snr

Thank you all for your responses. You've all told me what I kind of already knew...but it's nice to know I wasn't being paranoid about this project being too big. I'm still not sure what we will do as a failsafe (my sister thinks my niece doesn't need two dollhouses, so I have offered to maybe make a room box that looks like her room - her room is all Ikea stuff and I am pretty good at the custom modern furniture)...we'll see. But we are definitely going to build it, just not right now - but together and this year. So I will be back for advice later. As a funny side note I was thinking about OUR dollhouse, my sister's and mine, which was built from a kit (not sure which) in the early '80's by my Dad and my uncles. It was 9 rooms, but less ornate that the Beacon Hill. And I remember what we got on Christmas morning - a totally unfinished (not primed or sanded or sealed) dollhouse, with a partially shingled roof and a bag of shingles, lol. Because, of course, they ran out of time...

Oh man, I just posted a thread about how I promised to build a dollhouse for my niece's birthday (in November) and the one they decided to buy (without consulting me) was the Beacon Hill. It's nice to know that I am not crazy. I said that I could maybe build it by her next birthday.

Ages ago I promised my parents that if they bought a dollhouse for my elementary-school-aged niece, I would build it. I have never built a dollhouse but I have an extensive professional background in carpentry, painting and crafts and I have built a lot of dollhouse furniture from scratch. So I have the basic skills. However, turns out it was the Beacon Hill showed up on my doorstep yesterday. Looking at the kit, and online reviews, I am thinking that it's unrealistic that I can build this to the level it needs to be by November. (I freelance full-time and am the full-time Mom to a four year old boy who can't possibly be allowed to see it because he will want to play with it and therefore break it.) Am I wrong to think this? I know I can build it, but I also know how one tiny mistake on mini projects can cause hours of work - I once spent about 6 hours building a mini hutch from scratch and it turned out great, but there's so much sanding and fitting and careful glueing (especially if you want to stain...) I just imagine myself spending November pulling all-nighters, letting my kid watch too much TV and still ending up with a glue-covered crooked mess. Anyway, I'd love some opinions from experienced dollhouse builders. Can a relatively skilled, but newbie dollhouse builder build this house in 3 months without going insane? (as a failsafe, I am thinking of building her one of the smaller cottages, decorating it completely and then having them give her the unbuilt kit and we can work on it together throughout the next year. She is 8 and we get along terrifically and have made Fimo minis together)