DropstitchDitdit: SEW: Repairs and make things last

Bought a grey one and a purple one at Old Navy on sale a few years ago. They eventually stretched huge- the grey one especially went all the way to the navel. So I shortened both with the sewing machine and jammed the bobbin in doing so. Wore both once. Found them uncomfortable and ripped the repair out LOL

as a side note with holiday gift cards to amazon I bought 3 grey v neck t shirts. that's for my other blog LOL

pink wool sweater had buttons in the front v- removed those and sewed it up.

now as to the v neck t shirts bought on amazon. They are soft and long but the v turns into a u after one wearing. and there were fucking tags in the back neck- removed those.

January 21 2021

same pink sweater above came under the scissors- I cut the sleeves off where they had holes and then sewed a hem on the sleeves. Same with a black zippered sweater that is almost 20 years old and bought at Sears. I regret I gave away the red one like it when my mother died. Hope someone is enjoying it!

running out of clothes to resurrect!

wrong! LOL

January 28th

I had washed my masks and was ready to iron them and saw that one- the front seam was split oops! It fit funny anyhow so when I machine sewed the seam I curved it to stick out more near my mouth. Won't know until I wear it next whether it is more comfortable.

I have a pair of snow pants from LLBean that are at least 30 years old. Made of polar fleece they have shrunk a bit over the years so the waist band was cut. and the zippered ankle area was jammed on one side and too tight on the other.

So I cut out the zippers on both legs and sewed an elastic wide band to the back have of the waist. Won't know until I wear them but it should work.

February 7 2021

so I have the long underwear tops and bottoms that I wear to sleep in almost year round it seems! I recycle the worn out ones from daily wear. Well recently those seem to have shrunk. egads nothing worse that short tight underwear. The sleeves especially.So I cut them off! And they make a great undershirt that is warm too. No pinching under the arms. Earlier in the year I had cut off the reinforced neck and clipped a v into it. LOL

went on a tag removal spree. I do not care if it left holes in the shirt I was tired of being "bitten" by tags in clothing.

painted in tags itch too- not much I can do about it though

cutting top half of the elastic waistband on the fruit of the loom underwear.

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May 17

tired of wearing jeans I hauled out this old corduroy jumper. I was so long I was practically tripping. So I cut off about 10 inches and zig zag stirch on the machine the hem.

darn it the blog is down for adding photos using both browsers- chrome and firefox.

ho hum.

June 14 2021

hey back to that jumper above. Today I was ironing it and noticed that the hem was curling. So I used stitch witchery and Ironed that between what hung. Not good enough and that did not hold in all places. So I machine sewed the hem again closer to the edge. If that makes sense. And this jumper is at least 20 years old and I just today noticed that the pockets have the corduroy grain going the opposite direction of the rest of the jumper LOL special.

The pair of yoga pants I chose for the week are loose fitting and slinky. No other way to describe them The waist is wide and elastic but comfortable. But they are long. In Winter no problem I just wear leg warmers and tuck the cuff in. A little too warm for that, So I sewed the hem- 3 inches, and not caring at all how it looked just so the cuffs did not drag or trip me. I used black and white thread. Well jeez the material is awful to machine sew with it rolls and ripples. Oh well that 's done.

and last but not least the "fixes" for today. tops with necks that strangle. The green long underwear I had butchered a while ago but had to cut the neck with scissors to make it a lazy "v"

I call these scissors necks

Also hate the thick ribbing they put on neck good grief who thinks that is comfortable.

A week or so ago I went into Walgreens in search of lip tint ot a cheap lip stick. none but also need white socks for sneaks. Bought a 6 pack of Hanes said size 8-9 ladies or whatever. Open them and they look super small kind of like the ones I bought on the internet and ended up cutting off the ankle part because they were too tight. I used the cut off part for hair ties. Well these I was optimistic they would be okay. so I sewed colored embroidery thread on the back so I could keep the "wear" of them the same. Last night I wore them to bed and while I was sitting here they became too tight so I got out my stitch ripper and cut the elastic that was making the ankle too tight. well that ended up ripping them and they slide off all night so I switched to old socks. I will try to return them to Walgreens the receipt says full refund. Not sure if that means unopened or not but I will try. If not I will contact Hanes. and rip them a new one for selling such tiny adult socks. seriously they are small enough to be toddler.

