Strawberry Pancakes Clothing

posts tagged "winter"

How To Survive The Bleakness Of Winter, Part 1

Suggestions:

1. Get some kind of cool decor item for your room. Particularly one that moves or lights up. My favorite item in my room is my lava lamp (lights up AND moves!), in addition to a lot of other fun stuff, such as my movie posters, my giant pink star-shaped lantern, and a fun little sock monkey I picked up at a tag sale for a buck.

2. Paint your nails. I am a huge advocate of being glamorous and painting your nails is an easy way to achieve this. I tend to stick with pinks, golds, and peach colors, on my fingernails, only occasionally venturing into more vibrant colors…but when I paint my toenails in the winter, though a rare occurence, I go for fun, bright colors. Anyway, looking down at painted fingernails (or toenails!) is sure to make the blah’s of wintertime dissipate a bit.

3. Go thrifting. Usually when I thrift, I find some kind of hidden treasure. I’ve got a map in my head of the local thrift shops and I go to all of them fairly often. During the winter it’s especially fun, because since I have not school-year job, I’m tight on money and thrifting’s cheap. Last time, I picked up a vintage poodle pendant, a few sheets (to be made into spring dresses), and two champagne flutes. The grand total? $9.

4. Go out with your friends. How are you supposed to de-boredom yourself if you’re cooped up in the house? So far this winter I’ve gone to the movies twice, gone window-shopping at the mall, gone ice skating, and attended several parties with friends. And it’s only January! 

5. Drink tea like water. Use it to replace whatever (sugary, junk food) beverage you usually drink. It’s warm and refreshing and pretty good for you. Buy lots of varieties (I usually have 3 of each caffeinated and decaf on hand for both morning and evening). In fact, go for one of those sampler packs, where you get 3 of each flavor. Celestial Seasonings has one that I recently bought. Buy one of those teapot/teacup/saucer combo’s they sold at Borders last year (maybe they still have them) and serve yourself a fine afternoon tea.

My New Years’ Eve Dress!

Here it is! :-)

Fleece lined tights? I think I need these. ↘

Christmas Decorating

So we finally put up the tree. We always put it up on my birthday (Dec. 23). I took some pictures of it and other Christmas decorations I put up for your viewing pleasure.

I got this cute little snowman that plugs into my computer and glows. Clever idea.

Some boxes of antique Christmas ornaments.

Garland on the banister.

Me decorating our tree. (Not done yet though, I have yet to take pictures with the garland on it!)

And of course, various ornaments:

Wool Holiday Skirt

This skirt was made from a sale fabric at a fabric store having a liquidation sale. I drove a good distance to get there for the cheap fabric! The fabric is so soft and warm, and it’s perfect for the holiday season. Of course, I’ll keep wearing it all winter. Again, Alexx is my model. I think she looks fab in it!

It has a definitely 50s flair which I absolutely love, and what I love even more is how soft it is!

Table Runner and Quick Tutorial

I made this table runner for my mom. It’s reversible. One side is a Christmassy print, with wreaths and whatnot, and the other side is snowmen so it can be used during the rest of the winter.

How I made it - it’s really easy actually.

1. Rip two equally sized strips from two different fabrics, forming two long rectangles. I made mine about 10 inches wide and a few inches shorter than the length of my table.

2. Lay the rectangles on each other, right sides together. Sew three and a half of the sides - the two long sides, one short side, and half of the other short side.

3. Turn the runner right side out and iron flat. Tip - place the rectangle on the ironing board with the seams in the middle, not on the sides, so you can iron them flat before ironing the table runner into its final shape. This makes sure that the seams are not folded inward when you iron the runner. Hopefully that makes a bit of sense to you, the reader.

4. Stitch shut the opening you left to turn the table runner right side out. Either hand stitch it (more aesthetically appealing) or machine stitch as close to the end as possible (faster). I chose the machine method.

Ta-Dah! You have a table runner. This whole project took me about 20 minutes, tops.