Clearing the Excess

So, I've been reading two things lately which have made me want to give away half of our stuff.

First, I have been keeping up with Kelly's journey over at The Year of Less. She and her husband are trying to move their family into a simpler way of life. Less stuff, less stress, more happy.

Second, I've been reading 7: An Experimetntal Mutiny Against Excess, by Jen Hatmaker, for a book group. While the book isn't my favorite, it never fails to get me thinking about how much excess I invite into my home and my life on a daily basis.

So, what would it be like to clear some things form my life and explore the simple? I've decided I want to try harder in this area. I haven't quite decided what I want to limit or simplify.

I may not know what I'm doing, but I decided to start today.

Now, I am obsessed with Pinterest. I find wonderful ideas, recipes, and inspiration on the site. I could spend HOURS just paging through that thing. Its sort of ridiculous how much I love it.

So, I started my simplifying today with something (kinda) easy:

I went through Pinterest and cleared out any pins I wouldn't realistically do.

Source: blog.pinterest.com

While this might sound dumb to some folks, it really is a place that has built up clutter for me. 

Do I really need 5 pins to quilting tutorials, when I have never quilted in my life?

And why do I have 7 pins that lead to tutorials for making bags, when I've never even made one?

I even found 4 pins to tutorials about hexagon quilts, which sounded fun at the time, but now just sound tedious...

So, I deleted....and deleted some more. And kind of felt relieved.

To give you an example, I started with 112 pins in my sewing category and by the time I was done, I got down to 71. Still a lot, but at least they are all around my level of sewing ability now and many are tutorials for sewing basics that I don't know how to do yet.

I'm still trying to decide what my next battle against excess will be. I'm thinking my closet....or maybe media/screen time. We shall see.

Easy DIY Pet Bed

I actually did this project a while ago, I just never got around to getting all the photos off of my phone.

What can I say? I'm lazy.

Anyway, are you ready for a super easy project? Good.

I have to start by saying that our kitty LOVES fleece. Absolutely, positively, if you have something that is fleece around the house, he will lay on it. He loves the stuff. So, most of the time we just left an old fleece blanket dedicated to him on one end of the couch. It would probably be impossible to get all of the cat hair off of that thing. The blanket was just kind of blah and people would come over and try to use it as a lap throw, not knowing that they would leave covered in cat hair *embarrassing*.

So, as I was perusing Joann's one day I noticed that they had 50% off their remnant fabrics. I went to take a look and found 3/4 of a yard of really cute fleece. And it matched our living room stuff! So an idea was born: I'll make a pet bed for Scar, it will match our decor, AND people won't mistake it for a lap throw. Yay!

I created it as a stuffed inner pillow with fleece as the outer cover. And you could even remove the fleece later and wash it if you wanted to.

Here's what you'll need:

• less than 3/4 yard fabric - This will be what you sew up and stuff, I used an old pillow case - FREE
• ~3/4 yard fleece (or something that doesn't fray, like a knit) - Obviously, you should adjust fabrics to the size you want the pet bed. Since its a simple rectangle, its easy to adjust. - $3.00
• Filling - I used standard poly-fill, but you could use old towels or whatever you would like. - FREE
• Thread - it doesn't even have to match because it won't show. :) - FREE

Easy, right? No complex supplies here. Plus, if you count all the items I already had as free, it only cost me $3.00!



First, lay out your fleece and pillow fabric. You want there to be an extra 3-4 in. of fleece all around your pillow fabric. You will need two pieces of pillow fabric and two pieces of fleece. Pin and cut fabric to size if you need to.

Because I wanted to use every bit of the fleece, I laid out my fleece (folded in half), then adjusted my pillow fabric to size.

Now, go ahead and sew up the pillow part, leaving a 3-4in opening for turning and stuffing. I only had to sew up two sides since I was using an old pillow case.

Once you've sewed your sides, turn the pillow fabric right side out (seams in). Use your filling material to stuff your pillow. I didn't stuff mine to the brim, since I wanted it to be easy to snuggle down into.

Sew the opening closed. I just did a quick hand sew, since I was too lazy to go upstairs to my sewing machine.

Your pillow part is done! Now onto the fleece cover....

 

If you've ever made a fleece "tie" blanket, you can make this cover. Center your pillow on both pieces of fleece (its easier to cut them together).

Cut out the corners of fleece, like above. This is extra material. You want the corner of the square to come just up to the corner of the pillow.

Once all of your corners are cut, go ahead and cut strips along each of the sides, like you are making fringe. The strips will be as long as your cut out corners (if that makes sense....) I made my strips about 1/2 in. wide. I usually don't measure, just kind of try to keep them even as you go around.

Now, leave one piece of fleece under the pillow and lay the other over the top.

Start tying! You'll tie one top fringe to one bottom fringe. I tied the corners first, then worked my way down each of the sides.

That's it!

Stand back and admire, then let your furry house-mate enjoy.

Linking Up To: Places I like to link to & Mostly Homemade Mondays

Five Things Friday

Its Friday once again! Hip-hip-hooray!

September has gone by in a flash. We've had more social items on our calendar this month, so I'm ready for a weekend of being a homebody....and maybe doing some crafting? We shall see.

This is what I feel like doing right now. Nap Time!

See that cute little bed our cat is sleeping on, well I'll have a super easy tutorial for it up soon. :)

On to the things that have brought me joy this week....

1. Excellent food. We ate out TWICE in one week, just for my Birthday. 
2. Pie. This year's birthday desert of choice.
3. Mugs of tea. Its that time of year again.
4. Apple picking! We've got, a beautiful, 20 lbs to make into all sorts of tasty things.
5. The weather. Fall is wonderful.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Five Things Friday

Photo Source: The Grindstone

That photo about sums it up.

But not only is it Friday, its also my birthday! I love it when birthdays fall on Fridays, don't you?

This week has been pretty excellent, if you ignore the going to bed late every night thing. Of course, I'm still glad it's Friday.

As usual, here are my five joyful things from this week.

1. T got me a TARDIS mug and a Doctor Who shirt. Plus, he got candy corn season rolling early. Best husband ever? I think so.
2. Soccer games and friends...Oh, and nachos. And hard cider.
3. Indian food tonight. YUM YUM YUM.
4. Packages. Wonderful gifts have been arriving by mail all week. I have such a great family. :)
5. Windows open weather. Fall is approaching and, holy cow, am I ready!

I hope everyone had a good week and has an even better weekend!

Go USA!

We went to the USA vs. Jamaica World Cup Qualifier last night. USA won 1-0. It was a whole lot of fun. I love the athleticism that soccer demands. Its such an intense and concise sport; no waiting around and watching 6,000 replays. Nope, play happened, carry on.

Plus, you've gotta love a sport where the stadium has hard cider on tap!

Now, I just need a nap in the middle of work.

The US uniforms are little on the "Where's Waldo?" side...

As we were getting ready to go to the stadium, I realized I have not one red, white and blue item in my wardrobe. Not even an Old Navy 4th of July shirt. Not one thing. So, regular red T-shirt it was. How unpatriotic of me.

Its ok, I don't think anyone noticed.