DIY oatmeal face mask

I know what you're thinking.  This girl loves putting food products on her face.

Well, you've got me there.

Last week I found a nifty book called Concoctions at the library.  It shows you how to make things like invisible ink, play dough, and glue with common household items.

Cool, right?

It's like home ec and chemistry mixed into one.



Inside, I found a recipe for an oatmeal face mask.  It only requires two ingredients:
- 1 T quick-cooking oats
- 1 T hot tap water

I know, I know, it looks like Baby Chuck spat up on me.  But, it was nice trying something new (and rather slimy.)   Again, I'm not sure if the mask actually did anything for my skin, but it certainly made for an entertaining night.

Here are the directions if you'd like to make yourself an oatmeal face mask:
1.  Mix oats and water in a small bowl.  Stir until you have an oatmeal paste
2.  Spread onto your face
3.  Wait 10 minutes until mask gets stiff and tight  (Note:  Be prepared, gobs of oatmeal will fall off your face... especially if you keep laughing while you wait.)
4.  Wash with warm water

Have a great Monday.

Currently...

Baby Chuck's two favorite things in the world are keys and buttons.

Is this a stage that all kids go through?

Crapty cardboard cereal box elephant

Dear Long-time reader,

I'm no longer only crapting on Fridays.  Now that I've unleashed my craptiness, I'm just going to upload crapts any time I feel like it.  Hope that's ok with you.

-Me

Ok, now that that's over with, let the crapt begin!

Last week, a mommy friend showed me Muji's super cute cardboard animals.  She made herself a little giraffe and I was inspired to try making something too.  I had a lot of fun making my cardboard animal trophy head awhile back.  This time I ventured into new territory because I had to make my own template from scratch.

Eek.

So after many tries and fails, I finally came up with an animal that stands and a pattern that other people can use (although please note that it's far from perfect!)

So please meet Ella, my little cereal box elephant.

Isn't she cute?  

And this is what little Ella looks like naked (aka sans paint):

If you'd like to try making your own elephant, you'll just need these few materials:
- free elephant template
- scissors
- pencil or pen
- cereal box
- paint or markers (optional)

Then, you simply
(1)  Cut the shapes out.

(2)  Trace the shapes onto a cereal box.

(3)  Cut those shapes out again.

(4)  Optional- Decorate the shapes
Note:  If you paint the shapes, be sure to save a bit of the paint to fix up the scratch marks that will appear after you assemble the pieces.  If you look carefully at Ella, you'll notice that there's a bit of white by her nose.  That's where my paint chipped off.  Or, maybe you could protect your paint by coating your pieces with modpodge?  Not sure...

(5) Assemble the pieces
Note:  I tried my best to make sure that the pattern works as is... however... it's not perfect.  So you'll probably have to adjust the lengths and widths of the slits and various pieces, especially if you painted them.

(6)  Fix up any little scratch marks that assembling

Thanks for reading this tutorial.  I hope this little elephant project provides you and your family a bit of cheap and creative fun.  If you try it out, I'd love to see your results. :)