diy Archives - Lulastic and the Hippyshake

Homemade Beeswax Wraps

13 January, 2016

Here is my favourite little craft of the last few years – homemade beeswax wraps.

You know what I hate? Cling Film. (Here in NZ they call it Glad Wrap. As if that horrible cloying stuff has ever made a soul glad!!)

I partly hate it because it hates me – cling film started it when it refused to ever stick to itself so all my sandwiches look as if they are wrapped in scraggly, flappy bits of plastic. Oh wait! That *is* what cling film is!

It is the stuff that our great – great – great – great – great- grandchildren will discover on their archeological digs and think, with baffled expressions on their faces, scanning the barren, scorched land around them, “THIS was the reason for the demise of our beautiful earth! My great – great- great- great- great- Nana was a total plonker!” They will write articles in the National Geographic about how we used up the world’s most precious resource wrapping up old bits of cheese.

Crumbs, didn’t know I was such a hater. Feel much better for that.

You’ll be pleased (because I was sounding like it was giving me high blood pressure, eh?) to know I discovered an alternative to Cling Film. It is an eco, recycled, reuseable version made with bees wax and fabric. Introducing homemade beeswax wraps!

All you need for these homemade beeswax wraps is some scraps of fabric and beeswax. (Buy beeswax from either your local farmers market, your local honey bee place or here at iherb – ships globally) I did six different sizes ranging from 30cm x 30cm to 15cm x 15 cm. I wanted some large enough to go over baking dishes to then go in the fridge and I wanted some I could sew into little snack packs.

How to make homemade beeswax wraps

1- Cut your fabric (ideally with pinking shears so it doesn’t fray) You can cut afterwards as well – it doesn’t fray then as it has been waxed.

2- Shave on a small amount of bees wax – sprinkle this as evenly as possible over the whole thing. Work sparingly as a little goes a long way.

3- Place on to some tin foil in a medium- hot oven for 5 or so minutes, until wax has melted. 190°C would be good.

4- Bring it out and look at it in the light. You should be able to see any patches without wax on- sprinkle a bit on those areas and pop back in oven.

5- TADA! Done! You can use these beeswax wraps in replace of cling film and you can wash and dry it and use it again!

How to use your homemade beeswax wraps

Use your beeswax wraps as you would tinfoil or cling film (or glad wrap)- wrap up your sandwiches! If you fold the wrap around a simple shape and place in a lunchbox it will hold together. but if you are gonna chuck it straight in your bag you will need to secure with string. (Like the old days of brown paper bagged lunches tied with string!)

You can also use it to cover plates or bowls – again use a string or rubber band to hold it in place over the dish.

Turn your beeswax wraps into beeswax pockets:

I took two of my homemade beeswax wraps and folded them in half and sewed a seam down the side. I left one side open so snacks could be popped in. It can then be folded over and secured with a band or a clip. PERFECT.

How to make homemade beeswax wraps

After use simply wipe down your beeswax wraps and dry them well. You can use a mid eco dishwashing liquid on them too. Store them in a clean place were they are unlikely to get dust on them. After a lot of use they will stop holding their shape and might look a little scummy, with creases. I suggest to whipping up some more.

I am in love with this easy, peasy alternative to cling film and will never again wrangle with that nasty stuff and the great-grandkids won’t be calling ME the plonker. Yay homemade beeswax wraps!

PS – Post includes my affiliate link for iherb – buy all your organic and wellness good with my link and it helps me out too!

DIY, Thrifty

Easy DIY Cloud Shelf (Yurt Life)

2 December, 2014

I haven’t done much DIY for a while – but when I began imagining a shelf that looks like a cloud I couldn’t hold back. (Ah, bladdy Pinterest kinda beat me to it. Remember the pre-Pinterest days, when you believed you’d invented everything?)

Anyway this cloud shelf filled my dreams. It would be like a cloud, floating on my wall. AWESOME.

“Hold me back, man…Where’s the jigsaw? WHERE’S THE JIGSAW HOLD ME BACK.”

You know I love a novelty shelf.

Exhibit A – shelf made out of a vintage suitcase.

Exhibit B – shelf made out of a book.

