Childhood Crafting: Fashions & Food for our Sylvanian Families

In the box of Sylvanian Families stuff we found in our attic, there was some Sylvanian furniture and some Sylvanian Families themselves (of course!) ... but the real treasures were the homemade bits and pieces we'd made as kids to accompany the store-bought stuff.

As you can see, I've been making things from felt for a looooong time.

I stitched these very stylish hats, shawl and bag for my rabbit family - and I also replaced the buttons on Mr Rabbit's dungarees when they fell off, and knitted a cosy wrap for Grandma Rabbit (luckily small pretend rabbits don't care how bad you are at knitting). 

 

I distinctly remember making a wedding dress and veil at one point, and one Christmas I carefully (and secretly!) made hats and jackets from felt for all my sisters' Sylvanians, wrapping them up in teeny handmade cardboard boxes which I then hung on the Christmas tree like ornaments. If those fashions ever turn up, I will be sure to take photos to share with you all.

As well as making clothes, I made lots of little things to decorate my (homemade) Sylvanian house.

Anticlockwise from bottom left: pieces of fabric that sat in a basket next to the sewing machine;"flannels" for the bathroom; an umbrella stand (for the paper cocktail umbrellas my parents brought back from a party) made from half a cocktail stick box covered in faux-woodgrain sticky back plastic; "skeins of yarn" made from embroidery thread and yarn; a paper fan; a beaded "necklace"; and two tiny "letters" which were tucked in the drawer of the dressing table.

My sisters and I loved making stuff from Fimo and we made lots of fake food for our Sylvanians to take on picnics. Fake fruit, fake hamburgers, tiny fake sandwiches and fake iced buns (complete with fake cherries on top). So cute!

I also made some tiny packets of food for the kitchen shelves. Each packet is a tiny handmade box, filled with toy stuffing (to help keep its shape) and decorated with tiny pictures and text like "ingredients" and "best before".

Top row: Jelly, Sugar Cane, 400g Lentils, Flour, Cheese & Noodle Soup.
Middle row: Carrot & Cauliflower Soup, Cornflour, Icing Sugar, Tomato Soup, Vegetable Soup.
Bottom row: Birds Eye Custard, Self-Raising Flour, Selection of Fruit Herbal Teas.

Look how teeny they are!

Good work, younger self, good work.