stash/destash (creation vs. consumption)

Jumping off from Trent at the Simple Dollar's archive post, "Creation vs. Consumption," he asserts that in most every case, if you create more than you consume you'll be better off. He notes that in his former days of dreaming of being a writer, he'd buy a lot of fancy notebooks and then not use them. It was the *idea* that was sexy, not the actual use. Now he uses a beat up Mead notebook and is writing like mad.

What's the message for this crafter? Easy: my stash is growing (and I admit, grew yesterday with some awesome Ikea fabric finds) and yet my creation isn't keeping par with that. I am committed to using every last scrap of fabric (which is why you see the same fabric on my Bonnie dress pattern as in my Pearl Paperbag Pants pattern) but yet these 6 new yards from the big blue box have heftily grown my stack. What's the use of a big stash if it doesn't get used?

Trent's proposal is accurate in my world, which is why today I'm declaring a moratorium on buying new fabrics until I've used the ones I have in circulation. I have at least 9 selections awaiting my use (not counting the 6 or 7 more selections when my mom recently de-stashed) that are just crying out for a pattern. And the reasons?

• As an Etsian, using my stash costs me nothing today, and earns me money tomorrow.
  
• As a household manager, using my stash helps me get and stay organized. Or at least to nibble away at the stash closet.
  
• As an eco-conscious human, using my stash helps me ensure I'm not sending a message of needing more fabric than I truly do to the manufacturers and sellers.
• As a person seeking balance, using my stash to create something new just feels good. Creating feels great! Thanks Etsy!

So what's in the line-up? Let's walk it through, shall we?

• Three yards of a multi-color animal print and a coordinating stripe were selected by Hila. Per her request, the animal print will become a dress and the stripe will be a skirt. Thinking of a mom-and-me skirt pattern!
• A moderately beautiful warm brown with fans will become a unique wrap dress.
• A plain lime-ish green will become a one-piece romper, or it may remain my simple backdrop for photos! 
• A fuschia-on-pink will become a dress with a bubble skirt, round neck with flat pleats, and bubble-ish sleeves. 
• A white with an obscure geometric circle/flower print in teals and greens will create a short or long-sleeved frock with an oversized turtleneck in a coordinating jewel-tone teal. Perhaps a front tummy pocket will be added! 

And so the process goes! Will I be able to do it? 

And for those of you who can't destash yourself, help some of these folks work on reducing their stash!

• Mixed Blues And Oranges Strips from LilasLocker
• Aqua Summer Flower from acimon
• Mixed Fat Quarters - Super Deal from StarSpunQuilts

a day in the life

I'm always fascinated by reading about the "typical day" of others. So why not draft up my own?

So much of my day depends on how the night before went. Assuming I've slept at least 5 hours, this is what my best days look like:

6 am: Alarm goes off. At least 20 minutes spent hitting snooze.
6:30: Shower, make coffee, awaken slowly and resistantly. Check in on etsy; renew items as needed. Start a blog post or two.
7:00: Hila gets up after working on a couple workbook pages or playing with her laptop. Do some mundane tasks like packing lunches, picking out clothing. Hila picks out my shoes and earrings.
8:00: Leave the house for school and work (which are in the same place - lucky me!)
8:45: At my desk for my day job.
12 or 1: lunch! visit Hila!
5:30: Walk across parking lot to pick up Hila.
6:00: Arrive home. In nice weather, we eat by the pool and have a little swim.
7:00: final wind-down time for Hila - a show, quiet play, or a bath may be in the mix.
7:30: in bed for Hila. I begin my work! Check emails from work, messages from facebook and twitter.
8:00: the witching hour of crafting begins. Even though natural light has waned, this is when I begin new projects. I may do writing, or more likely will be spread out on the floor with beautiful fabric and at my sewing machine pounding away.
10 or 11 or...: Bedtime.

I've always been enamored of those who can follow a ritual-type day. I can't. I have too many factors: insomnia primarily, but add to those varying levels of creativity and drive and a sometimes irregular coparenting schedule and my wake-up time is as early as 5 or bedtime is as late as 2! Sometimes it's a matter of just getting through the day.

Here are a few etsy finds that are worth a look for getting through your day.

