Tuning/Tuners

I've got an old (1970s) Hughes 6 string Church dulcimer made from a kit when I was a kid. It has sentimental value, as my dad made it for me. I played it a little bit when I was a teenager, but have mostly just carried it around with me from place to place. Anyway, I took up dulcimer playing last spring and thought that I would try to refurbish it. I added new strings, tuned it, and it sounded really awful. It isn't my primary dulcimer, but I thought that it would be nice to play once in a while. When I try to tune it, I tune the first string. By the time that the second string is tuned, the first string is off key. I noticed when tuning that the pegs, (they stick up vertically) get pulled away from their position due to the string tension. They look like the leaning Tower of Pisa.My questions are: should I try to get new tuners? Should I try to tune the instrument to a lower octave so that the strings are looser? Like I said, it has sentimental value, but it is, at the end of the day, a cheap, not particularly well made instrument, and it isn't worth spending a fortune on trying to fix it. I can always use it for decoration. But I would like to make it playable again, if it is possible.