Dollhouse Dismystified

This eco-friendly dollhouse is so beautiful! It's homemade, and you can easily make one yourself by following the steps from Darlyblog. Click here to access the tutorial.

By Darlyblog

Holiday Button Tree

Although this cute tree is crafted with sewing supplies, there's no stitching required. Buttons and sewing pins decorate a plastic foam cone in red, green, and white tones for an easy decoration or holiday gift. Kids just have to be creative and build their own tree. They will love it!

Source: Better Homes and Gardens

Recycled Cardboard Ornaments

A fun project for children: each kid will make his/her own tree ornament using recycled cardboard!
Keep them busy, teach them a green lesson and promote creativity.
Empty beer, cereal, or frozen dinner boxes are just right for making sweet little upcycled ornaments. Just cut out whatever shape you like and decorate them. Once all of your glue is dry, punch a hole in the top and loop some ribbon through it to hang from the tree.

Source: Crafting a Green World

Classy Paper Stocking

Stocking made of recycled paper bag. Creative, beautiful, meaningful...genius!

Perfect statement for a green Christmas. Charming enough to be given away to anyone, at home or work.
What's more, they are so easy to make. Trace a template onto the bag, cut your shapes out, punch holes and then use embroidery floss to sew the bags together with a quick whip stitch.

Source:  Rock Scissor Paper

Felt Board = Loads of Fun

I just saw this on Crafting a Green World and loved the idea of putting together a long road with cars, turns, traffic lights, ... for my son. He loves to play with little cars and trucks, and this would be awesome!

For the main board, we can use traditional felt made from recycled plastic bottle. Tracing the shapes directly onto the felt with a Sharpie makes it a lot easier to cut.

If your kid is at least 2, he can make his own shapes, and get thrilled with his/her new toy. There is no lack of imagination when you let creativity juices flow. I guess we'll make 2 or 3 boards!

Sources: Crafting a Green World, Craft Knife

Cereal Box Marble Run: Brilliant!

Cereal Box Marble Run...what a great idea from Made by Joel. Awesome creative exercise for kids. All you need is a cereal box and marbles!

So simple to make. Brilliant!

Source: Made by Joel

Salt Dough Sculptures

Salt dough is a fun and green way to make oven-baked clay made of natural materials.Kids can make sculptures, signs, little (or big) animals, pretty much any shape.
Check out this awesome recipe with instructions from Crafting a Green World. Have fun!

Salt Dough

- 1 cup salt
- 1 cup water
- 3+ cups white flour.

1.Preheat oven to 200 degrees. In a large mixing bowl, combine one cup salt and one cup of water until the salt has dissolved.

2.Gradually stir in at least 3 cups of flour. To make a stiffer dough that has more structural integrity for three-dimensional sculptures, you can gradually mix in even more flour, as much as the dough will hold without becoming crumbly.

If you accidentally make your dough crumbly, add in a little more salt water at a 1:1 ratio. If your dough is just too sticky, add in a little more white flour.

3. Sculpt your salt dough into whatever shapes you like, putting each finished sculpture on a baking sheet.

4. Bake your salt dough sculptures in a 200-degree oven for at least two hours, and until the sculpture is completely dry. Thicker sculptures will take significantly more time to dry than flat ones.

Source: Crafting a Green World

Fun and Inexpensive Green Project for Kiddos

Transform yogurt containers into cute animals? Sounds like a fun green (and inexpensive) project for kids!

To make some froggy friends you will need:

• Small yogurt cups One flat like those of Yoplait YoPlus yogurts for the turtle, and for the frog a small cup like those from Yoplait FiberOne or Yoplait Kids yogurts.
• Green spray paint The type made for plastic works best but there are low voc options too.
• Green craft foam Thick green recycled/handmade craft paper or green cardboard would work as well.
• adhesive A glue gun and glue sticks are quick but hot. Try a fast drying craft glue if worried about burns.
• Craft eyes Small to medium size
• Markers One permanent and one fine tip or ball point pen.
• Scissors

To make your green frog friends:

• Clean and dry empty yogurt cups
• Take the yogurt cups outside or to a well ventilated area and turn upside-down on a bottle or newspaper and spray paint them green. You may need two or three coats to get even coverage.
• While the paint is drying, trace patterns for the head, legs, tummy (frog) and tail (turtle) onto the craft foam (or cardboard) with a fine tip marker or ball point pen.
• Cut out the shapes and set aside for the frog. You will need a large football/frog shaped head, two legs and a circle for the belly. For the turtle you need four little legs, a tail, and a head.
• Once the paint is dry you can glue the shapes on. Start with the head for each friend.
• Now glue on the tummy for the frog or tail for the turtle.
• Glue on the eyes
• Draw a mouth and nose holes for the frog.

You can use acrylic paint, stickers, or cut out craft foam to customize the frogs and turtles with spots and designs. You can use what you have on hand or look for eco-options when it comes to glue, paint, and other supplies.

Source: Crafting a Green World

Good Ol' Milk Paint

Milk paint is organic and safe not only for people, but also for the environment. The ingredients in the base paint are used in the food and pharmaceutical industries, and are all completely biodegradable. Products are free of lead, mercury, petroleum, plastics and synthetic preservatives.

Packaged as a powder, you just have to add water.



Manufactured and sold by milkpaint.com 

Beautiful Dowloadable Coloring Art Made by Joel

Check out these downloadable coloring sheets created by artist Joel Henriques. They are beautiful, like everything made by Joel, and help develop kids' creative skills!

Just click on each image to open the files.
 

Make Your Own Cardboard Shoji Screen

This is a fun project to develop with kids, and inspire their creative skills!
It is definitely a step up to the usual craft work, but pushing the envelop a bit will result in a beautiful and fun room partition for the kids!

The tutorial will guide you step-by-step.

Click here for the tutorial

Vegetable Glycerin Soap...Fun, Green and Useful Activities for Kids

We found these cool and easy step-by-step instructions on how to create green, and quite useful, glycerin soaps for the family. This will keep kids busy and entertained for a couple of hours. Can't get any better than that!

Check this out...click here!

Source: Crafting a Green World