Mad Cat Capsule | Winter 2021 (Jan, Feb, Mar)

One reason for making a Capsule Wardrobe is to make getting dressed simple. Having a set capsule allows you to easily get dressed, easily have each outfit reflect your style, and take the doubt and confusion or concern out of getting dressed so that we don’t suffer from decision fatigue, over buying, and negative body images.

Ideally, everything in your capsule, no matter the season, goes together for the most part. Every piece is something that you like and fits you well, and that you feel good in. A Capsule should be curated and therefore thought out before buying, cutting down on over-buying. If you are interested in sustainability, many of your pieces will be slow fashion. In my opinion, even if you are not interested in sustainability most of your capsule will be slow fashion as well, bc I believe that that is what makes up the best capsule. Clothing that you have had a long time and love, staples that are well made, thrifted items (in order to try out new trends without spending too much money), are all items that should be your capsule and these are all slow fashion.

Things to avoid in your capsule are cheap fast fashion. Not only are these mostly made by slave labor with deplorable conditions (which we do not want to support and also do not want to let that energy into our lives), but they are made with only easy money and changing trends in mind. These clothes don’t fit well, don’t last, aren’t made of quality fabrics, get stretched or misshapen or simply fall apart. Not to mention a drain on our environmental resources, human resources, and our mental health. We should also avoid the clothes we love, but do not fit us, or make us feel good. Keep tee clothes somewhere and try them on periodically but don’t wear them if you they don’t serve you at this time.

For my Capsule this Winter, I’m thinking about all these things, but I’m also striving to push myself when getting dressed. Now that I will be going to work less, I could and have easily fallen into the trap of never getting dressed. Staying in PJs all day is very enticing. But this quarter, I want to make sure that my capsule is serving me and making my life easier, but also inspiring me to get dressed!

One of the great things about a capsule wardrobe, especially a slow fashion based one, is that you can play with it! It has all clothes you love, that you know work, so you can add a few pieces to try, or bunch some together that you normally wouldn’t. Do you usually wear all dresses, but have a pair of pants in each quarter? why not try all the pants together? If you don’t usually count athleisure in your capsule, but find that’s all your wearing, why not make a capsule of those clothes and see how you like wearing them in different environments? Have a collection of silk pajamas you just don’t want to take off these days, try making them outerwear!

Personally, I was in a rut of not getting dressed, so the first thing I want to do with this capsule is use it every day. It’s even one of my 2021 quarterly goals. Next, I want to wear things that usually get neglected in my capsule, especially in winter. Dresses, flowey pants, and specifically skirts are a priority for the next few months. Making sure I wear them and making them winterized is the challenge.

4 tanks - brown (10+ years), blue and white (above, 10+ years,) black strappy (15+ years). white lace (5+ years)

3 vests - this is an unusual category for me, but I want to wear my vests! - lace (5+ years), orange (handmade, thrifted, vintage?), blue wool cut out (15+)

5 T shirts - Forgotten Boardwalk (local biz), parthanon (3+ years), vermillion (thrifted), grey AA (ethical, sustainable, 10+ years), Sounds (gifted).

5 short sleeved shirts - grey wool sweater (vintage, thrifted), brown silk (vintage, thrifted), emily pleated (hand me down), black and white crop (10+ years), brown floral (vintage, thrifted).

8 long sleeved shirts - grey silk button down (vintage, thrifted), snake print turtle neck (vintage, thrifted), grey mockneck (vintage, thrifted), white button down (15+ years), grey scoop neck henley thermal (10+), blue tie dye sweatshirt (thrifted, perhaps my newest piece), AA grey thermal henley (15+), brown extra long thermal (18+), leopard turtleneck (vintage, thrifted), grey thermal (hand me down, 5+).

9 sweaters - grey cardi (hand me down, vintage), anchor (thrifted), grey turtle neck (thrifted), black and white (hand made, thrifted), vermillion cardi (10+), cream mockneck (thrifted), confetti (thrifted), brown cardi (vintage, thrifted).

1 jacket - leopard silk (vintage, thrifted).

3 dresses - this isn’t too many, but my plan is to wear them more often that in a usual capsule - white eyelet (hand made, vintage, thrifted), black sweater (5+ years), black and white rabbit (5+ years).

4 Pants - brown silk harem pants (vintage, thrifted), brown linen (ethical, sustainable, thrifted), brown plaid (vintage, thrifted), AA blue linen (sustainable, ethical, 10+).

5 jeans -fleece lined wranglers (vintage, thrifted), blue skinny (sustainable, ethical), Grey skinny (sustainable, ethical), black skinny ( thrifted, 5+), engineer (thrifted).

