There's so much I'm doing at the moment that I'd like to blog about, but time is so precious right now, it's been a matter of choosing between the doing or writing about the doing, so the doing has been winning out!
When Thomas was still in the hospital nursery, David and I decided we needed a new mattress on our bed, as my old one was starting to feel uncomfortable. Looking back, I don't know why we didn't take the delivery guys offer to remove the old mattress! Why did I think I still needed the old one? We had no room for it, so for the next 10 months, it stood up on it's side in our spare room which cast a very gloomy atmosphere over it, and it couldn't have been doing the mattress any good leaning up against the wall like that. I couldn't think what to do with it, as most charities say they don't like to accept donations of mattresses, so would they come and pick one up? Like most things around our small rented 3 bedroom town house, our possessions seemed to be taking over, crowding me in. I just didn't know what to do with all this extra stuff we had accumulated over the last 4 years. Then it finally occurred to me that I could try and sell the mattress on ebay.
I had bought a couple of things from ebay in May 2010, including a
beautiful cane doll's furniture set that has featured on my blog before. But I had never sold anything. My overwhelming feeling was that I was too afraid to sell something in case the buyer would be unhappy, I imagined them harassing me for their money back, which would make me feel terrible! This was yet another avoiding behaviour of mine, while living like a hermit for 3 years, hiding from the world. But ever since David and I decided to start a family in early 2010 I've been getting braver, so I've been changing the way I live my life, the benefit of my child being the main motivator. So I had a go, and listed the queen size mattress on ebay!
I started bidding at $0.99 thinking I really just needed someone to come and pick it up. Oh, please won't someone come and take our old mattress away? And sure enough, bidding started that night, and by the end the auction closed at $10.50! More than I expected, that's for sure. And the sale went just fine, the lady came and pressed the money into my hand and took the mattress away in the back of her station wagon. We were worried that she didn't have enough room, she had 2 teenagers with her, and one had to crouch down below the mattress in the back seat! And then later that night, I had some positive feedback! I was on my way to becoming an ebay seller!
Since then I've sold David's old fish tank, which sold at an amazing $52 from a starting bid of 99c, a near new blender for $16.50, a wok for $5.50 and a plastic cheese grater for $3! Its surprising when these people came to pick up their items that most were under prepared. The fish tank ended up being put on her sons lap! But I've also made a couple of reckless purchases which I now regret and promise to be more careful of in future! I got it into my head that I wanted to buy a doll that I had from my childhood that I had lost. I saw a picture of her on facebook, and now I knew what her name was so I could find her for sale, she was a Beauty Secrets Barbie from 1979. I saw a listing for a group of 8 dolls, most I didn't recognise, but there she was, as well as the Ballerina Barbie from 1975, which I also had as a little girl. So I bought it, and after postage, it cost me $51.56! /gasp! But it gets worse, I also bought some doll furniture which I recognised, which included some dolls clothes, for about $55! So feeling guilty, I now need to clean it all up and sell it, to try and get my money back for making such frivolous buys! Oh, ebay how yee tempts thee!! I hope to find more time soon to blog about what I'm doing with these vintage dolls and clothes from the 1970s, and the journey I had learning to identify them!
My goal at the moment is to get rid of possessions we no longer need or use, which in this place we just don't have the room for. I've now learned its far better to offload these things sooner, rather than to keep carting them around from place to place for years just in case we might need them one day. I can finally see a light at the end of the tunnel that was an incredibly disorganised and cramped house. Now I dream of a streamlined, Spartan home that is easy to clean, and most importantly, easy to move when the time inevitably comes to do so.
I made these things to give as gifts this Christmas, finishing the dishcloths today.
My favourite soap is the pink Dove soap, its a pink ribbon fund raiser and is very nice, soft and creamy. I decided to use some pretty pink cotton I have left over from the sun hat I made for my niece last year, to make some pretty soap savers! Again, I had to have a second attempt, the first go I worked out the pattern then had to unravel it and start again properly. I started at the bottom with 9 ch, then a dc in every ch, 3 extra at each end, then another 9 on the other side of the ch to make a round. After that there are 7 rows of lace, the pattern is 2 dc 1 ch 2 dc, sk 2, 1 dc 3 ch 1 dc, sk 2, then alternated into the sp, if you know what I mean! Then the top is 1 dc 1 ch, and a ch threaded through and sl st onto itself to make a closed tie handle. I used a 3.5mm hook and a 50/50 cotton and acrylic blend. I hope the recipents like these, I think they're really nice anyway!
Today I finished these pentagon dishcloths using up the last of the pretty 50/50 cotton acrylic blend. It's so sad to see the last of it go! Again I used the 3.5mm hook, and my own pattern. This is like other pentagon dishcloths I've made, but slightly bigger as my husband has said they need to be! If I didn't run out of cotton they would be even bigger! I've made these for people who mentioned they'd like home-made dishcloths, I hope they like these!
