Old Children's Book Puppets

My Son has never met a book that he hasn't destroyed. It makes it a little hard to read him bed time stories. I decided to make puppets out of the characters of the books and use them in the story telling process instead of the book.

 These are the materials I used:     A few torn up books, felt, BBQ skewers, scissors.

Cut out the characters from the book you would like to make into puppets.     Cover the back of the cut out with Elmer's glue and stick the skewer in the middle. A Popsicle stick works the best, but didn't have any  in the house.

Turn the cut outs so they glue side is on the felt. Give the glue a few hours to dry completely and then cut the puppets out with the felt backing.

Tin Can Bird Feeder

Hand Crafted Ear Warmers

Making your old stained white shirt KICK ASS

I have a drawer full of once white shirts that I have kept for over the years. Most of them are now discolored or stained. They are most still in good condition and don't have the heart to throw them away, but also won't wear them in public because of the stains. In the spirit of up cycling, I have dyed a few and now wear them all the time again. I'm sure there is a millions ways of dying fabric, but this is what I did. 

Materials:



 Old white shirts and Dylon Fabric Dye and Liquid Rit Fabric Dye and plastic container

 I put the shirts under the sink and got them wet. Wring out the shirt because you don't want water and dye dripping every where.

Lay the we shirt on top of a town and sprinkle some of the Dylon Fabric Dye powder dye where ever you see fit.The top blue color ocean blue and the lower part of the shirt has pine cone brown sprinkled on it.

This shirt I just sprinkled on ocean blue Dylon Fabric Dye

I let those sit like that for about 10 minutes and then moved to the Rit Liquid Fabric Dye

Just to be up front, I didn't follow the mixing directions for the liquid dye. I put a couple of cups of hot water, couple pinches or salt, and about a 3rd cup of dye.

After putting the shirts in the liquid dye, I actually poured straight  Rit Dye in a few places to make a stronger color come out.

Threw the whole container, dye, shirt and all in the micro wave and cooked them for 2  minutes.

After I microwaved them, I pull them out and let them sit for an hour or two then take the shirts out and try to rinse out the the dye that isn't stuck to the fabric fiber.

At this point, I put them in the washing machine with laundry detergent, wash and dry, then wear.





I have used this same method to dye muslin in the past for quilting and other projects and it works amazing. Here are some pictures of my Muslin dye projects.

Front Porch Light Toothbrush holder

Printer Paper Tile Flooring

I've seen a lot of people use brown paper as flooring, so I wondered if I could make paper tiles and make it work as well. It does work.

What I used: Large bowel, Elmer's glue, ream of printer paper, acrylic paint, sponge brushed, and poly sealer.


Painted the sheets of paper with acrylic paint. For this specific tiles I used chocolate brown and light blue which made a predominantly grey color.

Keep in mind that the dry painted paper tiles will look duller than they will after you have finished the process of the floor.

So after your painted paper is totally dry stack them up. Get a large bowl and fill it with half water half Elmer's glue.  (Pre-clean the surface you are going to glue the paper to.)

Do this one sheet of paper at a time because they will stick together in the bowl. Crunch up the paper and dip it into the glue mix. Just long enough to get the front and back wet, to long and the paper will fall apart. 

I did a couple rows at a time. It was easier to keep my son out them. This is what it looks like when you child runs on the paper tiles before the glue mixture drys. 

This was easy to fix. I just scraped the left two paper tiles of and replaced them new ones.

After the glue mixture drys, throw few coats of polyurethane over the paper tiles. I was able to walk on the tiles only after one coat, but I actually did 5 coats so the tables and chairs wouldn't damage the paper. I loved this whole experience. I did my kitchen for under $30.00. 

Up Cycled Kids Costume

My kid wants to be a different personality every hour. He goes from a ninja to a pirate to a robot. I thought if I could make item of dress up clothing that would work for a couple of different characters it would save me time and money.  

I found an old shirt I've had for about ten years and have up cycled it into a ninja/pirate dress up shirt for my son.

Cut off the arms of the shirt and make a cut straight down the middle to make it look like a vest. Then cut part of the bottom of the shirt to a length that fits the child the best.

 I used a piece of fabric I had to make the black edges around the shirt was cut. It was ironed so it would be  easier to sew on.

This is what it looked like when I was done sewing on the fabric

This is a pirate belt I made from felt. There is a small piece of Velcro on the backside of the buckle to attach the buckled to the other end of the belt. Felt attaches great to Velcro. 

 The material I used made it look more ninja than pirate, but a four year old really doesn't mind that to much.