7 skirts - here is the meat of what I’m going out on a limb with this capsule - black sweater (vintage, thrifted), grey wool (vintage, thrifted), brown leather (vintage, thrifted), orange mini sweater (10+), floral cord (vintage, thrifted), black velvet skater (hand me down), black flowy (10+).

Thats a little over 50 pieces, which is right where I usually hover with my 3 month capsule. The prominent colors are grey (duh), brown, black, and vermillion with some white and cream, and orange. I didn’t include leggings and tights or shoes here. I’m counting them as the winterizing accessories this season.

A full flip through will be going up on the channel soon and I will add that link here when available.

Are you challenging yourself this season with your capsule? What challenges are does your current environment (working from home, the weather, your job or home life changing) present? How are you thinking about your capsule this quarter? Keeping it the same, or trying something new?

Leave your thoughts in the comments!

6 More Months of Zero Waste | The End of 6 More Months?

For more than two years Mad Cat Quilts has featured posts called 6 More Moths of Zero Waste. In this challenge series, we take 6 month increments to get started or work towards becoming better at zero waste. Each month for a 6 month block we tackle a zero waste problem and learn how to be more sustainable, more zero waste, become better at being plastic free. We would usually tackle these challenges the 6 months leading up to Plastic Free July and for the 6 month after PFJ.

In those years we have learned what trash we throw away when we did a trash audit, we’ve done meatless Monday, we’ve learned how to shop second hand, we’ve stopped buying bottled water, learned to grow our own food, and how to compost our scraps, we have become more aware of our consumption and waste, we have become better at the low impact movement lifestyle and we have found ways to use less plastic!

We were chugging reight along for those last few yers. But what happened in December of 2020? Well, that’s question that we could ask about every month in 2020. The last installment of the last block of 6 More Months of Zero Waste will happen…. Eventually.

This was a super fun series and it let me and my reader make new roads towards a more zero waste lifestyle.

But now, it’s time to reinforce some of what we learned in all those 6 month block. As we all know, Zere waste is the goal, but it’s a life long on going journey. We will have times where we fall back into bad habits, or get slack on those we keep. IN order to help us move forward, we can revisit the things we learned to make sure that we are still incorporating them in our daily lives. We will call this One More Month to Zero Waste.

If you feel ready for a refresher, you can go back to the beginning of the blog series, or take a look at any of the blog posts to see past month’s challenges. You can start at the beginning, or you can hop around. Over on my youtube channel we’ll be going month to month with small actionable challenges, based on 6 More Months to Zero Waste starting now! There are many ways to follow along and make every month a chance to be better at zero waste!

Did you have a favorite challenge from this series? One that surprised you? One you already did? What challenges do you feel the need to revisit? Leave us a comment!

6 Month of Zero Waste: Trash Audit Review

In January, I wrote about some things to do each month leading up to Plastic Free July. Are you following along?

Last month, we separated and audited our trash. What did you learn? Here are some questions to ask your self:
How much was trash?
How much was food waste?
How much of your trash was recyclable?
What part of each contained plastic?

Now that you know what your trash really looks like, where can you reduce it?
Go ahead and answer these in the comments below so we can share in your observations!!

You may want to keep separating and auditing your trash for another month, or for several month to see how your waste changes now that you are more mindful of what you throw away.

Now that we are making our way to mid February it’s time to start decluttering things, if you haven’t already. All the things. The decluttering craze is upon us so you can find a lot of resources and ideas out there. I suggest paying special attention to duplicates, paper clutter, clothing, as well as little or never used items and appliances. The goal here is to get rid of lots, but also to organize what’s left.

Do as much as you can do until we talk again!

Chagrin Valley Soap And Salve Company Review

Disclaimer: My product reviews are completely unsponsored and unsolicited. The opinions are my own from my own experiences.

Last year, while spending time in Cleveland, I came across the Chagrin Valley Soap shop. I brought home one of their shampoo bars and very much enjoyed it! Since then, I’ve tried several different shampoo bars but none were as nice. Last month, I ordered a few more bars from them.

From start to finish, I had a great experience!
I chose the Citrus Chamomile Shampoo Bar, the Citrus Soapnuts Shampoo Bar, and the Cocoa Butter Hair Balm. Ordering from the site is very easy, and shipping was shockingly fast.

I was so pleased to see that all the packaging was plastic free! One never knows what to expect with packaging, and it made me thankful to that I didn’t have to worry. The first bar that we opened was the citrus chamomile and so far we love it. We’ve used the hair balm a few times, and it’s also quite nice. The soap bars are large and judging from the one I got over the Summer, it will last a long time.

I look forward to using these products more. The plastic free packaging pretty much guarantees I’ll be purchasing from Chagrin Valley Soap again. I can definitely recommend these soaps if you’re looking for a reliable shampoo bar!