Showing posts with label blocks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blocks. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Reduce Reuse Recycle

The three "R"s have been literally branded into my long term memory by a certain science teacher in gradeschool... I honestly doubt I'll ever forget the phrase... it does however take a little more to consciously live by it though....

We are a family of juice drinkers and carton tetra packs pile up pretty quickly in our home, being bulky they take up a lot of room in the trash and are far from bio degradable... We've found a fun way to reuse almost all of the cartons by turning them into playroom building blocks/bricks etc. This tip should actually be credited to my mom, she was a daycare principal for many years... and we had a whole wall of milk carton blocks!




These blocks are light weight and great for making towers, building forts and igloos, giant dominos, indoor bowling, you name it! and best off they're free!



You can make them out of juice or milk cartons. Start by cutting off the angled top creating an open ended block. Once you've rinsed the cartons with soapy water (to prevent icky sour milk smells) and let them dry thoroughly, take two cartons and push one all the way into the other to create one block! If you're feeling especially creative you can paint them, wrap them with funky paper or your childs drawings, or try filling some with a handful of dry rice, beans, or pasta to make a percussion instrument!


Now all we have to do is find a way to reuse those discarded tops... I'm open to ideas.

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Busy Bee!

I've been quite busy lately trying to work on stuff for my shop, learn how to knit... (well sort of..) complete my assignments for school; I got to design a chair, a lamp, and packaging for spaghetti! and I'm currently drawing up plans for a duplex conversion, all while still taking care of my little pookie, whom by the way is growing up way too fast... and oh yeah! I'm an Aunt! My sister in law had a son, my first nephew! last week.

So I've designed and ordered labels for my etsy shop wares, and I'm anxiously waiting for there arrival! I've even figured out what was causing my sewing machine to fly out of whack....(cracked engine case...) and have designated some time towards my sewing. Here are some things I've been working on lately;



This is a bib I made for my daughter, I just love polka dots especially in some of my favorite colours, red and white! with some brown thrown in for good measure! it still needs some final stitches but all in all I'm happy with its outcome!


These are the pacifier clips I'm working on for my shop, "Preppy stripes", there were more but we're using some and others I gave as gifts... I hope to finish them up as soon as the labels get here and start listing on my shop!


Speaking of gifts, these toy blocks will be a set of three for my nephew, made with some of my favorite Amy butler and Joel Dewberry fabrics! I think they work great together! I'm also making another set for friends, hopefully after that I'll have some time to make some for my shop...

I was asked to help decorate the tables for my nephews Bris, the theme was green and blue, so I made these "Gift box" centerpieces....


Lastly these are some Cath Kidston fabric swatches I plan on turing into a "Shabby chic" block set for my own little girl, gotta love Cath! I'd seen and heard of her stuff before but I really became a fan after purchasing a "Letter pillow" from Yvonne of Yvestown with my daughters initial. Yvonne is totally gaga for Cath, check out her home on flickr, it's like an ode to Cath kidston!
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