I'm a writer, crafter, Zombie Preparedness Planner, and homeschooling momma of two kids who will hopefully someday transition into using their genius for good, not the evil machinations and mess-making in which they currently indulge. I'm interested in recycling and nature crafts, food security, STEM education, and the DIY lifestyle, however it's manifested--making myself some underwear out of T-shirts? Done it. Teaching myself guitar? Doing it right now. Visit my blog Craft Knife for a peek at our very weird handmade homeschool life, and my etsy shop Pumpkin+Bear for a truly odd number of rainbow-themed beeswax pretties.
Thrill a kid in your life by building them something huge out of cardboard. All you need is a collection of cardboard boxes and a lot of imagination!
Cardboard Constructions for Kids: Bigger Projects to Make Using More Upcycled Cardboard Read More 👉
Did YOU win a recycled snap book? Read on and let’s see!
Announcing the Winner of the Full Circle Crafts Giveaway Read More 👉
Full Circle Crafts is giving away a set of eco-friendly craft supplies to TWO lucky winners!
Giveaway! Win One of Two Sets of Eco-Friendly Craft Supplies from Full Circle Crafts Read More 👉
I’ll show you how we made our restaurant book using the eco-friendly supplies given to us by Full Circle Crafts, and–best yet–tell you how you can enter a giveaway to win even more Full Circle Crafts supplies.
Would you like to sew a quilt using only your fabric scraps that are so small that any normal crafter would toss them in the trash?
You bet you would!
How-to: Sew a Postage Stamp Quilt from Small Fabric Scraps Read More 👉
Kids love to play Memory! Here are a ton of handmade memory games that you can craft using sustainable supplies.
Handmade Memory Games Crafted from Sustainable Supplies Read More 👉
Directional fabrics, including children’s novelty sheets, require a slightly different, and only a little more complicated, method to sew a circle skirt with nothing upside-down.
Here’s how to make your kid a circle skirt where Charlie Brown ALWAYS faces the right way.
How to Sew a Circle Skirt from a Kid’s Bed Sheet (or other Directional Fabric) Read More 👉
Need something sustainably fashionable for that next big event, formal occasion, or fashion show fundraiser? Here’s how I sewed a formal dress for my daughter to model in our town’s Trashion/Refashion Show–from bloomers to bodice, it was created entirely from one silk sheet.
A Child’s Formal Dress Sewn from an Upcycled Silk Sheet Read More 👉
Using nothing but wire hangers, hot glue, and duct tape, I created a hoop skirt. Here’s how:
How-to: A Hoop Skirt Made from Wire Hangers Read More 👉
Like everything else handmade, handmade makeup is the way to go when you want something just a little different from what everybody else has.
Do I really need to tell you WHY I want to draw on rocks? Or wood? Or seashells? Just think up a reason that makes sense, and pretend that’s why.
Use Faber-Castell Pitt Pens to Draw on Wood, Rocks, and Shells Read More 👉
Scrapbooking chipboard is really easy to repaint and embellish. Here’s how I did it.
How-to: Remake Scrapbooking Chipboard Read More 👉
Play the guitar? Use a guitar pick? Ever wanted to make your own?
You can!
Review: The Pick Punch for Making DIY Guitar Picks Read More 👉
Need some sparkle? DIY body glitter takes just seconds to make, is perfectly customizable, and works even better than expensive, store-bought body glitter with freaky ingredients.
And, by using the secret ingredient that you probably already have in your cupboard as the base agent, your body glitter not only won’t be freaky, but will actually be healthy for your skin.
How-to: DIY Body Glitter from Healthy Ingredients Read More 👉
Your kiddos can create one handmade Valentine from just two perfectly fitting jigsaw pieces. Give them most of a box, and they can make all the Valentines for their class party. It’s a fun upcycling project that won’t cost you a cent.
How-to: Kid-Made Puzzle Piece Valentine Read More 👉
Have a jigsaw puzzle with missing pieces? You totally do!
Crafts to Make with Puzzle Pieces Read More 👉
I need all my stuff to be crazy awesome (or just crazy!), so I like to pretty up my thrifted dishes using the most simple, most brilliant craft supply that you’ve ever heard of: ceramics markers.
How-to: Refurbish Thrifted Dishes with Ceramics Markers Read More 👉
Seed starters made from food scraps are even more economical than recycled seedling pots–you’ve got to eat even more than you’ve got to read the newspaper!–and even better for your garden, because all those eggshell seedling pots, orange peel seedling pots, and pumpkin shell seedling pots? That’s compost, right where your garden needs it the most.
Here’s a selection of food scrap seed starters–no matter where your tastes lie, you’ll find something here to eat and then plant.
How-to: Start Seedlings in Food Scrap Containers Read More 👉
Black clothing is the hardest clothing to maintain, because it’s so vulnerable to fading. Even red clothes fade more gracefully than black! Here’s how to use black fabric dye to refresh your faded black clothing.
How to Refresh Black Clothing with Fabric Dye Read More 👉
Here’s the easy way to mend tears in your jeans.
How-to: Mend Ripped Jeans Read More 👉
Kids love to make their own jewelry, and these pendants, crafted from upcycled cardboard, are especially fun to create and wear. The pendants cost no money, slip easily inside a letter to a pen pal, and, if the kid gets tired of wearing them, can be tossed right back into the recycling bin.
