Dont Buy Cards! Make Them!

I used to buy cards. Never the $5.95 cards, but pretty cards in boxes or from $1 racks. However you can make cards for a fraction of this. I started my adventures in card making last year with a few collaged images from vintage books. My confidence has grown to be a bit more creative as I arm myself with inspiring library books.

Dolly had a friend turning 5 in her class. So she made a pretty cupcake card to wish him a Happy Birthday over the weekend.

As for myself, one of my friends had a birthday too... a few weeks ago... and now I wanted to wish her a belated birthday with a gift voucher of my services for 2 nights of babysitting. Recognise the gold fabric? It's from this... There is so much of it!

Our cards only cost about 30 cents each to make. It doesn't take much time. You can use scraps, it's personal and it's fun. I also think it's great for Dolly's self esteem to give beautiful objects she has created.

How do you source your cards?

Pinata

Hi Everyone,

Dolly and I worked on TO DO craft project today. A Birthday Party Pinata. I was inspired by someones blog but I don't remember who - so forgive me for not linking. We used our memory, adapted their method and created our own mini version of a Pinata ready for filling with sweets and chocolate gold coins. It's supposed to be a crown - but I think it kind of looks like a castle. No matter, as kids have great imagination and itch to have fun. And this party will be fun :-)

This was our process:

Cut a cereal box down to size and shape.

Cut crepe paper.

Cover box in glue.

Paste crepe paper in layers.

Paste embellishments.

Cover any bits that you missed with crepe paper such as the top flaps and bottom.

And Voila one Pinata ready to be be filled and whacked.

So there you have it! This Eco Frugal woman has achieved one of her aims again. Using trash and saving money. The only cost was crepe paper we used 1/4 of a $2.40 packet and glue. So roughly 80 cents and less than 1 hour of our time for one Pinata in the shape to fit our Princess And Knight themed Birthday Party. (You could make these as an inexpensive birthday gift for kids or adults. Just fill it with trinkets or sweets).

We have more crafting to complete this week in preparation for the party in 2 weeks time. And.. cupcake making for the school classroom where I will attempt something I have never made before. This will be my year of challenging myself by making many things myself to save cash, be creative, include my daughter and prevent the buying of new or over packaged stuff.

How about you? Ready to Party in style but cut costs by being organised and making it yourself? Let me know any tricks or ideas you have..

Gift Box For $5.85

This is a gift box of goodies Dolly gave to her friend for her 5th birthday. Dolly crafted the card and assisted with some of the bag construction organisation. Dolly also guillotined the scrap booking paper into small cuter sizes.

$1.25 Box made from Rubbish & Op Shopped Calendar & Book. (I'm wearing a thrifted $1 top purchased in 2011)

The library bag and box was made op shopped items that were reused. The plastic Doll was unfortunately new from a department store but will be much love.

French Seamed Bag with Different Fabric Straps.

I Love the Pretty Floral Fabric. It's a Beautiful Quality Too.

Total Cost of the gift was $5.85
My labour was more at 7 hours, some of it fun and some of it very frustrating!

Crafted Box $1.25 (glue and bits of an op shopped calendar and book).
Crafted Library Bag $1 (piece of green op shopped fabric and a girls dress purposely purchased for fabric) (Letters are a piece of old damaged fabric needing using).
Crafted Card 10 cents (scrap paper and picture from a damaged op shopped book).
New - 10 Pieces of different Scrap Booking Papers 50 cents.
New - Doll $3 (Purchased at Christmas time for this very purpose).

I felt very satisfied putting this gift together and hope to keep building my crafted gift repertoire and skills to create from used items. This gives me eco pride and frugal satisfaction (as you can see from my face).

Have you made anything this week?

Glue, Glue, All Types of Glue

Everyone is fast asleep and I spent some time alone fixing and creating with glue.

Dolly has a musical instrument that has been sitting on the table for 2 years!!! Yes, 2 years with the intention of fixing it. It took only 10 minutes. A bit of craft glue and elastic bands and the job was done. Why does it take me so long to get these things done...

I prepared Dolly's lunch box (vegemite sandwich, 1 plum with lime, 1 nectarine with lime, 2 crackers and veggie sticks) and decided to go cute. I used paper glue to stick a small image from a vintage book onto a scrap piece of paper. I also stuck on a butterfly (I used my shape cutter) and wrote a little note. Popped it into a snap lock bag (that I will reuse) with a little chocolate egg amongst the healthy stuff. Dolly will be so excited to find this surprise on her 1st day of big school tomorrow.

For Dolly's 5th birthday Party I have completed another gift for the pass-the-parcel. I purchased a gold belt from the op shop (thrift/charity store) $1, cut off the metal bit that goes in the belt holes and craft glued to form a circle that will fit a 5 year old head perfectly. I then glued a broken brooch from when I was 15 (a good year-1985) and 2 beads to create the precious jewels. Now it's a Prince crown for one of our boy guests.

