I haven't gotten around to unpacking my craft room yet (how did that get so low on the priority list?), so I haven't had any crafty things to show lately. Thanks to Jess for all the fun giveaways in the meantime! But I needed a quick and easy fall teacher gift this week, so I pulled out the ribbon box and an old favorite recipe: sugar hand and body scrub. One of my favorite sweet-but-not-to-eat-treats. That's what our teachers are getting for Halloween this year.
I've tried a lot of homemade sugar scrub recipes and come up with a basic combination that can be used to make lots of yummy scents. Sugar scrubs are wonderful because they soften the skin by exfoliating (sugar) and moisturizing (oil). Just wet hands or body and massage a little sugar scrub onto the skin, then rinse well. I love to keep a jar of scrub by sink in my hall bathroom for guests, and it makes a really fun gift for teachers, friends, and hostesses. You could take one to your Thanksgiving dinner host--she'll appreciate a sweet treat without the calories!

Sugar Scrub Basic Recipe
Ingredients & supplies
2 parts turbinado sugar (sugar in the raw--I found mine at Walmart) OR brown sugar (or half and half each)
1 part coconut oil OR cold-pressed oil like almond oil, grapeseed oil, sunflower, safflower oil, etc. (or half and half each)
Glass jars (canning jars work great--you just need something with a lid)
Essential oils for scents (optional)

To create your scrub, mix your sugars with your oils, store in an airtight jar near the sink or in the shower for about a month. I like using half coconut oil and half cold-pressed oil for a thinner mixture. Use all coconut oil for a thicker scrub, or all cold-pressed oil for an even thinner scrub. You can use all brown sugar, but I like using some turbinado sugar because the big crystals are better for exfoliation.

Mix dry ingredients together. Add oils and mix until no lumps remain. Divide into glass jars with lids. 


Mix dry ingredients together. Add oils and mix until no lumps remain. Divide into canning jars with lids.


1 cup turbinado sugar (sugar in the raw)
1/4 cup coconut oil
1/4 cup almond oil or other cold-pressed oil
1 Tbsp. coarsely chopped fresh ginger

Heat coconut oil and ginger in a small saucepan over medium heat for about 5 minutes. This will allow the ginger to infuse into the oil. Allow to cool a few minutes. Strain through a mesh strainer or coffee filter to remove ginger. Discard ginger.
Mix warm coconut oil with cold-pressed oil. Add sugar and stir well. Spoon into glass jars and cover with a tight lid.

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Ooh, so excited for today's post! Emily of Jones Design Company (one of the classiest and most talented design/craft bloggers out there!) is sharing her tutorial for summer beach tote tags, including free printables! Make sure you check out Emily's blog after you read on!

Summer bags are a must … toting beach towels and sand toys to the beach, goggles and
sunscreen to the pool and snacks and frisbees to the park. With kids coming and going, a bag
tag is a great way to identify each bag and keep track of it while you are out and about.
I have created a printable pdf with four beachy designs and with just a few inexpensive
products, you can customize in minutes.



Here’s what you’ll need:



:: beach bag tags printable pdf {download at the end of the post}

:: self-sealing laminating pouches {purchase here for

$5.99 for 5 pouches}

:: rubber stamps & ink pad, or pen to personalize

:: ribbon for attaching to bag

STEP ONE: print pdf & cut along dotted line





STEP TWO: personalize



There are some great alphabet stamp sets available at Paper Source {click here}.

STEP THREE: fold tag in half



STEP FOUR: following instructions on bag tags, set tag into pouch and slowly remove paper

backing and press to seal.





Now just add a ribbon of your choice and tie to your bag.











These work great on lunch bags for kids’ summer camps too!





To download the pdf, please click on image below



Enjoy your summer {and the tags!}

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I’ve been looking for some good homemade “spa” recipes. Unfortunately, most of those I’ve come across require a trip to the natural food store or an online purchase (like soap supplies). I was thrilled to find in the May 2009 Better Homes and Gardens Magazine recipes for treatments that used things I already have in my house. Hooray!

Yogurt Face Mask
1 cup of yogurt
1 Tablespoon of Tumeric powder (used in Indian cooking)

Mix well and brush evenly on your face. According to BH&G, yogurt is a “natural source of lactic acid, which organically dissolves dead skin and leaves your face feeling smoother”. The tumeric is used as a brightener.


Avocado Hair Mask

Half an avocado, mashed
1/2 tsp. olive oil
1 egg yolk

Combine all ingredients and mix well. Brush on wet hair paying attention to the ends. Let it sit a minimum of 30 minutes. Shampoo out.

We've seen lots of great home recipes out there, like pomegranate sugar scrub, honey bath, even a chocolate facial mask. Gather a few recipes and a few girlfriends--make your own spa girls' night in!

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This is the coolest concept. You cover a bar of soap with this fabulous wool fiber, then felt it, and you have a soap and washcloth in one! I love this for my kids because the soap doesn't get slippery and slip out of their hands, and I don't have to have a separate cloth or scrubby in the bath. And it really is an easy project.

