DIY Bird Feeders

Love this DIY Bird Feeders from www.momendeavors.com


Special Blend Bird Seed

This month’s Lowe’s Cre­ative Ideas blog­ger chal­lenge was all about the birds! And, with spring most def­i­nitely here, it was a fit­ting chal­lenge. As always, the tough­est part was just fig­ur­ing out what to do. We decided that we liked the idea of a bird feeder bet­ter than a bird house–

 So, here’s what they came up with:

Can you tell what they’re made from? They were easy to do–even some­thing the kid­dos can help with! And, I love the pop of color we have out­side now.

Cozy Den Bird House

Here’s the bird chal­lenge sup­plies picked up at Lowe’s:

- 3 small paint cans, a 3/16″ wooden dowel, finch food, a Hum­ming­bird feeder & Hum­ming­bird food! Now, of course, the hum­ming­bird stuff wasn’t part of our DIY project. But, since we were think­ing of our lit­tle feath­ered friends, we had to get some­thing for our beau­ti­ful desert hummingbirds–like this guy:Hope­fully they’ll come around even more often now that we have a new feeder filled with that super sug­ary red liquid!



Ok, now back to our project.… Cut­ part of the dowel into 4 inch pieces (one for each paint can). Then  work on spruc­ing up the paint cans. 


 paint the three cans and the dowel pieces.

Classic Series Arts and Crafts Bird House

Once those had a good while to dry,  put a lit­tle bead of hot glue on the inside grove of the top of each paint can (where the lid would snap into) and stick a dowel piece in. Then, you will need some­thing to hang them.

Quick & easy project and pro­vides such a cute look out by the gar­den. And, here’s the best part…our fine feath­ered friends have already taken notice! Here’s what we saw when we came down­stairs this morning:

Build it and they will come!”"

 Covered Bridge Bird Feeder in Victorian White


   

Bar of Soap to Liquid Soap

Turn A Bar of Soap Into Liquid Hand Soap

I have a confession to make. I don’t like bar soap. It gets dirty and takes a long time to use up, so I usually get fed up with it and throw it in the trash.
Despite this, people seem to like to give me bar soap, which I feel guilty not using. So I have been buying liquid hand soap at $3 a bottle and putting the bar soap in a box with the intention of somehow finding a use for it.
Then it occurred to me that I might be able to convert the bar soap into liquid hand soap. Why didn’t I think of it before? I did some research and found out that it is easy to do. All it takes is melting the soap with water, adding a little vegetable glycerin, and voilà, you have made liquid hand soap.

So I tried it and was thrilled to find that it works great! From one bar of soap, I made close to 2 liters of hand soap, which will last a long time. The only thing I purchased for this project was a $2 bottle of glycerin at my local drug store:

Glycerin is made from plant oils and is commonly used in soaps, shampoos, moisturizers, etc. Since bar soap already has glycerin in it, I tried this experiment both ways, with and without the added glycerin. I found that the below recipe worked fine without the glycerin, except that the soap tended to clump and didn’t have as smooth a texture. It made enough of a difference that I would recommend adding the glycerin, but you can also try the recipe without it, if you wish.

How To Turn A Bar of Soap Into Liquid Hand Soap
Ingredients:

1 c soap flakes
10 c water
1 Tbs glycerin

Equipment:

Cheese grater
A large pot
Measuring cup and spoons
A spatula for stirring
A soap container with a hand pump
A container to hold excess soap
Funnel

Directions:
First, grate the soap. Get out your cheese grater, grab the soap, and get grating. I found this to be surprisingly easy, although the soap particles tend to float in the air as you grate. You can wear a mask to avoid breathing it in. When you’re done, the soap flakes look like grated Parmesan:

One bar of soap yielded a little over 1.5 cups of flakes. The recipe only uses one cup of soap flakes, so I put the remaining soap in a jar for later use.
In a large pot, combine 1 cup soap flakes, 10 cups water, and 1 Tbs glycerin. Turn on medium-low heat and stir until the soap dissolves. This happens fast, about a minute or two.
Let the soap cool completely, then pour into the containers using the funnel. That’s all there is to it!

As I mentioned, this recipe makes a lot of soap, about 6 bottles worth. I put the excess in a large bottle and am storing it under the sink. When I run out, I will simply pull out the big bottle and funnel some more into the smaller bottle.
You can also use this soap as body wash. To make it smell nice, add a drop or two of essential oil to the mix.
As I mentioned, the only thing I bought for this experiment was the glycerin. I reused the bottles and the soap was a gift. (Alternately, I could have saved soap slivers and made the hand soap that way.)
In the end, I used about $.40 worth of glycerin to make the equivalent of 6 bottles of hand soap. That’s a savings $17.60, well worth the half hour of my time it took to make the soap.

UPDATE: I tried this with Dove Sensitive Skin Soap too. If you want to turn a bar of DOVE soap into liquid soap, click here for the recipe.

ETA: The kind of soap you use may be a bit of a wild card, since every soap will have different ingredients in it. I got the best results with a bar of Yardley soap, which did not even need the glycerin to become hand soap. In general, a higher quality soap will probably yield better liquid hand soap.
Dove Sensitive Skin Beauty Bar seems to be more difficult to turn into hand soap, which I would guess has something to do with the “sensitive” formula.
ETA II: I’m happy so many of you are finding this recipe helpful. If you are having trouble, such as thin or watery soap or “snot-like” (?) soap, I encourage you to read through the comments. Lots of people have reported back with their experiences with the recipe. It seems that sometimes letting the soap sit to thicken in the pot or hacking it with a hand blender to loosen it does the trick.
ETA III: For a solution on getting the soap to lather, try a foaming soap dispenser.

Kid Crafts

Look what I found when searching the web for 'Spring Crafts'...  Such a cute craft for those little hands! I can't wait to try this with all my grandbabies!!~

Paper plate crafts

Enchanted Learning Software's Duck Paper Plate Craft More Kinder Crafts This easy-to-make duck is a cute craft that is made from a single paper plate and construction paper.

More animal crafts

Supplies needed:

Paper plate Scissors Glue Stapler A pencil Yellow and orange construction paper or oak tag Crayons, paint or markers Googly eyes (optional)

Trace your hands on yellow construction paper, then cut the hands out. If you don't have yellow construction paper, use stiff white paper, then paint it yellow (or use markers).

Fold a paper plate in half. Paint it yellow and let it dry

Staple the hands near the fold on one end - these will be the tail feathers.

Using yellow construction paper or oaktag, cut out a circle (about 3 inches across or a little bigger) -- this will be the duck's head. Using orange construction paper or oaktag, cut out an elongated oval with one end cut off -- this will be the duck's bill. Fold the end of the beak over, making a small tab (this is where you will put the glue).

Glue the bill onto the circle (put the glue on the small tab that will be folded under the bill). Draw eyes above the bill (or glue on small googly eyes). Staple the head to the paper plate (near the fold line, opposite the tail feathers).

Using orange construction paper or oak-tag, cut out the duck's feet - they should be connected by a short strip of paper. To draw each foot, start with an oval, then draw a zigzag on one end. Fold the paper where the feet meet the strip of paper.

Staple each foot to the bottom of one side of the paper plate, right inside the fold line of the foot. You now have a cute duckie that will stand up.

For a duck theme page, click here.