Quilter 65

I am sewing on the blue Elna I bought in March, 1970 with my almost last teaching check. She still purrs and sews right along. I have worn out two two-speed feet and am on the third, which is a generic one that I don't care for, but at least it goes. I hope she never dies on me. Everything on her is second nature, push this, dial that, adjust this. I am afraid I would never "get" the newer ones. I made my clothes because my gangly arms stuck out of the sleeves about two inches too soon and my boughten pants didn't cover my ankle bones. I was so glad when they discovered tall sizes. Use it up, wear it out. I still have problems throwing ANYTHING away but am slowly getting better.

charsuewilson

I don't think of sewing machines as something you get rid of. I've had my Singer for 40 years now. I have an occasional issue with it, and I want to learn how to tune it up.

But the mention of the US Navy pea coat reminded me of my Dad's pea cost from WW II. It's 70 years old now, and still in great shape. I wore it in high school and college, and patched the lining once or twice. I think my SIL has replaced the lining 3 times now. My brother is still wearing it. Coats today don't last anywhere near as long as that one has.

miriam

I thought I would bump this up and hope someone enjoys reading it.

sews

I'll bump it up again. The Dolly Parton video made me tear up. That Never Happens :-) ......

miriam

I love those 5 R's!!! For Christmas this year my DGDs are getting gift cards and half off certificates to my favorite thrift store. My daughter says they will love it. OK... I had in mind maybe a craft store but we talked a bunch and it will give the girls control over what they buy, and they have to shop with grandma, not momma and not cost an arm and a leg besides they need clothes. I've taken jeans and old shirts then made them into skirts for the girls. We've cut down large skirts to small. They love that stuff. I kind of wish I could figure out how much money they come out ahead buying from the thrift store. How far can they stretch it? Last week I bought Miss L a pair of jeans that had blown out knees (50 cents) and sewed hearts up and down the leg and over the holes. She was very happy - custom clothes. Nothing fits them very long anyway. The oldest is very conservative in what she wears - she is 13 and goes for very classical looking clothing. She finds some pretty cool stuff at the thrift store. My daughter has always bought designer clothes at the thrift store. Once she was with the youth group kids at an amusement park. They wanted kids in shorts to do the water rides so she found a pair of scissors and whacked off her jeans. The other kids were horrified - good $50 jeans??? She didn't mention she only spent a buck or two... She just smiled and told them she would go buy another pair.

Sewnoma

What a great thread, I'm glad it got bumped up!

My mom was hopeless with a sewing machine but both of my grandmothers were quilters and sewers. Many pairs of my jeans featured dense darning and weird patches to fix rips, and whenever a zipper broke or a seam went out we knew it wasn't Mom who would fix it, it was Grandma. Most of my clothes growing up were handed down to me; my aunt was fairly well off and had 3 boys, the youngest of which was only a year older than me, so I had lots of "boy clothes" passed along to me and then to my sister after me. I loved it, I've always been a tomboy and I loved the flannel shirts and cargo pants. All those pockets meant I could carry a book AND still have a place to temporarily store newly-caught snakes and lizards and frogs while tromping around in the hills with my cousins! And then home to Grandma so she could sew all our pocket flaps back on for us, feed us cookies, and squirt Bactine on all our scrapes. (After we hid all the new critters we'd caught out in the back yard, of course!)

What a fun little dip into the past.

HouseDragon

I still have my Elna Supermatic (1966): it's my trusty backup machine. I also have two more from eBay to cannibalize for parts.

I made almost all of my kids and my clothes on that machine when DH & I were both college students. We were poor but we ate well because I'd learned a load of tricks from my Mom on how to save money at the grocery store.

This summer I told DD I'd buy the four grandkiddies their school clothes. *LOL* I taught my DD well! We hit the sales but the lion's share came from an upscale thrift shop where all clothes were $1 each that day!!!!! That included fancy dresses: so for one dollar DD bought a dress to wear to a formal dance they were going to attend. I bought DH some like-new shorts that I added to the shorts I'd bought on sale.

Now for my Green Hint: wash all your (not DHs) clothes by colour. It prevents those little pills from occurring. I have no idea why this works but it does. I have shirts that are at least fifteen years old that I still wear.

*LOL* Obviously I'm not the fashion diva wearing the newest colours.

miriam

My boss was kind of irked at the other supervisor because I dress better than she does. I told him I buy my clothes at thrift stores and she doesn't - I can afford to dress nice and if it wears out throw it out... well, um cleaning rags... LOL He said what ever I'm doing looks a lot better... I guess I'm saying going green doesn't have to look shabby.

Sheilz

Thank you. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this thread.

miriam

5 R's Recycle, Reuse, Repurpose, Regift, Refuse to buy "made in China if possible"
AND I thought of one more REPAIR!!!