Egg cartons- A multi-tool

YES... this post is about egg cartons. And yes, there are more ways of using egg cartons than just holding your eggs. So here are my ways:


1. Paint... it holds paint AWESOME! I cut out strips of them (say we have 4 colors, I cut out four). Easy to clean up and perfect for paint brushes.

 This one happens to hold puffy paint.. just waiting to be painted onto a penguin.

The lids are great as a pallet.. especially if you're into mixing paints to discover colors. I cut this into 2 so we could use it for 2 children.


2. Another way to use it is a counting game. I used a sharpie to write numbers on the sides of the cups. Then, I gave my son cheerios, raisins, M&M (those disappeared faster than anything) and he had to put the right number of snacks in each cup (I started at 10-22 because he knows how to count to 10). You can start with 1-10 though as well. Lots and fun.. and then they eat up the mess afterwards! Keep the egg carton for another time.

3. Faux Goggles. I took two cups (attached across from each other) and cut them away from the other 10. Cut a small hole in the bottom of both, and punch a hole of the sides. String a string through and tie them off like goggles.

As a cute lesson about owls: Owls can't move their eyes! Have your child try on these glasses and put something in their peripheral vision. They can't see it without turning their heads. They'll probably want to try it multiple times with the goggles on and off to figure it completely out.

I know there are TONS more ways to use egg cartons.. these are just a few :) So save those egg cartons and recycle them once you're finished having fun!

Organizing Your Crafts

Oh WOW! I can't believe I've lived with my craft items jammed into buckets for so long! I couldn't even take a picture of how they looked before; I am too ashamed! Here's how the buckets looked, and you can picture them all stacked on top of each other haphazardly in the closet:

I decided to clean and organize them all. So now they're in different containers:

1. Fabric scraps- This I organized by fabric, rolled them into long rolls, and used clear elastic rubber bands to secure them. It worked really nice. I can sort through the fabric easily, and more importantly, I can see what I have!!
2. Fabric paints- I used one of Killian's shoe boxes to store these. It works great! The shoe box is small enough that it actually fit into another container that wasn't completely full!
3. Felt Scraps- I use these for various crafts. I took out any small pieces and kept only the big ones.
4. Cross Stitching- I stuck all of the embroidery floss into a bag. This will be helpful, because I often use embroidery floss for my clothes as well.
5. Old Clothes- Instead of throwing stained or ripped beyond repair clothes away, I kept putting them in a pile. Now they're in their own bin. :)
6. Clothes for Up-Cycling- these are cute things that I've found that I KNOW I want to work with- or already have an idea for. These too now have a space.

 

7. Extras- Another little shoe box worked well as a catch all- Sewing Scissors, Bag of buttons, bag of thread, etc.

Now it's all stacked nicely and I know EXACTLY where everything goes. It took me about 45 min. to organize it all- and it was well worth it.

Organizing Your Child's Art

 

Every mother and father knows this: Once your child is over the age of 1.5, they start creating art work. Beautiful artwork, but also TONS and TONS of art work. I hated throwing it out, so I kept it in a small file. However, once he hit the age of 3, the art work started piling up! 3-4 pieces were being done every day! It became a little overwhelming. 

SO... I decided to store it in a nicer way. 

I bought a 3-ring binder. I took paper and 3 whole punched it. I inserted the paper:

 

Then I glued or taped his art work in there. Sometimes I kept cute things that he just signed or drew a picture on:

 

I also put in some clear sleeves so that anything he made that can't be glued down (like this elephant trunk hat) can still be kept in here:

 

One nice thing about this binder is that it has pockets. So the little books he started coloring/writing can fit nicely in:

 

Lastly, I took a piece of his art, and glued it to the front to make it look nice:

 

And added words:

 

Sometimes I use his art for crafts (like thank you cards)- and I'll show you how to do that another day. :)

That's it- Keeping your house organized one day at a time. 

Take-along Car Caddy

I made this car caddy for Killian last christmas. He loves it, especially when we're at an appointment. And it's super simple!

I used a green piece of fabric (actually a scrap of green fabric from Killian's kitchen) as the back of the caddy. Then I sewed on the train fabric on top, and sewed down pockets. Next, I sewed on some brown felt and yellow fabric to look like a road. Lastly, I sewed on a ribbon on the back to tie. I may change this and add bigger pieces of fabric with velcro, because the ribbon is hard for killian to tie so he can't clean up his own mess.

Here you can see the pockets. I have a few cars in each pocket and they stay in there when you fold it up. You fold the road on top of the pockets and roll it up:

 

Pretty simple but a fun toy for any boy :)