Recycled wool snowmen, trees, and hats

Here is what I've been working on:
1.  Simple trees, where I buy as little as possible.

  These are made with recycled wool, a vintage button, a tiny roll of recycled magazine page (to give the middle stability) recycled cardboard, or a vintage wooden spool, and new wire.   Catch that? The only new thing is the wire. Oh, wait, I use two tiny pieces of tape to hold the magazine page roll together.   Gotta figure out something to use instead of the wire.   Twisty ties aren't long enough.  I need 10-12 inch pieces...  The buttons on these are cut in such a way that when you look directly at it, you see a star.  Perfect for the top of a tree.    I find rolled up magazine pages work great when you need a thin sturdy thing, like a dowel, but you don't want to go buy a dowel.  (Remember, I used rolled up magazine pages in the sheep and reindeer legs to give them enough stability...)

2.  Cone trees, wrapped in recycled wool, with vintage buttons. 

These are made with cereal boxes as the cone.  If I feel like a "purist," I stretch long strips of wool around and around sewing as I go, or if I'm in a hurry or feel lazy I spray the cardboard cone with adhesive and glue it.  I ALWAYS sew all the buttons on.  I can't bear to glue vintage buttons.  I want to be able to cut them off and do something else with them. 

Here I used light weight cardboard, like a cereal box or a cookie box, instead of styrofoam as the base.  Styrofoam is expensive, hard to recycle, and a petroleum product.  We need to use something in our crafts that isn't that nasty.  Cardboard is great and does the job.  Would anyone be interested if I came up with patterns for common sizes?  I just wing it when I make these trees, but if you were following a pattern for a specific craft that called for a specific size styrofoam cone, you might be tempted to buy the styrofoam rather than fool around trying to make the right size cardboard cone.  If you had a pattern so you would know your cone would be the right size... 

3. I made a family of snow people:

These are for a niece.  She is trading me two GREAT hair cuts for snowmen to represent her family.  I may have to change the hat on the youngest...  It is pretty goofy.  The Dad is wearing an Ohio State "O" on his hat, but you can't see it in the photo.  The color scheme says Christmas, as well as Go Bucks.

4.  And finally, two little ones wearing new hats.  These are friends of mine that came to visit as I was trying to get my stuff organized.  You can't come visit me without leaving with some kind of wool (or if you are a baby, you get cotton or cashmere...)

So, I've been busy!