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So my sister and her husband have been here for 5 fantastic days so far. I always knew we were alike and besides my partner, she is my closest best friend. Still, when neighbours and teammates ask if we are twins, or our mom says on the phone that after a few days together our voices and intonations have melded together, I should not have been surprised to realise we were in direct competition with one another during a charity shop hop. On Thursday we decided to run through the charity shops in town and soon learned that while I scanned the nick nack shelves and children’s rack for potential souvenirs, she was busy honing in on the shirts I would have grabbed! We wear the same size and have overlapping senses of style.
As she paid for a cute teal shirt in the first store, I jokingly commented that she might ‘forget’ to pack the shirt when she leaves. In the next store where she found another cute teal/aqua shirt, she was thoughtful and let me try it on. At that same shop, I found two football jerseys for them to pick up for my nephew, who plays in a soccer league at home. We all left happy. Here’s a shot of the new shirt. I am thinking about either hemming the bottom up several inches, or making slits at each side to create more of a tunic shape. The first few wears I’ll keep it the same to see how I feel.
Incidentally, I learned that we also play Monopoly in the very same way- in moving the game piece and our property buying strategies…much to the occasional frustration of both our partners! It’s good to have my sister here!
My sister and her partner (aka “Young Wifey” and “Hubster”) are coming to visit us on Tuesday! They are staying several weeks and I’m really looking forward to showing them around. Last time young wifey came to visit me in Scotland, she wasn’t a wifey and I lived in a tiny student flat with 5 others in St. Andrews…that was in 2003.
Add this visit to the reasons cited in my previous post and you’ll know I’ve been busy tidying, decluttering and creating for the home. Here are my most recent completed projects
We have been working on this rag rug for a long time. Started in January 2008, it has stayed its current size for about a year. We ran out of purple to complete that round and have used it as a hang-out spot ever since. This week I talked to Partner (we both worked on it) and we decided that it was a perfect size already so I dug out some newly aquired purple, finished the round, and now it is complete! It is large enough for both of us to sit on the rug while playing games.
Next, is a hand towel I made using the Basket rib stitch on Ravelry. Here is the link to the original pattern. I cast on 74 stitches and made it just under 2 feet long because I think long rectangles stay on the towel rack better than shorter ones.
Last, is a wee heart rug I made one night to use up the red strips we had cut for the rainbow rug. It is about 1.5 feet across and sits next to our bathtub. I may expand it in the future but for now, I enjoy seeing a small red heart strewn on the floor. It reminds me of red hearts candy.
Before you read this post, here’s a delicious muffin I made the other day. I used of a lot of random ingredients (freezer bananas, mixed seeds, an oatmeal-type concoction that I thought was oats until I realised it was museli, etc). I also made soup to knock through ingredients, all the while accompanied by NPR’s “Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me”, my favourite radio show!
And now for something completely different:
My PhD thesis is still under way so I have no illusion about being able to be less of a paper hoarder any time soon. I have 11 binders, two cardboard magazine ‘racks’ and 13 expandable cardboard folders full of documents and fieldnotes from my research, taking up one and a half shelves where I would otherwise have space for books. It’s not that I am going to get rid of these documents. In the future, all research tends to be cumulative in a way but I would tuck them away somewhere. I’ve come to suspect that most university staff only want to work in a department for the priviledge of an office to keep their academic collections separate from their living quarters! This week I filled our recycling bag of papers- thousands of scraps that had already been used on both sides, etc- just sitting around waiting to be classified. Most of the information was no longer useful, like some company phone number without a name- so out it went and I found my desk surface again.
One thing I can begin to whittle down, is my stash- of yarn and fabric. The plastic bins I brought home the other day have been great for that and now I need to really get started on going through what I don’t really need to keep.
I took a large bag of fabric strips (I had the intention of making those into another rug, but the off-white and black didn’t fit anywhere into our schemes or inspire me at all) to the textile recycling skip the other day, freeing up some under-bed space. I am also going to cull our socks – the funky novelty socks we receive as gifts are fun to wear, but not the easiest to darn once they wear so thin. The darning ends up being much thicker than the rest of the sock! Those pairs will be recycled too.
