Well, we now have two houses, friends.

Our house, and the playhouse.

You know when you think you know what projects you are going to focus on, and then something comes along and swoops in and takes over? That’s sort of what happened with us this summer. We went from doing landscaping and planning a deck remodel and preparing to replace a couple of doors to putting all that on hold in order to fix up a playhouse for the kids.

It all started when we visited family in late May and they had a playhouse that both kids loved playing in. It hadn’t even really been on my radar before then, but all of a sudden, I started scanning Facebook marketplace for a nice one. Luckily, I found a plastic one for a good deal from a friend and bought and we brought it home a couple of days later. It was cute and the kids loved it, but somewhere in my soul came a tiny stirring to have a playhouse that looked like our house. I started researching the best way to paint the plastic playhouse, because I know sometimes people have good luck with that…but I wasn’t convinced considering how (not) well some other plastic things we’ve painted have held up outside.

Then, luckily again,  (or unluckily?) a short time later, I found a great deal on a wooden one and my dream of fixing it up to match our house was officially becoming an obsession.

So, we became a two-playhouse-family. At least for awhile, until we were able to pass the plastic one on to some good friends who have a daughter who could get a lot of use out of it. And then, the makeover began.

It was dirty, and had some mildew(?) in a few places, so I knew painting it would not only make it match our house, but give it new life. Click RIGHT HERE to see what it looks like brand new (or if you want to grab one for your family!)

One of the windows had a broken and missing board so Wyatt trimmed off the frame pieces that were sticking up and sanded everything so it wouldn’t give our kids splinters as they were playing.

Because you know Will has already climbed through the windows instead of just using the door every time.

It was also missing a piece of the siding on the inside near the door, so he had to make a new one and use a router to add the tongue-and-groove notch so it would slide in.

Here’s the before and after of that fix. He used a scrap piece of board we had on hand and it only took him about five minutes. I realize this is a very specific problem to need to fix, but if you happen to need to know how he did it, feel free to comment or email us. 🙂 He’d be happy to help you!

It was a good deal and in pretty good condition, but a new one would obviously be in perfect condition, so you wouldn’t have to do these steps.

Then it was time to start the fun part of the makeover!

I started by removing all the plastic trim from the windows so I wouldn’t get paint on them. They were held on with little staples and I just used a flat head screwdriver to carefully pry them off without bending the staples so I could reuse them. The flower pot holders and sink/stove/etc. were all screwed in and easy to take off. They all got cleaned in the sink.

Will got to help paint the roof to match our shingles. He thought that was pretty fun, and he did a good job! …Other than doing a bit of damage to my paint brush by bending the bristles all crazy. He’ll get it.

I actually already had this almost black, super dark gray exterior paint on hand because it’s the color of our front door. So, no extra cost there, which is nice. You know we’re all about the cost-effective makeovers, especially since we had to spend $$$$ to replace our air conditioner and heater earlier this summer.

Then, it took it me two coats of navy blue on the outside. We used the leftover Sherwin Williams Dark Night paint from our exterior paint makeover last fall, and it covered really well, but the cedar boards soaked it in and the second coat helped everything look really smooth and nice. I talked about choosing our perfect navy blue paint color for our house, IN THIS POST.

I used the same white trim paint that we used on the house since it was exterior, and again…free since we already had it, and I went ahead and picked out the perfect yellow paint for the front door of the playhouse, which will soon be the color of our front door on our real house. Once we get that done.

The door on the playhouse was actually missing when we bought it, and that was okay, but then I figured it was worth a shot to find a replacement, and even though we purchased this secondhand from another owner, I contacted the company and was able to get the door and the knob and everything else we needed, for free, in like a 2-day turnaround. I was seriously impressed and will totally remember this company in the future if we expand our outdoor play area. Would highly recommend them for their customer service alone…but we also think the product itself is pretty great.

After reinstalling all the plastic white trim and finding some perfect little flower pots from my stash of old ones that I spray-painted pink, we were ready for my favorite little detail, can you guess what it is?

When Will saw the house, he specifically requested a doorbell and we figured we could make that happen, at least for pretend because we didn’t have a way to wire an actual bell without adding some form or battery power. So, I started looking for cute doorbells to add and fell for this amazing one on Amazon.

It’s the doorbell that dreams are made of, I’m telling you.

Here it is, super affordable on Amazon if you need one for your playhouse. Or your own front door. I’m totally buying another one when we do our little front porch/curb appeal makeover.

It’s definitely a kid favorite and totally worth adding, in my opinion. Wyatt wanted to get a super cheap one from Home Depot…but I think even he thinks it’s pretty cool now that we have it.

And there she is! Sitting pretty in our backyard now.

I found the welcome mat and the little faux succulents at our dollar store. I think they are really cute, but if you wanted an upgrade or couldn’t find them at your store, I like this rug option from Amazon a lot! And here are some cute, affordable faux plants.

(I considered real plants here but they would BAKE and die in like a week from the heat from the patio and the fact that the pots are so shallow they can’t store much excess moisture.)

Plus…the kids play with them all the time soo fake was a good bet.

It’s safe to say the kids think it was worth the time and trouble to fix it up. They love it!

The little sink and stove are perfect for some pretend play, and I love that the windows are large enough we can easily see them and interact with them while they are playing. Em carried her chair in there and didn’t leave for about 30 whole minutes.

Again, while we found our playhouse on Facebook marketplace, if you didn’t want to wait around until you found the perfect one, you can grab the one we have RIGHT HERE! (On sale from Wal-Mart, of course!) It has excellent reviews and should hold up a really long time.

And this, folks, is why we sometimes don’t get through all of our plans for the year. Projects like this sometimes sneak ahead of the others on the schedule, and that’s totally okay! I am all for following where the year leads you in terms of home goals. All progress and projects count, even if they aren’t on the original list! Just think what we would have missed out on if we had passed on this!

I’d much rather our kids have this to enjoy now than wait until the time was perfect according to our original timeline. Plus, it was MUCH cheaper than a new deck–ha!

Anyway, now that we have two houses, we have plenty of room for guests…so come on over and play!