Cheap and Easy Christmas Ornaments DIY

It's December, and that means CHRISTMAS!

I LOVE Christmas. Last year was the first year I had my own flat (without flatmates) to decorate. We also were a bit tight on money so I made these DIY ornaments to go on my first full sized Christmas tree (I already had quite a few ornaments as my mum has been gradually building up my collection in my stocking each year since I was about 10 - yes, I still have stockings!).

Toilet Roll Stars / Flowers

I saw these on Pinterest and decided to make them. They're super simple, just cut a toilet roll into 5 strips, flatten them a bit, glue together (hold it with pegs), paint ( I used gold and silver poster paint that I found in my mum's supplies from when we were kids!) and sprinkle with glitter. I then sprayed mine with hairspray to seal them a bit but that's optional.

Mini Bottles of Glitter

These were inspired by a necklace tutorial I saw. I found the bottles in a local pound shop. I think they are so cute and I'd wanted to buy them for ages so when I saw the tutorial I finally had an excuse to! I filled them with glitter (I made a funnel with paper to help with this), put the stoppers in and tied green wool around them to hang them on the tree. I bought two different types of glitter, the larger flaky one is from the pound shop and the normal one was from Wilkos. Although the pound shop one doesn't really look like proper glitter, I quite like the effect.

Easy Peasy Lined Skirt

I finally made a skirt! Actually, this is the second skirt I've ever made - the only item of clothing I have ever made for myself is a skirt I made when I was about 15 (I still have it!), I keep meaning to actually get on and make some clothes for myself but somehow baby/toddler clothes and house-y stuff always seems so much more achievable!

So, back to the skirt. I made this for my niece but the pattern is super simple and could be made for any size. I used some cute nautical theme fabric that I bought last year for a (failed) attempt at at a romper for her. Sorry about the photos, I took them on my phone as my camera charger has disappeared...)

Materials

Fabric

Lining fabric (if you want to line it)

Wide elastic (I used 1" elastic for a toddler, you might want wider for an adult)

Thread

Cut matching rectangles from your main and lining fabric. The width depends on how gathered you want it, for stiffer fabrics/if you're using lining you'll want it to be less gathered. I just used what I had left from my main fabric which I think was about 80cm wide (my niece's waist is 49cm so it was about 1.6x her waist). The height should be however long you want your skirt plus enough to fold over your elastic (so I added about 3 inches to mine for that) and to hem (I did a large hem so that it can be lengthened as she grows but for an adult just add a couple of cm).

Fold both rectangles right sides together (for the lining right sides together means the side that you want to be able to see on the inside). Place one on top of the other and sew down the open edge. (It's a bit hard to see in this picture sorry!)

Turn the main fabric right side out, over the lining so that you end up with a tube with the main fabric on the outside and and lining inside. This is the bit where you check you have everything in the right place!

Turn the skirt inside out and iron down a small hem on the top edge and then fold down again to create a casing for your elastic. Sew around this, leaving a small gap.

Thread your elastic through this gap and round the casing using a safety pin (or however you like). I like to do this before I cut the elastic but you can measure and cut first.

Pull the elastic tight until it is just shorter than your waist measurement and cut. Sew the ends together (I overlapped the ends and sewed at both sides of the overlap so that it can be let out as she grows). Sew up the gap.

At the bottom of the skirt, fold over the edge twice, iron and hem. I handstitched the hem but you can machine it if you prefer.

And now you should have a beautiful skirt : )

Pretty Paperwork

I've been wanting a letter tray for a while now. Bank statements, pay slips, bills and other bits of paper get left on our dining table all the time. I wanted somewhere to put paper while it waited to be sorted or filed... and six months later I finally got around to making this:

It's not perfect but it's a lot cheaper than the pretty ones you get in shops (in fact it was free as I already had everything I needed) and it's a lot prettier than either a cardboard box (which is what it is, essentially) or the cheap ones you can find in pound shops (still more expensive than making this!).

So, here's how I did it.

First I cut one side off a cereal box so I had a tray shape and flat piece of card board. Then I used the spare cardboard from the open end of the box to make little 'L' shaped supports and stuck the flat piece into the box to make a second tray using a glue gun (I know that sounds confusing but the pictures should hopefully make it clear!).

Next I covered the top, sides and a bit of the inside with some pretty wrapping paper. I used a mixture of about half and half PVA glue and water for this. I didn't bother to cover the bottom or right inside the lower tray and it won't ever be seen but you could if you wanted to be thorough. If you want to cover the inside of the lower tray, I would suggest doing this before you stick the upper tray in.

