DHBG “Girl”

Happy New Year to everyone. I am in total disbelief that it is the first of February already. I am very happy that January is over and the days are getting a little longer each day. I hope everyone is doing well.

I get asked quite a bit about the meaning behind the Doll House Baked Goods “Girl”. Why doesn’t she have arms? Why is her hair always blond? Why is she always a girl? Why is your bakery named Doll House? I thought you sold doll houses? I thought you sold dolls? plus many more. I know some of you know the meaning of it because we have talked about it and our logo. Being in a new state and pretty much starting over again, I am starting to get all of the same questions over and over again. Why did you name your new website Doll House Actual.

This one never made it out in to the public. I can't count how many times this happened to us. I get it but yet I don't.

Our little cartoon Doll House “Girl” means so much to us. She is our motto/mascot (which for some reason I don’t like using this term because she means more to me than an object) behind Doll House Baked Goods. In all reality is she (“Girl”) is actually me.

When I first started out baking, I worked with friends and family that helped me come up with a logo for the new baking business. I had given our friends Chris’s old drawing he did back in 1997 for his sister in law (who is no longer a part of the family) who was wanting to open up an in home daycare. This drawing was never used by her or anyone else. We had been holding onto this ever since. When it came down to coming up with a name for the new baking business, we of cou1rse went straight to our last name DOLL. What can we do with this? I sent our friends a photo of this drawing that Chris did way back in 1997 and asked if they could work off that drawing to pull inspiration. With a couple rounds of back and forth, it did not take long for the “Doll House Girl” to come to life.

Once we finalized the name and logo for Doll House Baked Goods, Chris did his magic again. We first had fun using the logo on everything that we needed to get our name out there. Website, social media, packaging, business cards, banners for farmers market, and things just took off. Over the first few years, I have heard so many times (especially at farmers markets) that our logo was so different and very recognizable that people were starting to connect us with orders that were brought into schools, offices, and other businesses. I loved hearing that and I absolutely loved our logo and name. It was so us in a nutshell.

As we were growing, we were in search of a bigger space to bake out of because I was outgrowing my home kitchen. My poor family and oven. Business was taking over the kitchen and dining room. The family was getting sick of having to work around me while I was working and they wanted food. Chris was let go at his tech job and things needed to change. With some big sole searching and a miracle, we were told that a space was opening up in the Bothell Country Village. I absolutely LOVED the Country Village and I was so over the moon excited. With hesitation and everything on the line, we signed the lease for our very first brick and mortar shop together, Chris and I.

Prepping to get the shop open as soon as we could, Chris was doodling one day and came up to me with these sketches of the Doll House “Girl” doing all kinds of fun and silly baking drawings. He had us laughing so hard at some of them. These doodles were so fun to see and we were both excited to see these come to life once painted.

Chris went to work and produced 27 original 4 x 6 water color drawings of our Doll House “Girl”. At this moment, seeing these painting of our “Girl” who we have created, she came to life for us. She was us and she was an expression of who we are in a very fun carton character. This “Girl” is Doll House! These painting that Chris did, we had fun turning them into greeting cards, prints, and other merchandise for the new shop.

Once the shop opened up and time went on. Chris and our daughters both took on creating new things with the Doll House “Girl”. They sculpted a couple figures for me out of polymer clay and painted them. One of the sculptures lived in the shop in our bakery case with all of the daily goodies. Whenever I got inspired and wanted a new drawing/watercolor done, Chris was on it. He painted extra one over the years for holiday’s, after holiday feelings, my birthday, mother day, and the last two he did were for our new banner for the farmers market. These last two were my favorite and were done during Covid. We were given a small grant for Doll House Baked Goods, so one of our purchases was a nice new banner. Our old banner still had our location at the Country Village which no longer existed (the Country Village will be a whole other story which I will not go into now). We needed a new banner so bad so we were grateful for the grant to be able to order a new one. This banner was the best and Chris did an amazing job on the paintings. The “Girl” in these paintings were the best of us and what the farmer’s markets meant to us. She was us in every way and she expressed what we could never say.

As we closed down the business, sold our house in WA and trying to embark on new possibilities, our Doll House name and Girl never left our hearts. I feel if anything, it’s the one thing that has still keep us connected to what we had and what we miss every day of our home of 26 years in WA. This transition has opened up new opportunities, new friends, closer to relatives but it has also been very hard. Starting over.

As we build our new opportunities while building on to what we have, that is how the new name came to light. Doll House Actual. It pretty much says it all. It is all four of us in one spot. I get to do all of my crazy stuff, like these blogs, a very cute calendar that I absolutely adore to no end, and of course cats. You all have an opportunity to go check out what Chris is up too and Allison and Jessica.

This came about because we have found ourselves in the middle of a cat rescue and a house full of cats. We needed to find a way to pull in some income before all of our reserves were gone. The cat rescue took so much of our funds to feed all the cats, make sure we had enough litter pans and litter for a house full of cats and equipment for the cats. We had gotten rid of everything we had and I didn’t want these cats to tear up our new place. Hence we have not done to much remodeling. Plus, we wanted all four of us to have a creative space where we could be creative together.

Our Doll House Name and Girl are not gone. We may have been forgotten a little bit but don’t worry, we have plans and things brewing. This “Girl” will be back with a whole lot of more fun things to say!

Cheers and Happy 2025!

PS - I forgot to explain why the Doll House “Girl” does not always have arms. She was originally based off that drawing Chris did back in 1997. That particular drawing was Chris’s version of the Fisher Price vintage doll house play sets or as they called them when our girls were growing up “Little People”. They never had arms which is why our “Girl” has no arms unless it’s a drawing that she needs arm to hold something then we give her arms. LOL

She needs arms to carry her coffee cup!