It’s been a little while since I sewed anything, but I’ve been slowly whittling down my mending pile now that school is out for the summer.
Actually, I also did a little bit of repurposing (and I do mean little.)
Meet Nelson:
He belongs to Sonia (Because of course. He’s a turtle.), and Sonia felt he was in need of a scarf.
So, she brought me an old sweater, and I managed to cut a scarf-length section from the arm.
I just used one piece, folded in half, right sides together. I stitched almost all the way around, turned it inside out, and hand-sewed the small opening shut.
And now Nelson has a scarf. He looks happy, don’t you think?
Once Nelson had a scarf, Zoe’s bear Barney suddenly had a hankering for one too. 😉
These two crack me up.
I’ve also done some mending, which is probably the most common type of sewing I do.
This towel has only lived at my house since Christmas, but for some reason, the hem was already coming apart.
So, I sewed it back up.
The same thing happened to one of our bath towels shortly after we bought it.
(Sometimes I wonder if they don’t backstitch the hems at the factory or something!)
But it’s fixed now.
Easy-peasy.
Oh, and I also mended a sleep shirt of mine. It has adjustable straps, but the adjuster pieces were made of plastic and one broke.
So, I cut the strap, removed the broken piece, and just sewed the strap at the length that fits me.
I tried sewing that by machine, but it ended up being much easier to just sew by hand.
Mending isn’t very creative or exciting, certainly, but I do really love to fix things that are falling apart. It usually doesn’t take long, and it greatly extends the usable life of my things.
A lot of people think that the best way to save money by sewing is to construct clothes from scratch, but I think mending easily saves you the most money per hour of effort.
So, take heart if you haven’t sewed a single item of clothing from a bolt of cloth! Just keep sewing buttons back on and stitching up seams.
be
Tuesday 17th of June 2014
Count me as a mender, too. You inspired me to mend my clothes. I've mended everthing from towels and sheets to shirts to sweats and even sewed elbow patches on my black wool sweater with some leftover felt. I don't understand how now that I mend my clothes so many of them need to be mended.
I do some hand stitching, but I also use my grandma's old Singer machine. I'm getting a zigzag attachment to help w/ the repair work. Can't wait to try it out. Otherwise, it's pretty much pretty much the standard straight stitches.
I agree, mending does save me money. Although my fixes aren't pretty (my grandmother would roll in her grave if she saw my handiwork,) the clothes do get thrown back into rotation thereby saving me money. And since grandma was very frugal (she would knit a sweater for someone and if she didn't like the results, she would unwind it, straighten out the yarn, and knit another sweater for someone else!) grandma would approve of me trying to be frugal.
Kim
Tuesday 17th of June 2014
I really enjoy your post. you have helped me to save money on my phone bill and I also stopped paying for cable and joined the Netflix bunch. I also was inspired to start blogging and even though I have only been doing this a few weeks I have enjoyed it. Still learning how though. Thanks for what you do!
Kelly
Monday 16th of June 2014
I'm interested in buying a sewing machine. What advice can you give? I'd like a reliable and long-lasting machine that can be used by kids sometimes too.
Kristen
Tuesday 17th of June 2014
I just have a very basic Brother brand sewing machine. It does what I need it to do, but it's not exactly the bee's knees and it's not very kid-friendly either. I'd do some research online to see what's out there because I'm not a very good resource!
stacy
Monday 16th of June 2014
Yup....that's all I do! Sewing back buttons and mending seams. But I do it by hand. My mother is very generous to use her sewing machine for me on anything a little more difficult. She has an entire sewing room set up so it's always out and ready...lucky!
KT
Monday 16th of June 2014
I recently "turned the collar" on my husband's shirt because it was worn through. It is really easy for anyone who has a sewing machine. Just remove the stitches that anchor the collar to the shirt. (Hubby had actually already done this before he asked for the repair!) Turn the collar over and set it in where it belongs and stitch it up again. Easy peasy!
My next challenge is to patch the elbows of two shirts where they have worn through. Easy fix would be to cut them off and make them short-sleeved shirts, but hubby needs long sleeves for protection from the sun.
This conversation of sewing and being frugal reminds me of what my mother used to do in the 1950's and '60's. She would repair Dad's shirts until they could no longer be repaired. Then she would use whatever good fabric that was left, plus the buttons, and make a shirt for my brother. This shirt then was handed down through the brothers. If it was still wearable, it was passed along to a cousin. Not wearable? The buttons were removed and saved. The shirt was cut up and used as a cleaning rag.
Kristen
Monday 16th of June 2014
Whoa. That's a level I'm not sure I will ever reach!