Natural Car Air Freshener made from rosebuds

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This is a favorite craft of mine whenever I have roses. These pink ones were gathered in the wild during a weekend outing, the red were birthday roses that were about to wilt.

Simply use thread on a needle, held double and sew through the end of the rose.

Tie the thread around your rear view mirror to hang; it clips off easily when you're done.  The scent lasts about a month, though it stays pretty for months!

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Upcycled Sheets- Make two crib sheets from a full top sheet!

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Do you accumulate top sheets like I do? I had this nice quality flannel top sheet, 100% cotton and cozy warm, but we just don't use top sheets much. Some I use as quilt backings, but I haven't been quilting much lately.  I turned this white flannel sheet, stained with carrot juice in a few places, into two new blue crib sheets!  We bought organic mattresses from Organic Grace for each of our children, so you can bet that we'll be getting the maximum use out of this mattress size before upgrading to a twin.  Under the mattress I use a thrifted wool sweater as a natural mattress protector.

I took out the mattress and traced the size I wanted to get the dimensions, but VanillaJoy has a tutorial up with measurements if you want to go that way.  I find it so much easier to make up the bed when the pockets are deep enough, if you'd like, you can make your original rectangle a little bigger, and then cut out deeper corner squares so they're nice and big.

I dyed blue with RIT dye, in "Blue Denim" from our local Walmart.  I'm sure there's something more natural that would have been better to use, but for now I'm pleased with the new color.

Oh, and we do co-sleep, but my little ones take naps in their cribs and my 3-1/2 year old transitioned to her crib while I was pregnant with her little brother. We've been known to play musical beds as well, moving mattresses out of cribs to allow us all to sleep together if needed :)

More:
I use soap nuts to wash! Crib sheets, clothing, diapers, everything, soap nuts gets my laundry clean.
Upcycling again: Baby pants from a thrifted sweater

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A Simple Summer Tote

I've been using my old back pack from high school (!) as my diaper bag for 3-1/2 years.  But this summer, with trips to the spray parks, lakes, and rivers, I wanted something a little cuter.  As all seamstresses do, I had a collection of fabric in my basement which worked together nicely for a tote!  The blue is corduroy, which looked good in the store, but upon arrival home it was a bit too electric.  Bold is fine for a bag, not really my preference for pants :) 

Nice and roomy! Fits two towels, swim trunks, sun shirts, and hats for everyone :) I learned to make tote bags years ago following a tutorial on craftster.org, but See Mama Sew has a great tutorial as well.

I've been sewing this week after quite a break. I did 4 crib sheets too, I'll show you how I re-purposed a full-sized top sheet into two crib sheets next. On my sewing table now: A couple more birthday crowns for upcoming toddler birthdays!.

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Chemical-free Disposable Diapers- cheap!

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It seems like good deals on non-toxic alternatives are few and far between, so I wanted to share this while it was up! I don't know how long their sale will run.

Amazon is having 30% off select diapering supplies right now- I just ordered some.  This brings chemical-free or reduced chemical diapers down to the regular cost of 'mainstream' chlorine bleached chemical-laden diapers.  I try to use cloth diapers most of the time, but I do use disposables at times as well.

What I recommend:

Seventh generation has the 'gel' in it, but it doesn't come out of the diapers and get stuck to the baby as easily as some mainstream brands. Their paper is unbleached, which is much healthier up against baby's skin.  Regularly $51.99 I just purchased for $27.99, free shipping. (buy here)

Choose your size preference, then they'll highlight the 'count' and I had to click on that as well.  Choose Subscribe and Save for an additional 15% off. I marked on my calendar to cancel the Subscribe and Save a week after I ordered.

Tushies brand doesn't contain the gel, and they only use oxygen bleach. Not as good for heavy wetters, but if your child isn't a heavy wetter I feel avoiding the gel is a good idea.  Gel hasn't been in diapers for very long (since the late 80s  I think). I used these with my daughter, I think they may work better for girls than boys.  These don't have a Subscribe and Save option, but they are still on sale at quite a discount. (Buy here) Regularly 52.35, on sale for $43.63

Don't see what you're looking for? The rest of the diaper deals with the Subscribe and Save option are here

What's your diapering situation? Cloth full time? Cloth part time? Diaper free (EC)? Or are you done with diapers completely and quite thankful? :)

HT: Money Saving Mom

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Quilted Patches on Overalls- Cute, Thrifty, and Green

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A favorite pair of overalls were wearing through, what a great opportunity for cute patches!

Because lots of outside play means lots of kneeling down, I made the patches quilted. The padded layer is leftover organic cotton sherpa from making pocket diapers, so soft and squishy! I made them four layers thick.  Covered with a cute quilting print, also leftover from another project.

I used a blind stitch around the edge, taking care to only catch the one layer of denim.  Then I did a running stitch "X" across to keep all the layers in place.

Too fun! I love it that 'homemade' is more in style now.

Did you see our outside play area setup?

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