An idea I learned about a couple of years ago has changed my sewing life. 

One of Brisbane's own sewing legends, Evelyn Wood of Vintage Sewing School fame, began what she called 'Monday Mending' to tackle her ever-growing mountain of items in need of mending. Every sewer knows there is always a mending pile, full of items that need hemming or have a button missing or a hole needing to be patched. The idea is to choose just one item from your mending pile each Monday, and get it done.

Upon learning of this idea, I immediately dedicated an empty basket as my mending basket and filled it to the handle with the items I'd found in my wardrobe needing some tender loving care. Just having one day a week set aside for this sometimes boring but always satisfying in the end task, was enough motivation for me to start working through my pile.

The trouble was, as I fixed items, new ones kept being added to the basket! I was paying more attention to my clothing so noticing when maintenance was needed, and because the items weren't sitting in the basket to be forgotten and never worn again, I was comfortable to set them aside for a short time until I reached them in the pile.
One item, a beautiful black knit dress, took me months of mending each Monday evening to stitch over all the moth holes. The dress was given to me in a donation bag of clothes and I could not part with this beautiful item. The thread I chose to use for the stitching was a glossy black satin, and it looks great against the matte black knit fabric.

It took me about 18 months before I saw the bottom of the mending basket for the first time since starting Monday Mending. Through that time I had fixed all of my own clothes, a couple of pieces for my husband, and several household items. Butters the cat unashamedly helped me mend many pieces that only needed mending because of him!

Over this time it had become clear to me that the act of mending is one of love and service in many ways. 

I posted many pictures of my mending on Instagram where I would look at other people's photos, all of Evelyn's were amazing, and I drew inspiration and motivation from the community all embarked on this project together. Once the word was out among my family and friends I started receiving their mending items too. My mending basket now has more items in it that don't belong to me than are mine (I still find items I own that need mending, just less often now).

I appreciate that my loved ones feel comfortable asking for my help to mend an item for them. They either don't know how, or don't have the time, and as they've seen I have made time over the last couple of years to mend! So far I have mended shirts and skirts, reattached pant buttons, and replaced cloth bag handles. Like all the craft I do for others, I use the time I'm working on the item to think about that person and reflect on our relationship. I am then able to return a mended item to them truly hand-mended with love.

The other big benefit of mending for others, is I'm able to help them in a practical way to care for our environment. Even if it doesn't cross their mind when they ask, if I'm able to help them keep a clothing item in their closet rather than buy a new one, that is awesome.

Caring for loved ones and their clothing, caring for my own pieces and household items, shows love and service to our possessions and the people in my life. All of this wraps up into loving nature by minimising consumption and waste. There have been very few times I've needed to purchase a supply for mending an item, I do my utmost to only use the materials I have in my stash.

Having an ongoing project to care for items and the environment has been deeply satisfying, and I've improved many of my sewing skills along the way. Monday Mending will probably continue for as long as I'm a sewer but I do look forward to seeing my mending basket empty again in the future - as long as it doesn't last for long.

It was my birthday recently and to celebrate I took an annual leave day from my job and treated myself to some craft supply shopping! 

Brisbane is home to two secondhand sewing stores, neither of which I had ever visited. I had wanted to check them out for ages and this was the perfect opportunity. My third stop for the day was an industrial discards store, that I have regularly visited over the last few years and it's a place where I always manage to find interesting items.

I was interested to find out what kind of supplies I could access secondhand when many craft and sewing projects require quite specific items. Luckily, it was very much items inspiring projects rather than specific items to fit already conceived projects! 
The other side of crafting is that you can use many items to meet a purpose, and I greatly enjoy mending and using alternatives I already own to finish projects. I didn't find all the items I had hoped to purchase, but I found some great supplies and now have ideas about how I can make some items I need rather than buying them.

I also found that buying craft supplies secondhand was cheaper than buying new. For example, I bought a small cutting mat for $5, which usually goes for $15 new. That left me $10 to buy more things!
I have been building a craft stash for a long time but never with much thought, I will just accept gifts and buy items in op shops, and once things are worn out I'll keep them 'just in case' to reuse. This trip helped me be more mindful in buying items, I only bought things I am very likely to use, and now I know the kinds of items I can buy secondhand when those specific project needs come along.

