Make Cute Alphabet Magnets!

We love magnets as a learning tool in our house. My son got a great set of animal magnets for his first birthday and they've really helped him learn the names of lots of different kinds of animals. He's beginning his journey into the alphabet so I wanted to get some ABC magnets for him.

Problem: Many alphabet magnets are plastic and have tiny magnets that fit into that back and pop out and become choking hazards. Also, we just aren't fans of plastic.

Solution: Make your own!

There are a few different great ways you could do this (a quick search of "Alphabet Magnets" on Pinterest turns up lots of fun options). Instead of starting totally from scratch, I decided to get a head start with the alphabet magnets they have at the Dollar Tree (they have number magnets in the same style right now, too!). I like these because the magnet covers the full back of each letter and cannot detach. Jazzing them up with paint gave me the opportunity to use more colors and also make them with interesting with patterns.

If you have older kids, this would be a fun project to get them involved with...especially if you have tactile learners!

Here's How You Do It:

Gather your supplies. You will need: 2 packs of full back coverage alphabet magnets from Dollar Tree  (I got two so I could spell things with double letters) and an assortment of craft paint and paint brushes. You'll also want newspaper or something to cover your work space.

Prep the magnets. Cover your workspace in newspaper. The magnets can get a little banged up and dusty from their trip overseas. Make sure you wipe them down as you lay them out so that the paint has a nice clean surface to adhere to.

Choose your base colors and start painting! The set I bought came in four colors: red, yellow, green and blue. I tried to paint over similar colors (using blue magnets for the ones I wanted to paint purple or yellow magnets for the ones I painted orange, etc) to avoid weird show-through and not needing to use as many coats of paint. I also painted the sides instead of leaving them raw as they came.

Add some patterns once the base coats are dry. I used a mix of dots, lines, squiggles, hearts, glitter and more. Really the sky is the limit! If you want them to all be shiny at the end, you can top them off with a glossy acrylic sealer.

That's it! Once they're dry, throw them on the fridge and enjoy!

 

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I'm sharing my project with these great parties:

* Get Your Craft On at Today's Creative Blog * Show and Tell at Blue Cricket Designs * Mad Skills Tutorial Party at Mad in Crafts * Time to Shine Party at A Diamond in the Stuff * A Pinteresting Link Party at Tutus and Tea Parties * Ta Da Tuesdays at Mommy by Day Crafter by Night * What We Wore and Made at Rae Gun Ramblings * Tute in Tuesday at Oops I Craft My Pants * The Inspiration Board from Homework * Pinsperational Thursday at The Artsy Connection * Shine on Friday at Happy Go Lucky * Feature Friday Linky Party at Blissful and Domestic *

DIY Ginger Syrup for homemade soda

My family has been trying to find healthier alternatives to traditional soda. High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is not only horrible for you, but almost all of it is made from genetically modified corn - which we oppose on moral grounds. Plus drinking lots of extra calories is bad for you. Diet sodas aren't too much better. And with all the hub-bub going around about caramel coloring causing cancer, it's enough to make you give up soda altogether.

Except I'm addicted. I think it's the bubbles. I find plain club soda has a weird bitter taste so I still need it flavored somehow. And it needs to be inexpensive.

I've seen a few recipes for infused syrups that you can use to make homemade sodas floating around online about thought I'd give it a shot.  I love that I have 100% control over what goes into it and it's not pricey! It turned out pretty tasty, too, if I do say so myself. Plus I think it makes a fun inexpensive gift. So without further ado...

Fathers' Day

We had a great Father's Day weekend last weekend. On Saturday, my husband and I took our son hiking at Silver Falls just south of Salem and on Sunday we met my dad, stepmom and cousin for breakfast and went fishing. My dad caught a 5 pound steelhead in a new lake we'd never been to before (for those of you who don't fish - that's a pretty awesome fish!).

But the main point of this post if to show you one of the things we gave my dad for Father's Day that I'm particularly proud of:

Not only was it super meaningful, but it was frugal, too! We got the frame that came with the four-part matting for $5 at Walmart and took pictures of my son holding different parts of the message on piece of wood painted with chalkboard paint. Prints are super cheap (about $0.10 each). So: awesome meaningful gift for less than $6? That's how it's done, ladies.

This could be re-fashioned for lots of different occasions, but I totally love the idea of kids holding up signs to spell out messages that you can frame as a gift.

"Dollar Store" Christmas Round Up

This year has definitely been a financially challenging one for us. My husband was laid off in January, we had a baby in May which involved a mostly unpaid maternity leave as well as huge leftover medical bills. God has been faithful throughout and we have always been able to pay our mortgage even if it had to be a little late.

But what to do for Christmas? I love giving gifts to people but our budget really didn't have any wiggle room in it to make normal gifts happen. We usually try to do homemade gifts, but this year was going to be a bit more extreme...homemade and inexpensive with an attempted budget of $3 or less per gift. Enter Dollar Store Crafts run by the fabulous Heather. Heather specializes in cheap and fabulous crafts made from dollar store (or other inexpensively acquired) finds. While all the gifts we did this year weren't necessarily from her site, Dollar Store Crafts was definitely my inspiration for this year's frugal crafting Christmas.