• Mini Desk Calendar from zany
• Farmer's Market Planner from mylavendarcottage
• Retro Mod Numbers Clock by sofacitysweethearts
• Peacock Post-it Note Holder by ragsnehali
• Curly Maple Pen by talltimbers

swaporama

I might be new to the swap game, but I have to tell you, swapping is the new black.

What's a swap? By my definition it's trading one non-monetary thing for another. In wiki-speak, it's more accurately described as a "barter," which is when goods or services are directly exchanged without money.

My newest swap du'jour? Child care. In the month of August alone, I paid over $100 in babysitting in order *to go to work*. Yes, that's right. In order to attend meetings and events required of me, and not covered by the other parent in my child's life, I had to pay $120. Ouch. (I know that nannies and childcare people are expensive - get off my back. It's just extra painful to pay to go to work, above and beyond preschool/daycare. And no, I don't get paid by the hour, so more working hours does not equal more money made.)

How I did it? Craigslist. Sure, it's creepy. But a phone call, followed by a public meeting, followed by reciprocal background checks and pointed questions (like, Will any other adult ever be around my child? Are there any times when your husband would be alone with the girls? Have you ever spanked your child? Do you drink when children are at home?), we were poised to give it a go.

Sunday was the first Emilie adventure into caring for two children, and I have to say, I fell into a lovely swap family. 5-month-old L was bubbly and had a droolly giggle that Hila adored. 5 hours with her flew by! And as each hour went by, a little cash register sound went off in my head. Another hour in the babysitting bank! (And luckily the other mom is very cool.)

Part of the value of a time swap isn't what you perceive as your "hourly rate." Over the past few years, I admit to falling into the "My time is worth so much!" trap. Sure, my time has a monetary value (See the article "How much is your time worth?" for some perspective), but only when I can actually make money. My time during the day is of high value, which is why I have a professional position. But the time at night... not so much. A single mom can't go get a night job without there being other implications. Even if I were slinging starbucks, I'd be in the hole for childcare. So yes, my time has value, but so does investing in saving time as well.

One of my favorite blogs, The Simple Dollar, inspired me to consider the swap, and they have oodles of other frugality tips. Among my other favorite frugality and money-saving blogs are the following:

• Bargaineering with our friend Jim Wang
• Money Tips Network - an excellent mash-up of all the blogs
• The Frugal Duchess with our friend Sharon Harvey Rosenberg. Female Expertise!

adaptations

I admit it: I find commercial patterns so, well, commercial. But I've learned to value them in their adaptability. "Adaptable?" You're thinking. "Ha!"

No, it's really true. I make a habit of once a month zipping over to my local Joann's for the cheapo pattern sale. Lately I picked up 10 Butterick patterns, half for little girls and half for women. But truth be told, I never make those patterns. I rarely even open the envelopes, yet I sit with a shelf full of them.

Why? Because they inspire me. My problem with commercial patterns is that they are rather uninspired. (When I say commercial, I mean the big ones sold at the fabric store in the deep drawers with the 3" thick catalogues. I do not mean the ones made by people like you and me.) Sure, they seem to look great on the package, but they lack flair.

But they are great for adaptations.

I love to use a good size chart on the envelope flap. And I will often take a look at the pattern pieces for a glimpse into their shaping and overall measurements before I draft my own. Cheating? Nah, just part of the learning process for me.

Try it sometime: spread out your patterns, and figure out what your *really* like from each. Take a square neck from one and match it with a pouf sleeve and bubble skirt from another. It's a truly original adaptation... you'll like it.

Here are some great pattern finds!

• Bonnie Reversible Girls Dress by emilierebekah (ok, shameless plug there... but it's a good pattern!)
• Fluerette Bubble Skirt by hyperart
• Very Easy Vogue Vintage Top and Culottes by patterncellar
• Vintage Nautical Vogue Top and Pants by sydcam123 (so cute!)
• Animal Outlines Pattern by beckarahn (embellish away!)

Homemade at Hila's House

So we like to make things at our house. (You can check out my etsy store to see some of the things I make: handmade hila.) But we also hold a special fascination for making those things that we typically think of as un-makeable.

