The contest launched today, and they’re looking for nature-inspired pieces created on a sewing machine that integrate “organic elements.” Folks can submit entries for the next four weeks. They’ll select one winner and three runners up. The prizes look pretty awesome: The winner gets a SINGER® Confidence 7467 sewing machine, a set of 3 sewing books, and will have their project featured in the SINGER ad in the next issue of CRAFT Magazine....
My favorite double duty craft is the t-shirt quilt. I readily admit that I love t-shirts, and I buy a lot of them at any given time, which means that I grow out of them pretty quickly. I started saving shirts that I wasn’t going to wear anymore, and instead of chucking them out the door I collected them by theme and color. After a few months of this, I had enough to make a quilt!...
Create Your Own Building Blocks ice blocks. Encourage kids to spend time outdoors in the cold by surprising them with a fun new toy! Use silicone molds or cake pans to freeze a collection of blocks (dye with food coloring for even more fun!). Use milk or juice cartons to create a set of giant blocks for igloo-building! wooden blocks from scratch. Put your woodworking skills–and those fancy tools!–to good use....
Succulents are awesome, aren’t they? Once you establish them, they’re pretty low-maintenance, and though they prefer direct sunlight they will do fine in a sunny window. Their low watering needs make them great little house plants. Of course, you want your house plants to also reflect your green crafty ideals, right? Store-bought planters are cute, but they can be pricey and they’re definitely not as eco-friendly as whipping up a planter from reclaimed materials....
For the first book on our Top 5 Must-Have DIY Crochet Tomes list, most knitters will recognize Debbie Stoller as the editor-in-chief of Bust Magazine and the writer of all three Stitch ‘N Bitch books. Crafters were both surprised and delighted when she released Stitch ‘N Bitch Crochet: The Happy Hooker in 2006. Similar to her first Stitch ‘N Bitch book about knitting, The Happy Hooker is an introduction to the history and process of crochet as well as a kick-ass pattern book....
Drowning in cute, completed coloring book pages? Here’s a fun way to give those pages another life while spreading some joy around. All you need to transform your coloring book pages into fun postcards are: completed coloring book pages. As I’ve probably mentioned before, we photocopy all of our coloring book pages onto cardstock before we color them, but I’ve also made a postcard out of a vintage Archie comic book page, at the bottom of the pic, so that you can see how this method will work even with thin, cheap paper....
Like handmade jewelry? Teeny-tiny Scrabble tiles make perfect pendant blanks. Scrabble tiles are easy to find at any thrift store, and they’re a great size to use as jewelry–small enough not to weigh you down, large enough to hold a fun image. Scrabble tile pendants are quick and fun to make. All you need are a couple of kinds of strong glue, a little paint, some wonderful vintage papers, and a jewelry bail....
Whatever your style, check out some of my favorite homemade Halloween costumes for adults for the tutorial that speaks to you, and then go make yourself into something epic! 1. Claw Machine https://www.instagram.com/p/BaZNnVegyeF/ Any costume that you can make almost entirely out of cardboard boxes is a win to me! 2. Deer My favorite part of this costume is the tree branch antlers. It can be really hard to incorporate natural materials into a homemade costume, so this is a big achievement!...
If you buy eggs, whether it’s from a grocery store or the backyard chicken owner next door, then you’ve got egg cartons to deal with. Whether you reuse egg cartons or recycle them is your choice, but I’m just telling you real quick–there are LOTS of really cool ways to reuse them! 1. Start seeds. I am a huge fan of plantable pots, and if you use a cardboard egg carton, that’s exactly what you can do....
Old books can be an excellent eco-friendly source for paper crafters. Book crafting can also be a bit controversial, so take care when you’re choosing what books you want to cut up and craft with. Are you holding a vintage treasure or a book that might delight someone else from cover to cover? If the book is still usable, you’re better off leaving it at the thrift store for someone else to discover and cherish....
Want to spoil your pup? We’ve got lots DIY gifts for dogs, and they’re all made from recycled materials! We recently began fostering a very sweet dog, and honestly I am obsessed with her. She is a rescue, so she needs a lot of extra TLC, and it’s been super rewarding to watch her come out of her shell. She feels more like part of the family every day, so of course, I want to whip up all kinds of fun, crafty things to deck her out!...
I know that Hallmark super wants all of your money, but just between the two of us, we know that upcycled greeting cards are where it’s at! Seriously, they’re more personal. They’re way more awesome. And they’re free! Whether you’re an avid scrapbooker or a total novice, there is 100% an upcycled greeting card that you will love to make in the list below. Pro tip: Make a few cards at a time whenever you’re in the mood, and then when the next birthday rolls around, you’ll be all set!...
It’s garden season again–yay! Having accidentally left all my plant markers in the garden of my old house (I hope the new owners enjoy them!), I need to make new ones this year, so I thought that I would explore my options. Y’all, there are a LOT of plant marker tutes out there in the world! I’ve confined my results to those that use either natural or recycled materials, obv, but also to those that aren’t so finicky that it would break your heart if a kid stepped on them (better on that then on the plants!...
There’s one bad thing about having kids who sell Girl Scout cookies: Wow, there are a lot of cookie boxes! At one point, I had over 800 boxes of Girl Scout cookies in my house, and along with the consuming compulsion to Cookie Monster them all down, I would occasionally give them a horrified glance and think, “All that cardboard… oh, wow…” Fortunately, Girl Scouts are also a handy bunch, and if you put a Girl Scout and a cookie box (and maybe a hot glue gun and an x-acto knife) in the same room together, that Girl Scout will have figured out some awesome way to upcycle that cookie box by the time you let her out again....
St. Patrick’s Day is a lot of fun, and I think you’re going to love these eco-friendly craft projects perfect for decorating and celebrating the hope that spring is (almost) here: Toilet paper tube shamrock. You know that here at CAGW, we’ve never met a toilet paper tube project that we didn’t love, and this one is no different. A toilet paper tube shamrock is quick and easy to make, and if you don’t already have everything that you need to make it, just wait a couple of days....
The projects below run the gamut from adding some softness or green to urban spaces to brightening the day of a single person. No matter how you slice it, though, these urban beautification projects add some love and whimsy to city life! 8 Crafty Examples of Urban Beautification NCAA Net Works – New Craft Artists in Action is replacing broken basketball hoops in urban areas with handmade, colorful nets that work....
In this corner… wearing Amy Butler print shorts with a felt owl appliqué, weighing in at over 130,000 Craftster.org members: The Invincible Indie Craft Movement! And in the opposite corner… wearing art quilt shorts, weighing in at innumerable pounds of ceramic vases displayed on pedestals: The Fightin’ Fine Crafts Establishment! The exchange began with a conference held by the Society of North American Goldsmiths. Annie, from Imogene, wrote about her experience while attending a lecture entitled “D....
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....
1. Recycled Cat Bed Over at Natural Home Magazine, there’s a great tutorial for turning a broken suitcase into a cat bed. You could take this even further and paint the suitcase or cover it with decorative fabric from your scrap bin before adding the mini mattress. You could also sprinkle a little bit of catnip in the suitcase to get your kitty interested! 2. Fabric Scrap Catnip Toy This is a great project for raiding your scrap bin....
Years of cosmetic use can create a lot of waste. Sure it’s easy to recycle the glass jars and plastic bottles but what about the items that have many materials in them like compacts and lipstick tubes? Most of are made of combinations of glass, metal and plastic. I’ve always found it wasteful to throw away the pretty handheld compacts- the ones with the mirrors. I’ve been brainstorming ways to reuse or upcycle them but have only come up with a few ideas....
