PHOTO UPDATE: Small Black Shank Buttons for Summer Yellow Vintage 40s Dress for a More Sustainable Lifestyle: The Destiny of Things, Story 597
Creativeness overload from Etsy buyers! BEFORE:
10+ small vintage black facet shank acrylic domed buttons, available
here.
Here is the note and photo I received:
Perfect buttons to add this button less 1940s rayon dress! thank you!
How she could eyeball these buttons to look so natural and proper on this button less dress amazes me! I am not a yellow dress or rayon person, but dare I say, WANT, WANT!
An amazing AFTER: What a wonderful way to promote a more sustainable lifestyle!
Would you wear this dress too? It's so cute! I'd wear it with black boots!
It was listed at her shop, but I don't see it anymore! Sold out? Bummer!
Check out her catchy named shop, vintage109online,
here. Every piece of clothing is so dang cute, it would be difficult to make a purchase of just one item! How does she do it?
I love that her shop supports a more sustainable lifestyle by bringing these vintage outfits back to life by cleaning and restoring them! And if you support her shop, it goes to a great cause because she's renovating an old brick and mortar building in Madison, Wisconsin, which
will eventually be a vintage store. This has been a dream of hers for a
long time and she says it will be wonderful when/if it actually becomes a
reality.
I would love to see her shop and just wonder how she is restoring both! I mean, restoring all those beautiful outfits and restoring a brick and mortar shop? How does she do that? I need some of her non stop energy!
Saying Goodbye: My mom has been giving me buttons for years now! I have boxes full of them! I have so much sewing quilting hoard from her, it's going to take me years to list! Did I just say that? I only want to to do Etsy for 17 more months! I'm going to have to list like crazy!
Here are some more buttons from my quilter mom! I am so thankful they are selling! She's given me enough buttons and neckties to open another shop! Hoarder Rehab's button shop and Hoarder Rehab's necktie shop? Don't get me started!
50 shank hunter green or dark purple acrylic plastic toggle one hole button sewing craft buttons, available here. Photo via VintageToGoEasy.
What I Learned:
1. I've stopped taking stuff from my Mom and family due to having just too much to list now and very little time because I'd rather be stitching! First I have to organize all my crafting and fabric hoard of hoards! And stop buying more! I have been much better at not buying, but sometimes I see things I just can not pass up! Like this beautiful fabric from
kimonomomo!
I wish I knew why this piece of cloth speaks to me joyfully or should I say sings to me joyfully! Either way I had to have it in this blue. It only sells in half yard but my arm got twisted and I bought a full yard! I'm thinking of making a halter top, a simple draw string one with this at the border and then make textile art patches and collages with the scraps! I bought the last of the blue, but it's comes in cream and black,
here. Photo via
kimonomomo, thank you!
2. And I just didn't stop at the one above, I kept on going and bought a lot of skinny and fat quarters from this shop for my textile art. Every time I go to her shop I find something new and some of my other favorites have already sold out! Danger, danger for this recovering hoarder.
3. I'm doing my best to life a more sustainable lifestyle too, but I fell of the wagon big time at
kimonomomo. At least I have some projects in mind for them, instead of just buying them because they are singing joyously to me!
Most of everything I own is second hand or recycled from thrift stores or given to me. We don't even buy our clothes or computers new, nor any of our cars. I'm trying to think of the last thing I bought new and I guess it's fabrics from
kimonomomo. The last other thing I bought new were some non gmo and organic heirloom seeds for this year's spring garden, but next year I won't have to buy any because I'll just collect the seeds from this year.
How do you live a more sustainable lifestyle? I am quickly losing the battle of the bulge and on the verge of having to buy clothes in a size medium, instead of extra small. If I do, I'll buy recycled clothes, luckily I mainly wear jeans, shorts and t shirts, but wearing tight clothes has reminded me to walk more and eat less!
Here is one of the many skinny quarters I ordered from kimonomomo. See that little piece of dark red in the middle, it has a single loud joyous voice of it's own and the rest are a beautifully conducted chorus! Available from kimonomomo. Photo from kimonomomo.
Here is the project I'm going to include them in! I make these little tiny boro scrap books. The pages are hand torn from a Japanese children's book and then I sew the spine together. I gather some of my favorite boro scraps and assemble them in a collage on each page, so someone else can use them to make their own boro sew on patches!
These take a long time to make and are a labor of love. I have two listed at Mending Ways here and am making more with less pages and will be listing those on Hoarder Rehab were they have sold out. Photo via Mending Ways.
Thank you Etsy buyer for sending your inspiring note and especially for your photo update! It's just amazing what 8 little black buttons will do for repurposing a vintage dress! It's notes and photos
like yours that make my day and keep me de hoaring! I hope you continue with much success and I'd love to see your brick and mortar shop renovation too! I bet it's going to be awesome! I am so thankful you and I can help others
live a more sustainable lifestyle, while living it ourselves. BIG heartfelt thanks!
Here is a sample page of the boro scrap fabrics on every page of the book. There is a video too, I just can't remember which book I videoed. Available
here. Photo via
Mending Ways.
Sales
have been up and down with mainly crazy busy on the weekends and slow on the week days. Etsy's Labor Day Sale wasn't as good as last year, I'm not sure what happened, but I do know that the discount wasn't showing on all the items or on all the shops, it was haphazard and random. We tried re newing the sale several times with the same poor results, so we finally just left it. We usually run a sale for a month, but since this one was messed up we ended it when Etsy did.
Etsy has also started a "Star Seller" badge or I don't know what to call it on shops that fit their criteria as successful. Out of our 5 shops, two have the star seller badge and it's not the shops I thought would have them! One shop, Mending Ways has 100% in their 3 main criteria, but needs 10 sales and a top dollar amount to sell monthly. Mending Ways is one sale and 40 bucks to making "star seller" in October. Another shop supposedly needs better star reviews, it shows up as having 5.0 star reviews, but according to Etsy's star seller criteria it's only at 83% star review so I'm not sure how they are calculating that.
The last shop needs better star reviews too and faster email answering. I stopped answering promo emails because I was getting too many and they would keep writing me back, but I guess that was an Etsy star seller no-no. Now I'm not getting any emails, so I'm not sure how to raise that one. That shop only has a 4.9 star review and it's because someone left us a one star review because they only looked at the photos and did not inquire about certain color pompoms before they ordered, instead of after they got delivered. I just keep telling myself I don't have control over Etsy buyers who only look at the first few photos and do not read the listings and then leave one star reviews. Rant done!
Here are some patches I made from the leftover scraps from the last batch of mini boro books I made. These patches are available here, the mini scrap books are here. Photo via Mending Ways.My
simple plan to have the 2nd room organized by next year is still on schedule! Daily, I was setting a timer for 20 min to organize in that room, now it's up to 30 min! I'm still clearing the two tables I dump on, but I can tell I'm making progress and feel so much better knowing it will be organized little by little.
I've started walking again daily too. I started out with 10 min walks and I'm up to 30 minutes now. I still get out of breath easily, but that will change for the better too and I feel like my clothes might be fitting a smidget better, so I won't have to buy size medium clothes!
Click on the shop names to visit my hoard: HoarderRehab with 163 items, The Destiny of Things- 165 items, VintageToGoEasy - 163 items and JunkDrawerAndMore - 173 items. And now, Mending Ways with 82 items!
My new goal is to list 170 items on each shop and to keep a full 3
pages on Mending Ways. I am immensely grateful, thank you all who are
supporting
my alternative to hoarding!
Maybe you'll find something and give it new life and a new home! All pleasant lookieloos are appreciated!
