food + finance = fun

I don't know about you but I always seem to have a pile of stuff set aside to let my friends go through, send to my nieces or give to the Goodwill. Sometimes I change my mind (tsk tsk) and so my procrastination pays off! 

Fast Forward....A good friend of mine gave me the cutest apron. 

So cute, it actually hangs on display in my kitchen and rarely gets worn. Silly I know, but I just love the way it looks. When I think about gifts for other people I try and think about the things I have that I really love and imagine if said recipient might want something I find useful or awesome too. Well.... who doesn't need an apron? 

(I tend to wipe my hands on my pants or whatever I'm wearing, terrible habit, so I know I need one, and apparently so did my friend.)

The other day I was having a hard time cutting some of my favorite fabric in hopes of turning it into an apron.

 (this is common... and stupid I know)

When I spied the Goodwill pile I took a closer look. It turns out an old dress shirt was already scalloped on the bottom, with cute buttons down the front and so the idea hatched. 

Cutting the shirt apart was by far the hardest part. I didn't want to have to go back and sew what I had already undone. 

 (because I don't have a sewing machine which means all sewing would have to be done by hand with a needle and thread)

Here's where being a little smarter would come in handy... I probably pondered and imagined each and every way to make this work with the least amount of work. 

Some people have said I'm so simple I'm difficult. 

It's true. 

I even tried using the sleeves as the part that you tie around your waist. But you know what that looks like? and old shirt tied around your waist :) lol

Terrible. 

Well after a lot of agonizing, and screwing up one shirt that wasn't particularly cute (white), I cut the beloved purple shirt. 

I used the collar from the white one and sewed it and the ribbon by hand and voila! 

Reincarnation? 

I think a mens shirt wouldn't mind living it's next life tied around a little ladies waist... especially when it's helping to make some food :) 

two olds make a light

Happy New Year! 

This morning on the Today show they were talking about trends for 2012. I'm not big on "trends". Typically I'm a committer.

(I committed, long ago to overalls. I think they're functional, cute and I have them in varying lengths and colors... and I wear them. Every once in a while I'll get someone joking with me that "overalls are back" alongside a picture of some model at Fashion Week wearing a pair. 

Doesn't faze me. I'm loyal to my khaki, white, and jean.... short and long sets of overalls no matter what the magazines say. It only validates my longstanding relationship with overalls :) and gives me a good chance to wear them proudly in front of all those naysayers)

Back to the point - one of the "trends" which I hope won't be a trend, but a way of life... is to "unplug". Meaning, every once in a while, turn off all the electronics and just exist, in this moment. Without feeling badly that your second grade nemesis just bought a house and you're still renting, or that your coworker just signed up for their 20th Marathon and you're still working on getting up the courage to run the local 5k - Who cares? 

I think there is a healthy amount of competition that keeps people striving to do better, but then there's the unhealthy obsession that keeping tabs on your 2000+ facebook friends and trying to keep up with Joneses is somehow going to actually work. The best way to keep up with the Joneses...is to be the Smith's, the Vannatta's, the Buffett's. Make the world MORE interesting by being yourselves.

Do you think Warren was inspired to be awesome because his friends on facebook were showing him up? I think not. Enough of my rant... but I "unplugged" for the holidays - in case you thought I fell off the bandwagon! ha

The holidays were an interesting one for me - with this whole nothingnewforayear thing. I was very much aware that the rest of the world was getting a lot of new things that I wasn't... I was also uber aware of the fact that the gifts I would be giving people were not on any of the most sought after gift lists...

 Luckily I had a lot of things, people wanted. Despite being slightly used, people were surprisingly happy with their gifts. An ode to the fact that, newer isn't necessarily better. My mother got me a new vacuum for Christmas, and so I gave away both my regular vacuum and my Shark to some good friends, and everyone won!

 After the new year, I took a look around and decided I needed a little sprucing up at the house. Just because you aren't buying anything new doesn't mean you should look dull or your house! My mom used to always say that just because you're poor doesn't meant you have to be dirty... it doesn't cost much to be clean. She also said when you're fasting - you shouldn't LOOK like you're fasting. (Matthew 6:16)

She was right. There was something I could do to liven the place up! And so... I was on the hunt. 

