First up: my favorite pair of jeans. My dancing jeans. The jeans I hemmed with bias tape. The jeans that I wear most often when I carry my sketchbook around in my back pocket. The jeans with the two huge, gaping holes in the back pocket. Hurry and go dig out your favorite pair of jeans with the hole in the back pocket, because we are about to mend it....
Normally we buy yarn in order to make sweaters. Did you know you can also do it the other way around? Ashley Martineau started knitting and quickly found that it can become an expensive hobby. To feed her addiction, she started unraveling sweaters from thrift stores and reusing the yarn. When she perfected her technique, she was generous enough to share her knowledge with other crafters. Ashley’s Recycled Yarn Tutorial has everything you need to know as you’re eyeing the sweater racks at your local resale shop....
Don’t waste your money shopping for Thanksgiving decorations, centerpieces, and fun activities, not when you can make so many recycled Thanksgiving crafts to decorate your table! Whether you want some festive decor, are hosting the big holiday dinner, or have kids who are eager for handprint turkeys, you’ll find something fun–and upcycled!–in the project list below: 1. beer bottle centerpiece. You were going to drink those beers anyway–might as well upcycle the bottles!...
Vintage doorknobs make beautiful jewelry holders. They used to be a dime a dozen (literally), so with a little bit of searching, you should be able to find just the vintage style to suit you (if not, decoupage pictures of the Avengers on them!). Doorknobs are gentler on hanging necklaces than, say, a hook driven into the wall, but there are still pieces of jewelry that shouldn’t be stored hanging....
Can you believe how quickly April is flying by? The deadline to enter this month’s showcase is April 28th, so head on over to the Showcase page to enter today! We’ll feature our favorite entries on the first Friday in May. We’ve got some great projects rolling in already, and I can’t wait to see all of the awesome eco-friendly tutorials that you guys have to share. You can check out last month’s showcase right here....
A sailors valentine is a traditional form of shell craft, and they’re not just for mid-February! They were most popular back in the 1800s, when they made a pretty darn good souvenir for sailors to bring back to their loved ones from those exotic islands that they voyaged to. Today, they’re mostly the provenance of nautical-themed museums and certain fine artisans…and me! Sailors valentines can be profoundly intricate, with elaborate composition and loads of detail....
I think you should! An eco-friendly wedding is worth the effort that it takes to dodge all of the fast fashions and wasted resources that it’s so easy to settle for when planning such an important–and stressful!–event. Utilizing fast fashion and wasting resources are deceptively easy, and planning a wedding is so deceptively hard that you might find yourself getting sucked into making anti-environmental choices just as a default, or because you’re diverting so much mental energy into so many outlets....
As we all know, thrift stores are a never ending source of materials and inspiration for our crafts! I’m always on the lookout for interesting fabrics, embroidery hoops, thread, and odds and ends that don’t always have an obvious crafty purpose- like a napkin ring! On a recent outing to one of my favorite thrift shops I discovered a bag with a copious amount of fabric squares, probably for quilting....
Today, felt is a cheap material that comes in many colors. Mostly used for kids crafts and plushes, not all craft felt found in big box craft stores are 100% wool. Most are made of some synthetic fiber blend such as acrylic or polyester. So what to do when you want to use felt in your projects and not use fiber made from plastic? There are several options to green your craft project and feel good about your materials:...
I absolutely loved going through all of the wonderful projects that were linked up to our Green Crafts Showcase this month! Remember, we will be hosting the Green Crafts Showcase every month, so be sure to link up your projects! With all of that said, here are the top 10 projects we’ve chosen for the month of March (in no particular order): 1. Wine Cork Bird House by EcoScrapbook Save all of your wine corks to make this adorable bird house from Danielle at EcoScrapbook!...
Next in my Top 5 series, I’ll be bringing you the top crochet books available in print. Until then, enjoy this much-researched list on the wonderful world of knitting. Feel like something is missing? Leave a comment with your favorite knitting book and why you’ve referenced it so many times that the pages are falling out. When it comes to knitting, wool yarn is king. I find it far too itchy to wear and was very disappointed when I knitted my first scarf from organic wool and couldn’t even wear it....
Every year on Valentine’s Day I receive some of these yummy chocolates, as I’m sure most people do too (or I shamefully buy them for myself!). Once the chocolates are gone, though, the average person would think these cute boxes don’t really have a purpose. However, if you have a crafty, eco-friendly mind like me, these adorable hearts can have new life! What did I do? I created awesome wall art!...
Low VOC spray paint School glue. If you can, use ecoglue. Recycled paper Scissors A pencil How To Do It: Spray paint your Altoids tin. Trace the Altoids tin on the recycled paper. Then, cut it out. Write “Dad” in the center of the paper in bubble letters and cut it out. Mix your school glue with a little bit of water (just like I did in the original Altoids tin tutorial)....
Caron yarns has a new entry into our yarn vernacular called Simply Soft Eco. Simply Soft Eco is similar to Caron’s other yarns made from acrylic, but contains 20% of recycled PET content. If you recall PET is plastic water or soda bottles and is popping up in recycled form in various places such as EcoFelt, fabric blends, clothing, bags, and even boats! What I find really wonderful about this yarn is that it has recycled content, a huge selection of colors and that it is available in big box stores – great for when you don’t have access to a small indie shop....
Coming in the middle of winter as Valentine’s Day does, it’s a time during which you may find yourself starved for nature–I mean, you can tromp around the woods just as well in winter as in spring, but when your toes get numb, you have to go inside, you know? Valentine’s Day is a great time, then, to indulge in some sweet nature crafts. The Valentine’s Day nature crafts in the list below make great decorations and wonderful gifts, and they all include natural materials....
Dig into that trash and recycle bin with these creative garden recycling ideas! Winter is the perfect time to start preparing the garden for spring. It’s also the perfect time to start diverting items from the trash and recycling bins to reuse in your garden. Let’s take a look at the biggest contributors to home waste and how garden recycling might be appropriate for them. Food Packaging Many packaging materials are perfect for garden recycling....
Pine cones are particularly fun to collect and craft with, especially if you spend the time to case your neighborhood or town to look for different varieties. When my kiddos were small, we’d spend a whole day on this adventure, and then do all kinds of kid crafts with them all year. Now that they’re teenagers, we still get excited to pick up pine cones, although we mostly use them for seasonal crafts....
1. Stick and Baubles Toy This toy, found on Craftzine, is a great way to use little bits of things from around the house. Cats love any object they can bat at, just make sure that everything is secure so that there are no choking hazards. 2. No-Sew Cat Knot Sparklecat has this great video showing us how to make a cat nip toy using scrap pieces of fleece. Since you can whip up tons of these in no time, these would make a great donation to your local cat shelter this holiday season....
My kid is just starting to really be able to do art projects. At two, he’s finally learning that paint and crayons are for making art, not for eating. It’s like this whole world of art projects for kids is opening up to us. These are some of the natural and recycled art projects for kids that I want to try with my guy. Sandy Handprint – This is on my to do list while we’re at the beach this summer for sure!...
Green Crafts for Children: 35 Step-by-Step Projects Using Natural, Recycled, And Found Materials is full of cute, whimsical and super adorable crafts that kids, especially little girls, are going to love. The projects in this book can be made from items you may have in your cupboard, lying around the house, or even in your yard like nuts, pine cones, and tree bark. There are recipes for salt dough and the cutest play fruit, letter, beads and tea set projects to make from it, there’s also paper mache projects, yarn and wool projects, fabric and tissue paper flowers, and one of my personal favorites- glove creatures....