And ONE LAST PROJECT FOR DOLLY TONIGHT... Dolly carefully wrote a lovely letter for the fairies living in our garden and left it on the table overnight in a sealed envelope. If forgot she did this. She was very disapointed this morning. I explained that it had rained so heavily the fairies could not come as their wings would have been hurt. Tonight I drew flowers, cut them out, wrote a note and glued them together. Tomorrow morning she will find her letter gone and in it's place a fairy flower letter.

Glue is useful and allows you to be frugally creative by fixing stuff and making stuff with items inexpensively obtained. I encourage you to take a couple hours to fix and make stuff. It's a gratifying feeling and entertaining too. Where is The Rambling Expat in all this? He's in bed on his stomach with a pinched nerve in his back. Must have been all that fishing ;-)

Are you glueing anything?

Library Bag

With the new school year commencing soon, I wanted something homemade and special for for my sweet 4 year old...

So a couple weeks ago when I saw a pretty piece of green fabric with small flowers for $2 at the Op Shop, I knew I wanted to make her a library bag. I held off buying the fabric knowing it would be marked down. I returned the following week and purchased it for $1 at half price. I also had a piece of dot fabric from a $1 dress purchased in 2010. I still have plenty of this fabric, it's a strong cotton that can be used for many future projects. You you may see it again and again. And lastly I have Hello Kitty fabric at home which was purchased new in 2005. I put these all together and sewed my Dolly a new School Library Bag.

(In Australia it's often required by primary schools that students have a library bag to transfer borrowed school library books from school to home and back again. This aids in keeping them together and protected from further wear and tear.)

New School Library Bag - Dolly LOVES it.

The library bag has cost me less then $1.50 to make. Inexpensive compared to the themed library bags on sale at the shopping centres. Also by making the bag myself I have opted out of buying more new stuff, used items already at home and purchased 1 small piece of fabric, second hand.

It's the time that is takes me to sew that is frustrating. I understand that the more I practice the better and faster I will become, but being impatient and busy means I want faster now! I thought about attending sewing classes to gain much needed skills but have decided to teach myself as best as I can with books and You Tube as a free alternative. I can't afford paying for hobby classes at this point in my life.

I found the instructions for the library bag in Kelly Doust's book, The Crafty Kid (borrowed from the library of course). It was a little tricky for me understanding some of the instructions however as I made errors I had great light bulb moments, unpicked and tried again. Kelly Doust doesn't get you too just sew, she makes you to do French Seams so the finish is beautiful and polished. Fortunately my 4 year old will be forgiving of my beginners messy stitches. But now I'm working on a Birthday gift library bag, and this one will need to look polished.

Do you sew? If yes.. how did you learn? Do you attend any "hobby" classes?

Random Tibbits

Hi Everyone,

I have a few random things I want to show you and chat about.

The Swap-O-Matic Vending Machine...
Have you seen it? I love all things cool and kitchy. Well click this link and take a look! Or this link for a little demonstration video. I love it!! And want one right here in my city! I could see this in the local libraries and cool arty shops.

Super Cheap Haircut.
So my fringe was touching the middle of my nose and I was feeling blah about my hair. But wanting to not spend time or money at the hairdressers I grabbed my small sewing scissors and snipped snipped away in less then 5 minutes. It's a bit crooked, but I like quirky so now I'm quirky.
By the way, if you live in Darwin I noticed the hairdressers in Karama Shopping Centre are looking for models for creative haircuts. So if your feeling groovy give them a call and see if you can get a FREE cut.

Crookedly Quirky and Free.

Bad Book Purchase Turned into a Win.
I purchased a 2nd hand book for $4 thinking it had a photograph The Rambling Expat had taken. It didn't. However it had eight, 55 cent postal stamps that I can use. Value $4.40, that's a 40 cent win. Book off to the op shop, stamps in my wallet. Yeah for small wins.

Not the Right Book.

Happy Discovery of Stamps.

Birthday Goodie Bags.
Dolly prepared her goodie bags for her birthday party. I was inspired by this Blog Post. We used a 50 cent Art op shop book we had lying around gathering dust and lunch bags from last years birthday party. I am trying to instill a love and knowledge of Art to Dolly. So she chose Art Nouveau pictures that looked like Princesses, Princes, Queens and Kings.

Working Hard

10 Bags Completed - Ready To Be Filled With Treats.

Tiny Frog.
As I blog tonight the rain is sprinkling it's much wanted moisture giving us some relief from the humid heat. I can hear frogs singing from every direction and I saw this tiny creature on the fly screen catching insects attracted by my light. I dashed out in the rain to take a photo of him on the window and as I did so, he jumped on my head. As I eased him off gently, I took a quick pic for you. So small and beautiful.