I then left the tray to dry for 24 hours before coating it all over with the glue and water mix. I did this twice leaving it to dry 24 hours each time. And that's it. Now I have a pretty letter tray to put all my un-organised paperwork in!

Cheap and Easy Hand-Wash Upgrade

I've been wanting a nice handwash dispenser for a while but I just haven't got around to finding one. Recently I bought a Tesco Value hand soap for the bathroom and I realised that if I pulled the label off it would just be a nice plain white bottle. Then I thought to decorate it with Sharpies to match the toothpaste mug I have.

I think it looks really sweet now and it was basically a free project as the soap was the cheapest I could get anyway to have in the bathroom (and it smells really nice!) and I already had the coloured Sharpies It was really easy to do, if you go wrong, you can wipe it off with some nail varnish remover. I'm not sure whether it will last, it might fade or rub off with use but if it does I can clean if off and put another design on.

Happy Easter and A Mini Easter Craft

Happy Easter! I hope you're all enjoying lots of yummy chocolate today!

I am actually home alone until this afternoon so I decided to make some little Easter baskets and fill them with chocolate for my boyfriend and sister. They only took a few minutes each and they look so cute!

I used this tutorial, but made them a bit smaller and I didn't bother with covering all the staples, I just used some pretty washi tape to cover them on the outside and left them showing on the inside (the chocolates cover them anyway and I don't plan to keep them to use again). The card I used was some pretty stripy card left over from some packaging on something I got ages ago.

Babushka Doll Peg Bag

This was my Christmas present to my mum. I was inspired by this pin, which I thought was really cute but although I thought my mum would like it, I didn't think she'd LOVE it and I couldn't help but think that I could probably make one shaped like a Russian Doll, and my mum LOVES Russian Dolls, so I had to try! (Sorry for the lack of photos, I didn't start taking them until I had all the pieces ready)

Materials
Main fabric
Lining fabric
Filler fabric
Wire coat hanger
Felt (face colour and hair colour)
Embroidery thread (for face details - I used black and red)
Paper for making the pattern (I used newspaper)

To make the pattern I just drew round a cereal bowl for the head and then drew the body freehand. When I cut it out I folded it in half length-ways to make sure it was symmetrical. Now that I have finished it, I think it would actually be better bigger. It turned out smaller than I'd intended even though I put in generous seam allowances so I would suggest making it even bigger (my pattern measured about 39cm by 27cm).

From the pattern I cut out 2 pieces of the main fabric, 2 pieces of lining fabric and 2 pieces of another stiff fabric I had for strengthening (you could use any spare fabric or interfacing or batting for this, it's just to give it a bit more bulk and help it to hold it's shape when it is hung).

I then cut the top off my pattern in a kind of extended 'w' shape to make the pattern for the headscarf (see photo below) and cut one of these from another fabric. I hemmed the bottom of this (the 'w' shaped bit) as this would not be sewn to the main piece.

I cut a circle from some skin coloured felt, sewed on some felt hair and embroidered a face on it. After testing out a few faces on paper I decided on a very simple closed eyes and a small smiling mouth. Anything more looked a bit silly but you might be able to pull it off if you're better at drawing and embroidering than me!

Once the face was done, I sewed it onto my scarf fabric (I centered the face at this point but it did end up a bit wonky by the end so you could leave the face until the very end and sew it on there to make sure it is in the right place (or you could be better than me at sewing even hems...).

I pinned pieces for the front of the bag together (lining fabric, then filler fabric, then main fabric then scarf) and cut the slot for the pegs. I then hemmed this. You can add binding but I decided I liked mine as it was and with the stripy fabric I thought binding wouldn't look good.

Next, I layered up the back of the bag (lining, filler and main fabric) and sewed together the front and the back, right sides facing. Start and end at the top of the head and leave a small opening for the hanger to go through. I then used pinking shears to trim the hem to stop it fraying. Turn the bag right way out through the peg slot.

Finally, cut a wire hanger and bend it to shape so that it will go round the edge of the head and shoulders of your bag inside, then just slip it inside through the peg slot and you have a Babushka Peg Bag!

Also, my mum did LOVE it!

