Having a few basic sewing techniques in your budget mum arsenal will prolong the lives of your family’s clothes and potentially save you lots of money.Sites like WikiHow and eHow are invariably useful resources when you’re trying to do your mending, and I highly recommend checking them out.

Here are a few worthy tutorials to help you tackle basic mending chores:

Patching up jeans

http://damselindisdress.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/patching-jeans-cute-method/

http://www.ehow.com/how_902_patch-jeans.html

Hemming trousers

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A209008

http://www.ehow.com/how_2281295_hem-trousers.html

Replacing a button

http://www.ehow.com/how_4604_sew-button.html

http://www.wikihow.com/Sew-a-Button

Darning socks

http://www.ehow.com/how_648_darn-sock.html

http://blog.craftzine.com/archive/2009/03/darn_it.html

Mending split seams

http://damselindisdress.wordpress.com/2009/07/09/mending-101/

http://www.ehow.com/how_113353_mend-split-seam.html

Fixing things around your home sounds more fun when you call it DIY. If you’ve got a project in mind, don’t risk doing damage that will cost you more money in the end. Get online and try these resources for tips first. I also love using Google video to search for visual demonstrations when I’m trying something new.

• Instructables—A great community-driven resource for thousands of projects. I mentioned this site before in my post on Ikea hacking.
• BBC Homes—Resources for planning your next project, from safety tips to how to stock your toolkit.
• DIY Network—An American TV network devoted to home improvement. Loads of great tips and ideas from experts.
• DoItYourself—Loads of how to guides and a community forum moderated by experts.
• eHow—An online community for guides on everything from home & garden to every day tasks.

The American blog Shoestring.com also just posted a great article called Top 10 Online DIY Resources that is worth checking out. Some overlap here but some additional sites as well, including the magazine website ReadyMade.com which is quite cool. Want to do a bit of DIY but not sure where to start? Read FruGal’s fun post 10 (seriously chic) DIYs for you to try for serious inspiration!

I came across Old School, a brilliant website devoted to teaching “old” skills and household arts. According to the blog’s author, The Damsel, by reading Old School “you’ll learn how to do things that Grandma used to do all the time, but people have forgotten.”

A few great posts include:

Pickled Onions

Making Self-Raising Flour

Tea-Dyeing

Freezing Herbs (see picture)

Folding a Fitted Sheet

Making Butter

And of course, now that it’s too late to include it in my Knitting on a Budget post, I’ve found The Damsel’s post on Unraveling a Sweater!

Man vs. Debt has an incredibly useful and inventive roundup of 25 Essentials That are Better and Cheaper to Make at Home. According to the post:

Right now, many people are interested in saving money with do-it-yourself projects.  This includes everything from making your own cleaners, to creating your own makeup, to growing your own food.  While most of these can save you money, they will end up taking up some time.  For those who enjoy a certain level of self-sufficiency, the time investment required can be very worthwhile.

The post is a collection of great resources for making everything from household items to health & beauty products to Christmas decorations. There are some really great tips in here, definitely worth bookmarking for when you get the itch to make your own sunscreen!

I stumbled across the Ikea Hacker website once when I was trying to figure out if it was possible to paint our old Billy bookcase. I never did end up trying to paint our Billy, and this website has since been integrated into Instructables.com, but I still get a kick out of it. Ikea furniture is a budget staple in many homes but it doesn’t have to be dull. Check out these ideas:

• Malm bed goes glam
• Lack shelving bench
• Dotted Regolit lamp shade
• Benjamin gets souped up
• Expedit bookcase cover up