Monday, May 30, 2011

Books About Making Things Yourself





Home Made Best Made (Reader's Digest General Books)

Home Made Best Made (Reader's Digest General Books)

I own this book and have noticed that visitors will not put it down and visit with me, so I have purchased copies as gifts.  It is a nice hard-back book with color projects and instructions for paper creations, sewing, kitchen and cooking (jams, canning, etc), and just about everything in between.  You can update the projects by using pretty fabrics and paints.  Projects include making your own beauty products (soaps, shampoos, cleansers) and much more, including:

How to stencil, how to sew a rose applique from fabric onto a set of sheets to make them special, painting walls with special effects and finishes, a braided rug from scraps of fabric, making marmalade and breads, curtains, card-making, tablecloths, chair seats, candle making, decoupage,  how to make a simple tassel, how to add piping trim to a sewing project, how to plant a garden, natural bug sprays, how to make a folding screen from fiberboard.

Drying flowers, feeding birds, making birdbaths and an ornamental pond, creating paths and edgings in the yard, making tin can lights, and many other projects for outdoors are included--natural fertilizer, bug repellent, bee sting salve, and more.

This book shows how to knit, make your own rubber stamps, make place mats for the table, make a raffia basket, and make your own colognes and shampoo and even building a bird house.

Some of the projects are advanced, but most of them can be done with supplies that are quite easy to get.This is one of those books you can keep as a reference book along with your dictionary and concordance.