vintage pattern that my Mother-in-Law let me borrow. She made this pattern for my Sister-in-Law's first day of school way back when. Although the pattern is a 3, as you can see, it's huge. This Winter we'll layer with some long sleeves underneath -- or maybe a thermal.

And that's Crystal there in the middle on her first day of school! Weren't the 1970s amazing? (Happy 40th!!!). That is not my husband beside her. That is one of the neighbors. He would have been just out of diapers at the time.

I used a bright blue zipper in the back, royal blue bias tape for the hem, and the same color ric rack for the trim across the top. Also, I used my sewing machine's reinforced straight stitch to topstitch around the collar in the blue to give it a little kick. The sleeves on this thing are like crazy butterflies. I thought it would settle down a bit after a washed it but no luck. The pattern was actually super easy to use and I didn't have any problems with it at all. Very quick.  More pics on flickr.

The hoop

So I've finished the hoop and sent it off to its new owner. I took this photo before I did some more stitching to the dots. I kept it simple but wanted to add a little bit of whimsy to it.

I'll post a final shot after it's arrived to its new home.

Wool felt

Hey, can you guys help me out? I want to buy some wool felt but I'm not really sure where to begin.

Of course, I read all this from True Up but I don't even think I've made it to that level yet. I know I want to buy some sheets -- a sampler pack with several colors, to start. But I honestly don't even know if I want 100% or a blend. I got the new Wee Wonderfuls book and I want to make some dolls and I want to make some doll clothes -- stuff like that. Nothing major. Nothing big.

I just don't even know what I need to begin shopping. I would really love your advice.

Oh, and I that image is from True Up. It should go directly there.

Woah.

Look what I got in the mail today.

I couldn't be happier. When I saw this in the swap pool I really wanted it. I was hoping it would be mine. It's so simple and so perfect and so clean and so tidy and I could go on and on about how much I love it.

It was made by Meg of Fashioned by Meg. She is very talented.

I have been working on my swap but I won't show any more pictures. It needs to be a surprise!

Travel tips

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Links to travel size sites:

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http://www.cheaptravelsizes.com/

http://www.3floz.com/


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