Save the Sock Unicorns

Happy Earth Day everyone!  I hope you guys had a great Earth Day and are continuing the festivities year round!  That’s the great thing about the Earth, it’s okay and even encouraged to celebrate it every day!  Julius and I cleaned up a bunch of trash from a swampy embankment near our house.  We did what we considered a really good job, but honestly I could have spent about double the time there, it seemed like everywhere I stepped there were bottles or bags or take out containers.  Julius stood at the top of the hill shouting to tell me where different items were.  He had a trash grabber that he used to clean up items himself, but it was a little bit tricky and he preferred to direct the situation instead.

The stretch of land was on the side of a main road, so I had instructed Julius to stay near the guardrail while I picked up trash on the steep embankment.   He was doing his job, shouting at me excitedly from the top of the hill then all of a sudden he stopped.  I heard him excitedly shout “we are picking up trash!!” to someone who I believed to be Will and Patricia returning from their short walk to drop Dany off, when I stood up and turned around to realize 3 different cars had stopped and their drivers had approached Julius.  When they realized I was there, they all waved and drove off.  I felt slightly terrible at that moment because they clearly had thought Julius was by himself on the side of the road, while I know Julius is a good direction follower and would not run into the road, they could not know that.  I then simultaneously had another thought – what if Julius had been kidnapped while I had my back turned.  So, I did what I am sure now was the wrong thing to do and decided to take this opportunity to tell Julius never to get in anyone’s car with someone he didn’t know.  I’m really not sure this was the right time for this talk.  I don’t want him fearful of all strangers…because most strangers (like I can only assume this set) have good intentions.  Parenting is hard.

Speaking of parenting, let’s get back to Mother Earth!  I bought a bunch of exciting products in April (which I’ve heard some refer to as “Earth Month”) that will cut down on waste and/or reduce energy!  If you want to buy any of them there are links below (full disclosure the stasher one gives you 20% off and if you buy one will give me a discount too).  First, I got some more stasher bags and if you haven’t heard already I am giving one away… you can read my post here for instructions on how to enter.  While I love my reusable snack and sandwich bags (and we use them ALL the time for the kid’s lunches) these bags are watertight and dishwasher safe so I’ve been using them for cut up vegetables, food prep and freezer storage.  Next I bought a “Wonderbag” which is basically a giant insulated bag that you can put a pot in.  It basically acts as a slow cooker (without the need for a plug), continuing to cook a pot of food after it is removed from the oven or stovetop.  It was invented as a solution for those who cook their food using firewood thus reducing their time spent gathering fuel and tending a fire and cookpot (these tasks tend to fall on the women in the family).  In addition to freeing up the female head of the household it has the added benefit of decreasing the amount of energy required for cooking which is a win for the Earth!  Plus it is made of recycled materials and as an added benefit you can pay a small amount extra and they will donate a bag to those in need.  Mine arrived yesterday and I’m going to try it out tomorrow!  I’ll let you know how it goes.

The last Earth day gadget I bought was a “safety razor”.  The razor I got was from the company Leaf and has swivel head, which is a feature that doesn’t exist in other safety razors.  The advantage of the safety razor is that you only replace the blades in the razor and they are made of steel and thus recyclable.  I have already used it once and so far so good!  No cuts or any horror stories like those I read from other safety razors.  AND I bought Will one.  I thought he was a bit skeptical, but today he told me he used the razor and said it was totally fine!  (Everywhere online there are tons of warnings about how hard safety razors are to use.)  I’m going to use it a few more times before I give you the full review, but I’m excited to continue to decrease our bathroom trash.  I think tissues are the biggest contributor to our bathroom trash right now, and I had trouble sourcing recycled fiber tissues so we switched to bamboo (oh yeah, this is our toilet paper and tissue company now – they have 100% recyclable TP with no plastic wrapping).

