What great little gifts these would make! You could use adornments that are really meaningful for the person you’re gifting.

<3,
Becky

Home made beauty supplies are better for you, better for the planet, and less expensive than their conventional counterparts. If you want to make your own, check out my roundup of beauty supply recipes over at Crafting a Green World! >>

Image Credit: Creative Commons photo by meaduva

<3,
Becky

Check out the knitting pattern over at My Amphetamines & My Purls!

<3,
Becky

Via

<3,
Becky

When my friend Genevieve from SEWphisticate wrote about turning #6 plastic into shrinky dinks, I couldn’t resist covering it for Crafting a Green World! I really want to give this a try with the food containers from the Dekalb Farmers Market. I love their prepared food area but hate accumulating all of those plastic containers!

<3,
Becky

For starters, we made laundry detergent and rinse. We’ll be making dryer balls at a future point. The laundry recipes both came from the modcottage blog, and just like she claims, they were super-easy to whip up!

For the detergent:

1. 1 bar Fels Naptha soap, grated. We found the smaller grating holes made it easier to mix up. We also discovered that two of our bars were hard, while the rest were more soft. You might want to peek inside the soap wrapper before you buy.
2. 1 c Borax
3. 1 c Washing Soda
4. 1/4 c OxyClean (not necessary, but we add it)
Mix it all together into a bumpy, granular mix. Don’t worry about stuff getting correctly dispersed, it does, even if it doesn’t quite look like it.

Use 1T for a light load
Use 2T for a large or dirty load (It’s true! Only 2 Tablespoons per load!)

And the rinse:

1. 1 gal white vinegar
2. 25-30 drops essential oil in whatever scent you want your clothes to smell like.

Use 1/4 c in the rinse cycle. The vinegar clears the last bit of soap remaining on all your clothes and reduces static. (and doesn’t leave a smell behind, promise!)

The next products we tackled were window cleaner, and a general purpose spray cleaner/disinfectant.
We got these recipes from the women and environment blog

WINDOW CLEANER
1/4-1/2 teaspoon liquid detergent, we use Dr Bronner’s
3 tablespoons vinegar
2 cups water
Spray bottle

Put all the ingredients into a spray bottle, shake it up a bit, and use as you would a commercial brand. The soap in this recipe is important. It cuts the wax residue from the commercial brands you might have used in the past. Remember, one of the best things to use for a “rag” when cleaning windows is old newspapers. Streak-free!!

ALL-PURPOSE SPRAY CLEANER
1/2 teaspoon washing soda
A dab of liquid soap (we use Dr Bronners!)
2 cups hot tap water

Combine the ingredients in a spray bottle and shake until the washing soda has dissolved. Apply and wipe off with a sponge or rag.

The last thing we made was a soft scouring powder. You can mix this up as you go, but we chose to add the vegetable glycerine so we could make big batches to store. It keeps for about 2 years in the fridge.

CREAMY SOFT SCRUBBER
suggested uses: Use this creamy soft scrub on kitchen counters, stoves, bathroom sinks, etc.

2 cups baking soda
½ cup liquid castile soap (again, Dr Bronner’s)
4 teaspoons vegetable glycerin (acts as a preservative)
5 drops antibacterial essential oil such as lavender, tea tree, rosemary or any scent you prefer. We chose lemon and a thyme tincture that Kip made with thyme grown in her garden. She’s going to show us how to make tinctures soon, so we’ll have a tutorial for that up in the near future as well.

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We’ll be posting notes and reviews from everyone as they roll in, so check back for updates!!

1. Gather the Goods – fabric scissors, paper scissors, a Sharpie, cardboard (I used an empty 6 pack), recycled felt & glue.

2. Measure & Cut Your Cardboard

3. Measure & Cut Your Felt – You’ll want the felt cut to the same size as the cardboard to make certain your design won’t be too big to fit on there!

4. Draw Your Design – Use the Sharpie to draw the design on your felt. Keep in mind that you’re going to be gluing this Sharpie-side-down to the cardboard, so make sure to mirror anything that won’t work once you flip it, like letters or numbers.

5. Cut Out Your Design

6. Glue! – Put glue all over the back side of the felt (the side with the visible marker on it).

7. Voila! – Bask in the glory of your cute, new stamp! You definitely want to wait for the glue to dry entirely before you start stamping. To use the stamp, just apply paint to the felt with a paintbrush and gently press onto the surface you’re stamping!

<3,
Becky

So SuperCute! is scheming a little literature area for our booth at Inman Park this weekend. We asked some folks around town who we love if they’d like us to put out fliers, brochures or business cards for them, and we have a bunch coming in! Obviously, we needed a supercute way to display all these goodies! We did a little brainstorming and remembered this awesome hard blue suitcase that we’d thrifted and decided that would be just perfect. All we needed to do was add a place to stick folks’ info, and we’d be set!

This afternoon, I sifted through my fabric, pulled out my pinking shears and embroidery thread and got to work! I turned the top of a pillowcase into a literature holder by sewing it into a pouch and then sewing up the middle, so it can hold 2 sets of stuff! Then, I used embroidery thread to whip-stitch the pouch to the existing one in the suitcase. Voila! A totally adorable display!

Some of the blue patches are covering up little blemishes in the suitcase’s lining, while others are just evidence of my love for those pinking shears! Regardless, I can’t wait to set this little baby up in our booth! Whee! See you there??

<3,
Becky