little eco footprints

A simple quick and easy natural advent calendar

I'm aiming for a simple Christmas this year. I'm refusing to get caught up in all the business that usually comes with Christmas and instead am aiming to slow down.

I'm doing this by being ruthless with the tasks I decide to take on.

I'm starting with our advent calendar. Last years leaf advent calender was super quick and easy, so we'll make one the same this year. But last year, I complicated our life by making it an activity-orientated calendar, identifying a different nature play or eco craft activity for each day. It was fun, but really, I was simply adding more tasks to our already busy schedule. Little Eco was more excited about the calender and being able to remove a leaf each day than the activities. 

So this year there will be no activities or gifts associated with each day. We'll simply remove a leaf each day and focus on counting down till Christmas. Based on Little Eco's excitement for the calendar last year I know this will be more than enough.

Speaking of 'more than enough', I wrote about our 'less is more' approach to Christmas over at Childhood 101 today.

Are you already overwhelmed by the business of Christmas? Do you have a super long 'to do' list? Perhaps you could also be a little more ruthless with the tasks you decide to take on?

Don't forget the Planet Boab giveaway.

More kids dress-up wings made from recycled t-shirts

Megan from The Byron Life recently featured the dress-up wings I made for Little Eco from old t-shirts (using this tutorial).

She's motivated me to share some pictures of the wings I've subsequently made for birthday gifts.....

{image by Madeline}

There were three more sets, all for boys. In black & red, browns and blues. But I made these three the night before they all needed to gifted (on the same day!) so I barely finished them let alone had time to take a photo. I haven't been able to motivate myself to make a pair since that epic night.

I've managed to get my creating time down to an hour and a half by making the feathers wider so that I need less, and by not being too concerned with the 'rustic' look.

In contrast, the pair I made for Little Eco took hours and hours because it had so many feathers.

I think an hour and a half to make a birthday gift isn't too bad. It can sometimes take that long to simply go shopping for a gift.

I mostly buy my second-hand t-shirts for  $1 each or $5 a bag, so each set of wings cost less than $3. I also save time and money by not buying wrapping paper or a card. We simply wrap gifts in one of Little Eco's old artworks and write on the paper itself, or make a quick gift tag from an old card.

These wings are definitely my favourite handmade frugal gift for kids. Do you have a favourite handmade or frugal gift?

Our crazy kids' crafternoon

I was delighted when Kathreen from Whip up asked me to be part of her crafternoon blog party. It meant that I got to have a sneak peak at two new and delightful craft books for kids: Kids' Crafternoon Sewing and Kids' Crafternoon Papercraft.

Each book is filled with practical and creative projects, contributed by specialist crafters from across the globe, that can be easily completed in an afternoon. Little Eco and I excitedly decided to host our very own 'crafternoon'. I had visions of a neat table scattered with a few crafty things (perhaps even decorated with a vase of flowers and some cup cakes), surrounded by a couple of girls quietly concentrating on their crafty creations (clearly I was delusional).

Little Eco is only four years old and the books are targeted at ages seven and up, so we invited her two oldest friends (aged five and six) to our crafternoon. With fifty cool projects to choose from, we struggled to pick just one. Little Eco literally pointed at each and every one of the full-page photographs and said "I want to make that", "and that", "and that"...

We settled on Kids' Crafternoon Sewing cover star Limby the Button-eye Dude, contributed by Lizette Greco and grecolaborativo.

The crafternoon started very civilised, with each of our crafters quietly planning their Limby on paper.

The helpful lists of materials needed and equipment required meant it was easy for me to have everything we needed gathered and ready before we started. Fabrics were chosen from the scrap box and patterns were carefully cut out.

Heads were completed using buttons reclaimed from an old shirt.

But then my visioned calm crafternoon slowly deteriorated.....

(can you spot the third child?)

...into one very crazy crafternoon. 

Thankfully, each project comes with clear step-by-step instructions and illustrations, which meant that despite the chaos, progress was made and within an hour or so we had all our Limby pieces ready to be stuffed.

I then naively sent three excited and enthusiastic girls off to get the chop sticks they needed to stuff their Limby. Next thing I hear a scream. I race out to find Little Eco sobbing with one hand covering her eye and the other holding a chop stick. My heart stopped. Thankfully the chop stick left her with nothing more than her first trip to the optometrist, a blood shot eye, and a story for show-and-tell.

Determined not to let an injured eye stop her from completing the Limbys, that night Little Eco helped me hand sew the Limbys together.

We were left with three very cute and individual Limby Dudes.

Despite being younger than the target audience, our three crafters enjoyed creating their Limbys and only needed a little guidance and assistance. The six year old was a little more able and focused than the younger two and I can imagine how thrilled slightly older children would be to create the projects by themselves.

Both books would be particularly good for those of you who would like to craft with your kids but don't feel you are the 'crafty' type, as each project comes with clear and detailed instructions.

Despite the chaos, we're keen to host another crafternoon. Both books are filled with many more projects we'd like to try. I love that many of the projects are practical and would be enjoyed long after the crafting is finished. There's toys to play with (paper aeroplanes, spinning pinwheels, puppets, and kites) and treasures to wear (paper beads, mushroom brooch, jellyfish pendant, softy badges, a belt, and a bag).

We've since recycled some scrap paper into a few of the Stitch-bound books from Kids' Crafternoon Papercraft.

Want to find out more about these books? Both books are available from Booktopia and you can join in the blog book tour by visiting the following blogs. The party has already happened over at  Poppytalk and Picklebums and is headed to the following:

{25 July Beaspoke quilts} {26 July Maya Made} {27 July Checkout girl} {28 July The red thread} {29 July We Wilsons} {30 July Maggie Makes} {31 July Mmm Crafts} {1 August Domesticali} {2 August Floating Ink} {3 August Elizabeth Abernathy } {4 August Mommy Coddle } {5 August The Long Thread } {6 August Hannah Fletcher } {7 August Between the lines } {8 August Go Make Me}

What would you do if you had wings?

I know what Little Eco would do.

Fly, of course.

Perch on a fence.

Sit in a tree.

Perch some more. 

And join a flock.

I added this tutorial for dress-up wings to my 'love to make' list as soon as I saw the gorgeous wings Christie made. I had plans to make them 'one day'. But then I spotted the magical wings the Artful Jen made her children and decided I had to make a pair this weekend.

I made our wings out of a few old t-shirts. I've thankfully built up a bit of an op-shop-sourced stash after falling in love with the reinvention skirt. I used knit fabric so that the cut fabric won't fray and the wings are washable. I'm so thankful that they are washable because it seems Little Eco has decided the wings are 'every day' wear.

To be honest, I got a little tired of cutting and sewing on the feathers, but am so glad I persisted. Little Eco absolutely adores her wings, and I could easily watch her 'play bird' for hours and hours.

Anyone else have any good dress-up refashion ideas?

My first pillow case dress

I finally got around to making Little Eco a pillow slip dress.

I haven't had much time for sewing recently, and then last weekend Little Eco woke up and asked me to make her a yellow dress. She was a little surprised when I agreed. She excitedly chose the pillow case and we worked together sewing in our PJ's before breakfast.

I was going to try and pretend that the point of this post was to motivate the beginner sewers among you to try making a pillow slip dress. There's loads of tutorials online. I used this one, and for beginner sewers I think a video tutorial would help. They're quick and easy and the perfect introduction to refashioning. You don't even have to sew side and bottom seams. But i'll be honest, really this post is all about me celebrating just how sweet and cute my little girl is ;-)