ToddAhThrift Scores
The weather is FINALLY getting warmer, and that means dresses will be in heavy rotation around here. I love me some summer dresses, and this little gem has been waiting for a long time for me to make it into one!
I found this pretty little coral number at my local thrift store a while back for a whopping $4, and it’s been just sitting in my closet for a moment like this. Can you tell it’s been a while? This before pic kind of makes me miss my darker hair… Perhaps some color is in order soon:) This one was easy – just took off the sleeves, made it shorter, and paired it with my favorite belt! Summer, here we come!
Be sure to subscribe to our blog and like us on Facebook to see more thrift scores this summer!
Free Dandelion Wallpaper
Happy May! Mother’s Day, spring, and my birthday make this a month a great one.
I’ve got a brand new wallpaper to decorate your mobile devices. It features what I consider to be the a sign of spring. Dandelions! I have always had a fondness for these weeds. I remember playing with them as a kid and they were never in short supply.
Like I mentioned last month, I am going to start featuring future patters for our scarves as the wallpaper of the month. The pattern behind the word joy is what we want to turn into a scarf. I just added “Joy” for fun.
Hope you like it. Be sure to subscribe and like us on facebook to get updated when we have a new free wallpaper available.
Thrift Scores
Back in my college days, I was quite the thrift store explorer. I would score such great pieces and make them a fun, unique part of my every day wear. One of my favorite things to wear was a super fun rainbow button down shirt with a huge butterfly collar, straight from the 70s, I’m sure. And, I wore it well!
Graduating and getting a “real job” made me lose sight of adventure in my wardrobe for a while. It’s time to get back to the fun! So, here I go again – finding fun vintage pieces to bring back to life. Today, I scored some vintage color!
I found this bright cobalt blue shirt that I just had to have. And, for just $3, I couldn’t pass it up! Upon purchase, it wasn’t perfect – huge shoulder pads and sleeves wide enough to fit a smaller toddler in. But, I saw the potential – I tore out the shoulder pads, sewed in the sides and sleeves, and voila!
And, what better to pair it with than some beautiful vintage 9 West pumps! That’s right – found these beauties for a mere $2.50 at the same little thrift store, and I just love pairing these reds with my new cobalt top. Put on some skinnies, and I’m ready to go!
Be sure to like us on Facebook and subscribe to our blog to hear about more thrift scores on this journey to revive my wardrobe!
ToddAh Designed scarves
As I mentioned before we have started printing some of our own personal designs for scarves. All of which are now in our shop! That means anything we dream up can be printed on our new scarves from flowers to felines! Designing for patterns is new to me and I learned a lot from the process of getting this first batch printed. But even though this was my first go at scarf designing I’m extremely happy with how they turned out. They’re light, soft, colorful and perfect for the upcoming spring.
We are already working on getting our next round of patterns ready and can’t wait to show you what we have in store for the future. Let us know what you think of the new patterns and if you have any suggestions for future colors or designs.
What are you looking for in a scarf? A specific color? A certain style? A specific design? Let us know and we will make it happen!
Be sure to subscribe and like us on facebook to get all our updates about new products and designs.
April Wallpaper – Owl
I’m really excited about sharing this wallpaper with you because it is sort of an unofficial announcement of some of the new stuff we are going to be doing at ToddAh! Last month for our Fab sale we were able to have 6 scarves custom made with 3 patterns that we designed ourselves. Needless to say we are excited about this. The new scarves will be in our store soon AND we are in the process of designing more. As a celebration of our new designs, I thought it would be fun to start featuring some of our custom patterns each month for the wallpaper. And, if you bought one of the scarves you’ll be able to impress all your friends with how you coordinated your mobile wallpaper with your accessories.
Click below to download your wallpaper:
Be sure to subscribe and like us on facebook to get updates for when we put the new scarves up for sale and post more free wallpapers.
Spring Inspired Products
I think Spring may have finally arrived here in the Midwest and it gets me in the mood for some bright and fun colors so here are a couple spring inspired products that get a lot of love from us.
The first was a gift from my grandma it’s the strawberry hat from seattlehats.com. As you can see it is adorable and every time we are out with our little one she is guaranteed to get a bunch of smiles and compliments on the hat. Her favorite part of the hat are the berries, which she is always trying to eat.
The second is from an amazing local artist – Sleepy Time Quilts. We came across her quilts at a craft show and fell in love with them immediately. Her quilt is probably seen in half the pictures we take of Micah. We put it in the center of our living room, so it gets lots of use and quite a few compliments! Not only is she a local artist, but the patterns are by a super talented Kansas City designer, Tula Pink. Double local points!
If you like either of these go check out their websites and show them some love. Enjoy the spring weather!