Shelves are expensive, and so are brackets. Even second hand ones. So why not just DIY something out of stuff you have lying around that is also just a little bit more beauty than a plank of wood, too? Why not, eh?

It was my first time using a jigsaw, and, my word, those things are flipping cool as. I felt like the world was my oyster, with that in my hand. I just pencilled the shape of a cloud onto a bit of MDF and then flipped the switch and buzzed it out. I started nervously and then I could see the bumps and turns forming under the saw. Ten minutes later I was holding a cloud in my hand.

*God complex*

Once I had the cloud shape – drawn so that the open bit fitted perfectly onto an existing box I had (an old wine crate would actually be ideal.) I then glue gunned it on. Because the cloud shape is just a facade it really doesn’t need a sturdier fixing than that. Glue gunning it also meant I avoided having nails on show. A few licks of white paint made it the perfect canvas for my brightly coloured shelf occupants.

I used wire around the box to hang in on the trellis of the yurt. But you could equally just hang in on a nail.

Then I filled it with my favourite little bits and pieces.

There is no coming back from this. Jigsawing out a shelf for every whim and fancy. A shelf representing every one of my favourite things. I could make a rainbow shelf! A shelf like a fox! A GOSH DARN FRIED EGG SHELF!

And I know I will never have a plank of wood for a shelf again.

DIY

How To Make Recycled Flooring

3 February, 2014

Last week I completed a DIY project that I think is my favourite make in my life so far. Not because it is superbly pretty, was fantastically quick or perfectly used my skill set. In fact, there are one or two ugly mistakes on it, it took WAY longer than I thought it would and anyone on the planet could do it! Pfft.

I loved it so much because it feels like a complete and utter DIY HACK.

Everyone needs a floor. But carpet takes skill to lay, good tiling is expensive and vinyl is often ugly. Making a recycled floor out of stuff you’d usually trash is just such a GENIUS way around this. (I’m allowed to say that as I didn’t invent it, yeah?)

We picked up our big bus, Bert, two weeks ago today. One of the first things we did was rip up the carpet. It was the rankest thing I’d ever seen. Thick with grime, an awful brown, and smelly too. We were left with a sticky MDF floor. We searched solidly for an entire week for some retro vinyl in the secondhand shops and went into carpet shops to try and find an inexpensive eco option but had no luck. A bit of late night googling for “recycled floor ideas” turned up a few blogs such as this beaut and as I read my heart began to beat faster and I knew we had to give this a bash.

The blogs I read used brown paper bags and their results are brilliant and classy. We wanted something a bit more fun and a bit brighter – so I began trawling Pinterest for geometric shape inspiration.

We took a trip first thing in the morning to the hardware store for some PVA glue, some eco, waterbased Polyurethane and a few tubes of artists acrylic. One of the local second hand stores had a big roll of old wallpaper -BINGO.

We hurried back and began the work.

Let me give you more detail…

1- Mix PVA glue to water- half glue and half water. Mix really well. I imagine you can use any paper but we used wallpaper, with the back facing up. This was because my practice stencils didn’t stick to the shiny side of the wall paper. So check how your paint fixes, if you are going to decorate it.

You can use any size strips of paper but we prefered the look of the larger bits. Ours were approximately one square foot. The finished result of this is almost like tiles. The more you scrunch the more texture your “tiles” will have. I preferred less scrunch, aesthetically. But scrunch to break the straightness of the sheet of paper.

You have got three layers to nail this bit, so don’t worry too much about the first/ second!

Dunk it in your glue mix, swipe off the excess and smooth over your floor.

Move on to the next bit.

Leave each layer overnight to dry. Do make sure it is really dry inbetween layers. We did this on a hot day so ours dried really well.

We were happy with three layers.

2- Once it is completely dry you can start decorating it. I used simple artist’s acrylic and mixed my own colours.

I just freestyled triangles with masking tape. I want to encourage you to practice. I spent about a day simply perfecting my paint consistency and shapes! I tried making a stamp first but couldn’t get the clean effect I wanted.

I chose grey, mustard and yellow because it is the actual best colour combo in the world.

I did three layers so the triangles were very deeply coloured.

