Monday Message

Keeping up your sewing skills. Learning these skills can save money by remaking/reusing the fabric and clothes you already have.

This is a picture of a blouse that I'm in the process of reusing after it had a bad stain on it. You can see in the bottom picture that I am carefully taking it apart to use for a pattern.

http://blog.houseoffifty.com/2010/06/how-to-cover-lampshades-with-fabric.html - I thought I would throw this one to get you looking at things differently. Instead of buying a new lampshade save money and redo an old one!

http://sew-blessed.blogspot.ca/2011/03/tucked-hem-tutorial.html - this is a great idea for our ever-growing children.

http://www.danamadeit.com/2008/07/tutorial-make-your-own-pattern.html this is a real saver.

http://www.allaboutyou.com/craft/make-clothes/sew-girls-denim-skirt - this is a good recycle idea.

This is the third part to the crocheting tutorial - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cf8BPD_eXio

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdFm1QnXmT4&feature=em-subs_digest - this one is how to crochet flowers using what she shows in the above link.

This is a great idea to use up materials and make a floor covering  http://www.sugarbeecrafts.com/2010/02/rag-rug-tutorial.html#_a5y_p=1333134

Do you have too many zucchinis in your garden? http://www.beckysbacktobasics.com/get_full_recipe.php?File=1282174912&search.x=59&search.y=59

And of course my favorite chocolate cake, yum! I always keep the ingredients to make this cake on hand and if things got hard I would say we still have chocolate cake. The kids just thought yum but it seemed to help us get through the hard times.

http://www.beckysbacktobasics.com/get_full_recipe.php?File=1270689755&search.x=25&search.y=13 - This cake is great with white frosting as well as this which is my favorite chocolate frosting. You don’t have to have it just when life throws hard things your way though :)

It is nice to have the ability to cook from scratch so stock up some scratch recipes that you can always make and always love and cooking from scratch saves so much!

I suggest putting together a binder of recipes that you can make from your storage for a three month span. Then make sure you keep that amount on hand at all times if possible and use and replace. Keep a running list of what you used and replace it to the back of what you have. Do not go to the store and say well I used this jar of peanut butter and I still have several so I am good, cause you then end up using and not replacing. Also, do not put it in front of the old or you will lose that way too…use replace and rotate… a good goal for sure.

Keep working at being frugal and keep learning and having fun doing so!