I love this free pattern to crochet an Alphabet Baby Blanket. Great gift potential here.

I took a quick picture of this sticker book my mom gave my son before it became a little too well-loved, let us say. On the left is a sheet of stickers. On the right is notebook paper that has already been decorated by my son.

This is one of the cleverest gifts my son received this Christmas, and it cost under $5 to make. It’s a sticker book: a binder filled with blank pages, along with lots of stickers to put on the pages.

My son, who is 2, loves this gift. He has spent long periods of time taking stickers and putting them on the pages, and then coloring all around his design. It’s great for creative development and a nice way to occupy him when I’m busy. Plus you can keep adding to the sticker as you go along by replacing stickers and pages as needed.

All my mom did was get a white binder (she had one lying around–you can also frequently get them at thrift stores, unused, for under a buck) and fill it with white printer paper. Then she bought some stickers from the Dollar Store and stuck them in the envelopes on the front of the binder.

So if you’re in need of a new activity–or a fun, creative gift–give a DIY sticker book a try.

Here’s a great winter activity for bored little ones: DIY Laser Maze. All it takes is a hallway, red crepe paper. and some tape. Pretty great.

Here’s a good tutorial on How To Make A Hobby Horse Out Of A Sock. It looks pretty easy! These suckers can be expensive too.

In my quest to Make My Son A Play Kitchen, I came upon another great gift idea: make your kid a toy workbench out of recycled furniture.

Here’s one out of a $3 nightstand.

And this one from a $12 DIY bookshelf kit.

And finally, this one from some kind of TV console.

For more great DIY gift potential, check out this tutorial for a Unicorn Horn Headband. I would have loved this when I was a little girl.

Yesterday, I mentioned my annoyance at the high price of play kitchens for children. Even if you Make Your Own Play Kitchen, there’s still the price of the pretend dishes to contend with. They often cost $30.

Then yesterday, I was in the Dollar Tree toy aisle, and I ran into a set of pretend dishes for $1. Now, that’s more like it!

The five-piece sets come with a pot, lid, and two utensils. I bought two, thereby saving myself some money, had I been inclined to buy the $30 set. (I wasn’t.)

And yes, the Dollar Tree set isn’t as nice as the $30 set, but considering that these are pretend dishes for my son to bang around, that doesn’t matter to me one bit.

I looked into buying my son a play kitchen and was pretty surprised how much they can cost. This gift guide is pretty typical, with the kitchens ranging from $60-$300.

I feel like I’m missing something here. This is a pretend oven that my son can shove all his toys into and tell me he’s baking pie, right? Yeah, I thought so. I don’t think I need to spend a lot of money on that.

Here are four ways to recycle material around the house and make your own play kitchen, for a fraction of the price.

PLAY KITCHEN FROM A NIGHTSTAND. This project took a $6.50 nightstand from the thrift store and made a great play kitchen.

PLAY KITCHEN FROM A ENTERTAINMENT CENTER. Since the entertainment center was free, the entire kitchen cost $15 to make.

A PLAY KITCHEN THAT FITS OVER AN OTTOMAN. If you can sew, this is a great option: sew one to fit over an ottoman. You can fold it up when it’s not being used.

A PLAY KITCHEN THAT FITS OVER A FOLDING TABLE. This one works for small spaces.

A PLAY KITCHEN MADE OUT OF A CARDBOARD BOX. This one won’t last forever, but hey, they lose interest in these things pretty quickly.

Check out this free crochet pattern–the Eloise Baby Sweater. What a great gift for a little girl.

I love this tutorial to sew this Monster Hooded Towel Tutorial. What a great baby shower present.