#112 Repurposed Fabric Ghosts

My daughter thought we needed more Halloween decorations, so we made nine small ghosts using an old sheet that I would periodically rip rags off of, but still had a lot left. And a small ball of yarn leftover, and some permanent marker. I balled up fabric to make the head and wrapped the square around it and ties it with the leftover white yarn. My daughter cut the yarn and decorated half of the ghosts. Then we hung them on the front porch on small hooks that are there for hanging wind chimes or Christmas lights on.

She is pretty pleased with her porch of Halloween decorations. Right now we have a jack-o-lantern that we grew in our garden, and the window has window clings we received from someone on Freecycle, a spider craft (on the window sill) she made at a class of hers, and now the ghosts.

#111 Make Your Own Draft Dodgers

This was a work in process a while back and then I finally finished them today with my daughter. It really doesn't take that long to make these, I just took an extended break in making them because after the first half of the process we needed to go make & eat some lunch and I just finally got back to finishing them since we need them now that it is cold (seriously! we are supposed to get 3-4 inches of snow tomorrow in our part of MN).

Anyways, I don't have a specific pattern for these. I just made length measurements using a standard door frame and added an inch on each end . I cut the width of the fabric at 6 inches, allowing 1/2 inch on each side for seam edges. When I sewed them I tried to make an angled tail because my daughter really thought they needed to look like a snake. Actually, when I was cutting out & sewing these tubes, she really wanted to have her own snake to play with so I used some more of the excess fabric to make small ones. She wanted to have one for her, her brother & some gifts to give friends.

I used fabric that I had bought a long time ago for some other project but never used it. So, it was there taking up space and it was a nice heavyweight with a tight enough weave. The thread was leftover from another sewing project.

We used a funnel & scoop to put the sand in each of these. Then we had our extended break.

Today I stitched the other end and she glue on beads and yarn/pipe cleaners as eyes & tongues. Then we used a bunch of leftover fabric paint we had to put designs on the snakes. We made a total of 8 snakes, 4 small ones (for her, a xmas gift for her brother & 2 gifts for friends) and 4 large ones (2 for us & 2 others to give as gifts.)

The best thing is that we made these just at the cost of the sand. I bought play sand because we used about 1/3 of it to fill these snakes and then we just put the rest of her sand in the sandbox (which was losing it's sand rapidly over the summer.)

I have seen these sell for anywhere from $6-$15 (sometimes even more) in stores. And they are going to help keep drafts from getting through doors (or windows - just make sure you take measurements.) It helps to be able to keep the cold from getting in & cooling the house down during the winter months and will leave you feeling more comfortable.

#110 Milk Jug Catch Game

Today we had a small playgroup of my daughter's friends over to make their own milk jug catch game. The idea came from this website. Although, I think next time I may use 1/2 gallon jugs and make the one on this website that includes handles made from toilet paper rolls.

The moms precut the bottles and we gave the kids permanent markers (other kinds will just wipe off) and a variety of stickers to use. I cut my jugs the opposite way that the website said because I thought they would work more efficiently cut the opposite way.

The balls were even re-used. I once got a huge bag of balls from someone on Freecycle and kept out a small bag of about 20 balls and passed on the rest of the balls to my mom so she could have a ball pit for the grandkids. We used them for a ball pit for a couple weeks, but seriously, picking them all up was annoying, better to let grandma have them and let her pick them up infrequently then me having to pick them up every day.

#109 Reuse Plastic Containers to MYO Shrinky-Dinks

The idea on how to make your own shrinky-dinks came from this website. My mom originally sent me the idea. I actually had a difficult time finding #6 clear plastic containers, but if you are local to me, I found them at Nelson's Grocery Store. I thought it was a good way to have some danishes and reuse the container.