DIY Natural Toys: Art Dice from Building Blocks
What else can your kid do with her old, outgrown building blocks?
She can draw with them!
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Holiday Crafts: Leaf-Carved Pumpkin
Fortunately, the kiddos were perfectly happy with my suggestion that we carve the pumpkins into something appropriate for Thanksgiving, not Halloween, and that’s how we ended up with our leaf-carved pumpkins. They’re festive without being spooky, use real leaves as stencils, and are, thankfully, just as fun to carve as Jack-o-lanterns are.
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Crafts for Kids: Decoupaged Building Blocks
My kiddo used to be over her building blocks. Whereas she once spent hours building entire wooden cities, she’s into superheroes now. So I made these outdated toys brand-new again, kicked her building block play back into high gear, and totally thrilled the socks off of her just by decoupaging comic book images onto some of her blocks.
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Reduce, Reuse, Redecorate: Vintage Doorknob Jewelry Holder
Vintage doorknobs make beautiful jewelry holders.
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Tutorial + How-to: Make Origami Waterproof with Beeswax
‘Tis the season for making origami Mayflowers!
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Handmade Reviews: Uncommon Cards
You don’t need a store-bought, factory-made greeting card.
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Clothing + Fashion: How to Shorten Bra Straps
I’m really short, y’all.
And I have really big breasts.
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Holiday Crafts: Thanksgiving Pumpkin Crafts
There are TONS of fun Thanksgiving pumpkin crafts that will pacify a carve-happy kid and work for Thanksgiving decorating, helping you avoid Halloween waste.
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Holiday Crafts: Make a Harry Potter Wizard Hat
Your favorite wizard in training needs a hat, and it’s up to you, their favorite Muggle, to help them make one!
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DIY Home + Garden: Comic Book Wallpaper
Check out my small wall makeover that I did in one afternoon with nothing but comic books and Mod Podge. It adds a LOT of personality to a little bit of square footage!
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Tutorial + How-to: Make Zipper Pulls from Vintage Medals
Grab up a handful of old award medals, some vintage jewelry, and some pliers, and check out how to replace your janky zipper pulls with these excellent, sturdy, striking zipper pulls made from vintage medals.
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Back to School Ideas: A Project Display Board from Upcycled Cardboard
Make the Science Fair (or the Biography Fair, or the International Fair…) slightly less of a pain in the butt, AND save yourself a trip to the store to buy a cardboard or foam core display board, because crafting your own display board out of upcycled cardboard is so easy!
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Tutorial + How-to: Upcycled Glass Jar and Tissue Paper Luminaries
Gently glowing, flickering luminaries are a beautiful sight in the evening.
They’re also an excellent, easy kid’s craft. Using any old glass jar as a base, kids will LOVE pasting colorful tissue paper squares to make pretty pictures, and they’ll be thrilled to see how gorgeous their creations look that night, with a lit candle inside to start the magic.
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Handmade Reviews: Boo Bottles from InstaCraft
Looking for a quick craft? A cute craft? A kid-friendly craft?
InstaCraft, given to me by Ulysses Press, has become my kiddos’ and my go-to reference when we’re looking for something fast and easy to fill up a Sunday morning or a rainy afternoon with a little color.
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Tutorial + How-to: Make Homemade Dehydrated Nut and Seed Crackers
These homemade dehydrated crackers are delicious. They’re made entirely of seeds and nuts, so they’re SO good for you. They’re vegan and raw, if you’re into that. And my kid there ate an entire tray of them this morning for Second Breakfast, so they’re a hit with the small, fussy ones, too.
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Holiday Crafts: Halloween Crafts Made from Recycled Materials
Want an eco-friendly Halloween? This is the place to be, and now is the time to start!
Check out these green Halloween projects, all of which are made using recycled materials. Whether you’re looking for costumes or decorations, we’ve got you covered.
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Tutorial + How-to: Make Scrabble Tile Pendants
Scrabble tile pendants are easy to make. All you need are a couple of kinds of strong glue, a little paint, some wonderful vintage papers, and a jewelry bail. Here’s how to whip them out in a day.
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Back to School Ideas: Make Cardboard Number Tiles for Kids’ Math Games
Want to get a kid excited about math?
Play math games! Kids LOVE games and puzzles, and they’re great for cementing sophisticated concepts in growing little brains.
You can buy some pretty cool math games, sure, but as with nearly anything else, some of the best and simplest games are handmade. Here I’m going to show you how to build the upcycled cardboard number tiles that my kiddos and I use in tons of fun math games.
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Running Your Crafts Business: How to Make Business Cards from Paper Scraps
With upcycling, it’s easy to make perfectly unique, eco-friendly business cards that advertise the style of your business while costing absolutely nothing.
These particular business cards are made from paper scraps, waste cardboard, and a DIY business card stamp set. They reduce the footprint of your business by removing scrap paper from the waste stream, cost nothing beyond a few minutes of your time, and are eminently customizable.
