miriam

You know I got by for YEARS with just that Elna. I'd be happy to share my bounty if anybody was interested. I have good quality machines just sitting on CL all the time. Nobody wants to sew. They want to hug trees though. Sewing is so VERY green. I think about the old sewing books my MIL passed on to me. They had all kinds of stuff about how to remodel a dress. Change the cuffs, the collar, re do this re do that. These days if we are tired of it we toss the clothes and the machines are pretty much long gone. No room for that gotta have a big screen tv or what ever. I love Dolly Pardon's song about the coat of many colors her momma made. My mom made me one when I was in the 8th grade. There was a box of old clothes turned up at our house. In the box was a hideously ugly old coat. It was green, red, blue, gold plaid wool. Humongous and did I mention UGLY??? We were living in northern Wisconsin at the time and I out grew my coat. My mom managed to work out a coat out of that horrid thing. When she got done it had bias sleeves, bias pockets and it was double breasted. She re-lined it with bits of her wedding dress. AND it was WARM. To this day when ever I get a coat I wonder if it will be as good as that coat. Well, one day we were sitting around yacking about something and I mentioned the coat. My mom kind of snickered and apologized for not being able to come up with anything any better. I gawked at her and said, gee mom it was the best coat I ever had. I compare all the coats I buy to that coat. It was warm. So my sister said, "Was it that plaid coat with bias sleeves and pockets and double breasted?" I said, "Yeah" She said, "I remember that coat. I wore it too. I loved that coat." Then my other sister said she wore it too. We had a big group hug. Nobody knows where it is. BUT how green can you get - an old discarded coat out of thick wool. Yeah mom had to work around the holes... BUT the coat kept 3 girls warm. I'd say we each wore it two years. How is that for going green??? Oh yeah the cost was a spool of thread and 6 or 8 shiny new brass buttons. Kind of off season to be thinking about a coat... what ever. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1zJzr-kWsI
Dolly's song