I am not going to have time in the next few years to use up all the half-balls of yarn that I’m not interested in. Many of the colours are going to make it into a de-stash blanket. It’s here if you’re on ravelry. I need to sort through the rest and find a Girl Guides troop to bring it to if there’s enough, or get it on Freecycle or a charity shop.
We have a charity shop bag open in our home at all times. We deliver a full donation bag every three weeks or so. I occasionally post on Freecycle but I need to start taking fuller advantage of it to hand out the things that are unsuitable for donating. I like that you can say “I have this ____ that needs fixing, or repairing, is anyone interested?” and they usually are. The same stuff just wastes the resources of charity shops.
Other ways we sometimes declutter that I would like to make more habitual: a) Selling unwanted books and strange electronics (we have a wireless router that we were sold as “mac compatable”, it wasn’t and then we lost the receipt) on Amazon. b) Finding even more recipes to stretch our fresh foods further with creative uses of the dry ones so my partner doesn’t rush out and buy food because we “don’t have any”. I would like to try a new recipe a week or, realistically, every two weeks.
I am trying to organise all this in my mind because it seems like we are headed towards a gradual change in the road. We are not yet financially comfortable, or even started out in life- parter is still looking for a full time job and I need to finish this PhD and apply for jobs as well. I’ve been keeping my eye open for non-academic positions and applying as I go along, but that must not be in the plan at the moment. Last week I talked to my old boss at the shop about coming back for a shift a week and once the fall semester starts I will have a bit more pocket money from tutoring but I am far from the power earner at this point.
That being said, we have begun to actively think about moving in order to save money. We have such a fantastic set-up right now and are so comfortable, it will be hard to let go of the easy walk to my sports club, the train and the job at the shop.
The question is, at what point does moving to save £100 a month not make sense? We have great landlords and have plenty of warmth and space in this flat. I have lived here for 4 years and it is home. But really, home isn’t a collection of things, home is with one’s partner.
The things just make it harder for us to consider moving. Both of our hobbies take up quite a lot of space, as you can at least gather from my stash descriptions. Moving from the centre of town will knock the prices lower but we still need to be near public transportation and there’s only a certain distance away that could make that move worthwhile. Another thing is that we barely have any furniture in this country. We have a bookshelf, a few chairs…no bed (we do have an air mattress we could use for a while!) etc. So we would need to rely heavily upon our network of fantastic people, freecycle, store vouchers from completed surveys, and finding a decent furniture charity shop somewhere. We also have discussed moving out of central Scotland if any jobs come up, so we really need to start preparing. This potential move may not happen, yet my brain is a-buzz.
1. Be ruthless with worthless (to me) stash fillers that someone else may be able to use- yarn, cds, look into getting a crafty things box together for the guides or other group that appreciates craft supplies.
2. Keep Amazon active and list more.
3. Get the plants under control. Re-pot more babies and give away to friends and freecycle. Pare down to just the main parent plants and keep them happy. Then, freecycle the extra pots.
4. Work on wardrobe. Recycle non-reparable socks, fix the things I plan to fix, get rid of extra bags, wet suits and other strange things that we never use.
5. Crafting priorities- finish sewing the wedding gift, use of the acrylics for the destash blanket, use the large partial-sheets in stash for appliance covers. Go for the biggest impact- use the most materials for the most useful items first!
This post has mostly been to organise my own thoughts, so here are a list of some of the blogs and posts that inspire me when attempting to de-clutter. I may have posted some before but they’re relevant again!
I am inspired by Smallnotebook in general and this new post is particularly relevant. Prioritizing life- well said. That is exactly what we are trying to do here and it seems that it is all around at the moment. One friend of mine has decided to completely disconnect with all non-essentials. She’s keeping her email, but unplugging facebook, her blog and everything else that she feels has cluttered her life. I also really like this post about moving at smallnotebook- it will come in handy some day. Livingsmall is also inspirational for getting rid of ’stuff’. Zen habits has a good approach to stuff. While I don’t keep a wardrobe as basic as this, I am working towards a streamlined and compatible system [and another] of only clothing that I love and that mean something to me.
