Make Your Own Baby Wipes

Yep...I bought into the fad idea of making my own wipes.  Mainly because we didn't renew our Sam's Club membership (I loved their wipes) and the cheapy Walmart brand seemed to cause more diaper rashes.  Here is the formula I use and prescribe to.

Materials:
- Roll of paper towels (I like the select-a-size ones); each roll makes two.
- 1 Tbsp Baby oil
- 2  Tbsp Baby wash (I use Aveno due to a sensitive skin kiddo)
- 2 cups water
- Lavender essential oil - just a few drops **I added this on later as I found one girl was getting rashy/yeasty somewhat frequently...Lavender oil is an anti-fungal oil and is also gentle for babies skin.  It has done the trick; and no I'm not a hippy haha**
- container (I love my Sterilite ultra seal container found here)
- cheap steak knife (I bought some at the $1 store with jagged edge/teeth to save my good knives)

Cut your paper towel in half.  One half of a paper towel fits perfectly in the Sterilite container linked above.  I don't remember the exact measurements on baby wash and oil (and I just guess when I make them now anyway) but I do recall it is more baby wash than baby oil.  I mix up my water, oil and wash (if you're container seals tight enough shaking is great) then submerge your paper towel, put the lid on and immediately flip over.  Add small amount of water if need to wet missed parts.  Remove your tubing once it is wet and pull wipes from the middle.

Free Craft Friday -- Wire Accessory Organizer

I was cleaning out junk for selling our house when I came across my old wire cube storage.  About the time that the wire hit the bottom of my outside trash can the idea of turning them into this occurred to me instead.  I dug it out (yep I dumpster dove in my own trash can) and got to work.

Materials

-Wire cube (one side piece no extras)

-Ribbon

-glue gun

-scissors

-lighter

*I made this for FREE but I'm quoting under $5 to include cost of ribbon.

Step 1.  Arrange a pattern either in your mind or on the wire cube that you want to follow with your ribbon.  Don't worry about pre-cutting ribbon...do this as you go.

Step 2.  Loop your ribbon around the back of wire cube and hot glue to the back of ribbon.  Then proceed to weave your ribbon through the wire until you get to the opposite side.  Pull ribbon tight and wrap it around the wire and got glue to the back again.

*I promise pictures are coming;  my laptop crashed a while back and I think these pictures (done before the holidays) went with it.

Step 3.  Continue with your pattern by repeating step 2 until it is complete.  Then mount on the wall with a couple nails in the corners and you're done.  Decorate with hair clips (alligator work best but I've hung snap  types over the ribbon also--unsnapped of course)

The Difference is Paint...

Not much of a post but I'm quite happy with the result so I'm sharing.  We recently took on the weekend project of painting our master closet.  When we bought the home it was a dark brown...I think the previous owners were going for a "wood look" sans the nice look.  Anyway after 3 years (plus) of living here and the recent listing of our home to live somewhere else (we aren't loving our house plan or lot now with kids in the picture)...it came time to make a change.  A change I wish we would have made 3 years ago.

My side / shared side of the closet pre-painting (please ignore the mess)

Husband's side of the closet pre-paint

Post-paint job miracle...yeah! I love our closet now

Husband's side post-paint job (still needs organizing again)

Free Craft Friday -- Gripper Socks

In theory these look like a great idea right?  I thought so too.  Our one-year old twins are up and cruising but socks cause slipping.  And laminate floor causes cold toes.  And I didn't want to buy a bunch of socks with gripping.  So I bought some puff paint ($1 a bottle) and put these together.  Maybe if I had older kids they could comment as to the effectiveness but I can't tell the difference beyond them becoming more sure footed.  But they were fun to make and a cute touch.

Free Craft Friday -- Tomato Cage Topiary

I saw variations of this on pinterest.com with very little help in the matter of how to make one.  So most of this is me winging it but I thought I'd share how I did it.

Tomato Cage Topiary / Christmas Tree

Materials:
-tomato cage (I think mine are 4 ft)
-wire or wire clothes hangers (I tried to do mine on the absolute cheap)
-pliers
-wire cutters (somewhat optional; I didn't use mine)

*under $10 including cost of lights and tomato cage (I believe); cheaper or FREE if you have either on hand.

Step 1.  Turn your tomato cage upside down and secure the legs together in a point using the wire/hanger.  I tried hemp tie at first so ignore that part.

If your tomato cage is like mine there it too much space between the wire to have a nice rounded shape when wrapped in garland or lights.  It comes off looking more like a triangle than a "tree".

Step 2. Keep you tomato cage upside down.  Unwind you wire hanger and straighten it out.  Place your wire/hanger in between two cage wires to fill in space.  Put your wire on the outside of the tomato cage wire to help strength it and keep its shape when wrapped with garland or lights.

Step 3.  Using the top wire (holding the legs together) hook your wire/hanger over it.  In order to use one hanger for the height of the "tree" this hook was rather small made by bending it over itself with the pliers, placing it over the wrapped wire and then pinching it closed with the pliers.

