Dollhouse Miniature Toy Boats

Watch the video here.

I have still been working on trying to organize my craftroom/office and once again found myself distracted by looking at the magazines I was trying to put away. It is just so darn tempting to page through them as I sort them out. LOL (by the way the oldest one I have is from 1975, so the collection is huge)

As I was looking I happened upon a photo of a miniature bedroom for a little boy. One of the items that caught my eye was the collection of toy boats on a shelf. These were totally cute and although I didn't stop to read the article they looked pretty easy to re-create.

One again I pulled out the box that I put the small pieces of scrap wood into. It is just one of those plastic shoe boxes and it is pretty full. I have odds and ends of a lot of different types and shapes of wood. Some are off cuts from projects, some are leftover wooded pieces I have purchased and a few wooden beads have found their way in there as well as a few craft sticks.

I just grabbed an assortment of items and started playing with sticking them together.

I knew the boats needed to have pointed fronts so I got out my Eazy-Cutter since that is my favorite wood cutting tool for small bits. I also grabbed a couple of bottles of craft paint. It was really fun and after a little while I had a couple of little boats that looked pretty good I think.

Start with the base of your boat, I used some craft sticks (regular size and jumbo) and also some scraps of strip wood. Just keep scale in mind when you work on this.

I wanted my boats to be anywhere from a little over a ½” long to just under 1” long. I found I liked this part painted white the best but any color would work. I think a slightly larger one painted all in gray with black details might be really cool too.

I also painted an assortment of small beads, small dowels, and small strip wood at the same time. (I even got to use the drying rack I made for last week's tutorial)

When all the paint was dry I got out my glue and started to assemble my boats. I am not trying to replicate any real boats but I am sure it would be fun to do so. (If you do that be sure to send me a photo)

I was going to try to make some sail boats but totally forgot when I got started. To that all you would need to do is cut some triangles from cardstock and glue to the top of the base part. Maybe next time.

So this is certainly an open ended project. You can go so many directions with the basic idea and you could create an entire marina of boats.

Here are a couple more photos of the boats I have made so far.

Remember to share a picture with me if you do make some. I love to see what you are making too.

Also if you have something in particular you want to learn to make let me know maybe I can figure out a tutorial for it.