Fifteen Dollar Playhouse

I was browsing at a consignment sale the other day and came across a collapsible Strawberry Shortcake playhouse for $5.  Being a bit of a bargain junkie (thanks Dad) I bought it.  Unfortunately, when I set it up, I saw that it was in pretty bad shape.

You can't see it in this picture, but the plastic was torn in several places, and a little artist had done some interior decorating with black marker.

 "Ah, well," I thought "the girls can play with it for a few days before we toss it."

 And that's when the inspiration hit.

The house came on a collapsible plastic frame that was still in great condition.

So I decided to ditch the tacky, torn, scribbled plastic cover and make my own.

To do that, I bought some cute, cheap sheets at Walmart (I was thinking blue, but Olivia helped choose, and she wanted pink!  Of course.)  I used flat, twin size sheets, and they were $5 each.  

I used the existing frame and cover to cut out pieces for our new cover,  and then sewed away.  Sorry, no pictures of the sewing process...I had to sew like the wind to finish while the girls were playing happily.  I added some ruffles to the roof, and ties to keep the door open, but if you omit those, the whole thing is basically just sewing straight lines.  Surprisingly simple project!  I did the whole thing in one afternoon.

Ta da!  Are you impressed? I am.  :)

The girls love their new playhouse, but when they get tired of it, we can collapse it, and put it away until we are ready to use it again.  For $15 total, I'm pretty happy with it!