Homemade wooden play kitchen

Well, you know the kind of thing I'm sure, something like this or this one below, both of which are along the lines of £140?

Myriad's Play Kitchen

Here's my version, which cost a LOT less!

And yes, the dials do turn!

About a year ago I found this old unit on Freecycle. Thanks to darling hubs' skills, the rather dull 'telephone unit' was transformed by taking off the two original sliding doors below the shelves and turning them into opening doors, one for a cupboard and the other for the oven. 

This is with the sliding doors off and already sanded (it was originally going to be bare wood): I decided against those hob tops in the end

The girls played with it like this for almost a year quite happily

Jude cut a hole in the base to accommodate a spare dog bowl to use as a sink and added a set of old Bakelite knobs scavenged from a rusting cooker. 

Aw - this was October 2011!

A year (and a new baby!) later, it's finally finished!

The cute little shelves to the right is a spice rack found at the local carboot painted the same colour

  My only extravagance for this project was to buy a tin of Annie Sloane's Chalk Paint, which is probably the nicest paint you can buy, both in terms of toxins and odour as well as being environmentally kind. Jude put in a copper pipe to hang a set of hooks from, and I used a marker pen to draw hob rings on top. Total expenditure £17 (for the paint!) - but I only used a third of a tin and plain emulsion would have done the job just as well.

All the goodies on the shelves were bought in charity shops/carboots or gifted: nothing (our poor deprived girls!) is new. Granny very kindly bought a set of lovely fabric foodstuffs from the wonderful (but pricey) Myriad for a birthday, plus all the kitchenalia - pans &c - she bought from Ikea. A few weeks ago I found a boxful of toy grocery supplies in a charity shop for about £2, and everything else has similarly accumulated over the years.

(repeat after me) Re-use, re-purpose, recycle!

One very happy Milly May!

Unit: Freecycle

Paint: £17 for 1L tin in Old White

Knobs & copper pipe: Scavenged!

Sink: Pet food bowl, hole cut to fit.

Hinge and magnets for the doors: £5

Hooks: already had

Marker pen:"

Total cost £22!


I'm joining Fiona for Green Day today!

NB Sorry for the slightly crappy photos - my camera's been playing silly buggers lately... 

Autumn woodland and Monster Plans

We had a lovely walk at the weekend, in lovely Autumn sunshine. The light at this time of year seems to try harder than usual to illuminate the beauty of nature, with long shadows falling across paths and adding contrast to all those jewel-like leaves all a-glow.

Milly will be three in December and whilst I know that's a little way off yet, I'm trying to get myself organised in advance because I know that I will be doing all kinds of Christmas stuff when it does swing round. So, I'm planning a Monster party for her and her nursery friends. Here is a prototype invitation from an idea I found by Sarson on Pinterest. I think I'll be using LOTS of googly eyes!!!

I've also started sewing up some simple little fabric party bags for the children to take home. Already this year Jess has been to two birthday parties and each time come home with a plastic bag full of crappy plastic toys, so I'm keen to do something different. After all, I don't use plastic bags when I shop and if I buy the girls plastic toys they're always second hand; why should it be any different for a party? Plastic is probably one of the biggest environmental disasters in the making, as I've written about before so even if one parent sees my efforts and decides to follow my example, it'll be worth it.

Skitchbook finish!

Wa-hey! I have actually finished something! I can't quite believe it....

 Instead of the beautifully be-ribboned original I used these lovely fabric-covered buttons sliced from a charity shop top bought for 10p!! The same fabric patch is on the front cover. The white material is from an amazingly soft bedsheet I had in my stash which I think came from a Freecycle bundle: it's a super-fine quality cotton that had obviously seen many years use as it had been patched in the centre where it had worn out completely. It adds something quite special to the book as it is easily as soft as the fleece it covers. I'm glad it's been given a new lease of life in a context where it will still be in contact with skin and its' special snuggliness appreciated for many more years. There is something so magical about long-lasting hard-wearing fabric that manages to flourish with repeated use, unlike so many cheap modern alternatives.

Now on to the next project! I realised today (just in time, I hope!) that we're already nearly in October so I've got to get a wriggle on to get the C-word preparations underway... My plan is to get the damn knitted blanket finished for MIL then start some wristwarmers for the Aunties. Got to do something with the million-and-ten patterns I've Pinned!

Mil's birthday is also in December so I've been researching environmentally-friendly party bag gifts. I'll make some little bags and get the girls to decorate them: that way the kids can take something home that's a little bit special and can be re-used. Jess has been to two parties since school started and both times come home with a little plastic bag of throwaway junk which I don't agree with, so if I do something simple and different it might open someone's eyes. Fewer people choose to use plastic bags in shops these days so why doesn't it filter through to every aspect of consumerism?


(sorry about the poorly-lit phone pics: this is the light I often work in so I sometimes get some odd results with thread colours!) Edit: the photos were so bad I took them off and replaced them!! Left this one though :-)