Tag: mending

June 13, 2024 – Not Your Grandma’s Sewing

June 13, 2024 /

You might not think so, but kids are bound to pick-up on some things. Growing up in a traditional household, my mom was always into sewing. She would make us a shirt from the fabric of our choosing each school year. In first and second grade, it was a fabric that had a gold or silver thread in it. When I was in third grade, I had a shirt with a Millennium Falcon embroidered on the back. Unfortunately, the work took so long to do I outgrew it before I could wear it, so my brother got it. It did win a blue ribbon at the county fair.

I suppose that it is probably still true, but back in those days winning at the county fair also came with a cash prize. It was $3 for first, $2 for second and $1 for third. When I won two first place prizes for my rabbits, I thought I was rich. That is a little back stage baseball on our kind of life.

There was always a sewing place in our home. I was too young to remember before the utility room was converted in my first house but there was a dedicated sewing room in my second house. As we got older and busier, the sewing projects got farther and fewer in between for my mom. Hemming pants gave way to occasional mending and patches on our Boy Scout uniforms.

As kids do, sometimes we held onto those patches a little too long and needed them sewn immediately. In those cases, we had to do the work ourselves. No problem, I talked earlier about taking home economics in middle school and sewing our own bags. I thought nothing of it.

In this stage in our lives, I occasionally find that my wife has a few friends over on the weekend for a taste of normalcy. Given the impromptu timing and lack of planning, I often find myself heading to the basement to tidy up and stay out of the way but close enough to be nearby. It should be no surprise that I have a a myriad of things going on generating the clutter. As a result, I turn on some music and get to work. In these days of lack of control, having organization over my domain makes me happy.

One of the things that I had on my to do list was mend my son’s insulated pants. I had to of course tidy up the space around in order to have enough room to work. I was feeling in a darker mood that night. My music started with System of a Down and worked toward Metallica. Then I decided to crack a beer. When I was all done I was looking at the aftermath and I couldn’t help myself. I could never see my Grandma drinking a beer and listening to Metallica while sewing.

I have kind of had that moment that I had when I was in college. I needed tools to work on the car but I had nothing, including money. Dad always had everything that I needed. The same is true about sewing. It was always around and available, all the tools and supplies. I never imagined that I would be shopping for replacement needles and thread and other supplies. But, now it seems like I need to stock up in this area too.

Truth be told, my work is hack job level. I broke several needles and I had to watch a video on how to load a bobbin. It would win no ribbons at the county fair but it got the job done. I need to spend more time with the machine to figure out how the different stitching modes work and the different nuances. It is just like anything else, it takes practice to get good at something.

End Your Programming Routine: When I rescued the sewing machine from the giveaway pile at my in-laws estate, I only saw the utility of it. That is still my primary motivation. But, I wont lie that I enjoyed my time fiddling around trying to figure it out how to use it. I would like to get to the point that I could sit down and not have to watch videos to get started. I would also like to get to the point that I hope nobody notices how it was done. Like I said, hack level work.

February 27, 2024 – My First Stiches

February 27, 2024 /

Back in my day… I started middle school in 1986. As a sixth grader, we were required to take a whole year of survey classes. We had art, choir, shop class and home economics. I didn’t think too much of it. While my family lived a home economics lifestyle, it wasn’t something that I had done much of it, but I had been around it my whole life. We baked cookies and learned how to sew.

Our project was to make a drawstring bag using a sewing machine. We had to supply our own fabric, but that was easy because my mom had a whole chest of it. I remember completing it in a couple of days. I don’t remember much about it but I am guessing that I probably didn’t do the best job. Sewing is a skill that requires practice.

Learning to use the sewing machine came in handy when I was at home and had access to one. Occasionally, I would need to put a patch on my Boy Scout uniform and my mom didn’t get around to it. There was the periodic mend that needed to be made as well.

As time would have have it, I have been away from sewing machines a long time. It had been on my mind to pickup an inexpensive second, hand machine when I had the opportunity. I guess you could say I inherited one as I claimed my mother-in-laws machine as we were cleaning out the storage unit last year. But, it didn’t help much because I couldn’t remember a thing.

I watched a couple YouTube videos on how to load the machine. The one that was actually the most helpful was an eight year old (guessing) loading a simple Singer. This one is old and pretty basic, but it is well made. So, after watching the video three times, I got the thread loaded. Fortunately, the basic operation hasn’t changed much over the years. I’d have to say that if it wasn’t for my past experience helping me with what I thought I knew, I don’t think I would have got enough information from the videos alone.

