EARLY START ON HANDMADE CHRISTMAS GIFTS

Hey anyone thinking of making handmade presents for Christmas gifts this year, get started!  I always wait till fall when it feels like you should be doing crafts but then it feels like you have to rush.  I started a few weeks ago and that way if I need a basket to put the gift in I will have time to go to Goodwill and get one verses buying anything new.  I am getting baskets and spray painting them to make them new again!
Here are some of the things I am making for my Etsy Store too.  I can't tell to much on here about what I am making because my family might spy on my blog. LOL

P.S. Here is a couple of my newest creations...Long roomy purses.

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FRUGAL USES FOR COFFEE FILTERS

I just found this frugal bit of information on facebook and thought I would pass it along!!!

Coffee filters …. Who knew! And you can buy 1,000 at the dollar store for almost nothing - even the large ones.
1. Cover bowls or dishes when cooking in the microwave. Coffee filters make excellent covers.
2. Clean windows, mirrors, and chrome… Coffee filters are lint-free so they’ll leave windows sparkling.
3. Protect China by separating your good dishes with a coffee filter between each dish.
4. Filter broken cork from wine? If you break the cork when opening a wine bottle, filter the wine through a coffee filter.
5. Protect a cast-iron skillet. Place a coffee filter in the skillet to absorb moisture and prevent rust.
6. Apply shoe polish. Ball up a lint-free coffee filter.
7. Recycle frying oil. After frying, strain oil through a sieve lined with a coffee filter.
8. Weigh chopped foods. Place chopped ingredients in a coffee filter on a kitchen scale.
9. Hold tacos. Coffee filters make convenient wrappers for messy foods.
10. Stop the soil from leaking out of a plant pot. Line a plant pot with a coffee filter to prevent the soil from going through the drainage holes.
11. Prevent a Popsicle from dripping. Poke one or two holes as needed in a coffee filter.
12. Do you think we used expensive strips to wax eyebrows? Use strips of coffee filters..
13. Put a few in a plate and put your fried bacon, French fries, chicken fingers, etc on them. It soaks out all the grease.
14. Keep in the bathroom. They make great “razor nick fixers.”
15. As a sewing backing. Use a filter as an easy-to-tear backing for embroidering or appliqueing soft fabrics.
16. Put baking soda into a coffee filter and insert into shoes or a closet to absorb or prevent odors.
17. Use them to strain soup stock and to tie fresh herbs in to put in soups and stews.
18. Use a coffee filter to prevent spilling when you add fluids to your car.
19. Use them as a spoon rest while cooking and clean up small counter spills.
20. Can use to hold dry ingredients when baking or when cutting a piece of fruit or veggies.. Saves on having extra bowls to wash.
21. Use them to wrap Christmas ornaments for storage.
22. Use them to remove fingernail polish when out of cotton balls.
23. Use them to sprout seeds.. Simply dampen the coffee filter, place seeds inside, fold it and place it into a plastic baggie until they sprout.
24. Use coffee filters as blotting paper for pressed flowers. Place the flowers between two coffee filters and put the coffee filters in phone book.
25. Use as a disposable “snack bowl” for popcorn, chips, etc.
Not just for coffee–

source: http://allincook.com/coffee-filters/

USE FOR SCRAP YARN

Just thought I would add a few pictures of some of the things I have been making and have listed in my Etsy Store "ItsAllArtShop" !  These are yarn scraps tucked inside a crochet bag for wild birds to use to make their nests!  Its cool to find those empty nests later in the trees and find all your yarn scraps used in them!
Good way to prevent waste.