Step 4.  Stretch the wire to the bottom rung wire of your cage and then loop it over like the top and pinch it shut with pliers.

Step 5.  Repeat steps 2 through 4 to fill in the other spaces around the "tree".

Finished cage/"tree" should look something like this; the top swirl wire is just my excess from wiring the legs together.  Click on the picture to enlarge it if this helps.

Step 6.  If you do place it into a pot or on the ground it never hurts to secure it.  This could be done with little stakes or even bent pieces of hanger looped over the bottom wire and stuck into the ground. 

Don't love this picture.  I think they look better in person but maybe I'm a little biased.

I wrapped lights around mine but you could also use garland and other decorations.  I think next year I may try a combination of lights and garland.

* I also saw instructions on how you can use this for ivy plants or other vine growing plants in the summer.  Awesome!

If you happen to use this tutorial or link to it I'd love to know.  Please leave a comment.  Thanks!

Free Craft Friday -- Tea Dyed Onsie or Shirt

*I heard about tea dying through a Pinterest pin and loved the idea and decided a little interchangeable flower would be the perfect finishing touch*

Materials:

-new pre-washed onsie or shirt (used onsies or shirts will cause uneven dying; I tried this first and had darker stain around drool prone spots)

-Black Tea (I also tried Koolaid and Green Tea...Black seemed to work best)

-Lace or embellishments

-needle and thread or sewing machine

-bowl and boiling hot water

Step 1 : Boil water and place tea bags into water.  I used about 4 cups of water and 4 tea bags.  Let the tea soak and stir it to mix evenly.

Step 2 :  Soak your onsie in the tea-water.  I left my tea bags in.  It may work better for even color to take them out.

Step 3 :  Wring out minimally and air dry onsie.  Once it is air dried then wash and dry it in the laundry.

Step 4:  Lay out lace embellishment over the shirt.  Cut extra length on both sides.  For some reason my lace ran shorter as I sewed it on (I'm sure a pro sewer could tell you why)

Step 5:  Pin the lace loosely down on the garment to keep it in place.  Sew the lace down.  I used the thicker trim of my lace to hide the thread and only sewed the top edge.

*hopefully you should have a little excess lace on both edges of the garment like this*

Step 6:  Sew the hanging lace down into the seam of the onsie.  Make sure you don't catch under-layers of the onsie when doing this.

Step 7:  Trim off the excess lace.  Repeat steps 4 - 7 to add layers of lace if desired.

Step 8 (optional):  Sew on a loop to attach embellishments to.  I used an alligator hair clip that I use with flower headbands to gauge the width of the thread loop.  I then sewed over it 5 or 6 times to make a secure loop to attach embellishments to.  Tie this off on the inside of the garment.

 *finished shirt with lace and loop.  The thread loop somewhat blends in also so you don't have to attach anything if you chose*

Free Craft Friday -- Crochet Scarf

*I suppose I should stipulate now that Free Craft Friday is basically a free pattern...not completely free;  although I like to keep my crafts on the inexpensive side*

Late one night this past week as we were watching TV and I was sitting next to my craft pile (you know the mess on the couch with fabric, notions, glue sticks, yarn and such) I decided it was time to put my yarn to work. My friend who is a crochet master is going to teach me to crochet and read patterns.  But in the meantime I have colorful yarn tempting my hands.  So onto YouTube I search for the easiest tutorial out there.  Found one here, here and here.  And then this happened....

This one is small because it's for my girls but super easy to make  longer/wider

She's trying to be a good model

Nope it's nothing spectacular.  It's definitely a learning project.  But if you don't know how to crochet have no fear YouTube is here (this could be true of many crafts and projects).

Free Craft Friday -- Silk Flower Accessory

* can be used as embellishments on outfits, bags and hair clips...think of the possibilities*

Refabulous' tutorial found here.  These are so much easier than I pictured them being when I saw them in peoples hair and at the stores.  Definitely going to make more of these in the future.  Awesome and easy project.

Materials needed :
-satin or silky type materials (I used what they called "costume satin"...cheaper satin)
-scissors
-candle
-emergency water
-clothes pin
-beads, buttons or jewels (for the middle)
-hair clips
-adhesive glue or glue gun

1. Cut circles from your fabric.  Cut different sizes and colors if you want to mix it up.  They don't need to be perfect circles.  I think it looks just a good (maybe better) when they aren't.

2. Place fabric in clothes pin and skim the edges next to the flame (not too close so it doesn't catch fire).  I held mine so that they drooped in the way I wanted it to curl.

3. Stack your singed circles.  Start with bigger circles and go to smaller.  I like the idea of mixing colors found on the tutorials also.  

4. Sew a few stitches in the middle to hold it together.  I sewed my first bead on with this stitch to save some time.

4.  Apply to your hair clip or bobby pin or other attachment.  Enjoy.

*Be extra cautious as this project does involve an open flame.  Avoid children, pets and anything else dear to you in the process.  Always have water on hand and don't hold material into the flame*