A little bit of silliness...

The House of Two Sisters

This is the house of two sisters. This house was built by Keystone of Boston in the mid 1930s, and has been the home of Margarita and Daquiri Boozer since childhood.  Their parents purchased it in 1935 when the girls were 3 and 4 years of age. The Boozers brought all their Schoenhut furniture, even the bath fixtures and kitchen appliances, with them. 

Even though Margarita is a bit older than Daquiri, their mother always dressed them alike. They continue that trend even today....and giggle when people ask them if they are twins.

The house originally had four rooms, but with two girls needing their own space, the Boozer parents converted it to a 6 room house. 

Here we see Margarita and Daquiri reaching for breakfast.

Daquiri's favorite past time is sitting in her comfy chair with a good book. She doesn't read it, she just sits there with it.

Margarita's favorite past time is gazing at herself in the mirror.

One night around midnight, Margarita and her BFF Johnnie Walker decided they were tired of lilac fixtures in the bathroom and painted them all a light mustard color. 

Not to be outdone, Daquiri's BFF Jim Beam, convinced her they should paint the green kitchen sink a lovely shade of white.

Margarita and Daquiri swear that a Grey Goose suggested they paint the maroon sofa and chairs a light cranberry.

Not sure if that is Margarita or Daiquiri going for a tall cool one. 

The girls have left the dining room virtually unscathed....only because Mama Boozer and her good friend Chivas Regal decided one night it should be a flat brown without a varnish finish. 

So we leave Margarita and Daquiri Boozer, enjoying each other's company and holding tight to their BFFs, listening to music on Papa Boozer's vintage radio.

This is how the little house looked when I found it in 2013...missing windows and door, interior walls, stained by dampness, and absolutely filthy. There was a similar but larger dollhouse in the 1938 Keystone catalog, I copied the diamond-paned windows from it. The door in the catalog picture couldn't be seen, so it has a design composite of Tudor doors from other houses. There was no indication that this house had a door surround. To help anchor the door and cover some of the stain that couldn't be removed, I made a door surround by copying the timbers on the upper floor. Mr. Clean scrubbies helped clean the grime left from 80 years of play. And a fresh coat of paint on the steps finished the exterior. 

The dolls are small Caco dolls made in the late 1940s. 

I had a collection of repainted Schoenhut furniture I wanted to use in this house, but I needed 6 rooms. I figured if I was using bastardized furniture I might as well bastardize the interior of the house and give it 6 rooms. And this is the result.

Almost all the furniture is Schoenhut, made from 1928-1934. Patty Cooper has published a wonderful book detailing the furniture Schoenhut made during this period. It can be found here at the Blurb Bookstore.

Exceptions to the Schoenhut furniture are the refrigerator, which is a metal bank with a GE emblem, and the radio of unknown origin. Kage products include the curved floor lamps by the girl's chairs and the pink wing chair in Daquiri's room (yes I painted it). Dolly Dear bedside table lamps are in each bedroom. Strombeker made the trash can in the kitchen, the scale in the bath, and the lamps on the vanity in Daquiri's room. Both beds were missing the original paper covers, I gave them similar covers of fabric. I painted the chair in Margarita's room a matching blue and gave it feet, and I constructed her vanity out of 2 drawers from a Schoenhut dresser and added the end pieces made from the shelves of a Strombecker tea cart. This is what one goes thru when one collects these wonderful old houses and dollhouse furniture, not caring if they are in pristine condition! For me, half the fun of collecting vintage dollhouses is in refurbishing them.

We are....two wild and crazy guys!

Swinging, the Festrunk brothers enter their bachelor pad.
Yortuk says, "Oh, Georg my brother, there will certainly be a lot of swinging in our bachelor pad tonight!"

Laughing and swinging, Georg leans back and says, "Hold it! Let's catch some rays!" 

"You and what Army!" laughs Yortuk. "Forget about it!"

They swing over towards their wet bar. 

"Ah, that fox bar was really something tonight. It was no difficulty to see many swinging Americans enjoying each other a great deal." says Georg.

 

"And here is a thing I will tell you," says Yortuk, "that two swinging foxes have the hots-on for us, and are coming here tonight to let us hold on to their big American breasts!"

