Category Archives: salvaged materials

Some Special Sewing

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I have put my head down and done some concentrated sewing over the past couple of days. It is a birthday gift for our elder granddaughter.

The result is that I have now completed 21 patchwork blocks which is half of the total needed for a QS quilt.

I wrote a post in February which you can read here in which I mentioned that I had done the first block.

Here are the other 21 blocks ready to start sewing.

The disappearing 9 patch is essentially a 2-step process. The first is to sew the 9 pieces together and you can see some of them here at that stage.

After that, each block is cut into 4 pieces and rearranged before restitching. This gives the overall random finished pattern.

I hope to have the patchwork completed in the next week or so but it is somewhat dependant on other activities.

Conception to Completion

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We have guests coming to stay next week and as well as the dedicated guest room I needed to set up another bed. There is a fold-out sofa bed in the third bedroom so I have unfolded it and made it up in readiness.

After I had done the bed it occurred to me that there was no side table in that room. After a bit of thought I decided that I could create one fairly easily with things we have one hand.

First……….a spare plastic crate from the shed. No modification needed apart from turning it upside down.

The next step was to add a solid top. GMan found a piece of melamine that was leftover from the pantry renovation and cut it to size. It is heavy enough to stay in place without any additional fixing.

The next step was to find some suitable fabric in my stash to make a cover. I found a large piece of embroidered heavy satin which was originally one side of a thrifted doona cover and made a fitted cover.

The fitted cover in place.

The new side table in position and the room is ready for the guests.

The entire project took less than 2 hours to complete from the moment I first thought of the idea.

GMan’s Handiwork

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Tonight I want to show you a couple of recent projects that GMan has been working on.

First, a rack of hooks for our walk-in wardrobe. These were in the wardrobe when we moved in but we removed them before the recent remodelling of the pantry and wardrobe. I decided that I wanted to retain them but in a slightly different position. They are very handy for half-worn clothes as well as the occasional belt or scarf. GMan removed the hooks from the original backing board as it was damaged, bought a new piece of timber and did all of the necessary preparation and painting before reattaching the hooks. This was quite difficult by all accounts. Today it was replaced in its new position. The only thing left to do is filling the screw holes but that can wait for another day.

The other job was creating a permanent barrier between the shed and the back fence. It had previously been blocked up by a piece of metal which is needed for some other garden landscaping so it was time to attach an offcut of Colorbond sheeting which had been set aside for the purpose.

The photo does not do it justice but there were several steps, including attaching a timber support to the back fence as well as adding a timber baseboard to account for the slight slope. The sheeting was cut to size and screwed to the timber support and the corner of the shed.

The reason for needing this area blocked off is to prevent the dog gaining access to the driveway and front garden. Her domain is restricted to the backyard.

Speaking of animals, I will finish this post with a photo I took this evening as we were coming home for our walk. We live in the town but the local wildlife are frequently in evidence around the streets. This has been particularly so in recent times as it is very dry at the moment and the kangaroos are looking for reliable sources of water.

Patchwork – Pink & Pyjamas

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I began a new sewing project today. This is the first block of a patchwork quilt I am making for my elder granddaughter. It is for her 18th birthday in December. One block done, 41 to go.

Most of the fabric has been randomly collected from op shops and offcuts from various previous sewing adventures. However, there will be some from a particularly special piece. The small pale pink squares have history. They are from some leftover fabric from a dress which my mother made for herself – probably close to 30 years ago. From those leftovers I made a dress for my granddaughter which she wore on her first birthday.

This is not a great photo but you get the general idea. It was from an Enid Gilchrist pattern which I had made many time before and numerous times since.

The other patchwork was for the boxer shorts which I mentioned in my last post. I had rather optimistically thought that it would be a simple matter of adding a strip of fabric into the side seams and a bit at the top to extend the overall length of the crotch.

As I began to unpick the side seams it became obvious that the construction method was appalling and regardless of any alterations that I might make, the existing seams were not robust enough to stand up to much wear at all. So, I altered my plan and unpicked the entire garment. By this time it became obvious why they were not a great fit. The pieces bore only minimal resemblance to the pattern I had.

I used the excess length of the original trousers to add pieces to be able to recut all of the pieces for the boxer shorts using my own pattern. I used flat felled seams for joining the extra pieces as well as the main construction as I always do. These seams are great as there are no raw edges on the inside as well as being extra strong due to the two rows of stitching.

This photo shows the randomly joined pieces of fabric before I cut out the pattern pieces. I did not have enough fabric nor the desire to match the pattern.

It was a bit of a fiddle but I now have a pair of boxers which are comfortable. The various joins are really barely visible.

Upcycling Inspiration

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This is a follow-up from my last post about buying secondhand in preference to buying new wherever possible.

Of course there are items of our own and that are donated to thrift shops that are really not saleable for one reason or another so a lot of it does unfortunately end up in landfill.

However, when we were shopping for the champagne flutes, I noticed a large piece of patchwork displayed on a wall behind the counter.

This is the note that was pinned to it.

What a great reminder of the possibilities that upcycling affords. I love the design and will definitely consider trying it one day. It reminds me of stained glass.

Saved and Salvaged

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Sometimes it is necessary to buy something new but there are plenty of instances where you can reuse or repurpose something you already own or purchase it secondhand from a variety of sources.

Here are a couple of examples.

Today GMan put up a hanging rail in the new pantry.

It was the one that had been on the end wall previously but it was removed during the renovations. While the rail was in prefect condition, one of the tiny locking screws had been misplaced during the renovations. It seemed a shame to buy a whole new rod so GMan found another screw in his collection that was suitable apart from being far too long. He managed to modify the screw and the rail is now up and functional. It is a small addition but I am so pleased to have it.

I decided a couple of weeks ago that I needed a hook on the back of the laundry door. So, the next time I was in Bendigo I popped into the salvage yard at Eaglehawk and found exactly what I wanted for $2. The cost is not really the issue but more a matter of not buying something new when there are plenty of perfectly good items that can be reused. GMan cleaned it up and attached it to the door.

Now there is somewhere for GMan to leave his clothes that he wears in the yard. They are generally too grubby to put in the clothes hamper with everything else and are often going to be reworn the next day so this is a perfect solution.