IT'S MINT WHEN YOU'RE SKINT...

I finally got around to photographing my little winter projects: I knitted this neckwarmer in um, November. It was supposed to be a scarf but I did too many stitches and it was going to take forever so I changed it into this:

And I had that old Miu Miu coat re-lined in the Morning Glory Slate fabric (ahem, that no one liked!)

I haven't been buying any new clothes at all. (I got hit with a humongously terrifying tax bill which I should have put money aside for but really who does that? Besides, I didn't know how much it was going to be.) Anyway I'm now in the make do and mend frame of mind, which, being a bit of a frugal hoarder I secretly slightly enjoy - as long as it's only temporary.

I remember my grandmother telling me that during the war she made herself a skirt suit out of my grandpa's old overcoat. Things aren't quite that bad yet, but I do enjoy taking stuff apart and making it into something else.

Now I'm onto spring projects, my thriftyness knows no bounds. I'm starting with taking details off tops that have got damaged/gone bobbly and putting them onto plain t-shirts for the summer. Comme ca:

The top (thank you not very cheap at all Sandro in rue Vieille du Temple) went completely bobbly and horrible after I washed it once and was then unwearable. I've got loads of bits like that, details I really like that I've saved to put on something else.

My other top thrifty tip is to buy flowers once a week. You have something beautiful to look at and you don't feel that you're going without. And you're only spending four or five pounds. Of course in the summer you can just steal flowers out of people's front gardens. (joking)