How to make a SnowMan

Hi again! Today's project is a SnowMan. there are several ways you could make a simple Snowman. If you are not a sewing person, I'd suggest going to a Hobby Lobby or other craft store and purchasing the different sized white Styrofoam balls and making your snow man out of that. All you'd have to do is glue those together and you'd have your basic body for your snowman. I enjoy recycling stuff instead of buying things, so in this how to I'm going to show you how to make a snow man out of a old white piece of cloth. This material could be a old blanket, shirt, scarf, etc. It doesn't matter. If you wanted you really could use any color or material for your Snowman. It's yours so you make it how you like it.

For this project you'll need:

• Glue Gun
• Glue Sticks
• White fabric or some kind.
• Pipe Cleaners
• Buttons
• Needle and Thread
• Stuffing
  

So your going to start by taking your material and cutting on three different size circles like I did in the picture below. I made my bottom circle a bit bigger to steady my snowman so he doesn't fall over.
Once you have three circles cut out, take your bottom (biggest) circle and run the thread through it like the picture below. Once your done, it should look kinda like a lil pouch. You should be able to pull on the thread and the "bag" should scrunch up. Now your going to add the stuffing in to it. Make sure you add just enough to where it fills out but not to much that you can't close it. I also added some of my white fabric scraps to the inside of the bottom circle so it would be heavier on the bottom.

Once you've done this to all three of your circles, you can stack and sew them together like this. If your sewing isn't great you can always reinforce this by adding a bit of glue inbetween the balls and holding them together. Now you can add decorations. This part is just you added what you like. Take some buttons and hot glue them to the front. I always use pipe cleaners for the arms. And could give him a hat or antlers. Orange pipe cleaners are perfect for a carrot nose. You can even grab some other scrap fabric and make him some clothes. It's totally up to your imagination.

This is the one my daughter and I made last night.

So I hope this helps anyone out there. I'll probably not post anything for the Thanksgiving Holiday because I'm going out of town so Happy Thanksgiving to you all!

Just an Update

This post is just a entry about my cloth diaper adventure thus far. I've tried several different kinds now and so far my favorites are the G Diapers, just because of how easy they are to use, and I can reuse them without washing them. I have several Bum Genius's which are my 2nd favorite and I also have one Bum Genius cover which I also LOVE. And 3rd would be just a regular prefold with a snappy/cover. Since I was just getting use to cloth diapering I haven't been using one at night for changing because I wasn't sure about it, so I told myself I'd wait until he ran out of disposables to use the cloth ones over night. And he ran out of his pampers two days ago sooo for the past two nights I've been using my Bum Genius over night. Though G Diapers are my fav, I wouldn't recommend them for over night use just because they tend to link more then the bum's do. But so far they haven't been any harder then changing a pamper at night.

We don't have a washer/dryer in our house which does make it harder to cloth diaper, but not impossible. I've found several web sites that can give you tips on how to wash them without washer dryer. So usually what I'll do is fill up a wash board bucket I have around the house here, with some of my detergent. I use the Gain "Free" on my diapers. And a little bit of tea tree oil. Then I just let them soak a while, scrub them and then rinse them out and hang dry them. It's not really that hard. Then when we do our laundry, which is twice a week, I'll take all of them and machine wash them.

We are going on our first road trip on Wed. which is going to be about a 4 hour drive there and we will be staying for a few days. I was a little nervous about taking a trip with the cloth, but my mom's house has a washer dryer hook up so it shouldn't be too hard. I've also watched a few videos on tips for traveling with cloth and I went out and purchased a few more diapers just to have extras for our trip.

So it was hard at first because I had no idea what I was doing. If you are thinking of trying it don't give up because once you get the hang of it, get a routine to what you are doing it isn't that hard. I'll do a update post on how the trip went with them. :)

How to make a Santa Ornament

Making this type of Santa Ornament requires:

• Glue Gun
• Pipe Cleaners
• A colored Ornament
• White Paint

Ok so you are going to start off by painting the bottom half of your ornament white. So it should only have a red "hat" part left. My advice would be to paint them about an hour or so before you start to glue other wise you'll be blowing to dry them with a kiddo asking if they are dry yet lol. Anyway, after the ornament is dry, spread a light ring of hot glue along the edge of the hat and the what paint. Apply a white pipe cleaner to circle around the ornament to form the ring of the hat.

You will want to pre cut the lil black pipe cleaners to make eyes and a nose.



Now it is as simple as adding the glue and sticking on his two eyes and a nose. After this step you will apply a generous amount of glue along his "chin" and mustache area and using pillow stuffing you can add this to create his beard. I just used some stuffing from a old pillow. And thats it :) Let it dry and you have a little Santa Ornament. This is a really fun project to do with your little ones, my daughter had a great time making these with me and it's something to remember every Christmas when you hang that ornament on your tree. :) Have fun!

How to Make your own Wet Bag!

