Blue Monday - You're having a laugh!

Today is ‘Blue Monday’, allegedly the most miserable day of the year, due to a combination of factors such as the weather, proximity to Christmas, levels of debt etc.  So it’s interesting that on the supposedly the ‘worst’ day of the year a new report is launched in the press suggesting that money does indeed make us happy. According to a comprehensive think tank report, our happiness is indeed related to how much money we have and, contrary to previous studies, there isn’t a capping effect.  It It would seem that our happiness doesn’t level off at a certain wage band. 

But does this really mean we need money to make us happy? Don’t panic, the answer isn’t quite as simple as it’s presented.  This piece of work only focuses on the financial implications of happiness and it takes no account of the positive effects of health, relationships, lifestyle etc.

Here at MIAMI Towers we're taking very little notice of this piece of work as we know that one of the best paths to happiness is Making and Mending things.  There's a wealth of research out there that supports the positive effects of making things and we know from experience how good these activities can make us feel. 

However if you do want to buy into the ‘money makes you happy’ myth, you can rest assured that the MIAMI lifestyle can only enhance this effect, because let’s face it, if money makes us happy, making our money go even further, must surely make us even happier!  So either way, let’s make 2012 the year that we make every penny count and make ourselves even happier!

Hilary Bruffell

Come to Devon and make your own homemade Christmas

We've decided to emerge from  MIAMI Towers and run a real live event - and we hope you can come along and join us!

The lovely people at the beautiful Rill Estate in Devon have invited us to run a couple of one day workshops there.

We 're going to do live work sessions on card-making, fabulous show-stopping Christmas table dressings, gorgeous home-made Christmas decorations as well as gift ideas and wrapping.

You'll get all the materials provided, plus lunch and teas and coffees, the chance to meet the MIAMI team and other like-minded people in a convivial atmosphere and beautiful setting.

Who needs to be a couch potato and sit at home watching Kirstie Allsopp  pretend to make her homemade Christmas when you can do it for real?

What are you waiting for? We have 2 days available - Monday 15th or Tuesday 16th November.

>> Find out more here

The death of cheap clothing

There! Did you hear that sound?  

Apparently that's the death knell of cheap clothing ringing out loud and clear across Europe.  According to all the papers, the floods in Asia will mean that we are going to see a rapid rise in the price of cotton, which in turn will mean a rapid rise in the price of clothing in shops like Primark, Asda and Tesco.

Whilst financially this is going to be a blow for some, for many it will just mean that they think more carefully before they purchase new outfits: which in environmental terms has got to be a winner. 

For far too long society has been condoning, if not encouraging, people to purchase clothes that they don't need and to throw them away shortly afterwards.  Apparently in the last five years we have seen the proportion of textile waste rise from a meagre 7% to a whopping 30%, which we the taxpayers have to pay for.

As a society, we've become used to disposable fashion, without giving a thought to the effects that this might have on our environment, or on the poor people who have to produce these cheap items. So from my perspective, this price rise can’t come soon enough and this rise is all grist to our revolution.

However if you're worried about how you'll manage without all this cheap clothing, fear not, for in reality we really don’t need all these clothes especially as we supposedly only wear 20% of the clothes in our wardrobes, 80% of the time.   With a little bit of care and attention your can make your clothes last a lot longer.  And if you really do want something new to wear for that special night out why not try altering, adapting or refashioning your clothes.  If you are worried that your skills wont stand up to the task find a friend to help you….or if all else fails why not try ‘swishing’ at a clothes swap party.  With a little bit of thought and creativity we can all find a new wardrobe for a fraction of the price, but not at the expense of the environment.

Come on join our revolution and think before you buy, because life’s too good to throw away!

Hilary

Related posts on the website 

A beginner's guide to swishing 

Holding a swap party

Getting new life from old clothes

How to reinvent your holiday wardrobe

Makeover your summer wardrobe without spending a penny

Don’t get your knicker elastic in a twist, but…

I'm sorry guys and gals, but I'm ranting again!  I know, I know…when aren’t I?  But this time I'm really fired up.  We've just heard that John Lewis are no longer selling ribbon by the metre, but only by the full roll.  Having had a quick look at their website it seems to be that the average roll is 3 metres. 

3 metres?  Come on! when was the last time that you wanted 3 metres of ribbon?  The average person probably will buy ½ a metre at a time…so what happens to the rest?  Think of the wastage.  I thought John Lewis prided themselves on their green credentials, but I'm afraid there's nothing green about this move.  It's purely down to them boosting their bottom line over environmental issues!  We expected more from John Lewis.

