Category Archives: Handmade

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Planning Week, Fall 2012 – Minimalist Closet Hack: Shop Your Closet

I’m pretty sure I’ve talked about this before, but it bears repeating: shop your closet! (Warning: this post contains many exclamation points!)

As I’m preparing for my fall wardrobe, I’m looking through what I already own to see what things I’ll be including. I’m so excited! I love my awesome clothes.

Here are a few of my clothes that will definitely be in my closet this fall:

Here are my skirts. From left to right: brown wool skirt, raspberry pencil skirt, navy pencil skirt.

Look at my navy tops! Sequined tank top, striped long sleeve shirt, and navy velvet blazer. I love this blazer!

I recently bought this dress; this is its first appearance on my blog. I love it! It’s brown linen. See the seams on the tummy area? It’s so perfect – both in fit and in detail. I anticipate that I am going to wear this dress a lot.

Random: This dress is actually a petite. When you are thrift shopping, try on everything! You never know what’s going to fit. This fits me like a glove, and I am certainly not a petite.

This halter top is definitely staying in my closet. Perfect for date nights with knee-high boots and a cardigan.

This dress is also a keeper. Must I say it? I love it. :)

And remember this dress? It’s with the rest of my fall and winter clothes. I can’t wait to wear it constantly this fall. Again, probably with my leather boots. So pretty!

And last, here is a cardigan I am knitting. I started it about a month ago, and I have 1.5 sleeves done. I tried to give myself plenty of time before the weather gets really cold. I love the pattern and I love the yarn. I hope it fits when I’m done!

I haven’t decided for sure what’s going to be in my closet, but these items definitely will be. It’s easy to get dressed when you love your clothes. And boy do I love these clothes! I am so inspired, and I can’t wait to see the outfits I make this fall.

Do you have any great basics in your closet that you swear by? Do you see anything that I’m missing? I <3 planning week! 

PS Speaking of planning week, tomorrow is the last day! Be sure to check back as I wrap up my wardrobe planning for this fall!

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Two New (to Me) Minimalist Travel Organizing Tools

Hi all! I just made it home from the big weekend trip, and I hope to share some more pictures with you as soon as I get time to organize and edit them.

I want to share with you two new minimalist organizing tools I used that you might find helpful for any travel you are doing in the future. Both are up-cycled, and you could devise them out of things that you already own.

This first one takes a bit more effort: I actually sewed a shoe bag. I found the basic pattern here, although I altered the size a bit. (And I couldn’t tell you what that size was. I just measured a pair of shoes and tried to make it bigger than that.)

I used an old shirt from the Man for the outside of the bag, and the inside is a piece of red flannel that I had lying around. The ribbon was something my mom had. Voila! Free and useful travel item!

This second item was even easier to put together. I actually saw this travel hack on another blog a few months ago and had to give it a try. (If it was your blog, let me know! I will add the link.)

That is a glasses case that I used to carry my jewelry. This might get dicey if you have a lot of fancy necklaces that you don’t want to get tangled up, but for what I was bringing, this was a perfect solution. Bonus: if you have big glasses like I do, then you probably have a big glasses case, too.

So there you go. Think about trying these two organizing tools for your next trip.

Do you have any other travel organizing tips to share? I would love to hear them.

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In Brightest Day, In Blackest Night

And then I made this…

It’s a birthday present for a friend. And I think it’s awesome. These are four Green Lantern superheroes. It’s very 8-bit in the best possible way.

I bought the pattern from Wee Little Stitches, who make all kinds of amazing geeky designs. Check it out.

The only change I made was to put seed beads on the for the rings instead of French knots with thread. I really like the effect; I’m glad I made the change.

I have been very busy creating all kinds of things to share with you! I hope to finish them and get them posted soon.

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Frogs and bugs and camo…oh my!

Recently, I told you guys that I was making a new quilt. Remember this fabric?

Well, that fabric doesn’t look like that at all anymore!

A few people have asked me about the process of making a quilt. I took the time, while I was frantically cutting and sewing, to take pictures so I can show you all of the steps that go into a quilt. It is a fascinating metamorphosis. Feel free to ask questions at the end! I’m sure I’m going to leave some steps out.

First you cut and piece the top of the quilt. The pattern I am using is called a Coin Quilt. It was easy and came together quickly; I highly recommend it for a beginning quilter. (If you are interested, the free pattern is available here from CluckCluckSew.) When I finished piecing my top, it looked like this:

Here’s a close up of what it looks like now. This is going to change soon!

The next step is to make the quilt sandwich. You tape (with blue painter’s tape) the fabric for the back of the quilt onto the floor. You tape it so the print is facing down on the floor. The batting – the warm part of the quilt – is laid on top of that. Then you put the pieced top on top of that with the right side up. Once they are all lined up, you pin through all the layers with safety pins.

And this is what the back looks like:

The next part is what is technically called quilting. It involves sewing through all three layers. This is free motion quilting in a stippling pattern. Here is a close up picture.

And when it’s done, it looks awesome!

You’re not quite done yet! Now you cut the excess fabric from around the outside.

For the last step, you need to bind the quilt. I pieced my binding on this one, which is a first for me. I like the way it looks!

And then you hand sew the binding to the back.

Voila! All done!

Pat yourself on the back; you made a beautiful quilt! It’s all ready to snuggle a sweet baby boy.

Whew! I hope you enjoyed all the pictures. Have a great weekend, everybody!

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One Fish, Two Fish

It’s exactly what you’re thinking.