 Opening two bottles of beer, Georg says,  "Why not? There's nothing preventing them. After all, there is no other pair of Czech brothers who cruise and swing so successfully in tight slacks!"

Georg toasts his brother Yortuk, "We are...two wild and crazy guys!"
"Soon, will be the foxes." says Yortuk. And the doorbell rings!

"Fox-es!" they yell and swing successfully to the front door.

"Look who it is standing here, our swinging American buddy, Cliff." says Georg.
"Slap my hand, black soul man!" Georg extends his hand and Cliff slaps it.
"Uh, hi Georg, hi Yortuk." says Cliff.

 

"Hey, man, I was invited to this really hot party tonight. Do you guys wanna go?"

 

"No way! That's your funeral!"  Yortuk laughs.

"Don't come crawling to us. Two hot fashion models from the fox bar will be here soon to give themselves to the Festrunk Brothers!" brags Georg.

Cliff says "You.. got two ladies coming here tonight? I don't believe it!"

"We cruised for them in our tight slacks which give us great bulges!" smiles Georg.

"Wait a minute.." says Cliff,  "if these chicks were so interested, why didn't they just come back with you, man?"

"Oh, we gave them the address to our bachelor pad. They had to go to the Statue of Liberty to pick up their birth control devices." Yortuk informs Cliff.

"Uh, what..? The Statue of Liberty..?" stutters Cliff.

"They told us that in America, many American park rangers distribute birth control devices." says Georg.

Yortuk adds "Poor foxes. Every time they are having sex, they must go to the closest national monument."

"O-kay.. Yortuk, Georg.. sit down for a minute, I've got to talk to you." says Cliff kindly.  "Now, these chicks.. are not going to show up."

"Who told you that?!" Yortuk asks.

"Man, you guys have been hosed, baby." answers Cliff.

Excitedly, Georg yells, "Hosed?! Count me in!" He and Yortuk laugh.

"No, no, no, no.. Uh.. hosed.. tricked.. I mean, they stood you up, man. They're not coming here. These ladies figured, 'Hey, we got these two Czechoslovakian dudes trying to pick us up....what do they know? Let's hose 'em.' These chicks were lying, man." explains Cliff.

Georg says,  "I blame myself."
"This really bums me out." replies Yortuk.
"We sure have a drag." they say in unison.

"We will never swing again...," says Georg.

Cliff smiles and says,  "Hey, look.. you're good guys, man. But sometimes you come on too strong, man. Now, when we're out partying, if you want to score with girls, you can't keep running around yelling.. Let's swi-i-ing! You wanna swi-i-ing? Man, you gotta be cool, man! You're in America! This is America!"

"Come on, you guys...look, don't take it so hard. Let's go to that party, man!" Cliff says.

The doorbell rings.

  

"Who can this be?" asks Yortuk. Georg and Yortuk move slowly to the door, barely swinging.

 

 

"Now are the foxes!!" exclaims Yortuk.

"Hey, foxes! Clean up your act!" says Georg, and he and Yortuk laugh.

"Hi, Yortuk. Hi, Georg. Sorry we're late." says Fox #1.

"No hassles, man." says Yortuk.  "Hey! Listen to Georg's joke!"

"Okay! How many astro-sign medallions can you wear?" asks Georg.

Fox #2 says, "I don't know, I.."

"Next time, try five of them!" interrupts Georg, laughing with Yortuk.

"Let's go, foxes! Le-e-et's swing!" calls out Yortuk.

 

 "So get off my back, Let's get it on!" swings Georg.

"So, now you know. We are.. two wild and crazy guys!" from both Yortuk and Georg.

Thanks to my friend Myrtle Mayhem at Dollhouse Shenanigans for finding the Festrunk brothers on ebay and sending a link to me with the subject line "2 wild and crazy guys!"  When they arrived at the Village, they sported just wild slacks and white shirts. I added prints to their shirts, caps, medallions, hair on their chests...and of course their bulges!

And thanks to Saturday Night Live for the story line and basic dialogue AND for entertaining us all these years!

This is a Brio house from 1969. Bar is Lisa of Denmark, other furniture, with the exception of the couch, is by Lundby.