The picture on the right was my first attempt. As you can see I kind of started out as a mess. But that is OK. I am simply mending the pocket of my sweat pants. For years now, the seam between the back panel and my pocket has been coming apart. It isn’t a huge deal but more often than not when I try to stick something in my pocket, it ends up going down my pant leg, which is annoying

I could have done it by hand. And I would have if I didn’t have a sewing machine. But, I have been sitting on this for over a year waiting to figure out how to use it. I took the opportunity to do it. I have a bigger project in mind. My son needs all of his merit badges sewn onto a sash. He is Eagle Scout bound and it would be good to finally get this completed.

Sewing patches by hand is not easy. Pushing through the thick material with a needle and fingers is slow going. To make matters worse, most of the ones I have sewn by hand have eventually fallen off. My knots break and then it all starts coming undone.

I got my pant’s mended. I am ready to take on the next challenge. I probably need to practice before I do some more public facing stitching. The good news is that I have learned how to use a seam ripper too. The cutting is permanent but the stitching can be redone.

End Your Programming Routine: I think that it is valuable to have a sewing machine and know how to use it. Mending used to be a valuable skill, now we just replace items. But, there may come a day when that is not possible. My wife has already given me a pillow case to fix now that I am an expert. We will see how long it takes me to get around to that.

January 25, 2023 – My New Sewing Machine

January 25, 2023 /

Maybe my time reading Self-Reliance magazine is starting to rub off on me as I have been thinking about getting a sewing machine. I was thinking that if I ran across one at Goodwill for $20 or so, I would get it. After sewing my kids Boy Scout patches on by hand for years, I am kind of tired of doing it.

My mom sews, so this is nothing new to me. Growing up, there was always a fully outfitted sewing room. Mostly, I asked mom to do this because she was much better than me, but I could do it in a pinch. In fact, as part of the sixth grade survey we had 18 weeks of Home Economics where we all sewed a basic drawstring bag. What I am trying to say is that it is not that far off that I could sew something.

Recently, we cleaned out my in-laws storage unit. It was either donate, trash or keep. I think that we ended up keeping too much and throwing out too much but it was what it was. I ran across this sewing machine and decided that this was going to be mine (if none of the heirs wanted it, which they didn’t). This means that I really need to my sofa table done so that I can put this sewing machine where my stereo is currently.

Now, I am not planning on doing anything really major but it sure is handy to have around when you have three or four patches to sew on. The truth is, my boys are of the age that I am ‘letting’ them do it. If they ask for help, then I will but I am no longer just taking initiative to sew on their patches. This is something that is really their responsibility with uniform compliance. I used to feel some degree of judgement but not anymore, they are plenty capable.

When I was in grade school, my mom would sew us one shirt. We got to pick the material and it was the shirt that we would wear for school pictures. Generally speaking, that shirt first went to the county fair before school started. So, we had to wait and visit it before we got to use it.

Going to the fabric store was really painful as a child. It seemed like we were there forever and there was definitely nothing a child was interested in, except maybe the scissors isle. There was one year, I picked a fabric for my shirt that had a silver thread running through it. I think my brother picked a fabric that had a gold thread running though it. We thought it was pretty cool.

I think that my last year, I was in fourth grade. My mom made a shirt where the Millennium Falcon was embroidered on the back. This would have been right before Return of the Jedi came out. It was the peak of Star Wars mania (for me at least). Unfortunately, it took too long to complete and so the shirt went to my brother because it didn’t fit me when it was completed. It did win a blue ribbon at the county fair.

There have been some times that I have been tempted to try and build a backpack or bag. For instance, I cant find an exact range bag with the features that I want. With both of my boys shooting trap, I just don’t have enough space for everything that we need on a weekly basis in my range bag. Wouldn’t be cool if I could just sew one up? This is probably way too ambitious but it is actually possible. This is how many technical gear companies have started, see a need and fill a need.

End Your Programming Routine: As a alluded to in the first sentence, Self-Reliance magazine has three or so projects that are pretty simple, like sewing a reusable bag out of feed sacks. You know, like the kind you can buy at the grocery store. This is not really about making dresses but a tool that can really be useful. Throughout my adult life there have been many times I threw something away because it was too difficult to mend or repair appropriately. This is a step at correcting that