I think that everyone can appreciate living with less. We live in a world that encourages one time convenience instead of looking towards sustainable options. Investing in things that are reusable may require a little extra effort but the long term savings and elimination of wastes can be tremendous.

Yes, you will need to wash these Swiffer covers instead of tossing them in the trash once they've been use but you will also always have a Swiffer cover on hand from here on out. You won't be forgetting to pick them up from the store or spending any more money on them. This is something I think we can all appreciate and is far worth having to toss these in the washer after use. 

I would recommend making two or three of these because you might want to change them out during your cleaning. I will admit, I never owned a Swiffer because I didn't want to deal with having to buy new pads for it all the time. Then I saw a pattern for making your own covers on Revelry and decided to queue it. My roommate brought a Swiffer with her to our apartment and I finally had a reason to make these.

You might have noticed that the title of this post mentioned a fail. For some reason while I was making the first one, I failed to test the size of the pad against the base of the Swiffer and it ended up too large. Also the bobbles in the pattern didn't match the where you snapped the pad to the Swiffer nor were they necessary. The stockinette stitch held it in place just fine. I easily could have lived with this ill-fitting cover but I decided to undo it all and try again, tweaking the pattern for a better fit. Herein lying the fix. I decreased the number of stitches from the original pattern and eliminated the bobbles. I also avoided increasing the stitches for the seed stitch body. 

This is a picture of the original cover following the pattern exactly.
The bottom was fine but you can see how there is a lot of excess on each side and the bobbles were all wrong.

And the fix. As you can see, SO. MUCH. BETTER. Worth tearing it out and making some modifications.

What you need

- Cotton yarn

- US needles

- Tapestry needle

Directions

- Cast on 39 stitches
- Row 1: Slip 1 purlwise, purl until 1 stitch remains, knit 1
- Row 2: Slip 1 purlwise, knit to end
- Row 3: Repeat row 1
- Row 4: Repeat row 2

- Row 5: Repeat row 1
- Row 6: Repeat row 2

- Row 7: Repeat row 1
- Row 8: Repeat row 2

- Row 9: Repeat row 1
- Row 10: Repeat row 2
- Rows 11-44: Slip 1 purlwise, purl 1, knit 1
- Row 45: Repeat row 1
- Row 46: Repeat row 2
- Row 47: Repeat row 1
- Row 48: Repeat row 2
- Row 49: Repeat row 1
- Row 50: Repeat row 2
- Row 51: Repeat row 1
- Row 52: Repeat row 2
- Row 53: Repeat row 1
- Bind off and weave in ends.

Modified from this free pattern by Birdy Evans
You can check out my project here on Revelry

There are also a bunch of other free knit and crochet Swiffer cover patterns on Ravelry! 

I am going to share another project that I made a few years ago. I made these thumbtacks long before I started this blog but I still use them and enjoy their bright little pop of patterns and color. Made with those little glass gems that some people use to fill vases and recycled bits of magazine paper, this project is quick and low cost. I only had to buy the glass gems which cost me a dollar. 

These are great in my apartment to hold random stuff like coupons, mass schedules, receipts that I need reimbursed on, and other important things I don't want to lose. My bedroom in my apartment came equipped with a 4x4 foot bulletin board so I have plenty of space to use these. You can check this project out on my Kollabora too!

Materials:

Glass vase gems (Found at Dollar Tree or a store's floral section)

Magazines

Modge Podge

Paint Brush 

Scissors

Flat Thumbtacks

Apoxy glue

Stored in a thrifted jar. 

How to:

1. Go through your magazines and rip out pages with tiny patterns that you like.

2. Cut out tiny circles about the size of a dime from the pattern.

3. Using the Modge Podge, glue the circles with the pattern side facing the flat side of the glass gems. Let dry.

4. Glue the thumbtacks* to wrong side of the paper circles using the apoxy glue. Let dry completely. 

I let my jar sit on my printed next to a massager and my current book reading pile.

*I have also done this successfully with magnets!

