Greeny Crafter - Threading My Way

It's Greeny Crafters again. This week, we have the lovely Pam of Threading My Way. If you are in need for some sewing inspiration, you will definitely need to pop over and pay her a visit. Her site is very resourceful and has crowdsourced many tutorials and tips. I interviewed her to find out her favourite refashions and share her refashioning tips.

Share a little about yourself and your refashioning

I've been sewing for a long time, but I haven't always refashioned clothes. In fact, when my daughter first suggested I take a child's baby doll dress and turn it into a bag, I don't think I was very positive. It was a favourite dress and what if I ruined it in the process, ending up with neither a bag nor the original dress. When I was taught to sew at school, we had to adhere strictly to the rules we were taught. There was no thought of deviating and being creative. Cutting up the baby doll dress and turning it into a bag meant breaking those rules that were ingrained. My daughter, however, convinced me that I would have no problems and so this was my first venture into refashioning.

Thanks to my daughter's encouragement, I've continued to refashion. I even turned her wedding dress into a smart day dress. Yes, I was apprehensive, but surprisingly not nervous. We actually had a lot of fun. I had lots of fabric to play with, so also made a matching purse. After successfully refashioning the wedding dress, my head was full of ideas about further refashions I could do. 

A lot of my refashions are for children, using clothes that once belonged to adults. In particular, I like refashioning with shirts, either men's or women's. I have a lot of shirts in my pre-loved clothing stash and they just seem to lend themselves to sewing kids' clothes. It's not hard to make a feature of the button placket. My all time favourite is a shirt made from both a man's dress shirt and a woman's blouse.

I also like turning pre-loved clothes into things that can be used around the home. Cushions are quick and easy to make. Adding a piece of a favourite article of clothing to the front of a cushion, is a great way to keep the clothing.

 

Jeans would have to be my second favourite article of clothing to refashion. Even though I haven't done many jeans refashions, there's lots of ideas in my head that are just waiting to be implemented and I have a stack of jeans in my stash.

Having a good grounding in sewing has helped with my refashioning. Those rules which made me slow to take on refashioning in the first place, have actually helped me enormously. During the refashioning process, it is often necessary to take something apart, resize it and then sew it back together. Knowing how the garment was initially constructed can be a big help. Sometimes, a simple resizing is al that's needed to make a garment wearable.

What is your most prized sewing tool that helps you in your refashioning?

That would have to be my unpicker or seam ripper. In fact, it's my most used tool for sewing, whether refashioning or not, apart from my actual sewing machine. Next up is my tape measure. Sometimes I use a pattern when I refashion, but often I'll just go by measurements, or a combination of both. The more my confidence grows, the less I use patterns when sewing pre-loved clothes, hence my need to use a tape measure.

How do you juggle between being a mum, working (if you work) and making things? 

My children are all adults and have left home. I have also left the workforce, so I have the luxury of being able to sew whenever I want. The majority of my time is divided between sewing, blogging and gardening.

Thank you for sharing, Pam. I think my favourite refashion from you is the wedding dress. It's absolutely gorgeous.