I'd been scouring websites of other peoples living rooms to get ideas, but wasn't coming up with much. Swooped in to a Goodwill I'd never visited and there it was... an awkwardly bulging, turquoise lamp without a shade. For some reason I felt for it. For a couple of bucks I brought her home and tried her out.  She's a rather large, loud lamp and so I thought it probably best not to tame her with a cream colored lampshade I already had. Nope. She wasn't a trend setter, she had waited patiently on that Goodwill shelf  to find her home and her perfect match.... A bright red shade from a forgotten lamp...

Isn't she a beaut?? 

And the table she's on... found her in the backyard buried under some overgrowth. 

Merry Christmas to me :)

Ironically enough, I looked up that bible verse she always quoted and not far from that verse, was this one... 

"Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lampstand, where it gives light to all in the house."

Matthew 5:13 

Appropriate I'd say - and... I'm plugged back in.

Boomerang clothes

So a few years ago a friend of mine, who wears about the same size clothes offered me a look through her Goodwill pile... She said, take what you want, and then give the rest away. A fair enough deal...

 As I perused through the bag she would offer ways to wear things, where she had gotten them etc. It was a nice little hand off. Of course the deal was, take what you want, but then it was my responsibility to give the rest away... Smart!  That way she wouldn't have to resist the urge to pull a few things out of the bag she may have been on the fence about. She really likes clothes, so it took a while. But eventually I walked away with a few new things... the rest I hauled down to the Goodwill.

A few months later it was my turn to do some downsizing and I offered her the same deal. She gladly obliged and sifted through my castaways... but this time I was on the other side of the bag. I was offering my advice on what to pair it with, how certain things fit, etc, and it became clear to me that having an exchange like this was a good psychological lesson too.

A few things I had been on the fence about... I sadly watched as she didn't even give a second thought about, and it slapped me right in the face with a harsh reality... Those few items I had fussed about whether or not to give up... were really nothing to fuss about at all. It kind of made me feel good after awhile. Knowing that I had a second opinion... that sparkly going out top I wore on a first date... was in dire need of another date, and it wasn't mine. 

But there were of course a few things I watched her put in her take home pile that made me a little sad to see go, but, glad to know were still not quite gone... boy was I right...

Just a few weeks ago that friend called me for another exchange date. As usual she handed over the bag, and I took a seat to sift. It had been about a year since the handoff from me to her, but it's amazing how fast you forget. As I pulled a few things from the bag I thought, "hey I had a shirt like this"... or "wow, these are just like that pair of pants I loved so much in high school... wait!?"

You can guess what happened... ha! We had returned to that bag I originally gave her, with a few new additions. Yep, a few of those pieces I had reluctantly handed over were now back in my court. Ready for round 2 of the elimination process. Some... sadly were very clearly due for a new owner, but some... I was ecstatic to welcome home. 

Cargo pants are back! ha 

Shazam! 

(for all you fellow Big Bang Theory fans)

The Great Kindle Debate

Alright another dilemma.

Does buying a book on my Kindle count as a "new" purchase?

Technically "old" books I would buy from a Goodwill or something wouldn't be "new" but then there's the accumulation factor... and the Kindle purchases stay in the "cloud" - if you will...

I guess I have a little time to mull it over. I already have a few books I purchased on my Kindle I haven't read yet, so maybe I'm getting ahead of myself.

On a side note, I did run across a John Steinbeck book recently that I'd never heard of. I purchased it before I had really thought too much about it... it was "used" as you can see.

It's non-fiction and was written in the early 60's by John Steinbeck as he traveled across the US for 3 months observing the changes our country had gone through. He mentions how accents started diminishing even then, the mass production of food had almost wiped out the unique flavors of certain areas...  and he even writes extensively about how much waste the world was creating.

If it was so blatently obvious to him 40 years ago, imagine what he would think if he saw it today...

Great read... might be one of my best .99 thrift store purchases.

My dad's an avid reader and was a high school english teacher for many years, so I got really excited at the opportunity to surprise him with a little gem of a read. I was certain it would be new to him too since I'd never heard him even mention the title before...

Me:    "Dad, I've got a book you're going to love! It's a John Steinbeck book, but his writing style in this one sounds a lot like your writing style"

My Dad: "You must be reading Travels with Charley... It's one of my favorites"

Lesson learned: It's hard to surprise old people :) They really have done it all.