I struggle to post here regularly. Not because I am not making and creating but because I am terrible at taking pictures. It seems like the majority of time I have that I can work on this blog is during the evening when lighting is poor. Due to bad lighting, I finally got pictures of my drawers over the weekend. Disclaimer: I made these and have been using them since the summer of 2014. I am just now sharing them with you a year and a half later. But hey, at least I can say the drawers have been tested and tried. And I love them! You can check this project out on my Kollabora page too!

So here's how these drawers came to be: as I was preparing for moving into my new apartment led me creating a list of things that I would need to buy for the space as well as things I wanted to create. Since my apartment was small and the amount of storage was sparse, I knew that I wanted to have underbed storage. I wanted to make drawers instead of buying the collapsable bags because 1) drawers are prettier, 2) they would hold up better, and 3) they are customizable. 

 I was inspired by this pin:

Source

I loved the idea of an oil cloth lining for ease of cleaning and the extra pattern. I also loved the bright colors.

I cam across these drawers at a garage sale a few summers ago and I decided to buy them for a total of $2. I knew that even if it took me months to do this project I wouldn't be out much because a paid a whopping 40 cents per drawer. They are dirty but that wasn't anything a little soap and water couldn't fix. Surprisingly, I had these washed and painted right away.

Cameo appearance by Bo!

Nice and grimy...probably not worth more than 40 cents.

 What you'll need:

Drawers-thirfted or homemade--look for solid wood!
Oil cloth fabric

Paint

Wallpaper adhesive

Dresser knobs/spray paint

Caster wheels

Miscellaneous Supplies:

Screws and Screwdriver 

Paint Brush

Wallpaper Brush/squeegee

Sandpaper

Start by vacuuming out any dust from the inside of the drawers. Then remove your handles. If they are dirty like mine were, wash them out with warm water and soap using a rag and scrub brush. I did this on a warm summer day so they dried quickly in the sunshine. I washed each drawer twice.

Next lightly sand each drawer using a medium grit sandpaper. According to my mom, by lightly sanding the drawer, you will remove some of the stain/varnish which will allow your paint to adhere better and ultimately look nicer when finished. 

 Paint your drawers. This will take a few coats of paint.

I wasn't worried about the bottom since I knew I was adding a liner to the bottom.

So much better already!

I got my green paint from our local Habitat for Humanity store. I paid $5 for a gallon of paint that was at least 80% full. For quick little project like this, I would highly recommend looking into getting your paint from a resale store such as Habitat for Humanity. It's recycled paint from a previous owner-win. You are supporting a good cause-win. You are getting paint for wayyy cheap-win. 

Win-win-win. Also a win: the teal paint was FREE from where I worked over the summer. :)

So pretty.

Harbor Freight FTW

After your drawers are painted and dry, it is time to attach your wheels. I got mine for 80 cents a wheel at Harbor Freight. I really like them and they work great! I have been using the drawers like crazy and have had no issues!

Then add your hardware. I ended up buying some new knobs at Menards the day before I left for school. Since I was on a time crunch and there weren't any I saw that I liked for a low enough price or any that were the right color for the right price, I ended up getting some I liked in wrong colors and a can of spray paint. After a quick spray, my knobs look great! It was an easy fix. In time I might splurge for some clearance Anthropologie knobs but I was on a time crunch when I was working on these! Update: still using the original knobs. 

The last step is to add your oil cloth fabric lining. I debated what would be the best way to do this. I was going to get a spray adhesive but my mom suggested using wallpaper glue. We had some in the garage because my mom has done countless home improvement projects for others.

How to adhere the oil cloth using wallpaper adhesive:
Using a paint brush, coat the bottom of your drawer with wallpaper glue.
Lay the fabric over the glue.
Using a wallpaper brush/squeegee flatten the fabric so that all excess glue comes out and no air bubbles remain.
With a damp rag, wipe away any of the excess glue.
Cut the oil cloth with a utility knife.
Sadly I had no pictures of this part! :(

Fill your drawers!
How I am using my drawers:
Yarn storage
Food storage
Shoe storage
School supply storage in my drawers at home

I took the three blue ones with me to school and left the green ones at home. I honestly couldn't be happier. I have a ton of extra oil cloth because I ordered way too much but I hope I can find some other projects to use it on. I have a bunch of extra paint/spray paint left too even though I used leftover paints. Overall, I spent more on these drawers than a couple under the bed storage bags but I love them. The cost for making these was still incredibly low though! They are sturdier, prettier, and overall a higher quality. I have already got so much use out of them!