DIY Tie Flower Brooch
Remember when it was cool for your guy to wear ugly ties, and every Christmas and birthday came with another to add to the collection? Well, if this is you, and all those ties are stuffed away in your garage or closet waiting for that yard sale you may or may not have when good weather comes around, this tutorial is just the thing you need! It is super easy to re-purpose those old ties into something super cute that you’ll love and can wear all different ways! Here, I’ll show you how to make a brooch, but you could use these little flowers on headbands, necklaces, or even make a little shoe clip! Get creative and make something fun:)
Here’s what you need:
An old tie
Scissors
Hot glue gun/glue sticks
Felt (or some thicker fabric you might have lying around)
Brooch clips
1. Fold your tie in half, matching up the pointed tie ends, and cut it in half. I like to use the skinny end, because the little “leaf” at the end is skinny, but you could use the fat end for a bolder look:). Then, roll the cut end in a little bit, hot gluing as you go (this will make the center of your rosette).
2. Once you’ve got a nice center, you will begin the folding/turning process to make the petals. I like to fold mine pretty tight, but you could fold it looser for a bigger brooch. Continue to fold and turn, hot gluing about every 3rd fold. When using the glue, make sure to glue where the fold will be, fold, then glue where the bottom of the petal will land and press. This keeps the glue hidden from sight – you don’t want a bunch of hot glue sticking out everywhere!
3. When you get near the end, turn the flower over and put glue all over the back. Then, glue down the end so a little bit of that tail is sticking out (or you could cut that part off if you’d prefer it without a tail:).
4. Cut out 2 pieces of felt – one circle that will fit the back of your flower, and then one small square that will fit between your brooch pin.
5. Hot glue the circle felt to the back of your flower.
6. Hot glue the brooch pin to the back (on the felt). Tip on this – glue it near the top of the flower – this will help the brooch lay better when it’s on!
7. Hot glue your little piece of square felt between the brooch pin to hold it on.
Put it on and wear it proud, then make more!
And, that’s it! Simple enough, right? I’d love to see what you create and how you wear your new, re-purposed ties! Be sure to like us on facebook and subscribe to our blog to keep up with new tutorials:)
Scarf Giveaway!
Ready for another giveaway?! Just scroll down and enter to win 2 of our infinity scarves in great prints! It’s easy to enter – just like us on Facebook via the links and you’re good to go! The winner will be announced on Tuesday – be sure to subscribe to our blog to get updates on future giveaways!
Making Joy Appear
As a company, and as people, we want to make joy appear. We strive to make this happen in our personal lives, in our business, and around the world. Partnering with World Concern has helped make this possible for us. We wanted to take a moment and share a bit of this joy with you, because every time you’ve tweeted, liked, shared, pinned, and purchased with Toddah, you have helped make joy appear in lives like these, all around the world.
Meet Rashida.
Lives in Bangladesh
Forced into marriage at the age of 13
Mother of 5 by the age of 18
With a small microloan from World Concern, Rashida began her very own embroidery business and is able to provide for her family, send her children to school, and live in a safer environment. Her next goal: to open a showroom where other poor women can work and find new hope in their own lives.
Meet Bellia.
Lives in Haiti
Mother of 2
Through a shared business microloan with World Concern, Bellia has been able to maintain her small business, selling clothing and accessories in the local market. As her business has grown, her new goal is to buy land of her very own, where she no longer has to pay rent!
Each of these women have captured a bit of the joy you help to create. Twenty percent of all Toddah proceeds is donated directly to microloans to help women just like Rashida and Bellia break the cycle of poverty and provide sustainable change within their lives and communities. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you for supporting us, our dream, and the dreams of people like these around the world. We’ll keep you updated on the joy you keep creating – be sure to like us on Facebook and subscribe to our blog to stay in the loop!
March Wallpaper
This month is Easter, which seems really early and, despite the looks of it, the holiday wasn’t inspiration for this month’s wallpaper. That said I don’t mind at all that it works as an Easter wallpaper if you don’t. The white rabbit is just a reference to our name “ToddAh”. And this month I wanted to feature the motto we’ve been living by since we started our company. We just haven’t really announced it publically until now. Everything we work on here we try to follow the simple phrase to Make Joy Appear. I think it’s a good way to approach a business and life.
For us, this influences our quality and lighthearted designs. We strive to create products that leave an impression with people and making someone smile is our favorite way to leave an impression. Hopefully when you open our package in the mail you get excited. On top of that we also give a portion of our proceeds to charity. Right now it’s 10% of wholesale and 20% of retail but we are working on trying to give 20-25% on both. That means every time you purchase something from our site you are helping make joy appear somewhere else.
Even on our blog we follow this by trying to post about stuff you are interested in and giving away free patterns, tutorials, products and of course wallpapers. Download your wallpaper from the links below and remember to subscribe so you don’t miss out on future freebies or giveaways.
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