DIY Life

OK, I usually don't go for the "household item" craft projects... oftentimes, they look just like what they are. The pasta necklaces? They're nothing but macaroni on a string.

Better Homes and Gardens has changed my mind, though, with their pasta tree centerpiece project. This fancy little number is hip and funky, and doesn't look like old pasta at all.

All you need are a few simple materials; BHG promises that the project will cost less than ten dollars.

I'm loving this idea for keeping little hands busy on a cold afternoon: make a Hands-and-Feet Turkey decoration. The finished masterpiece can be used to decorate the house for Thanksgiving. Alternatively, it could be a cute dining table adornment for your Thanksgiving feast. Help your children make these every year and you'll have an adorable record of how their hands and tootsies have grown.

I found my instructions on the website, Kaboose. Let's start with tools.

You will need: light card stock or construction paper in autumnal shades like leaf brown, rusty red, pumpkin orange, or forest green. Extra points if you start with white paper and have the kids paint the paper themselves! You'll also need scissors, a stapler, glue, and a pencil or marker pen.

Step one: help your children trace their feet onto the paper. Keep shoes on for this step. Then trace their hand prints. Make one set of two hands on three different colors of paper. Then trace one final hand print on a fourth color of paper.

These autumn themed napkin rings will make the perfect addition to your Thanksgiving table. They look so delicate in their design, but will hold up for many years. You can get the whole family involved in crafting the napkin rings.

Materials

1. Salt
2. Flour
3. Water
4. Rolling pin
5. Cutting board
6. Cookie sheet
   
7. Aluminum foil
8. Golden yellow paint or some other autumn color
9. Fine tipped paintbrush
10. Ribbon in a dark autumn color
11. Leaf button or small leaf stamp
12. Sharp kitchen knife
13. Fake autumn leaves (found in most craft stores)
    
14. Hot glue gun

In the full instructions for making Thanksgiving napkin rings you'll find each step and tips along the way. You can choose ribbon and paint colors that match the rest of your Thanksgiving centerpiece. You could even play around with different silk leaves or flowers. If you're not hosting Thanksgiving this year, make a set of rings for your hostess. She'll appreciate the gift, you'll have fun making them, and the cost is next to nothing.

First, try and share the planning (and expense) with others. If not a neighborhood association, then hopefully a few neighbors will agree to work with you on this.

Second, a fun Fall theme definitely helps put people in a party mood and also makes a party more memorable. Here are some suggestions for an Autumnal celebration: put up a welcome banner decorated with real or faux (paper) Fall leaves. Arrange pumpkins and hay bales at each end of the section of street that's been designated the party area. Balloons are always fun to have around: look for some in Fall hues, like orange and brown. Decorate the table/s with Fall-themed table runners or be creative, arranging small pumpkins, pine cones, apples or leaves amongst the plates and dishes.

Pumpkin vases are simple, and leave lots of room for your own creativity. You can choose flowers or leaves in colors that match your Thanksgiving table setting. This autumn decoration can be quickly transformed into a Halloween accessory by draping it in a spider web.

What you'll need

1. Pumpkin
2. Carving tools
3. Spoon
4. Vase
   
5. Flowers or leaf branches

After the break I'll explain how we make the pumpkin vase. Make sure you take a look through the gallery for pictures accompanying each step.

My sister has a wooden tree swing in her yard. The children love it, often choosing it over the metal swing set that sits nearby. It's a nice place to sit and watch the children play, or just swing for a while, taking in the crisp autumn air. The wooden swing was there when they moved in. It probably had years of enjoyment before them, and they will leave it for the next family, I'm sure. If you think this would get the same kind of use in your yard, why not build one yourself?

Jon Vivian teaches us how to build a sturdy wooden tree swing. He refers to the swing as something "your children and grandchildren will remember you by." He says that you don't need any major carpentry skills. It's a project the whole family can get involved in. After the break I'll tell you how.

Put on a happy face this Fall: plant container mums by your front door! The chrysanthemum is an inexpensive yet high-impact plant that will provide a colorful focal point for your home. Its cheerful, compact blooms look good in any context, while the myriad rustic shades of brown, red, orange, and yellow are perfect for autumn.

Here are a few tips for success with container mums this Fall.

First, consider impact. One lonely pot of mums does not look good unless your home or apartment is right up close to the street, in which case you might be able to get away with it. A much better strategy is to mass at least three plants in separate pots. Place them in a casual-looking cluster or in a row descending your front steps. Another option is to plant several chrysanthemums in one large pot.

Get creative with your gourds. I mean, what gourd wants to be seen during the holidays just sitting on a table? If you were a gourd, I think you would rather be stylin, smooth, and be the talk of the party. Like Sharon says to Jill, hey, look at Bob, he had all kinds of body-modifications done, he got a mouth, and now he's chasing those bad dudes all over the place. How cool is that. I so want to be Bob.

This is not about you and me, this is about the social and emotional health of your family gourds. They want to be seen at parties as fun, hip, and young too. The evil folks at that Mad Science place have cooked up -- ouch, bad choice of words for a gourd to hear -- a nifty idea to bring some old-school back to the new-school, er, something. Making popular video-game icons from gourds is a great way to liven up your holidays and theirs too.

There aren't any steps listed on how to do this, but it seems pretty obvious to complete without problems. Then you can chase your family around the house with these goofy guys all day, or at least let the kids do it until they fall asleep, which sounds good too. Pumpkins work great too for this.