While I did buy new products, I really prefer to give old things new life.  One of the things I have is a bin of old holey socks screaming to be mended or made into something new. Julius and I have made sock puppets with a couple of them, but I wanted to try my hand at a sock animal.  Patricia’s first word was sock, so for Christmas I decided to make her a stuffed unicorn out of socks.  Since socks are all different sizes, I will give you the basics of how I made mine below, and you can use the instructions as guidance to make your own if you choose!

Recycled Sock Unicorn

What you’ll need:

• 6 socks (I used all white socks)
• Yarn for hair (I used leftover white/silver yarn)
• Scrap gold fabric for the horn
• 2 buttons for eyes
• Embroidery thread for nose
• Stuffing

So I will start by saying that I was working around holes in socks and worn/dirty areas, so not all the places I cut my socks was optimal fabric usage.  Do what you can with what you have.

1. Cut two socks in half, retaining the material that sits on the top of the foot to form the legs of the unicorn.
2. Cut strips for two arm pieces from a sock, ideally you use the grey toe portion of the sock for the hooves (like I did with the legs above), but mine had lots of holes so I had to sew this part on later.
3. Cut the toe off a sock to use as the body of the unicorn.
4. Stitch on a piece of grey toe from another sock onto the top of each arm piece if required, or else, fold the sock in half, right side in, and stitch along the long side. You may want to shape the bottom end of the sock where the grey toe is to form a curve.
5. Turn inside out and stuff with stuffing.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 for the legs, which will be slightly longer and wider.
7. Turn body sock inside out, and place the arms just below the ankle portion of the sock, which will be the neck of the unicorn.  Make two small incisions on either side for the arms.
8. Feed the stuffed arms through the inside out sock, and insert unfinished end of each arm through each hole.  Stitch.
9. Insert legs, unfinished side first, through the “neck” of the inside out body sock.  Pin the unfinished edges to the sock.  Legs should touch.
10. Stitch sock body bottom and legs together, curving the body bottom.
11. Cut off any excess sock then turn inside out and stuff the belly portion.
12. Here I once again had to sew a grey sock toe on to form the nose of my unicorn, but if you have less worn socks you can probably just use the sock as is.  Stuff a sock with stuffing up to the heel.  Slice from the ankle to the bottom of the heel.
13. Stitch out some triangles with rectangular bases for your ears.
14. Stitch along the lines you drew, leaving the bottom of the base opened, trim and turn right side out.
15. On the ear, fold the bottom points of the triangle and base in towards one another.
16. Decide where your ears should go, cut small slits in the head sock, and insert your folded ear.
17. Turn inside out to expose the unfinished side of the ears and the edges of the sock you just cut open and stitch ear to sock.
18. Cut a small triangle of gold scrap fabric and stitch into a pointy triangle with base opened.
19. Turn inside out and stuff.
20. Cut a small hole in the head sock, between and just in front of the ears.
21. Insert the horn into the hole, turn inside out and stitch together the unfinished edge of the horn, and the edges of the sock you just cut open.
22. Fold the sides of the unicorn head in on themselves to form the shape of the head (see picture).
23. Invisible stitch the seam on the head together.
24. Ensure your unicorn’s head is fully stuffed then invisible stitch the head to the body sock. 
25. Stitch buttons onto eye locations desired.
26. Take yarn and wrap around 3 fingers 10 times or so. Knot the yarn around the loops then snip the yarn loops opposite the knot. 
27. Stitch a bundle of yarn onto the unicorn’s head through the knot, in a line from horn to neck base, along the hand stitching you made.  (You can cover up any unsightly stitching with the mane.)
28. For tail, wrap yarn around a cell phone (or other 6″ long object) 15-20 times.  Knot the yarn around the loops, then snip the yarn loops opposite the knot.
29. Stitch through the knot of the tail onto the unicorn’s bum. 
30. Embroider nostrils onto unicorn nose using black thread. 
31. At the end I made a tutu by folding a piece of tulle in half, stitching 1/2″ from the fold and inserting a 3/8″ thick piece of elastic into the space created. 
32. When you have enough pieces, pull the elastic to stretch a bit, then tie the elastic together.