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DIY Crafts: How to Make Greeting Cards from Record Album Covers
If you’ve got any source of recycled cardboard that has a natural crease–think food packaging, USPS flat rate envelopes or other mailers, or the old record album covers that I’m using here–then you’ve got a natural greeting card just waiting for you to cut it to size, write in it, and mail it off!
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How do I Re-use T-shirts: T-shirt Crafts that You Can Wear
Before you take the scissors to that pile of screen-printed jersey knit, check out this master list of T-shirt crafts that you can wear–there are T-shirt mods for your top, T-shirt mods for your bottom (ahem…), T-shirt mods for kids, but all of it is just the way that T-shirts are meant to be.
Wearable.
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Running a Crafty Business: UncommonGoods Upcycle Design Challenge
Got a great idea for an upcycled design?
Want $500 and an UncommonGoods vendor contract?
Check out the UncommonGoods 2013 Upcycling Design Challenge!
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How-to: Change the Neckline on a T-shirt
Tired of always having the same old neckline on every single T-shirt?
Fortunately, the neckline of a T-shirt is the easiest thing to alter. You can create tons of different looks, it’s super quick and easy to do, and it doesn’t require any sewing skills!
All you really need, in fact, is a pair of great scissors, a T-shirt to play victim, and a brave heart and bold hand.
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How-to: Take in a Too-Large T-Shirt Tutorial
Tired of being swamped by a too-large T-shirt?
My Mammaw would tell you that you look slouchy when your clothes are too big.
Gain my Mammaw’s approval, and a T-shirt that is cuter and comfier to wear, by taking it in.
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Board Game Storage: Build a Board Game Box
Did your favorite board game box crash and burn? Yeah, mine, too. Here’s how to make your own board game storage to replace it.
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Book Page Projects: Reuse Your Old Books
Just because you love books doesn’t mean that you can’t subject them to the (craft) knife. Check out these book page craft projects to give old books a new life.
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How-to: Make Re-usable Chalkboard Signs instead of Posters
If your kid wants to set up a lemonade stand or hold a car wash, your first impulse is to buy some poster board and fat Sharpies and let them make themselves some signs.
If you spend a little more time, however, and make a good-sized chalkboard sign, then not only will you save some trees, but you won’t have to scrounge for poster board ever again!
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Book Page Prints into Greeting Cards from Spooky and Bright
How to make your own greeting cards that aren’t super cutesy and twee?
Include something vintage!
I made these DIY greeting cards not with rubber stamps of teddy bears or foam stickers of ducks in bonnets, but with vintage book pages. Pages trimmed from a ratty, torn copy of The Turn of the Screw and an old dictionary, embellished with paint, compose the front images of a set of all-purpose blank cards, suitable for either the kids or the adults in the family to use.
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Soaps to Live by Giveaway Winner
Did you win the giveaway from Soaps to Live by?
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Giveaway: Win Three Handmade Soaps from Soaps to Live by
Soaps to Live by is giving away, to one lucky winner with a United States address, three of their handmade soaps of the winner’s choice. Yesterday I reviewed the Bliss oatmeal cloves soap, the Dream peppermint rosemary organic soap, and the Shine citrus lavender soap, but perhaps you’re more into patchouli orange–then Hope is YOUR soap! Prefer thyme lemongrass? You’ll want to ask for Live.
Whatever your preferences, get your wish list ready, and then read on to see how you can enter to win your own three soaps from Soaps to Live by.
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Crafty Green Review: Hand-Crafted, Eco-Friendly Soap from Soaps to Live by
Soaps to Live by soaps are made by real people, using real ingredients, in small batches, with eco-friendly practices. Read on to see how I liked them, and how Soaps to Live by is going to give even more soap away to one of you!
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How-to: Felted Wool Mason Jar Cozy
Need a crafty green way to upcycle an old wool sweater? Here’s how to make a wool sweater Mason jar cozy, to help keep your hot drinks hot and your cold drinks cold and leave your precious hand the perfect hand temperature while you drink.
Crafty Book Review: Mason Jar Crafts, by Lauren Elise Donaldson
Mason jars aren’t just for canning!
But perhaps you knew that already? Perhaps you, too, drink frosty beverages out of your Mason jars, or fill them with water and wildflowers and plop them in the center of your table? Perhaps you decorate their lids and store buttons in them?
Perhaps you sometimes get a little crafty with them, hmm?
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How-to: Painted Stones
Stones are completely beautiful in themselves, but sometimes you just feel in your heart that you need something with a little more color.
And that’s okay! Maybe sometimes a plain old grey stone WANTS to be painted, you know?
How-to: Organic Terrycloth Hooded Towel with Applique
There’s nothing like hopping out of the pool and into a comfy, soft, bounteous towel.
But big beach towels are hard for little kids to manage, and that bleached, dyed terrycloth can be scratchy and harsh on damp, delicate skin.
It’s an organic terrycloth hooded towel to the rescue!
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