Cheap Lip Balm Recipe

So I totally made lip balm today!

I use it all the time, but I'm totally skint for money. Unfortunately I've developed a taste for homemade lipbalm and I used to buy lipbalm off Etsy, but not having the cash I've been using $1 lip balm from the Asian stores. Although the balm itself does ok I spose, the packaging sux, which is half the fun of home made lip balm for me.

So it was a really basic recipe. I just made do.

Cheap Lip Balm Recipe:

20 grams Bees Wax

20 grams Cocoa Butter

20 grams Olive Oil.

Heat in a double boiler (A mug in a pot of water)

Once melted use an eye dropper to put into containers.

For the containers I just reused some old ones I had.

These are ones from an Etsy shop called Flourish.

The packaging was so nice I kept them for some reason.... and then it occurred to me to use them for this!

All set to go, the whole process only took about 10 minutes

And as you can see, by the time I filled the last container the first ones were already starting to set.

I also had half left over! So I just kept the mug fill, put some glad wrap on it and put it away to reheat again once I need it!

I can see these lasting me around 4 months and the ingredients only cost $16 including postage and I only used a fraction of it!

Easy draped top TUTORIAL

I couldn't believe this actually worked! so I did a quick tutorial. This only uses about a 50cm strip of material, so costs next to nothing... especially if its an old off cut you had from something else!!

STEP ONE: Cut a strip of fabric 150cm wide by 50cm. (Don't worry about how the picture looks... it was a wonky scrap that I just used as it was)

STEP TWO: Cut two straps 8 cm wide by around 50cm long

STEP THREE:  Fold straps in half. Sew along one side. Turn inside out using a safety pin

STEP FOUR: Wrap fabric around your chest. For me there was around a 45 cm overlap. Pin where it overlaps then pin down the front where you think the folds will hide it best.

STEP FIVE:  (No picture sorry, I forgot!).... SEW DOWN THE LINE YOU PINNED. If using knit fabric, use a zig zag or knit stitch.

STEP SIX: Pin on straps and sew.

VIOLA!!

SMURF CAKE - tutorial

 I've had a number of hits people looking up my smurf cake instructions I made a year or so ago. These were very sparse though, with no pictures, so I have decided to remake the cake to show you better how I did it. The second one didn't turn out as good as the first, but maybe you can learn from my mistakes, and remember, it works... the first one turned out great!

Here's how I did it:

1. I baked a cake in a meat tray as I don't have a rectangle tin. Once cooked I cut off the top and the sides and turned it upside down. Instead of using a crumb coat of butter icing I used jam.

2. I iced the cake with butter icing. Recipe: 2 cups of icing sugar. 50 grams of butter. Hot water.... mix together to a nice consistancey. Once the icing was on I smoothed it out with a knife dipped in hot water.

3. I printed out the template (bottom of this page), and traced around it with a toothpick. I filled in the eyes and body as best I could.

4. I made a stiff icing using icing sugar, black food colouring and a small amount of boiling water to make a very stiff icing. Then made a piping bag out of waxproof paper by folding it into a triangle and cutting off the tip.

 NOTE: this is where things didn't go so good this time. You have to make sure you make a nice thick line with the icing so when you fill in the runny white and blue icing won't spill over the top of it.

5. Then I made a very RUNNY icing, using icing sugar and hot water. I used a spoon and drizzled it into the gaps. Then I added blue food colouring and did the same with that.

 So here's how the second one went. Not as cool as my first one, but you get the idea.

And here is the smurf template. right click on this and save it and print it out on an A4 sheet of paper. 

Here is my original instructions.

How to make a 6 panelled skirt, size 6 child.

 My daughter is taking drama classes at the moment, so here is a very theatrical skirt, it's pattern and it's tutorial.

The pattern is in pdf, and can be found here. Print out the 6 A4 sheets, cut out the rectangles and tape together, then cut out the pattern pieces.

Step ONE: Cut out the pieces. There should be 6 skirt panels, 6 pieces for the frill, and two waiste banc pieces.

Step TWO: Place the frill pieces together and sew into one long strip, then sew remaining edges together to form a circle. The pieces are sewn short sides together as shown.






Step THREE: Sew the panel pieces together by placing right sides together (that means the side that's going to show outside), and with the short ends all at the top, so the skirt flares out at the bottom. Here are four pieces sewn together. All six need to be sewn together, then the first piece and the last piece sewn together to make the skirt.

 Step FOUR: Turn the pieces over (you should have two pieces now.... the skirt piece, and the frill piece) and iron the seams flat.

 Step FIVE:  Pin the frill to the skirt. Do this by pinning right sides together... pin so the panels match, then gather the rest into a frill.


Step SIX: To attach the waiste band, sew the two pieces together to form one long band. Then pin to inside of the skirt, wrong sides together.







