when i was nine years old i got a dollhouse for christmas. it was amazing… my mother had wallpapered some rooms and installed wainscoting in others and together we chose paint colors for the remaining areas. she had purchased a few key furniture pieces to have in place for christmas morning, but the house was mostly bare and i spent the next couple of years furnishing it. there was a shop called mz. mcphizz on solano avenue near my house and i used to walk down there and spend hours looking at the tiny candelabras and picture frames and dishes. they had loads of miniature room set-ups in glass boxes: a music room, a playroom, a parlor… and they were all inhabited by tiny people or little furry gray mice wearing clothes. ultimately, i filled my house with a large extended mouse family, which is funny now as i definitely do not welcome mice in my current house. (we DID get mice in our amsterdam apartment because we were the only family in our building without a cat - theo LOVED seeing them race across a room and i was always startled and horrified.)