Last minute costumes

Hello everyone!

I hope you have all had a good week. Yesterday, I went to pick up my children from school and I was reminded that today was dress-up day for Book Week. EEEK!!

For those overseas, Book Week is an annual event in many Australian schools where kids celebrate books and reading. As part of Book Week, the kids also dress up as their favourite book character for a day.

Anyway, with all of the busy-ness of my life at the moment, it had completely slipped my mind that it was Book Week and of course, had completely forgotten about dress up day. So there I was at 4pm with no real plans for their costumes today. My daughter wanted to be "Tiger Lily" (from Peter Pan) and my son wanted to be "Harry Potter".

I almost caved and bought some costumes for them. I also almost fell over in shock at the cost of their costumes ($30 for a Tiger Lily costume and $55 for a Harry Potter costume?!!). So in the end, I went home and made this:

Tiger Lily's clothes were made using a large costume given to us as a present last year. I altered the teen-sized shirt into a dress by laying one of her dresses on top and sewing in the sides and arms. Ribbon, feather and ribbon belt were from the craft pile (which meant that I would've gotten them from an op-shop):



Harry Potter's clothes were made using a black flat bed sheet, cut up and sewn into a cape (using these instructions). Underneath, he wore more black vest and his cream polo top. The tie was a strip I cut off from some striped fabric offcut. Wand was a chopstick. The only thing I bought were the fake glasses ($5).



The whole costume-making thing took me 30 mins to do.

Both kids were very happy with their costumes. I have to say, I think they looked quite good.



Did you make any costumes for Book Week? Care to share?

Sometimes, they move me so much...

Hello everyone,

Tonight I'm sitting here feeling so proud and humbled by my children. Everyday, my children and I make it a point of talking about our day. I tell them about my day and they then tell me about theirs.

Anyway, today, I told them of a fundraiser happening at my work to help out a sick little girl called Olivia. Olivia has a rare form of cancer and need money to go overseas to get treatment.

As it happens, my children's school were also participating in a fundraiser to help out Olivia and her family.

As we talked about what's happening, my children started to ask questions about Olivia's sickness - what is cancer?, does it hurt?, if Olivia doesn't go to another country what can happen?

I answered their questions the best way I could. And when I answered their final question, I saw in their eyes shock as it registered for them that someone their age could die.

Miss 7 years old, at that moment, withdrew $10 (out of her $32) from her own pocket money savings to give to Olivia.

Mr 6 years old, after thinking about it, also took out $5 (out of his $27) from his own pocket money savings to give to Olivia.

Both understood that by giving money to someone else, they would both have to wait a little bit longer to achieve their goals...but they didn't care. As my daughter said "Waiting a bit longer won't make us die." And given what we were just talking about, I know that she is saying that in its most literal sense.

They then proceded to play and bicker between themselves as if they have done nothing out of the ordinary.

Their letters to Olivia

****************
If you want to know a bit more about Olivia's story, you can read about it here: http://olivialambert.com.au/.

Incidentally, my children are going well in learning how to manage their money (and I'm so proud of them that they understand that generosity is part of that management).

My daughter has now bought her second-hand DS (thank you Quixotic for selling her yours! She absolutely loves it and is so proud of telling everyone she's bought it herself). She is now saving up to take all of us out to the movies, complete with popcorn and icecreams (so about $60).

My son is now getting pocket money (I introduced it to him in the same way I introduced it to my daughter). He has decided to aim big right off the bat - he is now saving up for a second-hand DS.

********************

I wish you all well and hope you are having a good week.

Spending is harder than earning

Hi all,

I've been reflecting over my efforts to rein in my consumption the last few weeks and I've realised something (or perhaps have just thought more in depth about something I already know)...

Knowing how to spend money wisely is hard work! I think its actually harder work than earning that money to begin with. Looking back, I've had an income for over 20 years. That income has steadily grown from casual wage to minimum wage to the level it is now....and when I look back, I have been "rich" and "poor" in those 20 years, regardless of my income level.

I have been "rich" when I had less debt and a very clear commitment to my goals. I was rich when I was still at school on a casual wage and I wanted to buy a TV, VCR and stereo. I was rich when I was on minimum wage and saving up for a deposit on a house.

I have been "poor" when I had too much debt and no idea what to spend my money on. I was poor when I finally earned higher than the national average income and I got two credit cards with high limits. I was poor when I was promoted to an "executive" and I got myself into debt in order to live up to what I thought was the lifestyle that was expected of me.

So for me, rich or poor didn't have anything to do with what I was earning but had everything to do with my commitment to spending wisely in order to achieve greater goals.

And I guess that's what's happened. Over the last few months, I had lost sight of those goals. So time for me to re-focus and bring them to mind.

What about you? Have you experienced "rich" and "poor"?

It's black....with a bit of white.

Hey everyone!

Well, it looks like I've finally gotten back into sewing. My lovely friend Bec dropped by yesterday with some fabric goodies for me! (Aren't I lucky?) For new readers to this blog, Bec was instrumental in my learning how to sew (<--link takes you to the other blog I write in, Simple Green Frugal Co-op).

Bec, had culled her sewing pile and in her stash was a black dress she had pretty much finished (she insisted on giving it to me anyway). So for me it was a matter of just re-sizing it and then because she did all the hard work, this gave me the energy to add details I normally wouldn't have the energy to do. And here's the finished product:


I stuffed up the neckline so I ended up fixing it by cutting the deep part of the boat neck and turning it more into a v-neck. Then covering up the stitches by making a little rosette out of the same ribbon (also op-shopped) I used for the hem and neckline.

I like it. Thank you so much Bec for doing the hard parts of the dress!!

My daughter though thinks the dress is "too young" for me. She thinks it should be longer and my arms covered up....what do you think?

I hope to make a few more things over the next few days. Please wish me luck (and time) so I don't lose the sewing bug!!

I see red...:P

Hi everyone!

Thank you so much for all your encouragement in my last post (almost 3 weeks ago!). The last 3 weeks, I have managed to squeeze in some sewing. Mostly repairing things for friends and finally finishing one re-sizing job for a good friend (if you're reading this S - yep, I finished your jacket!). Anyway, funny thing about doing sewing is that even though I didn't start out to do stuff for myself (or stuff from scratch), I always end up with stuff for me anyway. (Is it just me? or does this happen to everybody else.) So I thought I'd show some of it:

Sometime ago, I made a crazy quilt patchwork cushion for my son. Now I made one for my daughter:





To be honest, I'm not too sure about how this has turned out...but my daughter loves it so I guess that's the important thing.

Long-term readers here will also remember the time when I said I wanted some new things. It seems that fate stepped in and my old phone finally died. As I don't have a landline (yep, I'm one those people), a mobile is pretty essential for me.Anyway, in the end I didn't go out and buy an IPhone and went for a HTC Desire instead. AND I LOVE IT.

I did manage to stop myself from buying accessories though. Instead, I decided to make a case for it:





As usual, all of the above sewing projects used second-hand sourced materials and thread.

Oh and before I forget, a lot of you asked where I was selling my low priced items - I have been selling them at work. Its free and easy to bring my little things there to hand over to people.

Anyway, this post has gone on longer than I meant it to. I hope you are all well!