There are so many opportunities to get great photos around Halloween. We have the changing leaves, the bright orange pumpkins, the carved jack-o-lanterns with flickering lights, the costumes and make-up. You just don't find this richness in the other seasons. For me, Halloween shots are among my greatest photographic failures. I cannot, however, seem to properly photograph a jack-o-lantern, or catch the mood of a haunted evening. The Ghoulish Guide to Scary Snaps is exactly what I was looking for.

The collection of Halloween photo tips covers everything from appropriate lighting to photographing your jack-o-lantern and frightening costumes. They suggest that the best Halloween pictures are taken at dusk. There is enough natural light to go without flash, but still show off the candle lit pumpkin and bright costumes. They also have some great recommendations for designing your jack-o-lantern so that it can be easily photographed.

Once you've mastered your Halloween shots, get ready to enjoy the rest of the season with their 12 Fantastic Fall Photo Tips. Next time you're out raking leaves with the children, make sure you bring the camera along. Armed with a beautiful setting and your new knowledge of fall photography, you're sure to have some beautiful photos.

Rain, rain go away, but it won't considering it's Autumn, and that's what the weather does best in the Fall. It's almost time to put away that old umbrella of yours though. Before you know it, the snow will be falling gently and you'll forget all about your need for a new umbrella.

When the time comes for you to get a new umbrella, don't throw out the old one -- turn it into a kite for your kiddies! The Sampler has instructions complete with diagrams on how to turn your umbrella into a kite. You use all the parts from the umbrella, so therefore there will be no waste. All you need to make your umbrella into a kite is a sewing machine, an umbrella (of course!), kite string, scissors, pliers, and a permanent marker.

I know this project is geared more toward spring, but since winter is coming soon, you might as well get started on this project now, that way you can actually have a kite by spring, AND remember that you need to buy a new umbrella to boot. If you are one of the fortunate few who do not know what winter is, then this project can be done this weekend, so you'll have a new kite to fly by next weekend.

Last week I tested out a homemade deep conditioner. It was an avocado and mayonnaise concoction that had impressive results. Days later, my hair felt great!

This week I tested a homemade face mask. I tried out the Autumn Apple Face Mask. The results were a little less impressive, but I'll share the recipe and experience with you, and you can see for yourself.

The Autumn apple face mask
This seasonal mask is designed to combat dry flaky skin that tends to creep up on us with the changing season. The apple and oatmeal recipe helps you get rid of dead skin cells, invigorating your skin, creating a bright, fresh complexion.

Gallery: Autumn apple facial mask

As I was driving along our country roads today on my way into town, I had a hard time keeping my eyes on the road. Our leaves are such beautiful vibrant colors of red and orange that the beauty of the trees literally took my breath away. I started thinking about all the falling leaves and how much fun it would be to rake them up and then tumble into them with my little girl. It used to be such fun as a kid, and I must confess, it is still a blast.

Since the calendar says it is now fall, it is time to start thinking about making all the Halloween decorations and putting them out in the yard. Such a decoration would be a scarecrow. Scarecrows are so easy to make and can be put out now and left up until the first day of winter. Join me after the break to make your own sitting scarecrow.

The other day, CRAFT posted a link to a fun tutorial at the fabulous site 365 Halloween: a pumpkin picture holder made of polymer clay and wire.

The instructions are for the kind of picture display that has a weighted base with some sort of holder or clip rising straight up; the photo sits in the holder. They're great temporary "frames": use them either when you want to change the holder a lot (as with seasonally themed holders), or when you want to change the photo a lot.

However, I think the project could go in another direction. Realistic fruits and vegetables made from polyclay are a major part of the miniaturist's art these days, so you could make just the polymer clay pumpkins, then use them as dollhouse miniatures. (They'd be more realistic with a sculpted stem, but they're OK as they are.) Use these pumpkins in the creation of a fall scene, or use them with some of your Halloween decor... you could, for example, string them into a garland, use one as a "knob" on top of a box, or make pumpkin-shaped drawer pulls by making them around a bolt. The uses are only limited by your imagination.

Aside from the candy embezzling that I sneakily, and obsessively, do from my children's Halloween bags, my favorite part of Halloween is the pumpkin design. While I enjoy the traditional carved pumpkin designs, my favorites are the off-beat themed pumpkins. I like to get out the glue, paints or odd bric-a-brac and see what I can create.

One sort of pumpkin design I have used over the years involves leaves (real or silk), a hot glue gun, and a thin bladed knife. For the pumpkin I have shown in the accompanying picture I harvested some green oak leaves and then uses some fall colored silk leaves I had lying around from a previous craft. The whole process took less than an hour and produced a fun, whimsical pumpkin that can be displayed on the front porch or used a centerpiece. The process is as follows:

With the calendar turning soon to October, the Autumn season has begun. You couldn't tell this past weekend, though. We had gorgeous sunny days with highs in the 80's. Now it is back to the 60's. That's Wisconsin for ya!
Got to pull those fall jackets out soon. Hats too.

That got me to thinking. I want a new hat this year, but I really don't like hats because I have a hard time finding one to fit my little noggin. So off I went to find a pattern to make my own, and I came across this wonderful pattern for a fall knit head wrap, perfect for what I need. With clear concise instructions, it should not take long to knit this beautiful head wrap, and you and I'll be stylin' and ready for those cold, wet, miserable days coming just around the corner. HA! Who am I kidding, they came yesterday.