I started knitting these fish last week, and suddenly, all I could think about was Dr. Seuss. So I had to make that happen. As they allegedly say in Minnesota, “Oh, fer cute!“

And here are a pair representing the Green Bay Packers.

And more obscurely, the Colfax (Wisconsin) Vikings.

These are too much fun! I had all of the supplies on hand, so that makes them even cooler.

Anyway, this set of fish isn’t for me. I am going to pass them along to a sweet 2-year old little girl who loves “shish”. They are theoretically a good way to learn colors. Plus they are awesome, so there you go.

What are you all making? I am knitting like crazy and I love it!

 

 

 

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Minimalist Money Hack: Cash Envelope System

A couple of years ago when I started getting serious about money, I read a few personal finance books. One of my favorites was The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. He had some very basic ideas about money that I agreed with, and I have tried to follow his baby steps to become financially secure.

One of the things that Dave talks about that made a lot of sense to me was paying for things with cash. Specifically, he advocates for an envelope system, with each envelope for a different budget item: food, transportation, haircuts, kids clothes, etc. You put cash in the envelopes on payday, and when you’re spending the money, it’s gone when it’s gone. It’s an easy budgeting hack, and it mitigates the need for credit cards.

I’ve been doing this sort of half heartedly, and it never really worked for me. (Surprise.) But yesterday, I got motivated to finally put together a serious envelope system that would be easy to use, easy to carry, and keep me on track with my budget and financial goals.

So what you’ve been waiting for, pictures of my brand new, fancy schmancy envelope system:

I am so happy with how it turned out! I printed out these templates onto plain white cardstock, folded and taped them into envelopes, and then bound them with a machine at work. (The labels are from the same link as the envelope template. Super helpful!)

I only have a few categories, but now I can keep them straight. It’s so much easier than trying to remember why I was saving that random $20 in my wallet!

It’s thin too so it doesn’t take up a lot of room in my bag. Win/win/win!

Do you have any easy tips or tricks for staying on budget? Do you use a cash-based system? Share! :)

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The Dead Are Alive!

I bet you thought this post was about Easter. But it’s not!

My über talented friend Anthea has published her second set of short stories today. Refuge: Tales from a Zombie Apocalypse is a set of seven fictional short stories about zombies, of course, but also survival, community, and what it means to be human. I read some drafts, and let me tell you: this is some great stuff.

And you can get it right here. Normally it’s $2.99, but until April 23, you can get it free with her coupon code. If you do, please go back and review it for her. Good karma and all that. :)

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Funny Bunny Is Funny

I’ve been noticing a trend lately of bloggers being completely honest about some aspect in their lives, as a way to show how everything isn’t perfect online. “Keeping it real“, if you will.

Here’s my confession for the day: sometimes I make things that I think look bad.

Exhibit A: Funny Bunny

This is one mangled softie. You can’t really tell in the picture, but her legs are all wonky. All four are the same size, which makes the bottom ones seem out of proportion.  They aren’t really in the same plane either; it looks like she’s constantly doing some weird yoga move. Also, her “face” isn’t centered on her head.

Same thing with her ears.

But you know what? She was made with a whole lot of love.

So I’m going to send her to my niece anyway for Easter, and I hope that someday she can see appreciate the intention behind this accidentally-creepy rabbit.

Funny Bunny reminds me of a quotation from Ira Glass on NPR about ambition, intention, and skill:

“All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know it’s normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work … It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions … It’s gonna take a while … You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

Back to Funny Bunny: she comes bearing chocolate, so I hope that helps.

Have you ever made something that didn’t come out the way you planned? What did you do with it? Did you try to improve it by adding chocolate??

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Minimalist Wardrobe Hack: No-Measure Custom Tailoring

Wow, I had a great weekend. On Saturday, I went to a rummage sale where they were selling clothes, $3 for whatever you could fit in a paper bag! What! In the interest of good thrifting karma, I only picked out the things I knew I would wear.

One thing I snagged was this white button-down-the-front shirt:

Now, I normally don’t like white button-downs on me. They fit weirdly. I have broad shoulders, which makes the buttons pull in unflattering ways. I don’t want to iron the collar. The material is generally thin and more “see through” than white.

But I know this is one of those basic pieces that I ought to have, so when I saw this shirt, I snagged it right away. I have an undefined waist, and I knew the princess seams would look good on me. I was delighted by the feminine ruffles. The kicker, though, was the mandarin collar. No ironing! Sold!

But when I got home and tried it on properly, I realized it was too big.

So I decided to do some custom tailoring. What did I have to lose?

The princess seams were perfectly spaced on the front (whew!), so I just needed to take in the side seams. Rather than using some fancy measuring method, I simply sewed the width of my presser foot. Check it out:

(See how I’m lining up the outer edge of the foot with the original seam?)

So, I did this a couple of times, trying it on after each set of seams. I ended up sewing four seams on each side before it fit the way I liked.

I didn’t want to make the opening for the arm hole any smaller, so I started my seams in the armpit.

After I got my shirt the right size, I zig zagged between the last two rows of stitches. I wanted to finish the seam and give it a faux-serged look. Mostly, I didn’t want the raw edges of the fabric to fray later on.

Then I cut off the extra fabric. Voila! Beautiful custom tailored shirt.

I love this shirt now! I can’t believe I would ever say that about a white button-down, but I do. I plan on wearing this pretty much with everything this spring. I love beautiful basic wardrobe pieces!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What’s your favorite article of clothing that you altered to make extra special? I would love to hear your stories.