Sunday, April 16, 2017

Wardrobe Malfunction Insurance


Sometime back I decided I wanted a sewing kit that I could keep in my suitcase in case of any possible wardrobe malfunctions that I might experience when away from home. They sell such kits at Fabricland and at craft and dollar stores, but I never felt inclined to buy any of those kits because they weren't attractive and often didn't appear to have decent quality items. I know from experience that commercially made sewing kits sometimes have very poor quality thread. Then one day when looking for fresh knitting post shares for my knitting blog's Facebook page, I caught sight of some of the homemade sewing kits on Pinterest (I seriously cannot believe what some crafters can do with old Altoid tins), and decided to put my own little kit together.





First I bought this eyeglass case from Value Vilage for $1. I picked a coppery brown one because it matched my brown-checked luggage set. Then I made a list of all the things I'd like to put in it: scissors, a thimble, a measuring tape, a stitch ripper, a thread card, and a needle book containing pins and needles.





I bought the scissors, the thimble, and the tape measure as a kit from Fabriclands. I got it 75% off, and even at that I was still paying too much for it, but it *is* such a perfect and pretty little set of tools for my purpose.





I got the stitch ripper at a discount at Fabricland too. The thread card I made myself out of an old greeting card and a selection of the threads I had on hand. I tried to include every reasonably possible colour. Then I just needed to make a needle book, which is something else Pinterest has a jaw-dropping array of.






This is the needle book I made. For the sake of accuracy, I might as well say that this is the *second* needle book I made. The first I made out of a scrap of gold-embroidered satin I had left over from an ugly old secondhand purse I took apart so I could use the handle. Hideous as that satin was when part of a purse, it was the perfect fabric to go with the rest of the kit. And the needle book turned out pretty well except for one thing: I used glue to attach the felt pages to the embroidered satin cover, and the glue showed through the satin as black smudge-like marks. It ruined the look of the needlebook, and I had no more suitable pieces of that embroidered satin.

For take two of my needle book project, I hunted through my fabric remnants to see what I had that would go with the rest of the sewing kit. The best I could do was some pieces of red velvet. I decided to link it to the other things by detailing it in gold. So, as you can see, I made little gold embroidery thread ties, and added two little gold beads to the end of the ties -- the last two of that kind that I had left in my box of beading supplies. I also embroidered a little floral design on the front in gold embroidery thread, even though I'm not much of an embroiderer -- it had been many years since I'd done any real embroidery, and I never did know more than a few basic stitches. My stitches look a little crude, but I suppose they'll have to do.





I also stitched the felt pages together with embroidery thread. And this time when it came time to attach the pages and the cover, I used sewing thread to tack the outside page and the cover together at the corners and in the centre. I was taking no more chances with the glue.

There are much cuter and more artful hand-assembled sewing kits on Pinterest, but this one is presentable enough, and will certainly prove as handy as any other sewing kit should I ever have to deal with a popped off button or ripped out hem while away from home.

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