The Rambling Expat in the Background, Inside Out Of The Rain.

Exquisite.

Thanks for reading and if you're lucky enough to get a Swap-O-Matic near you let me know :-)

PS: My Rambling Expat has a Fishing Lure Giveaway if you enjoy fishing.

Frugal Card - Invite Making

Many of our friends are artists, musicians, stylists, photographers and so on. The Rambling Expat himself is creative and works in a creative field. As for myself I'm the wanna-be-artists with no talent or skills in any of the areas. A hanger-on of the creative types. However the past 2 years or so of taking steps to be eco-frugal has lead me to to be more creative as a solution to stop purchasing the same old rubbish on offer at the shops.

This past year has seen me making a pillow, a soft toy owl, collaged boxes, yo yo necklaces, pretty chocolate wrappings, earrings, magnets and now party invitations. It's been a fun ride.

Dolly's fifth birthday is coming up and we are preparing for the Princess and Knight themed party. This afternoon we spent a couple of hours at the library where Dolly read and played while I found inspiration in 3 amazing card books.

Library Books To Gather Ideas.

Pages That Inspired Me On My Invitation Making Journey.

For the party invitations I'm using mostly resources from home dating back from the past 10 years such as pencils, stamp, card stock. Images are from a 50 cents op shop book. I did purchase 3 new items out of my FUN budget. A fleur de lys hole punch $4, a gold permanent marker $3 and a box of 50 gold pins for $2. They were not needed, these were wants however they will all last for years. Each invitation is costing me roughly 10 cents to make. I have 2 created and 8 to go. I'm enjoying this and finding it so much fun.

Kitch, Vintage Feel, Princess Invitations.

Kitch Princess Invitations.

I like my cards and how they are so different to the regular shop bought invitations. Each one will have a message on the pretty back (not shown), inviting a child to the party stating it's a Royal Party for a Princess being held in the Royal Gardens and please wear your Royal Gowns and Suits for Cake and Fun.

Is frugality making you more creative? If it is, do you enjoy it, resent it or even dislike it?

Australian Women Spend $3000 a Year On Clothes!

Apparently the average Australian woman spends $3000 a year on clothes and accessories. I guess I'm not average. In the past 16 months I spent roughly $300 on new & second hand clothes for myself.

Yes - I like Red, White and Black!

These are the new clothing items I purchased in 2011.

• 2 bras (far out! They are expensive pieces of fabric, lace and wire) 
• 2 pairs of work trousers (boring - yawn...) 
• 2 work tops (wasted money - cheap & nasty quality)
• 1 packet of knickers (much needed)
• 1 handbag in Paris sales (dud - doesn't like the tropical heat much)

This year I have an envelope with $180 tagged for clothes and accessories shopping for myself. I hope to have fun and funky it up a bit on this budget as I love quirky clothes with a bit of a twist. Maybe my new tentative steps in crafting will allow me to create crazy alterations to op shopped clothes. (My $20 a month budget for flipping and markets will not be part of my own clothing budget).

How much are you going to spend on clothes and accessories?

1. $3000?
2. Much less?
3. Nothing at all?

Tell all - spill your beans... hang out your dirty laundry...

Use What You Have On Hand

Dolly is currently preparing 4 craft boxes for 3 friends and herself as gifts. Yes she's preparing a gift for herself too. How smart is that.

To present all the inexpensive and op shopped goodies as pretty as possible I have been working on making the boxes as gorgeous as possible to give it extra Zip Dang Bang! I have completed 2 so far (one a night at roughly 2 hours each) while my family sleeps.

The boxes were from The Rambling Expats workplace destined for landfill. Old A4 Illford Photography Paper boxes (back from the darkroom days). He saved them for me knowing I'm a hoarder of all good things. I started cutting random images from books and mags but then remembered these sweet calenders from 2010 and 2011 purchased in op shops for .50 cents each. So cutting and gluing ensued with beautiful outcomes.

 

These are not completed. They need one more lick of glue to varnish and protect, then I'm done. These are time consuming but I'm hooked as I have found it meditative to cut and glue in the quiet. We have a 70th Birthday party to attend soon. I'm planning to ask a shoe shop for a nice sturdy shoe box that I can cover. I hope to fill it with herb/rose petal sachets, chocolate and photos. It's for a man, so I will masculinate all my gifts.

Have you done anything like this before? It's my 1st time and I think it's quite nifty. Have you been using what you have on hand?

