Make do, Mend and Minimise in 2020

p00

my make do is to avoid going to the shops again today. I need teabags but have enough to last the weekend so by not going to the shops I am not then buying all the things that end  up in your trolley. 
I needed a repair around my chimney as it started leaking at the leading. After roofers  not turning up to appointments to quote I remembered someone I knew 40 years ago, who I thought must be retired but would know someone.  I've seen him 4 times in 40 years yet he sent around one of his staff and sealed around the leading FOR FREE. Its who you know not what you know after all.  That has to be one of the best mends Ive done or had done.
I also repaired the zip on my onesie that has been waiting for over a year.  Love my onesie until I want a wee lol. I wonder if putting poppers on like a babygrow is comfortable.
p00 xx

MrsCD

I've minimized my wool stash, slightly. I've made some little squashy pumpkins for an Autumn Display on my side table! Next will be some acorns and oak leaves, all crocheted.

p00

MrsCD said:

I've minimized my wool stash, slightly. I've made some little squashy pumpkins for an Autumn Display on my side table! Next will be some acorns and oak leaves, all crocheted.

Id forgotten about my wool. I sold 24 balls I had bought from Hobbycraft last year to crochet a throw. Then realised it would be far to heavy to put in the washer being mainly cotton (and ivory and have dogs).  Sold this week for same price I paid so that was handy.
Gave away a big stash of wool to a lady that works in a care home and they knit for charity.I have no idea why I buy so much wool.
Gave a box of crafty stuff away on Olio.
My craft cupboard is minimising nicely with no intention to buy more.  The more I minimise the happier I feel when I open a drawer or cupboard.
p00  x

Laura_Elsewhere

The Fashion on the Ration group on MSE has helped me buy much less wool and yarn - we try to stay within the 66 coupons that one adult in wartime Britain had, to cover all clothing, and fabric and yarn, regardless of price. It's a real eye-opener...!

I had knitted a lace hood, a decade or more back, wore it about twice, never like dit, and it went with almost none of my clothes, so it and its leftover pink-purple lacweight wool sat around for years and years and years... this morning I've unravelled it, wound it all into three loose cakes, and they are now dyeing in a Pyrex dish of white vinegar with black food colouring in it, squishing them around with two forks occasionally and in an hour I'll ping it in the microwave, just one minute at a time, off and on for an hour, to heat it without felting the wool. Then I'll leave it to cool overnight and tomorrow I'll handwash it with plenty of squishing about in a washing-up bowl of tepid water with washing-up liquid and rinse and rinse. Then it's going to be knitted up with a load of leftover autumn-leaf wool that's been sitting unused for years and in a couple of weeks I shall have some lovely warm thin wool socks that look like my beloved Russian-lacquerwork bowls! 

Mrs_Salad_Dodger

Sounds brilliant Laura.

Make Do & Minimise: Food from freezers & stores. Saving money by using los to make soups. 

Minimising wool stash by knitting scarves & hand warmers.

Laura_Elsewhere

Using up the stalk and leaves of cauliflower to make cauliflower-cheese soup for My Intended - I can't believe I'd thrown away stalk and leaves all these years! I kept potato peelings in the freezer to add as well, so the only 'real' veg going in is onion  

thriftwizard

Quite chuffed with this bit of MDM&M: a rug made from moth-eaten old wool blankets & rugs, cut into strips & woven on a warp of dead duvet cover! The blankets were from the pile that my son's mini-dachshund slept on (and in) when he was a puppy; he can manage with just one or two now. So 3 blankets & one raggedy duvet cover have turned into a tough but soft rug, which will be great for fireside use as wool doesn't burn. (The warp loops visible at the edge will vanish into the weave over the next few days as the tension evens up.) Eyeing up the rest of the blankets now...

Laura_Elsewhere

@thriftwizard, you really are a thrift wizard - that is gorgeous!!!

skogar

The rug is great Thriftwizard. Love it.

thriftwizard

Thank you! Been at it again today... DD2 announced yesterday evening that her last pair of pyjama bottoms had disintegrated. I hasten to add that we're not so mean that we wouldn't buy her any new ones, it's that she's on the spectrum & won't wear any that don't feel right; oddly enough, cheap ones rarely do! But sometimes they're better than expensive ones; anyway, daft to buy any that she can't feel first. I was tidying up round the sewing machine earlier & chanced upon a pair in brushed cotton that her sister gave me a year or so ago, to be chopped up & used in one of my raggy quilts, as the top had come apart & been consigned to the rag-bag. Out came the overlocker, and half an hour later she had a nice soft "new" pair of PJ bottoms! They're both tall & slender (at least, from where I'm standing at 5'4" and size 16) but a different build; DD1's a size 10 hour-glass but DD2 altogether straighter & overall slenderer at size 8, though with the same size waist. So I minimised a little bit of pre-stash fabric (as well as a lot of weeds from the allotment this morning, and some fallen-apart bamboo obelisks) & made a pair of PJ bottoms do!