When I was young and thought I was quite fashion forward, I collected hats to wear with every outfit I had in my closet. We often attended the track at Del Mar, where we were members of the rather “elite” Turf Club. It was my late husbands favorite way to entertain and it was my favorite excuse for a new outfit with a matching hat. Even though I no longer have any of the dresses that go with the hats, I still have the hats.

I have loaned the hats out for several fashion shows over the years, as they have now become almost vintage, just like me.

I will never forget a few years ago, I dressed up as Marilyn Monroe for a Halloween Party, with the chiffon dress, gold heels and a beautiful mink coat my late husband bought for me when were going to move the Pacific North West.

Arriving at the party, someone asked me: “Where did you find that gorgeous vintage coat?”

I looked back at her and said: “Oh Shit, I am old!”

We all laughed, but that is a little how I feel about my hat collection.  Thirty-five years ago, I most likely paid well over $200 for each hat and at the time I had about forty of them. I still have about twenty and the boxes were starting to fade and fall apart.  I started looking on Amazon and Ebay, only to see that the price of Hat Boxes, like most other things had gone up.

The two hat boxes in the worst repair could use a new look. Straight edge, cutter, great glue, some nice wrapping paper and ribbon could save the day or at least two of the hat boxes.

A little time and energy and they look like new. I found some of sewing supplies worked easily to make this happen. The straight edge used mostly by quilters, made it easy to cut a straight line and rolling scissors made it easy to cut a circle using the hat box as the pattern. On the polka dot one, I just repainted the edges with a magic marker, but on the striped one I had to add ribbon, as the edge was totally worn out.  I think it worked well.

One of the boxes still had the price tag on the bottom and even that many years ago it was $25. They are far from perfect, but sure look a lot prettier in my closet than they did.

The closet is a work in progress, but I think the repaired and new (found at TJMaxx) are a nice addition to closet.  I will post a few more photos of my closet and you will begin to see that I am a avid collector.  I love not only hats, but belts and shoes and what I call junk jewelry.  It will all have an organized place in my new aqua closet. I will share as it is completed.  Right now everything is in my bedroom.  Oh my!  

I figure a light aqua blue/green is a happy color and that is what I want to feel when I go in my closet.  Hope I might inspire you to reorganize and see what you can do to make your closet a happier part of your house.