My Neice's Very Own Quiet Book

The Quiet Book I made for my niece’s Christmas present was my major Christmas project. I started it in October and only finished it just before Christmas. It took many many hours of work and also cost quite a bit in materials (despite using lots of fabric I already had). But it was worth it I think. I am very proud of it (despite it being far from perfect) and she is enjoying a lot it and hopefully will do for years to come (I plan to update the pages as she gets older).

So, first of all, here is my Quiet Book.

Playdough shape matching page

There is one of each shape in each colour

Face making page

There are about 3 different eyes, noses and mouths, 

she can make happy, sad and angry faces to help with

her emotional understanding

Aliens Love Underpants page

The aliens are hiding behind bushes and the pants can

be taken off the washing line and stuck on any alien

This is just a simple clasps page so she can play

with different fastenings

Incy Wincy Spider climbed up the water spout

Down came the rain and washed the spider out

Out came the sunshine and dried up all the rain

Gruffalo page

I wrote The Gruffalo words into a little hand-made 

bookletand she can act it out with the finger puppets

I spoke to my sister recently and apparently Bryony's favourite pages are the Aliens one (she loves to lift the flaps and say 'Peepo!' ) and the Gruffalo one. She is still learning about sticking the pieces on and taking them off (although apparently she can already do the aliens' pants).

How I Made It

There are plenty of websites and blogs that can give you far better instructions than I can on making a quiet book. These are the ones that I used.

• How To Make a Quiet Book

• Imagine Our Life

• Serving Pink Lemonade

• And this is where I copied the Gruffalo finger puppets from

I got ideas on page content and information about the technical bits of making the book but in the end I designed my own pages (some more influenced by my research than others) as that was easier to do than trying to find specific materials and also I could tailor them to my niece’s interests. I asked my sister about what she liked before I started (she didn't know what I was making) and she told me she liked Aliens Love Underpants, and Incy Wincy Spider book she had, mirrors and faces, playdough and some other stuff I couldn't fit into the book. It's me who loves The Gruffalo but I'm sure she will too!

Here’s the specifics about my book if you’re interested (everything else can be found on the pages linked above):

• The pages have 3 eyelets each and they attach to the cover using book rings (found at Staples) which means that the pages are removable and can be replaced as she grows out of them.

• The cover is made of denim so hopefully will be fairly durable.

• I used Velcro for most of the removable pieces as it was easy to sew on and should be easy for her to stick on and pull off. I’ve seen some that used poppers but  I thought they would be harder for her little fingers and also more expensive to buy a load of than just getting a strip of Velcro, especially as I only had to use tiny pieces of Velcro.

• I used some old fabric I found in my parents attic for the pages, it’s quite stiff and kind of canvassy but unfortunately I don’t actually know what it is! I didn’t need anything to strengthen this, two pieces sewed back to back and the fabric making up the pictures on the front made stiff enough pages.

• The mini pegs on the Aliens Love Underpants page were from Amazon but I wouldn’t recommend them, I think I will need to replace them with Velcro as they were already falling apart over Christmas. I’m not sure if they were just bad quality pegs or if it’s because they are so small.

DIY Christmas Present Rundown

So, now Christmas is well and truly over (although our tree is still up as I haven't got round to taking it down, and the Christmas chocolates are still tempting me every evening!) I thought it was time to write a little overview of the 12 homemade Christmas presents I gave this year (or I guess it's last year now...). I will be dedicating whole posts to a lot of them hopefully over the next few weeks but I thought I'd do a quick overview and post some photos first.

Here's they are:

1. 3 guitar pick keyring holders (inspired by this pin on Pinterest, 1 not shown as it was for my boyfriend and he was around when I photographed these!)
2. Kindle Paperwhite case (designed by me)
3. Headphone case (following these instructions)
4. Travel wallet (loosely following this tutorial)
5. Leicester City Football Club themed baby booties and hat (the booties are my favourite tried and tested pattern and the hat is a new pattern I found, which is really quick and easy, see below for pic)
6. Christmas hair clips (inspired by this post)
7. Knitted headband/ear warmers (it's just a strip of knitting so no pattern!)
8. Tote bag insert (inspired by this)
9. Russian Doll Peg Bag (my own design)
10. And finally, my pride and joy, a Quiet Book for my niece (there were many websites and blogs I used to help me with this but I will write a whole post on it instead of putting it here)

Here are some more individual pics:

I'll be doing more detailed posts on the Quiet Book and the peg bag, the others are either fairly self-explanatory or the links I've posted are easy to follow.