I love mustard. I love it on sandwiches and many other savoury things, but most of all on pretzels. Pretzels and mustard are one of my all time favourite snacks (although we’re out of pretzels at the moment or they would be in the above photo!)
The store brand pretzels sold in the UK at Chrsitmas were great when they were all we could buy, but now that there is enough of a demand for importing packs of pretzels from Poland (say that quickly 5 times!) I just can’t go back to the under-toasted flavour of holiday pretzels. Also, since they’re only sold for the holidays, they’re all produced at once and every pack expires in March. So, we’re very happy nibbling on the yummy ones our store now sells for an affordable price….which leads me to my mustard cravings!
I’m also picky about mustard- I was raised eating spicy brown mustard on all pretzels, hard or soft. The whole grain mustard here is beautiful looking (in that earthy, real food sort of way) and I do dump it on sandwhiches or roast veggies but I find it too lumpy and sweet. So I thought I’d make my own!
I came across this recipe and modified a few things. I used a bit of purple onion instead of shallots because I had one to use up. I used only brown seeds instead of brown and yellow and added a bit of tumeric in the blending stage.
I followed the recipe and soaked everything together overnight in the fridge. It looked like this:
The next step is to blend it all, which I tried to do in my food processor since it is sturdier than my blender. I strained it and only put about a third of the liquid in- which was a very smart move! Using the food processor, however, was not. The large blades just threw the seeds around, making them look like those little styrofoam balls dancing about inside a child’s play vacuum! After scraping it all into the mortar and chasing the seeds around without grinding many of them, I resorted to the blender. The blades started to do their thing, although it took many pauses to scrape it all down off the sides again. Just as it was getting close to being smooth the blender stopped having fun.
Next time, I will make more than one batch to justify all the scraping and only put in a third of the liquid for soaking. The mustard does taste good and it’s pleasantly Not sweet, but I will be trying a few more recipes before I settle on one. If you have one of those wee mini-blenders for your food processor (the sort that you grind coffee in), this process will be a breeze! Tonight I’ll be making some rye bread to make the perfect sandwich!
1. TAKEN (subject to collection) Wet suit and boogie board, both well loved. The wet suit is a women’s medium, last worn by a 16 year-old. Partner remembers owner saying there is a small tear in the suit somewhere but we cannot find it. It should be easily reparable.
2. TAKEN (subject to collection) Three plastic aquarium plants.
3. TAKEN (subject to collection) Jewelery set- earrings, necklace and tika.
4. TAKEN (subject to collection) Radio alarm clock, in working condition.
5. TAKEN (subject to collection) Eleven yellow Ikea photo frames, 4×6 inches.
As I walked by a charity shop today, I saw a cute window display/campaign. Two mannequins dressed in nothing but underwear, have signs draped around them saying “Stocks are low…”
I didn’t have my real camera with me so here’s a shot with my wee camera phone. I think you probably see more of the building across the street but the idea’s still there!
Edited to add: Two days later I walked by another shop with my camera and snapped this photo.
While visiting my older sister, I had a flick through a clothing catalogue my nieces receive and was interested to see pages which could have been from wardrobe refashion images all over the internet. I guess ‘fashion’ is responding. Some of the shirts gave me ideas for refashioning men’s button shirts.
A friend and I did a birthday gift exchange and she requested a bag similar to my sling bag. She wanted a neutral background with blues and greens on it…and here it is! The main material was a slightly stretchy corduroy which made it awkward to sew with when I treated it like regular corduroy, especially since I did a sturdy satin stitch over the edges of the design this time. Overall, however, I think it’s an improvement upon my first sling bag. I love the batik fabric on the flower because not only does it include the colours requested but it is complex and interesting- just like my friend!
On the receiving end, I was very spoiled! She decorated a tiny notebook for me (she knows we share a weakness for, and take delight in, tiny things and notebooks!). Next, she decorated a frame and included one of her beautiful drawings! I keep telling her she should sell her drawings on etsy- her work is so organic, in a way, and always makes me dream of the possibilities in the world! I actually styled her bag on the flower in my birthday card since it seemed she had been inspired by flowers recently. Lastly, she commissioned a friend to make me buttons which I will be adding to some very special crochet and knit garments (once I make them of course!). Thanks Marie!