How-to: Kid-Made Recycled Cardboard Pendants Read More 👉
Beeswax cut-outs take seconds to make, and can be used to decorate candles (even boring store-bought ones!), make candles of their own, or just hang out in your house and look pretty.
How-to: Make Beeswax Cut-outs to Decorate Candles (or Your House) Read More 👉
Colorful building blocks made out of ice are an inviting toy any time of year, but they take on added interest in the winter. They’re easy to make out of a variety of stash and upcycled containers, and everyone will enjoy using them to build outdoor structures that, if it’s below freezing outside, will actually stick around long enough to be played with over and over again.
How-to: Ice Building Blocks for Outdoor Play Read More 👉
Solid lotion contains all the ingredients that are really good for you, like coconut oil and shea butter, but none of the artificial ingredients that make it squeezable through a plastic bottle. A solid lotion bar just sits on your dresser looking pretty until you need it, and then melts with your body heat into your skin right where you want it.
Store-bought solid lotion bars can be REALLY expensive, but DIY solid lotion is an easy homemade project–all you have to do is melt, stir, and pour!
How-to: Homemade Solid Body Lotion for Natural Skin Care Read More 👉
Want to snazz up your pine cones, AND keep them forever?
Here are three different easy methods for making your own dipped pine cones – they’re gorgeous, they may even match your wall colors, and you can keep them just about indefinitely. Even better? Pine cones are free! Just head out to your back yard or to the park with the kids and a basket and collect those natural craft supplies to your hearts’ content!
Decorative Dipped Pinecones: Three Methods Read More 👉
Store-bought wrapping paper offends me for a lot of reasons–the wasted money, the wasted resources, the energy misspent on buying ephemeral window dressing instead of focusing on family time.
And yet brown paper bags and sheets of newspaper, the go-to gift wrap for the thrifty and eco-minded, aren’t so much…well…cute.
To solve the cuteness dilemma, I spent a lot of effort decorating my first several packages with various upcycled materials and stash components. And then…
…I did something different.
Yes, I DID Wrap All of My Christmas Presents in Newspaper and Brown Paper Bags Read More 👉
Worried that in twenty years you’ll have trouble remembering what it was that your little kid wanted more than anything else for Christmas this year?
Record their wish lists for posterity with an ornament!
Cinnamon dough is as easy to make (and as fun play with!) as play dough, and the ornaments that you can make with cinnamon dough are both sturdy and sweet-smelling.
How-to: Cinnamon Dough Ornaments that Smell Delicious and Last Forever Read More 👉
My kids LOVE to make ice cream in their Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker. But is it worth the fuss?
Depends.
Review: DIY Ice Cream with the Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker Read More 👉
Here’s how to turn yesterday’s newspaper into a temporary toy that your kids will love using to increase their spatial reasoning abilities.
How-to: Build Newspaper Structures with Your Kids–It’s a Toy that You Can Recycle! Read More 👉
If you’re fond of making rolled beeswax candles (it’s an easy, fun, kid-friendly craft, and beeswax candles are much healthier than store-bought, petroleum-based candles), then you’ve had to answer the following question:
Where on earth do you BUY those honeycomb beeswax sheets?!?
Honeycomb beeswax sheets are rarely found at local, indie crafts stores (although you can request that they be stocked), rarely found at big-box crafts stores, rarely found at the honey farm booth at your neighborhood farmer’s marker.
I buy my honeycomb beeswax sheets online from Knorr Beeswax, and here’s what I think of them.
Review: Rolled Beeswax Honeycomb Sheets from Knorr Beeswax Read More 👉
A roller shade is easy to repair. Replacing the torn section with fabric won’t hinder the shade’s performance, and considering how roller shades are about the cheapest and most crappy-looking window covering available, anyway, the repair will actually vastly improve the overall look of the entire window treatment.
Here’s how to repair a torn roller shade with fabric that you already own, making it look even better than it did when you first bought it.
How-to: Repair a Roller Shade with Fabric Read More 👉
Eco-friendly containers, made either from natural or recycled materials, make great indoor planters. They’re cheap, they’re customizable for whatever spot you want to put them in, and in May, when I’m raring to get back into my outdoor gardens, they can go right back into the recycling or compost bins.
Read on for ideas to create your own eco-friendly indoor planters.
Wool sweaters, cotton sweaters, and even acrylic sweaters–there’s a place for all of these in a crafty Christmas!
You lucky ducks who’ve had feet upon feet of snow already probably don’t care, but I’ve been desperately staving off the whining for snow in my house with tons of snowflake crafts. If you, too, feel the need to get your DIY snowflake craft on, here are several crafty tutorials to get you started.
And, because a snowflake that harms the environment is a pretty darned poor snowflake, all of the crafty snowflakes below are made from primarily eco-friendly ingredients.
Snow that Won’t Melt: DIY Snowflakes Crafted from Eco-Friendly Materials Read More 👉
You want to make a Christmas tree ornament out of natural materials? Check out my epic round-up below–from pine cones to beeswax, popcorn to acorns, if it’s been hung on a Christmas tree, then it’s here!
Christmas Tree Ornaments Crafted from Natural Materials: The Epic Round-up Read More 👉
