Green Crafts

DIY Valentine’s Day Gift Ideas

January 30, 2018 By Lisa Sharp Leave a Comment This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

Avoid the waste and stress of buying Valentine’s Day gifts and try these eco-friendly, DIY Valentine’s Day gifts instead.

Valentine’s Day is coming up and it can be a day that costs a lot of money and comes with a lot of waste but it doesn’t have to. One way to reduce waste and save money is making your own eco-friendly Valentine’s Day gifts.

There are so many great ideas out there with something for everyone on your list. And homemade gifts come from the heart and can be a lot more special than a store-bought, generic gift.

DIY Valentine’s Day Gift Ideas

Microwaveable Heating Pad from Bren Did
Lavender Bath Bombs from Retro Housewife Goes Green
“Let Love Bloom” Seed Bombs from A Bride on a Budget

Peppermint Shower Bombs from Life Currents
Lollipop Covers from Green Child Magazine
Love Embroidery from Adventures of a DIY Mom

Fabric Treat Cone from Super Mom No Cape
Beard Oil from Retro Housewife Goes Green
Mason Jar Gift for Teachers from Confessions of a Mommyaholic

Chai Vanilla Sugar Scrub from The Rising Spoon
Bird Feeder Hearts from Thrifty Jinxy
Valentine’s Tote from Organized 31

Lavender Bath Soak from Retro Housewife Goes Green
Face Scrub from Mindful Momma
Recycled Love Blocks from Organized 31

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Homemade Christmas Gift Guide

November 16, 2017 By Lisa Sharp 1 Comment This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

Looking for some great homemade Christmas gift ideas? People will love these gifts and they are all eco-friendly.

Christmas is a magical time but sometimes the magic is lost when we are stressed about our budgets and finding gifts. Homemade gifts come from the heart and can save us money. It’s also a great way to reduce waste this holiday season.

There are so many great homemade gift ideas out there, you are sure to find some you would like to make and give this year. All of these ideas can use eco-friendly materials, many can even use upcycled supplies.

Homemade Christmas Gift Guide

Fizzy Peppermint Bath Salt from Retro Housewife Goes Green
Simple Cable Knit Scarf from A Modern Homestead
Upcycled Sweater Cup Sleeve from Organized 31

Cinnamon Ornaments from Strenght and Sunshine
Coffee Bean Ornament from Bren Did
Peppermint Bath Bombs from Retro Housewife Goes Green

Additional Information: 25+ More Homemade Christmas Gifts

Massage Candle from Rebecca Lavender
Beard Oil from Retro Housewife Goes Green
Lemon Sugar Scrub from Savings Lifestyle

Mocha Lip Scrub from Retro Housewife Goes Green
Gingerbread Cookie Scrub from The Pistachio Project
Etched Wooden Spoons from Mindful Momma

Additional Information: 8 Reasons to Shop Locally for the Holidays

Lotion Bars from Utensi
Chocolate Peppermint Lip Balm from Fit as a Mama Bear
Woodsy Cologne Blend from Everblossom

Gingerbread Bath Bombs from The Pistachio Project
Cold Processed Soap from My Homestead Life
Peppermint Vanilla Lip Scrub from Retro Housewife Goes Green

Additional Information: A More Meaningful Holiday Season

Coffee Soap from Beauty Crafter
Candy Cane Room Spray from Retro Housewife Goes Green
Wine Cork Key Chain from A Few Short Cuts

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Recycled Halloween Crafts

October 10, 2017 By Lisa Sharp 2 Comments This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

These recycled Halloween crafts are adoreable and easy to make. Many are easy enough for kids to make.

Looking for some easy Halloween craft projects? We have gathered some great ones that use materials from your recycling bin!

It’s a great way to save on craft supplies and be a bit greener this Hallowen. It’s amazing what you can make with things that were headed to the landfill.

These recycled Halloween crafts are perfect for different ages and skill levels. They would also be fun to do at a school Halloween party.

Recycled Halloween Crafts

Tin Can Bowling from Party Delights Blog
Halloween Night Light from While He Was Napping
Monster Candy Holders from Craftberry Bush

Additional Resource: How to Have an Eco-Friendly Halloween

Halloween Village Luminaries from Oh So Savvy Mom
Halloween Votives from Skip to my Lou
Paper Bag Bowls from The Long Thread

Additional Resource: Have a Greener Halloween

Halloween Craft Stick Puppets from Creative Family Fun
Bread Tag Monsters from Crafts by Amanda
Glass Light Shade Cover Ghosts from Sadie Seasongoods

Additional Resource: Things to Do This Fall in Oklahoma

Hanging Bats from Buggy and Buddy
Frankenstein Upcycled Tin Cans from You Brew My Tea
Flickering Spider Lights from The TipToe Fairy

Start saving up your recycling to use in these great crafts. It’s a great way to upcycle your trash and help the planet.