The Sewing Lair - Beenleigh
​$20.50

My first stop of the day was The Sewing Lair. The shop is accessed by walking through the workroom, where on the day I visited the class was busily putting together quilts.

The items I bought here were:

• Ribbed elastic (always handy for waistbands)
• White Aida (for cross stitching, you can never have too much!)
• Large plastic buckle (I am working on a better system to attach hiking items to the exterior of my pack, perhaps a future post!)
• Camel cross stitch kit (I love camels, and cross stitch, so this was a no-brainer)
• 3 fat quarters of pretty fabric (fabric prints get me, but I never buy fat quarters new because I can't justify the cost for such small squares. I've already used one of these to make a pretty new mask for myself)
• Embroidered handkerchief (I'm a sucker for pretty items like this, and I don't embroider, so it's also a skill admiration thing. I'm already using this item)
• Tracing wheel (can't wait to give this a go with my next project, you use it to mark out pattern pieces on fabric, will have to do research on techniques)
• Navy embroidery hoop (these are great presentation for cross stitch pieces)
• Navy knit fabric (inspired to make a t-shirt or singlet with this, navy is the base colour of my wardrobe so will match heaps of my clothing)
• Pink fabric (inspired to make a light summer shift dress or similar, pink is also part of my wardrobe palette)

So many project ideas for such little cost!

The Nest Community - Everton Park
​$55.12
Subtotal $75.62

I spent so long here exploring! The Nest Community is on the ground floor of a high-set Queenslander style building. The people working/volunteering there were friendly and chatty with all the customers, which was nice.

I bought these items:

• Polyester wadding (I have been thinking about making our cat Butters a bed, now I can do it without buying new filling!)
• Two small easels (one for me and one for my mother-in-law, these will be used to display artwork that can be rotated without needing to hang anything)
• Cutting mat (for cutting on and not damaging surfaces!)
• White and black lace strips (always handy for edging, inspired to attach onto sock tops like when I was a kid, haha)
• Coathanger styled hangers (these are used for hanging decorations, in my case they will be used for cross stitched pieces, perhaps as gifts)
• Checkered fabric (I will eventually learn how to make a business shirt for my husband!)
• 4 different types of Christmas fabric (okay I went a bit overboard, but I refuse to buy once a year fabric new! Inspired to try furoshiki wrapping and make myself a dress/skirt/pair of shorts for the big day)
• Black and pink lace pieces (I like lace and would like to include more of it in my wardrobe. I'm thinking about hems, overlays, panels, and pyjamas)
• Pink Aida (I didn't have any pink so obviously had to buy!)
• Plastic box with floss cards (I store my cross stitch cotton floss skeins in boxes like this, wound around the floss cards as bobbins. This was an awesome find for only a few dollars)

Reverse Garbage Queensland - Woolloongabba
​$28
Total for the day $103.62

RGQ is a large shed for industrial discards and not dedicated to craft supplies specifically. Hence I bought a greater variety of items here, but all will be useful, and many are also craft related.

I bought:

• Three wooden boards with food prints (two as gifts, one for us to hang in our backyard, we are keeping the dark purple chillis)
• Yellow envelope (I have several identity documents that are larger than A4 size and have been looking for something to keep them in)
• Window envelopes (these are for those random things you need to post sometimes, or to keep small items together safely)
• Computer paper (I think that's what it's called, I remember my parents had a lot when I was a kid. I'll be using this as pattern paper to trace sewing pattern pieces onto so I'm not ruining the pattern itself)
• White sticker strips (for jar labels and covering the windows on the envelopes)
• Grey upholstery fabric (perfect for the cat bed!)
• Black polka dot fabric (I saw this on my last visit and didn't buy it, that meant I had to get it this time! Inspired to make a little button down sleeveless blouse)
• Two Christmas gift bags (I ran out of these last year and didn't receive any in return to reuse, will probably use both of these this year!)
• Art canvas (I have an idea to cross stitch onto this, it will be an experiment!)

I had such a lovely birthday treating myself, being inspired and feeling creative, and finding lots of craft items for not really spending that much money. I look forward to using all of these items for all the projects!