The Bargain Life

Moving to Austin, TX

Linda — Tue, 11 May 2010 19:16:56 +0000

I haven’t posted here much because for the past year I’ve been living in my very un-fabulous bedroom in my parents house. But I’m finally moving on with my my life. Colin and I signed a June 1st lease for a place in Austin, TX. It’s tiny, but it’s got a separate bedroom, which will probably be good for our sanity. The floors are all wood, and we can paint the walls provided that we paint them white again when we move out. This is the apartment:

I’ve decided that moving my current possessions across the country is simply not worth the cost, so I’ll be starting fresh, although I’m sure very little of what we acquire will be new. I have no vision for the place yet, we’ll start with furniture and work from there. I still to want to get picture ledges to put all my records on (I’m up to about 20 now) so that I can have them as art and still take them down to play them.

The battle now is going to be deciding what I want to bring. I’m limited to what can fit in a sedan with two people and a drugged-out-of-his-mind cat. I have so many clothes. Even if I brought half of everything, it would still be more than I need. I’ve decided that a person does not need more than 20 little boys’ t-shirts (that includes my band tees, which are almost all ill-fitting youth mediums). But when that person owns well over a hundred t-shirts, some tough choices need to be made. I’m trying to take things that fit with actually dressing my age for once, so I won’t be taking many hoodies, but my ever-growing cardigan collection is coming with me.

I don’t think I’ll be bringing many household things, as most of them were hand-me-downs or thrift store finds. The only one I’m really attached to is my Hello Kitty toaster, which is just too awesome to leave behind even though it has no place in an adult apartment. I probably want to bring my sewing machine and most of my hand tools, which will take up a fair amount of space.

I

Linda — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 04:30:58 +0000

So a few weeks ago I got the craving for a pair of saddle shoes. Yeah, those shoes that girls wore with their poodle skirts in the 50’s. I had at least two pairs when I was a little kid, a normal black and white pair and pink and white ones. It may seem like an odd thing to lust for, but they are black and white, retro, masculine, and little kids wear them — so that’s 4 things I like.

Problem is they’re hard to find in women’s sizes. Solution is…I can’t believe I’ve gone so long without knowing this, but girl’s sizes aren’t the same as women’s sizes, they are 2 sizes bigger. Since I am a 6 in women’s, I’m a 4 in kids. So I walked into Payless about 5 minutes before they closed, and walked out with a new pair of shoes for $12.99 (the cashier was quite surprised that I actually found a pair of shoes in 5 minutes).

So now I own saddle shoes, and they are awesome. When I wear them to work all the old people compliment me and talk about how they remember back when they were cool.

buy @ Payless

A Christmas Halloween Costume

Linda — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 05:26:48 +0000

Colin really wanted to be an elf for Halloween…even though he rid of his elf costume when he moved. So instead of renting one for $20, I made one for him. But helped me sew on the bells.

supplies:

green t-shirt – $3.99
sheet of felt – $0.29
bag of bells – $3.99

total cost: $8.27

I cut the felt into two rows of spikes and sewed it to the t-shirt right below the collar. I cut the sleeves and the bottom of the t-shirt into spikes. And then we sewed bells to the bottom of the spikes. Sewing the bells on was sort of obnoxiously time-consuming, so we didn’t do any bells on the sleeves. He bought Christmas stockings at Goodwill for $1.99 each and wore them over his shoes.

The Great Sofa Project: Phase 1

Linda — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 01:24:14 +0000

i am attempting to build a sofa from scratch, which is probably way over my head, but i think it’s more fun trying to build things when i don’t know exactly what i’m doing. so far i’ve cut the sides of the frame with my jigsaw, and that’s about it. those aren’t even finished since i want to round the corners. at this rate, it will probably take years to get this thing done even though the design is really simple. i just got the jute webbing and webbing stretcher in the mail, so now i’m ready to proceed, but i think cleaning my room should come first.

current progress: kitteh approved

I’m Never Going To Get My Shelves :(

Linda — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 01:12:59 +0000

A few weeks ago i went to Ikea and found shelves that i want for my bedroom, but they happened to be out of stock. i went back last week…and they’re still out of stock. This time i asked when they would be getting a new shipment, and they said it would be 11 weeks, i’m not even going to be living in my house by then!