3- Once dry do your first layer of waterbased polyurethane – we used an eco brand. Waterbased takes much less time to dry and is much less toxic. Work quickly, don’t re-go over bits. Pick any fluff off as you go. Most of the bubbles and streaks will fade as it dries but do try and avoid it! We did three layers of polyurethane but we are going to do a couple more as we want this floor to be super robust seeing as it is the only floor in our house!

EXTRA TIPS:

Give yourselves at least 3 days from start to finish. You aren’t working this whole time (only actually about 4 hours of work for my tiny space and most of that was the shapes!) but it all involves a lot of drying.
Do make your floor as even as possible before you begin. Shave down bumps, clean it well. We didn’t and it is, um, quite textured!

Sweep well before every stage.

Do a little practice patch.

If doing in a bathroom/ kitchen do add silicon around the edges to make it totally sealed.

Don’t skimp on the PVA. I did because I found it was sticking well with less PVA but when we added the second layer of polyurethane these little patches went dark and our lovely floor ended up slightly blotchy. See picture below, on the left? Learn from me, friends. This floor is cheap enough already- don’t be a cheapskate!

I have already swept, washed it down, spilt crap on it, walked tar onto it and it is holding up perfectly. And the other blogs tell me it has many years life in it yet!

You can probably tell, but I am completely stoked with our lovely floor. It cost about £20. We will almost certainly be doing this if we end up living in a proper house one day.

*skips about singing* My floor, my recycled floor, how I do adore!

(Ramona has begun singing everything. “Oh the cloud is sad in the sky while I eat my carrot” What a crack up. I do not know WHERE she gets it from.)

If you consider doing this I really recommend checking out some of the original bloggers as their posts are EXHAUSTIVE…
An Oregon Cottage (the Original Genius)
Ooh, I could totally do that! (Most excellent blog name!)
Lovely crafty home (Comp.Re.Hen.Sive)
Domestic Imperfection(Hilarious)

I am off to sit in the bus and rub my feet all over my shiny new creation.

(Thanks, lovely sheepskin for £5 from a car boot sale, for hiding the bits I messed up.)

Craftiness

DIY glitter figure decorations

18 December, 2013

Quick! It’s Christmas! COVER EVERYTHING IN GLITTER.

I am always picking up small plastic figures from charity shops and car boots sales- sometimes whole plastic bags of them for 50p. I rummage through it saying to Ramona “One for you, one for me” until they are all dished out. She plays quite imaginatively with them and I craft them up. (These Cowboy and Indian pots were probably my favourite. Until now.)

I also like putting glitter on stuff. Really, who doesn’t? Anything goes. (See: shoes)

Glitter on tiny plastic toys is a WINNER!

Grab some glue- a nice toxic shoe glue is a goody, something that dries quickly but is really strong.

Grab some glitter.

Apply glue to your figure in centimetre patches, dabbing it in the glitter before you do the next centimetre.

Don’t get your fingers involved. (I was Goldfinger for about 3 days.)

Apply a string to hang on the tree or a name tag for a placeholder.

Merry glittery Christmas everybody.

(HARHAHAHAHA *evil laugh* Your guests will have glitter in all their nooks and crannies for MONTHS.)

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Babywearing

Babywearing: Three easy and quick DIY sling tutorials

12 May, 2013

I simply don’t know how mothers who aren’t into babywearing do it. Without a wrap or sling how on earth do you keep your newborn happy whilst continuing to tweet on the loo/ stand in front of the fridge for endless minutes picking your way through leftovers and the chocolates your toddler received in honour of becoming a big sister/ wash off the paint toddler has plastered all over her face whilst breastfeeding newborn? Babywearing can work for all mamas and babies – I have heard that even babies born with hip dysplaysia can wear their babies. Also, babywearing is PERFECT for disguising the fact that you are in the supermarket in your milk stained pajama top.

Like many parents we have a couple of different slings – ones for different occasions and timeframes in our daughters life. For these early days I find a stretchy wrap invaluable- it is so comfortable for me and snug for the little lady. I also find a ring sling handy too- it is easy to whip them in and out for pottytunities (we do EC with our daughters.) However, I seem to produce Gold Top milk that soon sees our babies piling on the pounds and becoming rather, um, BONNY, so by 3-4 months need to upgrade to something sturdier like my woven Didymos wrap. Most babies will get to at least 6 months with a ring sling or stretchy.