June 16

I have worn this rain coat maybe 3 times in the 30 years I have owned it. Rain is usually a surprise and I get drenched. But had to wear this and when I dried it out realized there were buttons missing and hanging!. It is an unusual button and I remembered it being in my collection. So I proceeded . It should not take 30 minutes to sew on 3 buttons but it did. So many frustrations along the way.

There are "back" buttons to each and I had to find a 2 holed button for a replacement. In the search for one I idly wondered if there was such a thing as a 3 holed button. why yes! I found 3.

So trying to attach the new 2 holed one the thread would fly through with its knot- the holes being so large, So had to make big ugly knots. LOL

Then the material being water repellent it was tough to push the needle through. So that's done for another 30 years I hope.

September 8

seemed like a good day to do frustrating things so I tackled the pair of pants bought from LLBean in like 2000. Mom bought them they looked like they had a gentle waist and she ordered her usual size - 16. They had from outside square pockets and were loose fit. Well that an understatement because I took them in on side seems, inner seams and crotch seams and they are still huge. I will take pix later. It doesn't matter if there is not a before pix as they are still huge. While attempting this the machine ran out of thread of course. But I found some beige and a bobbin of beige too. But while sewing I kept hitting the on / off button when I wanted to hit the back stitch button. LOL
so maybe pix later sometime

the pants

still huge

October 6 2021

this was a hat that turned out to be too tight, tried to pull it apart and reuse the yarn but the yarn sticks to itself. so it is now a neck warmer. Not terribly attractive but comfortable

My Mom knit 4 identical sweaters same wool different colors. for herself, me, Jer and Kar. They were super warm and I loved mine. That was maybe 25 30 years ago. No clue where the others are or if still worn. well I know Mom's isn't worn by her! but. A few years ago I noticed mine had shrub and was almost like a Loden wool coat- very tight stitches. I felt I could not wear it but still kept it to sit on or keep my stomach warm in a nap. Well I am still cold and this year decided to wear it even though it is short in the back. But I had no way of closing the front. The button holes had shrunk a LOT . So I decided the other day to sew buttons on. oops not that easy. The only buttons I had were gold metal type with a loop in the back. I used yarn and tied them on. perfect so far.

November 4

**WARNING-LONG***

Thought I would take a day off from being "creative and crafty". I ended up being pissed off at everything. Making apple chips in an attempt to warm the apartment, a pleasant aroma and use up the last apple that is tough and not sweet. They ended up sticking to the parchment paper and only tasted so-so. Then tackled the pants dropping issue I have. All day Saturday I spent yanking up my fleece yoga pants. I almost gave up in CVS and let them drop it took so long to check out. But I leFt CVS with dignity intact. Thought I know what I can do to solve this! I have many articles of clothing with toggle closures that I never use ( the toggles) So cut two off a old LLBean polar fleece jacket and installed the toggles on the yoga pant ties. No simple task. Not easy to thread with one hand, while squeezing the toggle open. So got out my adjustable crescent wrench , tightened it to keep the toggle open enough to thread the tie. It worked. Not comfortable to sit with two toggles at my waist but I can open them here while sitting at the lap top. Will test later to see if they remain "up". But please note the one photo- the collection of my hair on the LLBean tie. Hair only on one. 30 years of yanked hair.

Toggle and pants

okay I was able to buy 2 packages of toggles in JoAnn Fabrics and installed them on my other 2 pairs of yoga pants. Finally got the knack of halding it open and threading the end with needle and thread and then feeding it through the hole.

Weird thing here is the way the ironing board cover changes colors it is off white with teal design.

While I was doing this I was wondering where my short small plastic drying rack was LOL