Yep, I've made a big, gelatinous batch of homemade laundry soap. Why did I choose to do it? Mostly, I have some pretty specific financial goals and this (in addition to many other baby steps I'm taking) brings me a little bit closer to it. On the other side of the coin, the mentality of "I like to know what goes into my (insert product type here)" doesn't really hold: I made it with washing soda, borax, and a bar of soap. I couldn't tell you that i have any idea about the contents of those. But again, it's cheap and works well.

But would I choose to enter the all-out-frugal-penny-pinching-miser status that goes with making the following?

• Homemade Shampoo. Varieties available, but I think that I'm better off making a homemade conditioner of something like olive oil and parrafin. (My hair is very frizzy, get off my back.)
• Homemade Deodarant Ok, so I'm naturally against the idea of homemade deodarant, but upon further thought, the stuff from the store doesn't work all that well anyways. (Come on, you've had that moment in an elevator where you realize that smell is *you.*) So sure, this will make the list.
• Home Cleaners. No link, just the standard "mix baking soda with water" rigamarole. I'm actually super into this idea. Cheap, works ok. However, I won't give up my standard bleach-down-the-kitchen followed by a nice-smelling wipedown.
  

But perhaps the real question is, would I tell my friends? Does it naturally label me as a hippy wunderkind? It doesn't help my self-image that I drive a hybrid. I ride my bike quite a bit, to the point that I can strap kiddo onto and I have equipped with a goods-hauling backpack. Why is there such a stigma attached to frugalism that helps the planet?

Hippies be damned, I just love saving money!

Speaking of money, here are some money-saving etsy finds.

• "Fight Club" Duct Tape Wallet from CustomWallets (my favorite movie + favorite adhesive product!)
• Porcelain Baby Head Coin Bank ("Save for the Future") from modernfx (weird, yet intriguing)
• PIF Lunchbox Love Notes (Pay it Forward) from Uneek4u. (Free, just do something nice! Search etsy for PIF and find many do-gooder listings.)
  
• Variety of Reusable Lunch Sacks from WasteNotSaks
  

The inverted box pleat

This week's project, the Betty Jumper, came about from a peruse through the sale Simplicity patterns. I found a pattern for a women's dress that featured a curved yoke of sorts. And voila! the Betty was born.

In another post I will talk about the use of commercial patterns in creating other styles. For now, I am focusing on adapting a bodice pattern that started with a gathered front to a box pleat. The box pleat itself provides a lot of opportunity for easy style!

A basic box pleat is defined by wikipedia as:
"Box pleats are knife pleats back-to-back, and have a tendency to spring out from the waistline.^[2] They have the same 3:1 ratio as knife pleats, and may also be stacked to form stacked box pleats. These stacked box pleats create more fullness and have a 5:1 ratio. They also create a bulkier seam. Inverted box pleats have the "box" on the inside rather than the outside."

A bodice can use either the standard or inverted, but note that the inverted lends itself to "peekaboo" styling.

Here are some suggestions for going wild with a bodice box pleat:

1. Keep it simple. A basic or inverted box pleat at center is no vanilla way to say "I put thought into my garment."

2. Double up. Try side-by-side box pleats or off-center box pleats. Stretch your pattern engineering skills by simply widening your bodice pattern piece at an interesting point.

3. Get horizontal. A horizontal box pleat from armpit to armpit can look adorable on babies and toddlers. For older girls, this pleat can work if it lays high above the bust.

4. Peekaboo! Add a strip of fabric which will serve as the inside of the inverted pleat. A great choice would be a high-contrast fabric of similar weight to your garment's fabric.

5. Triangulate. On a pattern like the Betty, you could sew the top of the pleat in the standard fashion, but then open it up to where the bodice meets the skirt.

Try it! You'll like it! Here are some other great examples of pleats as embellishment:

• Birthday Party Dress from PinkLizzyfromAus
• Pleated Skirt for Girls from SewFrivolous
• Hard to Resist Accessory Pouch from sewingsparklz
• Slate Scarflette from flutter
  

The Creative Process: Patterns

Well, another day another dollar. When you're balancing a full-time career with a creative (and hopefully profitable) craft venture, the creative process can be more like creative torture. The thoughts start racing: what if my 2-hour window of awake-time tonight is totally wasted on feeling uninspired, or worse, watching a rerun of "House"? What if my kiddo stays awake until 10 when I promised an order would be mailed tomorrow at 8 a.m., and it needs 3 hours of work? What if I'm a hack?