Wool Felted Soap Tutorial


What you'll need:

*Bar of soap (check out Bath & Body Works for great fragrances--they often go on sale for $1!)
*Wool fibers
*Wool felting needles or tool (optional)
*Nylon sock (optional)
*Washboard (optional)
*Wool felting block (optional)

I found these lovely wool fibers from the local yarn store. It was super reasonable (only a couple of dollars per ounce and look how much I got!).


1. Place your wool felting block on a flat surface. Lay a piece of paper on top of the wool block and lay your fibers on the very top layer. We used a piece of paper to prevent our fibers from getting stuck in our block. If you are using a different type of block, one that is similar to foam, you may not need the paper. This block is like a brush, and without the paper in between, we would've been picking out fibers for days.


2. Using your wool felting need or tool (be careful--these babies are sharp!), punch out a design. Move your needle up and down to secure the fiber in place. Use contrasting fibers so your design really stands out. We chose a simple star shape for one soap and polka dots for another. (Hint: you could probably use a plain old pin or needle to do this, but it will take longer than using the felting needles.)



3. Continue to punch the contrasting wool shape (in our case, a star) until the contrasting fiber (star) is thoroughly intertwined in the bottom wool fiber. You want this contrasting fiber to hold its shape when you felt the fibers, so make sure it is really on there.


4. Gently separate the wool fiber from the paper. It will stick a bit, but a steady hand and patience should give you great results. Don't worry if you have small pieces of paper in it. They will eventually dissolve and paper will not harm your body so don't pull your hair out getting every last piece.


5. Wrap your fibers tightly around your soap. This is where this craft moves into "art-rather-than-science" mode. Don't use too much fiber or you will have excess after felting that will hang off your soap like little wool fingers. If you use too little when you felt, you will have areas of your soap thatare exposed. Don't worry too much if either of these things happen. We had soap that turned out each of these ways and they are still useful in the shower. They just have "character".



6. Once your soap is completely covered and you feel happy with it, prepare it for felting. It helps to put the soap in a nylon stocking, but you can achieve the same results without it. We used a trouser sock and it was a little too thick for what we needed, but still worked. It just took longer to felt because the wool fibers were not getting agitated enough.

We scrubbed the soap in the sock on my washboard using HOT water. If you don't have a washboard, you can rub the fibers with scrub brush or even your hands.


7. After we felted the wool soap in the sock (until the wool shrunk up around the soap), we removed it from the sock and shaped it by squeezing the soap. Our star needed a little tweaking in order for it to look right, but not much else. Don't worry if your soap starts to suds up a little (ours did).


8. Squeeze dry. It was a really sunny day, so we set these out on the back porch for a quick dry, and in a matter of minutes they were dry and ready to go.


Creating detailed images will take a lot of practice, but don't let that stop you. Get creative with simple shapes or dots. Our "dinosaur skin" soap was a huge hit with the kids. If you don't want to go to the trouble of needle felting an image, just wrap your soap with various wool fibers to get the tie-dyed look like the pink and purple one below.

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Two of the birdies are off having fun with family this week, so since I'm flying solo, I think it's a perfect time for a super-duper-simple craft idea. And I have just the thing. We found this idea over at Just a Girl. Hand sanitizer is a great way to slow the spread of germs. This embellished hand sanitizer is a quick and easy project perfect for the cold and flu season. It would make a great teacher or office-mate gift!

We peeled the labels off of hand-pump hand sanitizer and let the kids replace them with pretty stickers. Rub-ons used in papercrafting would work great, too. Then we added a stamped tag with a coordinating ribbon and voila, pretty enough for any desk or bathroom! This is a great, inexpensive way to coordinate your bathroom soap pump with your decor as well.


Let's all stay healthy so we can keep crafting!

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It's craft fair time! Stacy and I have been madly sewing and crafting for two craft fairs we signed up for this week (Jessica, out of pure wisdom I'm seeing, chose to opt out of this crazy idea). It has been a little stressful, but a lot of fun, too (thanks for the babysitting help, Jess!). We had our first today--it was a small affair, but a good trial run. This Saturday we've participating in the Kokanee Holiday Bazaar in Woodinville, WA, which will be a little bigger. If you're in the area, stop by and see us! Here are the details:

5th Annual Kokanee Holiday Bazaar

As I was preparing items to sell, I kept looking for a tutorial for a bath mitt to compliment the other bath and body type items I was making. Everything I saw was crocheted--just not what I wanted. Then I found this great tutorial for an oven mitt from My Longest Year (who has other great tutorials, too!) and thought I'd try something a little crazy.

Voila! Since it's too small for the average hand, I guess I'll have to keep this one for myself. Darn! If I have a chance to make a new one, it will be sold with coordinating rice heat therapy bag (tutorial coming soon), cold pack eye mask (also coming soon), and makeup bag for an ultimate spa gift. If I would've thought about it sooner, I would have ordered a few soap slices from my friend The Soap Lady to include in the package. Her soaps are divine! Maybe I'll have to throw in a bath bomb instead. I'll post a picture if I can get it all together before the bazaar on Saturday.
One more thing: We are optimistic, but we're not naïve--we know we will probably not sell a lot of what we made. But that's good news for all our not-so-local readers. Most of what we have left will probably end up in our Etsy stores soon. I know, can you believe it? Four months and we still haven't listed a single item in either one of our stores. It's embarrassing. But we'll let you know when we finally stock the virtual shelves!

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