DIY: Toyarium gardening project

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Miracle-Gro for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

As Baby J grows older, I try to include him in more projects around our home. I even bought a small watering can just for him to help me water our little balcony garden. In reality, it’s more like he’s bashing the tops of the plants with the watering can! It’s cute though, and I want him to grow up being helpful, so it’s all okay!

Miracle-Gro has several fun garden projects (<<check this out!) on their Pinterest and Facebook pages, and as soon as I saw the “Toyarium” project, I knew I had to try it with Baby J! As you can see, the “Toyarium” is a terrarium with toys in it.

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To make your own Toyarium, you need:

Step 1: Add rocks to bottom of container (they help with drainage).

Step 2: Use your spoon to scoop moisture-control potting mix into the container.

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Step 3: Place your succulents into the container (if they have barbs, be careful!).

Step 4: Add your toys. Then scoop potting mix around the plants and toys as necessary.

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And that’s it! This project is easy and fast to do.

Tips:

To save money, use a glass jar, vase, or other container you have around the home. Just make sure it’s cleaned thoroughly first, and that the mouth is wide enough that you can easily place the plants and toys inside.

For the drainage layer, you can buy rocks polished specifically for this purpose. Or try small pieces of gravel or broken pottery.

To help your plants grow, try the LiquaFeed All Purpose Plant Food Advance Starter Kit by Miracle-Gro.

Regarding the toys, I started off with a rubber snake we had in the toy bin. I thought it looked cool! But most people would find it creepy (see below), so I took it off and went with Buzz. When I get the chance, I’ll check the dollar store for toy dinosaurs. I think they’d look perfect peeking through the foliage!

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Too creepy, eh?

If you want to get your green thumb on, check out The Gro Project and join the movement!

 

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DIY: Valentine’s Day Door Wreath

I have a newfound love for holiday door wreaths. To be honest, I never cared about holiday decorations (especially on the OUTSIDE of the house) until I started staying at home with my son. The home is my domain. Yes, it’s usually a messy domain, 🙁 but my recent domestication has me embracing sewing and crafts as my new hobbies. One thing I learned very quickly, you can usually make something much cheaper yourself, rather than buying it.

See this Valentine’s Day door wreath below? It cost me about $7 to make.

Valentine's Day Fabric Door Wreath

 

All you need to make this wreath, is fleece fabric of your choice (I used red, pink, and white), a wreath, heart ornament (optional), 3 hair pins (ornament hooks or paper clips will also work), and yarn (extra fabric or rope can also work, as long as it’s 15′ worth).

Not going to lie, it’s a time-consuming door wreath. But it’s easy to do, inexpensive, and looks great! You can even have older children take turns helping.

For detailed instructions on how I did it, visit HERE.

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DIY: Pacifier holder repair using snaps

This “tutorial” is so easy and self-explanatory, that I suppose it doesn’t deserve a tutorial. But I’ve decided to compile posts anyway that use snaps in DIY projects, because snaps are AWESOME! You can do so many things with them! Check out this list that KAM Snaps put together on their Web site.

When my son is tired, he loves his paci; and I love that he loves his paci. Trust me. I spent the first two painful months of his life as his pacifier, so I LOVE his paci. Keeping the paci on his little person is not always an easy thing. We have at least three pacifier holders (because they keep disappearing), but it’s disappointing how quickly the hook and loop fastener wears down and stops working. It would be a very bad day for Baby J and for myself, if we’re outside the home and the paci fell off because of the worn fasteners and was subsequently lost! So I decided to fix the holders…and even make them better (in my opinion).

BEFORE (Don't be fooled...that Velcro will NOT stay fastened.)
BEFORE (Don’t be fooled…that Velcro will NOT stay fastened.)

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If you don’t have snaps and pliers, but want to repair the velcro on your pacifier holders, buy something like this:

Comes in white too
Comes in white too…maybe even other colors…don’t know

Velcro (or another hook & loop fastener brand) is not as cool as snaps, but it’ll work. You’ll have to use a seam ripper to remove the old Velcro and then sew the new strips on. A sewing machine will work fastest, but you can obviously sew by hand if you don’t have a machine.

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On to the snaps!

I purchased Dritz Babyville Boutique Snap Pliers and snaps during an online sale a few months ago, and I love them! They’re working great for me. I recently discovered the same Babyville pliers along with packs of white snaps for sale at Hobby Lobby. You can also check local fabric stores. Otherwise, they’re easily available on the Web.

To complete this project, you’ll need a set of snaps, an awl, and pliers or a press.

Click on photos to enlarge:
Snaps, pliers, and an awl
Snaps, pliers, and an awl

It’s best to remove the old hook and loop first, although you could work around it if needed. A seam ripper is the best thing to use when errrrr ripping seams. Unfortunately, I have to use my seam ripper much more often than I would like.

My old friend/nemesis...the seam ripper
My old friend/nemesis…the seam ripper

Tear out that velcro (without destroying the pacifier holder)!!!

Use seamripper to tear out thread securing old Velcro
Use seamripper to tear out thread securing old Velcro

While doing this, I discovered that a piece of the Velcro was sewn down with the tucked end of the fabric. What this means is that if I removed all of the Velcro, the sewn down end, would become loose and the fabric could potentially unravel/fray at the very end.

If I removed the entire piece of Velcro, this end would no longer be sewn tucked under.
If I removed the entire piece of Velcro, this end would no longer be sewn tucked under.

Since this was supposed to be a no-sew project, and I didn’t want to dig out the sewing machine that has been hidden away since we had company for the holidays, I decided to leave half the Velcro on the holder.

I cut half the Velcro off.
I cut half the Velcro off.

Now it’s time to put your snaps on. I’d highly recommend first pulling out a paci to see where your snaps need to go exactly. Once you’ve determined where you want the first half of the snap, pierce a hole there with your awl.

Pierce the holder with your awl.
Pierce the holder with your awl.

Then poke the snap cap through the hole.

Cap poking through
Cap poking through

Make sure it’s poking through in the right direction. That may seem like a no-brainer, but when it’s late at night (or very early), I’ve made mistakes like this.

Place a stud (male part) over the poky end of the cap.

Before pressing

Slide your pliers over the set, until they’re completely level with the cap/stud. Gently squeeze the pliers just a little bit until there is a click. There needs to be a click. This tells you that you have the cap and stud evenly inside of the pliers. If they’re not even within the pliers, you could ruin the set and even ruin the paci holder.

Press down gently until you hear the click.
Press down gently until you hear the click.

Once you hear it click, give the pliers three or four firm squeezes. This will flatten the prong from the cap. Your cap/stud should now look like this:

Pressed stud/cap
Pressed stud/cap

Repeat these steps wherever you want the correlating side of the snap to be. Instead of a stud, you’ll need to use the complementing socket (female).

Completed snap
Completed snap
Voila!
Voila!

I was well supervised during this project.

My helper! Confined to his crib due to excessive exuberance during the sharp pointy parts of the tutorial.
My helper! Confined to his crib due to excessive exuberance during the sharp pointy parts of the tutorial.
Have you completed any DIY projects lately? I’d love to hear about them!

Note: Affiliate link present.

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