Step SEVEN:  Fold over waisteband to the front, tuck under a 10mm seam and sew down, leaving a gap in the front to thread through some elastic. To thread elastic through, attach it to a safety pin and push it through the waiste band. Tie the elastic in a knot, then sew down the gap if you wish.

Boy Dolly Jumpsuit pattern

Here is the pattern for the jumpsuit for the free dolly pattern for Dolly Donations, a website that gets people to make doillies for children in need.

This is my pattern and free for anyone to use. The dress pattern is here.

The pattern prints out as an A4

DOLLY DRESS TUTORIAL

As promised, here is the dolly dress tutorial. This may also end up on the Dolly Donations website in PDF to download, I will post the link if it does :)

Click on these to enlarge them. For printing, they are exactly A4.

How to clean a burnt pot

I thought I'd test out a method of cleaning a burnt pot my friend said worked. It worked to a point. It took about 7 minutes.

1. Put vinegar into pot, and freeze in the freezer.

2. Take out, thaw slightly and add baking soda.

3. The burnt bit are supposed to flake off easily.

They didn't. The surface stuff came off but I was still left with a burnt bottom. So...

4. Added some more vinegar and baking soda and scrubbed with a steel mit. After about 5 minutes scrubbing I ended up with a passable pot. (Passable, Janet-standard = good enough is good enough)

How to scale up a picture for a wall

This is how signwriters transfer large images to a wall. They use a pounce. This is one method.

You will need:

Picture you want inlarged

tape measure

Charcoal or chalk

Pencil

Paint

Steps 1-4

1. Take the picture you want and divide it into squares. The squares must be square.

2. Measure your wall. You will divide this into larger squares. My drawing was 5 squares by 4 squares. My wall was 100 cm high so I divided it by 4 to get the height, then multiplied it by 5 to get the width. The total was 100 cm x 120 cm. You do this to keep the squares 'square'.

3. Get a large piece of paper and draw the squares on it. (So mine was 5 squares wide by 4 squares deep. Each square was 20 cm square)

4. Now using the squares as a guide, transfer the image to the paper. The more squares you have the easier it will be to get a nicer drawing... especially if you are not that good at drawing.

5. Now turn the paper over and put charcoal or chalk on the back. I could see through by paper which is why my charcoal lines follow the outline closely. If you cant see, just scribble over the whole area

6. Tape it to the wall, with the charcoal side against the wall

7. Draw around your outline with a pen or pencil

8. Once you take you pounce off the wall it should leave the outline on the wall. You may need to fill in the blanks with a pencil. Your image is now transfered to the wall!

9. If you are doing a cartoon with a blank outline, it's easier to roughly fill in the colours first... then just tidy it up with the black outline last!

Peasant blouse

Being trying to think about some folky clothes for the Auckland Folk Festival... so I've made this peasant blouse out of an old mens shirt. I found the tutorial here. I didn't get the neck quite right, but it doesn't matter. I'm happy with it overall.

HOW TO MAKE PLUM JAM

You will need:

Kitchen scales (up to 2 kg)

Chopping board

Knife

x2 Large bowls for fruit

x 2 Large saucepans

Pouring spoon

tongs

x 6 clean jars (with lids, or use cellophane circles with rubber bands)

RECIPE (Edmonds cook book)

2 kg plums

1.5 cups of water

7 cups of sugar

METHOD:

Stew plums untill they are pulpy with the water. Add sugar and boil rapidly for 15 mins or until set. Pour into hot sterilised jars and seal.

JANETS TIPS :P

1. Set up 2 bowls. One for the fruit one for the discarded bits. Measure the weight of the bowl before you put the plums in so you can minus it from the total.

2. While you are cutting up the plums, put the jars to soak in hot water to remove labels. There is a product in New Zealand called Desolve it which is good for removing label glue. I think its made from citrus.

3. Start stewing the plums and put the jars in a saucepan of hotwater at the same time. It doesnt need to be full or it will take too long to heat up. By the time the jam is ready your jars will be too.

4. Put your pouring spoon and tongs into the saucepan with the jars to sterilise them as well.

HAS MY JAM SET????

The proper method to test if jam is set is to place a bit on a saucer. Once it has cooled you should be able to run your finger down the centre and it will leave a ridge. I have found that by the time its cool enough to do that your jam has been boiling an extra 15 mins. Also, last time I boiled it long enough for it to set straight away it had turned so dark it looked black. I like it to keep its pretty red colour so I don't mind if my jam is a bit jelly-ish. I have found that after disolving the sugar I will boil it for 20-25 mins. On the plate it is still runny but a bit tacky. Once I've poured it into the jars and it has cooled, I find that the jam on the plate has set enough for me to be happy. Really, things like this are an art and they take practice, so don't give up if it doesn't work out. Put it down to experience and try again another time!