I might be away tomorrow as We are taking The Rambling Expat out for dinner - it's his Birthday. Pop over to his fishing addicted Blog to wish him a happy 45th (he only looks 30 - lucky Duck!) We've been together for 19 years. Who would have ever thought? My plan was to stay single and sexy all my life and then I met him... Now I'm content and Rubenesque :-)

Christmas Day

Today was relaxed. Dolly woke at 7:30am and said "Do you think Santa has come yet?" I said go and see. So she ran into the lounge and found many small parcels from us and from Santa. Dolly played with her Papa, The Rambling Expat while I squeezed in a bit more sleep.

Then the 3 of us made a batch of fresh pesto for my mum's Christmas present out of yesterdays basil harvest. We used basil, chilli, Parmesan cheese, garlic, toasted pine nuts and virgin olive oil. Simple luxury that is delicious on pasta, rice, veggies and by the spoonful. Mmmmmmm. Cost about $10 to make a jar full (pine nuts and parmesan are expensive here).

We then headed to my mums house for a left overs lunch from last nights dinner of Roast Pork, potatoes and veggies. Simple and delicious. On our arrival Dolly discovered Santa had left her a present at Grandma's, her beloved Rapunzel! Dolly jumped up and down on the spot about 20 times in her overjoyed excitement.

As you can see from the tutu I did not craft as planned. I decided to tell Dolly, that Santa had given a plain tutu for her to embellish herself. This worked a charm and she is looking forward to crafting her tutu into a work of art. This will be a fun and frugal holiday activity.

We had a simple, stress free, easy day just hanging out with my mum eating and watching French TV. On our return home we did a bit more cyclone preparation in the back yard as the winds may affect us tomorrow however it's believed we will not be directly hit. Tonight I will curl up with a book or watch a DVD that I picked up FREE from a Giveaway box at the office. Frugal life is good.

Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrates this time of year. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my ramblings, inspiring me and making my late nights fun.

Sweet Homemade Chocolate Bars

On our arrival home I cooked quick angel hair pasta with a jar of sauce as we had serious business to get to. Dolly and I were on a mission to make decadent Rocky Road with macadamia nuts, rice bubbles, turkish delight, marshmallows, snickers, mars bar and of course good old cadbury milk chocolate.

This is the last piece for the major fancy gift pack as seen here and here that Dolly is giving her special person tomorrow. We did a little tasting along the way of course and at the end we both had a bowl each to lick and share. Ahhhh the Good Life :-)

Dolly Said This Looked Like Salad!

Mmmmmmmm, Chocolate in the pan ready to be harden in the fridge. We made 2 pans full = 16 generous chocolate bars.

Decadent!

When the chocolates were cut and wrapped in my new favourite style, they were so sweet and pretty I couldn't stop looking at them. I was inspired by a library book showing home made chocolate bars wrapped in pretty wrapping paper. I thought why buy pretty paper when there are so many super cute vintage books all ripped and damaged at the fraction of the cost, ready to use and preventing it from entering landfill.

Wrapped and Ready.

The completed gift is ready for tomorrow morning, being given as a Thank You from Dolly to someone she loves (and Drat - it's not me - I wouldn't mind getting this gift, I'll have to spoil myself and make a pack for me).

Crafted With Heart.

Break Down Of Gifts Costs:

• Rose Petal Sachets .80 cents each = $3.20
• Necklace = $1.00
• Bottle Top Magnets .5 cents each = 20 cents
• Chocolate $1.15 each = $2.30
• Vintage Staffordshire Plate = .50 cents.

TOTAL Gift Price = $7.20

I think the gift is very eco-frugal pretty and I'm feeling proud of my efforts. These 2 years has seen a big change in me from a buyer of regular stuff, to a buyer of discounted stuff, to a buyer of second hand stuff and now to a buyer of second hand stuff to recreate into other items. Many hours and lots of heart went into these gifts, which is a much nicer feeling then wandering around a department store looking for a generic gift like all the others.

Has your lifestyle changed in the past couple of years?

Craft - All Good and Frugal

Hi Everyone, Hope you are all well and not as hot as I am. It's sweltering here in the tropics. A little hard to cope with as it's draining.

For dinner tonight we had left over roast chicken cooked in a pot with carrot and broccoli. It turned into a lovely soup which I poured into bowls half full of rice. Healthy, cheap and yummy. And helping my family to shake these coughs.

Once I had Dolly in bed at 7pm I sat down in front of a the TV screen and crafted for 3 hours while watching the Closer.

YoYo Necklace - ready to swing around a pretty neck.

Shiny Bead to Hide the Snap Lock Button

And the 2nd present for Dolly's special person is completed. It cost me roughly $1 in materials from old clothes purchased in op shops, ribbon, 1 new snap lock button and new thread. Buttons were from freecycled buttons. It did however take me about 4 hours to complete as I kept making mistakes and having to unpick to resew. I guess I was blinded and distracted by TV.

Did you have a fab frugal day too?
Do you craft to save your pennies?