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Mason Jar Upcycled Crafts

May 18, 2017 By Lisa Sharp Leave a Comment This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

Mason jars come with endless possibilities. Reuse them for food storage or turn them into a beautiful new item that would make a great gift.

mason jar crafts, glass jar crafts, diy mason jars, upcycled

We are learning more and more why we should avoid plastic. With this knowledge comes more glass in our homes. One kind of glass you likely end up with a lot of is mason jars.

While glass recycling is great not all towns offer it and it’s even better to reuse things. Glass is great for reusing because it doesn’t hold on to odors, stain, or break down over time.

Mason jar crafts are becoming very trendy and while you can buy new mason jars it’s even better to use ones you already have on hand. You can make some really cute crafts for yourself or gifts.

Benefits of Upcycling

Recycling is the process which breaks down products so they can be remade into newer consumer products. Many of these products, especially plastics, are lesser quality than the original item.

Upcycling on the other hand is taking a material and turning into something of more value than the original product. This is a great way to extend the life of products and keep them out of our landfills.

Upcycling also requires a lot less energy and resources, in general, than recycling. It really is the best option when it comes to keeping products out of the trash.

Mason Jar Crafts

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Herb Garden from DIY Inspired
Bathroom Organizer from Modern Mom Life
Soy Candles from Something Turquoise

mason jar crafts, glass jar crafts, diy mason jars

Bathroom Storage and Accessories from Mason Jar Crafts
Picture Frame Vase from Home Stories A to Z
Tissue Holder from Landeelu

mason jar crafts, glass jar crafts, diy mason jars

Succulent Planter from Life + Storage
Rustic Wall Sconce from Shelterness
Salt and Pepper Shakers from Landeelu

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Mason Jar Metallic Vase from The Glamorous Housewife
Pet Treat Containers from Bren Did
Mason Jar Mug from Melissa Voigt

mason jar crafts, glass jar crafts, diy mason jars, upcycled

Mercury Glass Jar from AttaGirlSays
Glowing Photo Luminaries from Tip Hero
Snow Globe from It All Started With Paint

More Homemade Gift Ideas

These all would make wonderful gifts. If you are looking for even more gifts to make? Check out these posts.

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Make Your Own Unpaper Towels

May 9, 2013 By Amber Henderson-Bonge Leave a Comment This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

One of the latest green crazes I have noticed around the internet is unpaper towels. Unpaper towels are exactly like paper towels except they are made out of fabric. The fabric used to make them is up to you. Most of the unpaper towels I have seen have a cotton or flannel top layer and a terry cloth bottom layer. The tutorial that I have put together is a nice blend of other tutorials that I have found. The greatest part is that they are easy to make, even for a beginning sewer.

Since I am all about saving money and going green, I thought this would be a great first project for my recently refurbished sewing machine. I will say that I am not a great sewer, but I enjoy making items for our home and my family.

I did not want to spend a lot of money on this project, so for my fabric selections I found 1 ¼ yard of cotton fabric on sale for the top layer of the unpaper towels and repurposed old towels and hand towels for the bottom, absorbent layer. To attach the unpaper towels to one another, you can either use snaps or hook and loop (velcro). Given that I have never done any projects with snaps, I went with hook and loop.

Materials (makes 10 unpaper towels):

Around 1 yard of cotton, flannel, or your choice of fabric
Around 1 yard of terry cloth fabric (I used 1 old towel and 2 old hand towels to get 10)
4 velcro pieces for each unpaper towel – 2 for each side
1 spool of thread in the color of your choice
Scissors

To start, cut 12’ x 12’ squares of both your fabric for the top layer and your fabric for the bottom layer.
Next, sew the top layer fabric right side down and terry cloth together leaving a small opening that will allow you flip it inside out.
Trim all the excess fabric around the edges and flip it inside out. Make sure you poke all the corners through and do a top stitch all around.
To make sure that the two layers don’t separate when you wash them make a squiggle line stitch through the center of the unpaper towel.
Sew on two pieces of velcro hoop side on the edge of the top piece of fabric. On the same unpaper towel, sew two pieces of velcro loop side to the terry cloth side. The velcro holds the unpaper towels together when they are on a paper towel holder.

Put all the unpaper towels together and you are done! If I were a more careful sewer, I would probably pin the fabric together and iron them at some point. Since this is just for our house, I didn’t worry about that too much. These turned out wonderfully, and I even made a kitchen wet bag to hold them after they get dirty. Unpaper towels have been a great addition to our kitchen.

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Naturally Dyeing Easter Eggs

March 24, 2013 By Elizabeth Pilgrim 1 Comment This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

Naturally dyeing Easter eggs is a fun and simple project to do with children. We searched our home for fruits, vegetables, and spices that would produce color. We also took a trip to the produce section at the grocery store and talked about the various plants that dye our fingers when we eat them. We skipped the bananas and looked at raspberries and blackberries.

There are two ways to naturally dye Easter eggs. You can dye them after the eggs are hard boiled or dye them while the eggs are cooking. Because my children are young, we chose to dye the eggs after they were hard boiled. It was more fun for them, and it kept them away from the hot stove. However, using a hot method does tend to provide a deeper color.

