I got home yesterday to a surreal 60-degree spike in temperature — from gray and below freezing in Brooklyn first thing in the morning to 83 degrees and sunny in Burbank in the afternoon. It was so strange to lug my heavy coat, two sweaters, hat and gloves off the plane and through the warm, nearly blinding sunshine, but I have to say it felt so good on my skin, after I’ve been so cold all week. And even better than the unexpected spring/summer weather, I got to have a joyful reunion with my sewing machine!

Last night I went out to Lisa Congdon‘s art opening at ReForm School, which was amazing — I’m writing a review for the Adorn blog tomorrow with my pictures. Lisa was so nice and her work just shone in the intricate groupings she created, so seeing it all together was dazzling. I bought the very first piece at 7:15! I also got to hang out with Cathy, Jessica, and Charles Phoenix, which was lovely. It was such a fun night, and really inspiring!

So this morning when I woke up with tons of energy before 7 am (thanks to the time change) I decided that it was finally time for my first Wardrobe Refashion project — altering a super-preppy whale skirt I spotted for $1 last week in a Connecticut thrift store. I love whales — here, here, and here are some of my favorites — and I have three skirts with whales on them. So what could be better than a refashioned fourth one??

The waistband on the skirt was teeny-tiny and the length was pretty unflattering on me, it hit at mid-calf and didn’t look that great. So I cut nine inches off the top, created a simple 1/2-inch double-fold elastic waistband, rethreaded it with 3/8-inch elastic, saved and re-sewed the belt loops, and ended up with a comfortable, perfectly sized 19-inch-long a-line skirt!

I still have that top length of fabric left — I’m planning to sew a tiny reversible handbag with a contrast kelly green and navy print soon. I may steal the piping belt for the handles but for now it looks so cute on the skirt, I’m leaving it in place.

And I still haven’t bought anything new! The other cool and unexpected side effect of doing Wardrobe Refashion is that I’m really loving the very last new thing I did get, a pair of pink pajamas I bought in January… they seem a lot more [I can’t think of the right word here… valuable? special? I don’t know] than if they had been sandwiched between whatever my second-to-last purchase was and the mini H+M spree of t-shirts I chose not to do. And everyone else’s blog posts and pictures are super inspiring, too.

It really feels like restricting my buying has shifted my perspective away from acquiring without appreciating to appreciating without acquiring. So thank you, Wardrobe Refashion!

(cross-posted to the WR blog)