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| The milkweed pod babies I craft for fairs and to hang on my own tree. |
These little milkweed pod babies are so easy to make. I love to go for long walks in the Fall with my family. Sometimes we collect a few milkweed pods from a field or roadside for fall crafting. If you should choose to do the same, make sure that you do not take all of the seeds. Spread some of these to the wind so that there will always be milkweed in the area you harvest from.
I crafted these little pod babies by first hollowing out the seed pod and setting aside the soft fibers and seeds for the finishing touches.
Then I squeezed a generous amount of glue into the pod. Fill this pod with soft cotton and glue into one end of the pod a little clay baby head. These may be easily manufactured from a press mold. You can choose to use flesh colored clay when you make these but I painted my pod baby faces using acrylic paints: pink, flesh tone and brown. Glue the soft fibers with a few seeds back onto the surface of the cotton for a finished look.
Use a large embroidery needle to thread a silver of gold ribbon through the top of the milkweed pod for hanging.
More Crafts Made With Milkweed:
The milkweed filaments from the follicles are hollow and coated with wax, and have good insulation qualities. During World War II, over 5,000 t (5,500 short tons) of milkweed floss were collected in the United States as a substitute for kapok. As of 2007, milkweed is grown commercially as a hypoallergenic filling for pillows
A study of the insulative properties of various materials found that
milkweed was outperformed by other materials in insulation, loft, and
lumpiness, but scored well on various metrics when mixed with down feathers. Read more... Help Save The Monarch Butterfly, Plant Milkweed:
- Why Should We Care About Monarchs?
- Here's How You Can Help Bring Monarch Butterflies (and Honey Bees) Back from the Brink of Extinction
- Researchers: GM Crops Are Killing Monarch Butterflies, After All
- Toxic pollen from widely planted, genetically modified corn can kill monarch butterflies, Cornell study shows
Milkweed attracts Monarch butterflies too, everyone should plant this in the naturalized areas of their gardens or in fields or roadside areas where it won't be mowed down. It is the only plant that Monarch butterflies eat and farmers are always poisoning it! Don't eat it though, parts of the plant are toxic!
ReplyDelete"Anonymous" your comment here is so important that I will include a list of links above for folks to go and read about this problem. Thank you for mentioning the trouble. It is true that ordinary people like us can make a difference here. We can plant milkweed in many places to help save the monarch butterflies!!
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