I have made each one of the following slings and recommend them wholeheartedly- they are genuinely first rate, even though they are cheapskate and will meet all your babywearing needs in the thriftiest possible manner.

1- A stretchy woven – 5 minutes to make, £7

Here is how:

You will end up with one loooong bit of fabric (5 metres suits most, I made mine shorter, around 4 m) which can then be tied into all sorts of wraps- I use this pre-tie the most (click here for demo.)

If you use tee shirt material you won’t even need to hem it but if you use something lighter like gauze you will need to hem it to stop it fraying.

2- A ring sling, 30 minutes to make, £10

My friend made this one for me, using some beautiful sari material and some heavy duty curtain hooks. Here is an identical tutorial.

(Do excuse these heavily vintaged-up photos, I am clearly trying to hide away my pokey, tired peepers!)

3- Mei Tai carrier, 2 hours, £15

I used this tutorial from the beaut Grumbles and Grunts but adapted it to turn it into a toddler carry by making it slightly bigger and adding loads of stuffing. In some ways it was a blazing success – soooo comfortable for carting my two and a half year old about. In other ways it was an utter failure; I added so much padding (like, 2 pillows worth of stuffing HA) that it was incredibly bulky and was, strangely, like carrying a toddler and 2 pillows about…

So maybe stick to the simple version, it should see your tot through to about two years old.

Right, I’m off to go and graze in front of the fridge again.

What stuff do you get up to with a baby velcroed on to your chest? Have you found any brilliant babywearing tutorials?

PS I’d hate for you to miss a post… enter your email to get them pinged into your inbox. I won’t be spamalot, promise!

Craftiness

DIY Valentines decoration with a doily and a coathanger

3 February, 2013

Doilies are little things of wonder, an intricate relic of a daintier world whose stars faded in the eighties. (Like most good things, eh? MC Hammer pants, Button Moon, my childhood.) I heard it was once commonplace, before the advent of T.V cabinets, to have a giant doily placed over your telly, to hide its big, boxy crassness. Giant doilies, eh? Can you IMAGINE.

I recently inherited a small stack of doilies from my Nana. I was thrilled to BITS with this lacey, memory exuding pile. Although when I got them home I figured out why I normally don’t snap them up when they are going for a song at a car boot sale. What do you do with them? They are superfluous wee things. When put on your shelves under ornaments, as is, I gather, traditionally done, they add a fiddliness to dusting that makes me think there was probably a perfect correlation between the increase in women in the workplace and the descent of the doily’s popularity.

I need no other disincentive for cleaning so I have had a LOT of fun crafting with the doilys over the last few days. I am most excited about this:

*sings operatically* “YESSS! A Valentines Wreath! It is exactly what everybody neeeeeeds” (Since seeing Les Mis last week, which was basically me paying a tenner to sit in a public place and sob for three hours, I have been UNABLE to not sing almost everything. It all just sounds so much better, makes life a lot more dramatic. Imagine every other sentence in song, if you can.)

You need:
Air Dry Clay – this is worth having, it is so easy to work with and non messy and especially good if you are a parent who likes to craft as it can occupy tots too. Ramona and I can happily play with this together for an hour. Although salt-dough would also work.
A Doily
Scissors (or a cookie cutter – but I love the way it feels, cutting this stuff)
A rolling pin
A coat hanger

Simply roll out your clay to about 0.5 cm, and then cut out your hearts. Place your doily on one corner – or the whole thing, if you fancy- and roll your pin over it again, very, very firmly, just once, it should end up about a third of a CM thick.

Do this with about ten hearts of different sizes.

Meanwhile, take a coathanger and undo it. Twist it in on itself until it is a sphere with a circumference of about 10cm, with a small hook at the top.

Once your hearts are dry (this could take up to a day by a radiator) glue them on (liberal with the glue folks, this isn’t the Depression. Nope, just a quadruple dip recession.)

Hang it up! Ta Da!

I am pretty happy with how it looks, but mostly I flipping loved making it. So much fun, so quick and simple.

Made anything lately? Would love to see it!

PS I’d hate for you to miss a post… enter your email to get them pinged into your inbox. I won’t be spamalot, promise!

PPS Linking up with the most magnificent Liz and those other marvellous Magpies!

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