Sewing Up A Storm

With dreary weather upon us lately, I've been trying to catch up some much needed sewing projects and repairs. With a pile of torn jeans laying on the bench at the foot of my bed, I decided that I would just bite the bullet and fix them. Mind you, it wasn't anything major or beyond my abilities, it was just taking the time to take care of it.

I think my resistance to sewing often comes with the lack of space to leave my sewing machine up all the time. I usually make a pretty big mess at the dining room table when I sew and I get consumed with all of the projects I want to take care of while I have everything strewn out. No family meals at the table during this, sadly.

Well, so far this week here is what I've sewn:

-repaired 4 pairs of jeans with holes in them
-cut off and hemmed 1 pair of jeans (yes, that's me, I'm short!)
-made some attractive wiping rags out of "reclaimed" fleece, hemmed and all for drying washed chicken eggs. (Not wanting to use good towels or paper ones for that matter to do this.)
-made some cloth menstrual pads with material I had stashed. I'll have to post more on "why" later
-made cosmetic cleaning cloths out of fleece for using astringents and toners for the face (to save cotton balls/pads) This was inspired by Julie at one of my favorite blogs
Towards
Sustainability

I still have the sewing machine up and I keep thinking of many more things I could be sewing right now. I have a wish list ya' know. I still want to work in the holiday cloth napkins. I just need to do it.

My goal for all of this is to eliminate disposables if at all possible. It not only helps the environment, but it takes me off the buy-consume-buy treadmill for certain things. It hasn't been that far back in history when most, if not all of the things I'm replacing weren't used. Even in the Great Depression people didn't have many of the disposable expenses we have come to use today. Our being squeamish over so many things today has caused us to think these steps are barbaric in nature. But thanks to the "green" movement, many of the past practices are becoming more acceptable. Thank you green!