The shelves in question are Stripa shelves. i wanted to put 3 in a row along the wall opposite my bed to display my records and the 8 white picture frames that i got at Target 2 for $1 months ago, which have been sitting in a bag ever since. i may shop around elsewhere, but West Elm wants $34 a shelf instead of $8. i think i’m just going to accept defeat on this one.

my life is incomplete without you!

12 shirts for $4.21!

Linda — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 22:41:31 +0000

why is the last thing you need always the hardest to resist? the logical part of me knows it’s not a bargain if you don’t need it, but 12 shirts for $4.21? i was looking for black tees to wear with all my crazy colored/patterned pants, but i found a lot of other really awesome shirts. and i may try to sell The Used shirt on ebay or something because i’m sure i could get back more than the 50 cents i paid and i’m not a huge fan of the band, but i do like them and it’s a cool shirt.

fronts:

plus a solid pink shirt i plan to do something crafty with
& top right has the back-side up – oops!

backs:

Worthwhile purchases or a waste of money?

Linda — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 06:11:50 +0000

In the past 2 months I’ve bought a total of 6 records, the 4 pictured and 2 pre-orders that haven’t come yet.

the collection right now:

Set Your Goals – Mutiny! LP – brown
Four Year Strong – Rise Or Die Trying LP – purple/yellow
Fireworks – Adventure, Nostalgia, and Robbery 7″ – yellow/green
The Wonder Years – Won’t Be Pathetic Forever 7″ – black

pre-orders:
Set Your Goals – Reset 7″ – mint green
The Wonder Years/All Or Nothing – Distances 7″ – white w/ red and blue splatter

I don’t know if this is a worthwhile collection or if I’m just wasting my money. I stopped buying band t-shirts over a year ago because I have so many t-shirts and the $15 band tees weren’t getting worn any more than all my 50-cent thrift store tees, so buying them was clearly a waste. I don’t have shirts for any of the bands I own vinyls of because I’ve only gotten into most of them in the past year, and I wanted to support them by buying something. I’m also really into album art, so it’s cool having it full size. So far, so good. But here’s the catch…i don’t own a record player. So I’ve bought 6 records and I don’t have anything to play them on. Now that seems like a waste.

Winter Break Clothes Shopping

Linda — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 06:03:17 +0000

i tend to do more shopping while i’m home for break than when i’m at school in Atlanta since there isn’t much else to do in suburban New Hampshire. plus H&M had a buy one get one free sale on all clearance items. here’s a round-up of my purchases:

clockwise:

teal skinny jeans – H&M – $19.90

plaid skinny jeans – H&M – $7.50

star sweater – H&M – $7.50

purple thermal – Wet Seal – $7.50

black thermal – Wet Seal – $7.50

printed tee – Pacific Sunwear – $4.20

teal cardigan – H&M – $16.90

leopard skinny jeans – Wet Seal – $15.00

striped skinny jeans – H&M – $7.50

Sweater Reconstruction

Linda — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 21:59:42 +0000

i’ve been doing a lot of sewing for my various furniture projects, but this is the first time i’ve sewn any clothes in a while. i started with a men’s extra large sweater that i got for $2 and altered it to make it fit me. now it’s slim fitted, but nice and long and with sleeves i can tuck my hands into.

before:

after:

Clothes Shopping

Linda — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 03:14:51 +0000

I went to the mall today for the first time in ages. I have lots of clothes, and I rarely actually need any (that will change when I start looking for a job, I don’t own anything professional), so I try to prevent myself from wasting money. But I needed to take my computer to the Apple store, so I shopped around the mall while I was there, and I bought a few things from Wet Seal.

houndstooth thermal – $12.50

teal houndtooth hoodie – $16.50

shiny pink leggings – 50% off – $8.25

and a note to all macbook users: apparently the battery is only made to be drained and charged 300 times, and after that it isn’t covered by applecare, so you should use it plugged in whenever you can. i just learned this today because my battery, which has been charged well over 500 times, now only charges when it feels like it. but they did give me a new charger, which i assumed wasn’t covered by applecare, so you win some you lose some i guess.