making it last

The start of this week involved some distracting things, so instead of carrying on with the Works in Progress, I am doing a bit of mindless mending.
Well, mindless in a way, but also creative. I have a few pairs of jeans that have worn some holes. Partially because I have been wearing leggings or long johns under them during the winter so that my legs don't hurt so much. and so added to the circumference making the fabric rub together more.

I worked out how to use the darning stitch on my machine. Not rocket science - I could do the same thing by going back and forth manually or with free machine embroidery. But for this, you stitch forward the amount you want, and then press reverse. From there it goes back and forth that same length (or near enough)about 9 times. Then you move position and stitch again and it remembers the length. As I said, a bit of mindless mending.

So, here is a photo of one area I worked on.

I am sure if you looked closely you could tell the difference, but because the denim has a bit of a stripe thing going on already, it made it easier. I put a scrap underneath from some jeans I already chopped for something else. Then got busy with the darning stitch. Sometimes changing the length and blending it together in a similar way to embroidery shading stitch. With the other fabric beneath, it meant I could just darn up and down with the grain of the fabric, and not worry about side to side.

In case it isn't obvious, the part of the jeans above the horizontal seam is the area where I did the darning. Actually it is interesting to see it in the photo because I realise that the worn places developed along the faded lines which was already a feature of the jeans.

So, now I can get more use from these. Probably only at home, but I won't be ashamed to go down to the shops. I find it hard to get jeans that fit. I bought these when visiting family about 5 years ago. We hope to go again this summer for a family celebration, so hopefully I can get a new pair like them at that time.