More Thrifty Fun

Look at this DIY embroidery stand we just made! Materials include an IKEA lamp we’ve had forever and which was sort of broken anyway (and from which we extracted the still-functional electrical components), a 7/8″ dowel, a nifty clamp from the hardware store, and two zip ties. We’ll trim the zip ties and finish the dowel with some stain and varnish so it looks a bit more civilized. Total cost in new materials (things we bought specifically for this project) was about $15. They sell things like this for between $250 and $275 new. How great is that!?

Winter Craftiness

It seems a winter of sorts has finally hit us down here in SoCal. Rain off and on all weekend, and a genuine storm by any standard hit today, with high winds and cold rain. The weather has provided a nice excuse to hunker down and be cozy in the evenings (which is not altogether uncommon, it’s just that now we have an excuse). This, combined with a renewed campaign to turn the TV off if there’s nothing in particular that we want to watch, has given us some good productive time. Last night, I finally got around to sewing the crane (maybe stork? egret?) patch my wife embroidered for me onto my $2.00 garage sale messenger bag (the patch covers up a machine-embroidered logo for some kind of gin), and tonight I rebuilt the front wheel of my current bicycle project while my wife worked on her latest embroidery project. It was really lovely to sit in our little living room, working on our projects, and alternately talking and listening to the storm outside and the cat snoring. I can’t think of a single thing I would rather have done with my evening.

Diversify in a Down Economy

Scavenger AND chimney sweep. Now that’s maximizing your skill set, and your profit. Not only could he afford an ad in a magazine, he has two telephones, and an office, apparently. Advertisement from 1899.

Phoo…

Despite all the drama, we now have everything settled: a check from insurance, a new car, and a loan from my father. What would we do without family? It’s not a big family, but it’s a good one. We can finally take a deep breath, get back to life and work, and stop getting all worked-up about everything. I’ve got some fine tuning to finish on my recently-finished bicycle project, then I’m looking forward to a big excursion around the city with it, hopefully tomorrow. Yesterday involved just tying up a few loose ends with the car dealer, insurance, etc., and then I indulged myself and took a bike ride around the neighborhood, cut some shelves for our garden stand out of some scrap wood I found in the alley, then made some lemon orzo soup. It felt good to do good things, rather than deal with insurance people and car salesmen (two bad things; sorry folks, I’m sure your families love you, but I don’t care for your functions).

I’m also ready to get back to work in a big way. I probably would have gotten started last week, had it not been for all of this non-sense with the car, so I’ve got a whole extra week of enthusiasm and energy stored up and waiting for me to unleash it on Monday. In the meantime, I’m going to take this weekend and just relax.

Thrifty Fun!

Saturday was a real cheap-skate bonanza around here.  First, we made this less-than-ideal, but still completely functional DIY lightbox for my wife to transfer embroidery designs onto fabric.  It’s pretty much just a lamp in a box with a pane of glass over it.  The glass was re-purposed from a large frame we happened to have laying around, and which needed to be dismantled anyway.  We taped up the sharp edges with electrical tape, and viola!

Second, while taking out the garbage, I noticed that our neighbors across the alley were getting rid of a rather dirty and wobbly wooden stand of some sort, which was missing its shelves.  Well heck, I thought, I bet I can find something to do with that, so I cleaned it up, tightened the Ikea-style bolts, cut a piece of scrap wood for a shelf, and ended up with a perfectly serviceable garden-stand-thingy.  I’ll scavenge a couple more pieces of board for shelves, slap some stain and varnish on, and we’ll have a nice place to store extra pots, tools, etc.  It even has handy pegs for hanging towels or whatever.  I get much more excited about this sort of thing than I ought.