Come on all you Make and Menders – join us and demand your half-metre of ribbon rights. We used to have fantastic fabrics and haberdashery shops in London, but they're rapidly disappearing.  Don’t let the big companies price us out of Making and Mending.

Tell us what you think!

Thanks to our Twitter friend giornalista1 (Andrea Dean) for this info! If you're looking for us we'll be tied to the lamp-post outside John Lewis with the finest ribbons!

Hilary

A bad worker always blames her tools

One of the problems facing novice DIYers is knowing what tool to use for the job. Another is buying the cheapest tool available then discovering it is unequal to the task.

Make it and Mend it's Anne Caborn is a bit of a fanatical DIYer. She likes nothing more than a sharp blade or a well-turned angle grinder - unless it's a nice knotty bit of html. We asked her to pull together a list of products to go into the ideal beginner's toolbox as well as her advice on choosing them and using them.

Anne's sensible advice made me think how many tools I have bought and then wasted. Like the (very cheap) electric screwdriver and cordless drill I bought in a mad moment at B&Q, intending to get back into the DIY habit. One of these tools (I forget which) I never even got to use as I couldn't get the drill bits to fit properly and then one got stuck inside and broke off blocking the whole thing. The other was so crap it didn't hold its charge and was always flat when I tried to use it. So they may have had cheap price tickets but they proved very expensive mistakes.

My personal DIY history has happened in reverse. I started out in my early 20s with great confidence and tackled anything that came my way. I wallpapered. I tiled round the bath. I painted the house from top to bottom. I stripped paint and varnish off old furniture and then repainted and changed the handles. I was given a power drill for Christmas and used it all the time. Whilst I never tackled plumbing, apart from fixing an overflowing cistern, I did some very basic electrical tasks and always knew my Dad was on the end of the phone with helpful advice if I had any questions. Then I stopped. I started telling myself I was far too busy to do this kind of thing. My spare time was for relaxing and enjoying myself. So I started buying-in help. Once embarked on, this became an irreversible trend. I spent a fortune on painters and odd-job men. My tool kit lay neglected in the back of the cupboard and as time went on, my confidence eroded. I am ashamed to say that when I last moved house, I actually paid for someone to come and hang all the pictures !

Am I alone in this backward progression towards 'de-skilling'? Have any other people lost the skills they once possessed? Has anyone got them back again? If so how did it happen?

What's happened to making do, Kirstie?

Did anyone catch Kirstie Allsop's offering on Channel 4 last night? It's good to see a mainstream TV programme adopting some make it and mend it principles, but it really did feel like the poor little rich girl plays house.

Kirstie is decorating a dolls house that is bigger than most people dream of.....and last night paid £100 a roll for hand made wall paper....perrrrllleaase.....£50 for a door handle...I ask you! As one of our MIAMI contributors said "the empress is naked while wielding the wallpaper glue brush!"
Don't get me wrong. I like Kirstie as a presenter, but she is completely out of touch with reality. It's all well and good to use expensive items as inspiration, but the point should be 'how can I do this within my budget?'. Everything she did focussed on buying something, not making do with what you have and spending the minumum. It should be "Yes this £100 a roll of paper is fab, but how can I adapt it?" You could paint the wall a plain colour and then block print a design onto that (a bit like potato printing). Much cheaper, and just as dramatic.

Or "This door handle is great, but I can't afford it so what else can I do? If I can't change the handle how can I direct attention away from it?" As my mother used to say 'if they are noticing your shoes, there's something wrong with your conversation!'

The week before, Kirstie did some skip-diving to find a mirror and bought some cheap chairs and did them up. This is much more like it - although having seen her get an interior designer to make her cushions while she sewed a couple of buttons on them, I think she needs to get those sleeves rolled up and get doing it herself.

Anyway Kirstie, all is not lost we are going to do some pieces regularly on the website on taking high end design ideas and doing them the MIAMI way. Watch this space!

Still sewing strong at 90

Our Make it and Mend it Heroine of the Day today is an old lady, Ida Mulert, from Iowa in the USA. At 90 she is still sewing and mending, a hobby she has enjoyed for the past 80 years.

Ida made clothing for her ten children as they grew up and now she continues to make for grandchildren and friends - every new grandchild receives a homemade quilt. Ida still does the mending for her family and helps out with mending and sewing as a volunteer in a residential home.

We'd love to hear about other old people who are still "making it and mending it". Post us your stories and pictures - below or to mail@makeitandmendit.com