DIY Life

If you happen to have all your shirts from the last 30 years hanging in the back of your closet, or even just taking up much needed space, don't throw them away. While I know that you needed to get rid of them yesterday, and you have them all stacked up by the door ready to make their way to the thrift store, why not get out the scissors and cut them up to make a warm and cozy quilt?

Design*Sponge regulars Derek and Lauren were getting sentimental about whether or not they really wanted to take Derek's old shirts to the thrift store. They needed a new duvet cover, so they decided they would cut up his shirts and their old duvet cover and make a new warm and cozy pseudo quilt, thus keeping their memories intact. Using old shirts, a duvet cover, scissors, a rotary cutter, a ruler, sewing machine, iron and a self healing cutting mat, Derek and Lauren's directions are very easy to follow and you can soon end up with your own "new" cozy "quilt".

I think this is a neat project because you are killing two birds with one stone by getting rid of your old shirts and making over your boring duvet cover. Since duvet covers are so expensive, this project should be right up your DIY alley.

It's ironic: the target audience for this article may never know it exists. See, if you didn't notice -- it would have been nearly impossible for anyone who owns a TV and watches networks other than NPR, let alone those of us who spend a lot of time online, not to notice -- Halo 3 came out on Tuesday.

How many gamers planned their vacation days for this week? How many living rooms are slowly filling up with empty pizza boxes and spent Mountain Dew bottles, as the inhabitants frag, frag away? (If not Mountain Dew, insert favorite over-caffeinated beverage -- er, I mean, "beverage with just enough caffeine to keep you going!" -- here. Gamer fuel!)

I'm assuming the number is massive... as massive as this game launch. Which means that those people probably aren't spending too much time browsing the Web. Nevertheless, we have some awesome Halo-based DIY projects for everyone. When the people who would appreciate them most finish the game, or at least come up for air, this article will still be here.

Join us after the break to get your Master Chief on. You know you want to.

Hand me down clothing was a part of my family growing up. I didn't really have to wear my sisters clothes, simply because I am kid number 8 and they are kids number 3 and 4. I still had to wear hand me downs though because our friendly neighbors were always giving away their girl clothes and I just happened to be a lucky recipient.

I wasn't really given a choice on the matter of whether or not I wanted to wear these clothes, simply because new clothing purchases in our household rarely ever happened. You can help your child realize that wearing their big brother or sisters clothes can be cool and unique, and the finished product will look totally different than what their sibling had. Please join me after the break for some neat ideas.

I don't like folding my clean clothes, especially my shirts. To attest to this fact, I have a laundry basket sitting in the corner of my room that's literally overflowing with clean, but incredibly wrinkled t-shirts. Each morning, when I'm wasting time ironing that day's shirt, I think to myself, "if only I'd take the time to fold these darn shirts, I wouldn't have to waste my time ironing them every freaking morning. Why won't someone invent a shirt folding robot, and end my miserable plight?!" Unfortunately, the good people at Honda have yet to respond to my letters asking them to teach Asimo how to fold t-shirts, which means I'm stuck doing this tedious job manually for the rest of my life... or am I?

When I came across this video from Dan Pereda earlier today, demonstrating how to build and use your own t-shirt-folding machine, I nearly fell off my chair. It seems as though Dan has created a simple folding mechanism out of little more than foamcore and duct tape, and in so doing has solved one of the most pressing problems of all-time.



I can't wait to go buy some foamcore, and build one of these machines later tonight. I bet I can burn through my entire basket of t-shirts in less than an hour! Woo hoo! My life is finally complete! Thank you t-shirt-folding machine! THANK YOU!!!