If you knit or crochet you know that buying nice yarn is expensive. There is a way that you can get nice yarn  though if you are willing to do a little bit of work. And it's a green project too!

You can deconstruct sweaters for yarn and save some money! Here's a few tips for doing this:

1. Avoid Cotton, most cotton sweaters are made from tons of individual threads versus just a single piece of yarn. There's a way to check if its a single piece of yarn or many threads and its really easy.

Just pull a stitch and see if its one strand or many. When you're done, if you pull around where you picked the stitch, it will go flat and you won't be able to tell you pulled it.

Many strands:

One strand:

2. If you are getting any wool/natural fiber sweater, make sure the piece isn't felted. You can also check to see if it is felted by following the method used in #1 to see if there many threads or just one. If it's felted, the yarn fibers are locked together and won't be able to be separated.

3. Save the labels for the yarn so that way you what the yarn is made of and how to care for the whatever you make using the yarn. Save the buttons for future projects!

How to make yarn:

HOW TO:

1. Remove any labels and buttons from the sweater. If you are using a cardigan or a sweater with buttons, use a seam ripper to removed the threads sewn around the buttons holes.

2. Start to take apart the sweater but ripping its seams. If you cut the seam at the top. it should unravel all the way down fairly easily. If you cut the seam at the bottom, you should have to unravel the seam yourself. 

3. Pull apart the sweater.

A giant mass of yarn

4. Wind into a ball. 

It may be hard to tell, but you can get a crazy huge amount of yarn by taking apart a sweater. If you have ever knit a sweater than you know how much yarn one sweater takes. The purple were from this deconstructed vest which was a size small but the cream was a from a large sweater and you can sort of tell that there is more there. PS for reference, the cream ball is the size of my HEAD!

Good Luck and enjoy!

Earlier I posted a tutorial on how to make t-shirt yarn. Now if you are looking for some projects on how to use it, look on:

You can knit (or crochet) pillows:

(found on Pinterest)

You can make baskets:

Tutorial here from My Poppet

You can make scarves:

Tutorial here from One Dog Woof

You can weave with it:

Tutorial here from Creative Jewish Mom

You can make poufs:

Link to pattern here by Memento Vivere

(The blog is in Danish but there is a translate bar)

You can refashion shirts with it:

Tutorial here from Trash to Couture

Tutorial here from Trash to Couture 

Any ideas you have? 

Happy Crafting!

A few years ago t-shirt yarn became really popular. It's a great recycling project and it is super easy to do. I started making t-shirt yarn when I cleaned out my dresser and had so many shirts that I hardly ever wore. Instead of donating them, I began to make yarn.

I highly recommend getting old shirts from thrift shops. They usually cost 25-75 cents and you can get them even cheaper on half off days! If you are thrifting for t-shirts, always, always, ALWAYS go for the large, extra large, or tall fit shirts. Why you ask? MORE FABRIC FOR YOUR MONEY. But if you are sticking to a color theme for your project or see a super awesome color shirt but it's a smaller size, go for it anyways, you'll still get a ton of yarn from it.

To get started what you need:

Steps:
1. Start by washing your shirts if they were thrifted.
2. Cut the band around the bottom of the shirt off. I just follow the top stitching around.

3. Starting at one of the corners, cut a strip about one inch thick across the body of the shirt, once you get to the end, flip the shirt over and continue to cut. (cutting t-shirts is sorta like using one of those apple peelers that take the peel off in one piece.)

4. Keep cutting until you reach the armpits of the shirt (once you can no longer make continuous strips.

5. Starting at one end pull the string so that it stretches out and curls.

6. Repeat step 5 until the entire string has been stretched out.

7. Wind into a ball and enjoy!

What I like is that this is a mindless project, I can work on this while watching movies and I also love that it't not important for the thickness of the string to be exact.

Happy crafting! :)