For the cold method:

Boil eggs and let them cool
Cover the boiled eggs with water
Add the dyeing material
Add one tablespoon of vinegar
Let the eggs soak for a couple hours or even overnight in the refrigerator

For the hot method:

Place the uncooked eggs in a pan and cover with water
Add one tablespoon of vinegar
Add the dyeing material. Use more dye material for more eggs or to darken the color
Bring water to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes.
Strain water and let eggs soak longer if a deeper color is desired

For our dyeing material, we used fresh raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, steamed spinach (blended), coffee, turmeric, steamed carrots (blended), and grape juice.

The coffee, turmeric, and grape juice worked well and produced even color. The berries (smashed and placed in glasses) and the steamed carrots did not produce color. However, my three-year-old was able to paint an egg with smashed berries and a paint brush. That was fun for her.

We left our eggs to soak overnight. Because we did not strain our material, we made speckled eggs. The kids thought these were fantastic. I was disappointed none of our eggs turned bright pink, so the next day I tried the hot method with dried blackberries and cherries. The eggs turned a peachy brown color which was not the effect I was hoping for. Next time, we will try cooking beets.

Experiment with the following to see what colors you can create:

Red / Pink	BeetsBoiled red onion skinsCanned cherries	CranberriesPomegranate juiceRaspberries
Orange	Boiled yellow onion skinsCooked carrots	Chili PowderPaprika
Yellow	Boiled carrot topsBoiled orange peelsGround cumin	Ground turmericVarious teas (chamomile, green tea)
Green	Boiled spinach leaves
Blue	Boiled red cabbage leavesCanned blueberries	Grape juice
Purple / Lavender	Grape juice (smaller quantities)	Red wine
Brown	CoffeeBlack Tea	Boiled freeze-dried cherries

Have you tried dyeing Easter eggs naturally? Share your thoughts below or join the conversation on our Facebook page.

Homemade Non-toxic Finger Paints

February 29, 2012 By Deanna Layman Leave a Comment This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

What child doesn’t like to paint? Better yet, what child doesn’t love to finger paint? It’s not very often that kids don’t like getting messy and using their hands to paint fun and creative pictures for the refrigerator.

As a mom I am constantly wanting to make sure that the products we use are safe, non-toxic, and eco-friendly. There are more and more choices for these types of items on the market, for instance Crayola has washable non-toxic finger paints, it comes with four 5 oz. tubes. This is a great option for many families. Another great option is homemade non-toxic finger paints. This idea can seem a little intimidating at first and there are so many recipes out there that it can be hard to know which ones to use.

This is easiest recipe I have found.

Ingredients

Water
Flour
Food coloring

Directions

Just pour some flour into a bowl and then pour enough cold water to make a very thick paste. After that, add hot water until you reach the consistency you want and add the food coloring. Let cool for a few minutes before painting. It took less than five minutes to make and works great. Make only enough for the current project because they do not keep well, but with as quick and easy as it is to make it takes no time before you are finger painting another masterpiece!

*Editors Note: We do not endorse Crayola finger paints as we are unsure of the ingredients. They are likely safer than many options but still use with caution. We recommend always looking for products that disclose all ingredients to be sure of their safety. We also recommend for this recipe using natural food based food coloring like the ones found at the Natural Candy Store*

About the Author

Deanna Layman is a stay at home mom, blogger and passionate about “going green.” After the birth of her son she realized just how much we are exposed to chemicals. She decided to begin her journey of going green. She is passionate about it and love to share all the new adventures she is experiencing. She also started a site for moms, Raisinginspiration.com, a place for moms to go and be encouraged, inspired and to create community.

Make Your Own Reusable Bag

November 19, 2011 By Lisa Sharp Leave a Comment This post may contain affiliate links. Click here for full disclosure.

Did you know about 1 million plastic bags are used every minute?! That’s a lot of plastic and only .5% to 3% of the plastic bags are recycled. Reusable bags can help reduce your impact. If you are the crafty type why not make your own? They would also make great Christmas gifts. Here are a couple of video tutorials to get your started.

If you can crochet or knit, you can take the plastic bags you and your friends have and make them in to reusable bags using plarn (plastic yarn).

If you have any ideas for making your own reusable bags, post in the comments below.

About the Author

Lisa Sharp is passionate about green living, organic food, animals, and natural medicine. She is an environmental activist, green living expert, and consultant. In addition to being the founder and editor of Green Oklahoma, Lisa has a green living blog, Retro Housewife Goes Green. You can follow Lisa on twitter @Retrohousewife5 and Facebook.

Photo credit: cakersandco

Green Crafts

DIY Valentine’s Day Gift Ideas

Homemade Christmas Gift Guide

Recycled Halloween Crafts

Benefits of Upcycling

Mason Jar Crafts

More Homemade Gift Ideas

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