It all comes down to the "What if I'm a hack?" question. How can it not? Look at etsy's beautiful and skilled crafters and you'll ask yourself the same thing. But when it comes to patterns, I think I am on solid footing.

There is a process that I've become familiar with for my pattern development, and it goes something like this:

1. First, I see something I like and want to improve. It's usually of the basic criteria like "dress," or "skirt." I make a mental note and sometimes send myself a note.
2. I then sketch the shape on whatever's handy. This is usually the back of a Target receipt.
   
3. I bring the sketch home and draft up instructions. Typing up the instructions before having a pattern or even putting needle to fabric helps me figure out what shape the pattern pieces actually have to be. (I've done it both ways: on both the Jaime Sundress and Eryn reversible skirts, I actually made the garment first. But I learned from these I would rather think it through before making it.)
4. I then draft up pencil-drawn pattern pieces, usually taken from whatever similar garment I can get from my kiddo's closet. I modify, tinker, alter, and put the pattern pieces on her butcher paper. (We had an incident a couple months back where she unrolled an entire butcher paper roll from Ikea; it's now cut into workable sizes for me to make pattern pieces.) Then I cut the fabric.
5. I take pictures along the way, at every step. It slows me down to a very uncomfortable pace (I'm a rusher, so sue me). But it ensures that I'm thinkign about each step. I don't mind screwing up in my own home, but the sheer idea of how mortified I'd be after screwing up a step that someone else tries inspires me to take it slow.
6. I then match the photos to the steps: was I right? Did I implement it in the same way or different. I do final text tinkers.
7. Then comes the fun part: doing the real pattern pieces in the pattern. This takes a little skill and a lot of patience because I'm determined to get them just right. Straight lines are easy, but very few of my patterns use right angles. I hunker down for the challenge and dive in with curves and angles.
8. Dumping the photos into the pattern is the final reward. A few touch-ups to the cover art usually take me forever, because I'm not a good finisher. (Just ask my second-grade teacher Mrs. Hallett.) But I do it. And you'll note I often give myself announced deadlines. Otherwise I'd never get anything done. (Just ask my boss, Gary.)

Posting the finished product to etsy, or packaging it for sale at a local shop, never feels like the relief it should. But when a new pattern sells for the first time, I get a little chill each time. I finished something! I did it!

Here are a few others who've made the creative process work for them on etsy. My fave patterns:

• Coffee Cosies by agreensleeve. Perhaps adaptable for cans too, for those of us in hot climates?
• Candy Wrapper Bags by bagladymomma. Make a statement, with the smell of chocolate.
• Journal Clutch by keykalou. All of her stuff is delicious.
• Max the Owl Plushie by ginia18. Owls are a love of mine, a love that is not shared by kiddo.
  

Dreams regarding my day job

Okay, it's not like I'm turning in my resignation letter today. In fact, I'm one of those lucky people who actually likes their job. Verging on loving it. But I can't help but recognize the strange allure of leaving the day job life behind to pursue hopes and dreams.

One of the biggest fuels for this dream is Etsy's series of Storque articles on "Quit your day job" success stories. I look at their happy little crafter faces, their personal anecdotes ("I've never been one for getting out of bed before 10"), and their beautifully handcrafted stuff, and I think, "That could be me."

But I'm a long way off from that. I have a *career*, for g'sake, and the prospect of replacing said career income is, well, difficult to imagine. When I do the calculations, I need something of the magnitude of 20,000 sales (accounting for supplies, postage, etsy fees, the caviar pictured above, and so forth).

So how does one transition from the "Big Dream" (note capitals) to the "big dream" of making a little extra, having someone out there adore your product, and buying a new pair of shoes from time to time?

Changing the thinking is the only thing I can come up with. Repeat after me:

• I am a creative crafter.
• It doesn't matter what hours of the day I do my crafting.
• My goal isn't how much or how often, but just to make.
  

So for today, I will just make. And tomorrow, I will go to work.

And I'll continue to be inspired by some of my fellow etsy creators who focus on the business of business:

• Tin 'o Notes by ShopBub. A steal at $3.50!
• Handmade Wooden Pencil Holders by SugarShackShoppe. Like my vision for high school woodworking class, except beautifully executed.
• Business Card Holder by LM Creations. Sushi, anyone?