Hi again! Today I'm going to inform you on how to make a 'wet bag' out of a shower curtain and a zipper :). Yes, a shower curtain!




You'll Need:

• A Shower Curtain
• A Zipper
• Sewing Machine, or you can hand sew if your talented. *I'm not lol.*

You can buy a shower curtain at Walmart or a dollar store pretty cheap. But if you REALLY want to save money you can go to the Dollar Tree and buy one for $1.00. I bought two for this project because I double layered the bag but you could use only one.
In this how two I'm going to be showing you how to make this bag with two layers for double wet protection lol. So to start you will lay both curtains flat on the carpet or floor. What I did to make this easier on myself because I had kids jumping on them is if you know around how big you want your bag, cut the curtains in half or even cut that half in half and you can fold the rest up or let your kids build a fort or something out of it to keep them busy while you do this hah. So to measure how wide you'll need your bag your going to lay the zipper on the edge of your curtain. I just stacked the two pieces of shower curtain on top of each other so I would have to cut less. Then starting at one edge of the zipper, you cut down as far as you want. The farther down you cut the deeper the bag will be. Then just cut across for the bottom, and then up and finally meeting the other edge of your zipper. After you have done this you can take one of those squares of curtain and lay that on top of your uncut curtain and cut the next two piece out so they match the size and shape of the squares you just cut. When your done it should look like this:

So after you have four pieces of curtain you will take your "outside peice" or the side you want on the outside of the bag and lay it on top your inside piece. The piece that wont be shown and pin those together with bobby pins. After you have done this to both sets of squares, you'll take one pinned square and align your zipper up. This is about the hardest part of this project because shower curtains are slippery. To make sure you have your out side piece showing, your going to lay the zipper upright under the edge of your square. Then you'll slightly fold the curtain over at the top and pin that to the zipper edge. After your done pinning, you can then sew that piece onto the zipper. Once you get that side done you repeat with the other piece.


When your done it should look like this. Now that's finished fold your squares over on top of each other so the bag looks inside out." Pin the edges together and unzip the top of your bag. Don't forget to UNZIP the bag or you won't be able to turn it out right. Now you just sew these sides together. Should look like this when your done.


So now your going to reach into the zipper and pull the bottom of the bag out through the zipper turning it inside out so the pattern you wanted on the out side will now be showing. Smooth it out with your hand and that's it! Your done! These are great for wet swim suits or towels when you go to the beach. Or wet clothes and diapers from kids when your on the go. I use mine for dirty cloth diapers when I'm on the go. This whole project cost me a total of two dollars because I already had a few zippers and a sewing machine laying around. :) Good luck!

How to get creative with a wipe case!

I'm going to start with this project because its very simple to do and fast.

You'll Need:

• Glue Gun
• Glue Sticks
• Material
• Ribbon
• Wipe Box

OK, you'll start with buying a travel wipe case, or you might already have one laying around. If not, they are really cheap. I bought the one I'm using in the pictures for $1.27 at Walmart. You'll need material, which you can buy from a fabric store, or I even think the dollar store carries just pre cut squares of fabric you could use. I love to reuse everything, so this material was actually a dress my daughter out grow two years ago, and I loved the pattern so I recycled it. It also saves on the cost of material :). To start off you'll lay the case on the material you want and basically what I do is just cut about a inch away from the case around it. So you're square of material will be bigger then the box to start off.

After this your going to get your glue gun and right above where the case shuts together, your going to spread glue along that line and press the end of your material along that line. It doesn't have to be perfectly straight or anything, you will be laying ribbon over it so no one will be able to tell when your done. You'll do this with your material on each side, slightly pulling and stretching the fabric so it obtains that flat look to it. After you finish with the glue, you can trim your excess material away from the box.

Now to add the ribbon, you lay glue along the edge of your fabric and lay the ribbon along the glue and press. Make sure if your using ribbon to scorch the edges so it doesn't fray anywhere. And your done! :)

This is the one I did for my son, those are his initials, which I just added in ribbon because I ran out of iron on's but you could use those as well. Tip: you have to iron them on BEFORE you lay the material on the wipe box or it will melt. I know that sounds obvious but you never know lol.

I hope this helps somebody. I didn't even know that people did this with my first child and once I saw one I had to have one for my son! If done right this project might cost $5-10. It didn't cost me anything because I already had a glue gun, sticks, and ribbon laying around and as I said I recycled the material. Soo good luck! Get crafty!


OUR NEXT POST: How to make a "wet bag" out of a shower curtain :)!

Just Getting Started

Ok, this is my first post. I should be posting later today with my first project I'm going to blog about. I just started this blog as a way to share / receive tips and ideas and various projects. I'll be sharing my crafting projects, tips on how to keep to budget and hopefully I help someone out there or maybe I'll get some help myself :). I'll be back tonight because that's my crafting time lol. After the kids go to bed!