Stuff it!

[John Fenna]

OK - there are those out there who have this picture of me - hard bitten, steely eye, no compassion, no nonsense survivor of years out in the wilds, living in the wilderness, hard headed, hard hearted hero type...
Well it may come as a surprise that beneath the rugged exterior beats a heart of solid marshmallow!
Bear with me a moment...
Back in the good old days of the Western Frontier, flour sack and such were printed with clothing patterns so that the poor and afflicted could easily obtain the means to clothe themselves and their families. Not elegant - but functional! (No - you at the back - I was not there... I am not quite that old!)
OK now - my faithful old Bison Bushcraft Ventile SAS smock has come to the end of it's days as a functional and functioning garment. A sad fact but a fact none the less. The cuffs had been bound in leather, patches supported the button tapes and holes were appearing in every pocket corner. Cuts, tears and punctures had been repaired and still it kept out the worst of the weather...but then the stitch holes in the main seams got lonely and started to join up for company and I knew the time had come...
The old Bison had seen many a wood, hill, campfire and rainstorm and even in retirement from full time town and Bushcraft wear, it proudly kept rain, mud pig poo and chicken carp from me on the farm - but now it was a jacket only in its own mind, inertia and goodwill holding it in shape and together.
So what to do?
Burial with full honours?
A Viking funeral on a bushcraft pyre (lit by hand drill of course)?
What?
Which?
Then I had inspiration - I live in the Wilds of West Wales so the Wild West came to mind, with the garments made from sacks!
Great blazing incandescent bulbs flashed on in my mind! Of course!
Devolve(a popular word in this part of the world) the process!
TURN THE GARMENT INTO SACKS!
So I did

Stuff sacks (hence the title of the thread) so my faithful old jacket can still come out in the woods with me for years to come .
For that "antique" look the drawcords are hand cut leather thongs with leather slider/locks while the smaller bits of rescued Ventile will be PRE-FADED patching material for my other (already fading) Ventile garments - no more glaringly new patches on MY gear - and the fade level of the patching fabric varies depending where the fabric came from Pocket linings and the yoke are not as faded as the sleeves for example.
The smock is dead - long live the smock!
For Bushy wear I will now be using either my Snupack/Westwinds smock or my Home Made Ventilish SAS Smock, for "Smart (it is all relative) wear, I will wear either my replacement Bison Bushcraft SAS smock (bought a while back when "Old Faithful" was showing signs of wear and stored for this very day) or my Home Made Waxed Cotton SAS smock...
For farm work I bought an MOD desert camo smock (brand new, never worn - charity shop - £10) until one of my other smocks gets past realistic wear...
So - if you have a moribund but much loved old smock - STUFF (sack) IT!
PS - I got a bottle of very nice Malt Whisky for my Valentines prezzie....

 

[Mesquite]

Nice recycling job John

 

[Toddy]

You know you could use the fabric as the inner for quilt-as-you-go blocks for a superb camping blanket ?

Neat upcycle though
I've got another shrunken pure wool Antarex pullover needing used up I think it would otherwise fit an 8year old

atb,
M

 

[Clouston98]

Good stuff John! Dead handy for organising your kit, good to see the fabric get used too

 

[Ogri the trog]

Long live the smock!

Ogri the trog

 

[John Fenna]

You know you could use the fabric as the inner for quilt-as-you-go blocks for a superb camping blanket ?

Neat upcycle though
I've got another shrunken pure wool Antarex pullover needing used up I think it would otherwise fit an 8year old

atb,
M

I had not thought of quilting - the traditional upcycle of worn out clothing - next time perhaps ... though quilting can be very fiddly and time consuming...

 

[Toddy]

Ah, but it doesn't need to be. Modern quilting is harking back to the old time stuff….use embroidery floss or fine crochet thread on pieces of old wool clothing, scraps from making stuff, and it's very appealling and very useful too

Inspiration ?

https://uk.pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=wool quilt&term_meta[]=wool|typed&term_meta[]=quilt|typed

and for hiding seams (I know this site's a bit 'pretty' but the principle's sound )
http://blog.betzwhite.com/2008/05/felted-seam-technique.html#.VOJiakuudNM

atb,
M

 

[John Fenna]

Ah, but it doesn't need to be. Modern quilting is harking back to the old time stuff….use embroidery floss or fine crochet thread on pieces of old wool clothing, scraps from making stuff, and it's very appealling and very useful too

Inspiration ?

https://uk.pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=wool quilt&term_meta[]=wool|typed&term_meta[]=quilt|typed

and for hiding seams (I know this site's a bit 'pretty' but the principle's sound )
http://blog.betzwhite.com/2008/05/felted-seam-technique.html#.VOJiakuudNM

atb,
M

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOh! I like both of those!

 

[Toddy]

Thought you might
It's a great way to use up all those wee offcuts that we end up with from sewing wool.
I cut them into regular sized pieces and bag them until I get around to using them up. I have a load to go to Tom soon, but if you'd like some different colours, let me know.
If Ian's right about the blooming redcoats there'll be masses of red available soon, and probably green and deep gold too since those are the trim colours on the uniforms.

M

 

[bilmo-p5]

Thank you for the links (esp. the 2nd), Mary.

 

[John Fenna]

Thought you might
It's a great way to use up all those wee offcuts that we end up with from sewing wool.
I cut them into regular sized pieces and bag them until I get around to using them up. I have a load to go to Tom soon, but if you'd like some different colours, let me know.
If Ian's right about the blooming redcoats there'll be masses of red available soon, and probably green and deep gold too since those are the trim colours on the uniforms.

M

I have masses of rovings... a whole binbag full...and more when I want it, from a local woollen mill. The care farm I work at use them for felt making with some of our day service participants. I "organised" the opportunity for the farm to have anything the mill is binning
Felted wool offcuts I do not have though as I made some sporran pouches out of all I had - and they sold very well! Tough stuff that thick felted wool!

 

[Toddy]

It is indeed I use it for the soles of my slippers

Any wool cloth will work for those blankets though, so long as you can stabilise the cut edge if necessary. zigzag is fine, the felting over the seam idea is excellent, double tramming stitching is traditional and very effective, or using one of the heavy multi headed felting needles all over the layers makes really sound cloth from loads of bits. Never mind buying an expensive felting board, just a pack of car wash sponges and use them underneath four for a pound was all I paid for the last set of those.

Felting needles need care; I joked with Eric that I reckoned I could loose about half a pint before I could get it back out if I got it wrong with my big brass one It takes 16 needles and it fair builds up muscles. I think I fancy one of those wee ones.

M