Mending Mishaps! aka Shortcuts Don't Always Work. Happy #NeedleworkMonday ;)

Last #NeedleworkMonday, @redbone had a great post about mending and I felt very inspired to tackle mending a favorite jacket of the Husband's. (A rather broad hint from the Husband may have had something to do with the inspiration, too. I don't blame him because I volunteered and made him all happy, and then I put it off.)

What needed mending was a hole in the back hem. Behold, the hole:

Behold, the guilty party:

Anyway, since that canvas fabric is so thick and heavy, I had had the bright idea to put a flannel binding across the back edge, and just cover up the whole hem, instead of trying to match and patch the hole alone. I got the Husband's approval on a flannel piece that I'd bought on impulse 5 years ago, I think with the ambitious idea of making pajama pants that never happened. I measured the hem and doubled the width measurement mentally (anybody already see where I screwed up?). Ironed the fabric, cursed it while trying to straighten the grainline so the plaid lines wouldn't be wobbly, marked it, and cut it out. I even got as far as ironing the edges in, folding it in half and pressing it...

...before realizing I'd goofed. I should've doubled that width measurement twice in order to have double binding wide enough to wrap around to the back of the hem. As double binding, this was only half the width I needed. Now what? Wing it with a "single binding" (is that even a thing?), or cut another piece? I hate wasting fabric, and there was just enough left on that flannel piece to use on the back of a lap blanket. I decided a single layer of fabric would suffice. (Mistake #2.)

Naturally, my distractions helpers (I'm kidding, I really do like having them hang out with me) had taken all of 2 minutes to hunt me down and install themselves close at hand.

Colorful spools of thread never get old. I remember getting as much endless entertainment from sorting through my mom's collection of embroidery thread.

Playing with a little farmer figurine

I serged one edge of the flannel, and then sewed the other edge to the outside of the jacket. So far, so good. Then I tried to fold it around to the back...uh oh. I should have allowed for the thickness of the canvas when measuring, because I couldn't get the edge of the flannel to stretch as far as the stitching line. You know how sometimes you get this fatalistic feeling that things just are NOT going to go your way?

My stubbornness rose to the occasion and told me that I could make this work.

Hmm. Let's see, either I can pick out the stitches and try again, or I can stretch the flannel as far as I can and try doing a zigzag stitch to catch that edge. Yep, I'll do that. Anything to avoid breaking out the seam ripper. At this point I should have realized I was making a series of mistakes thanks to attempting shortcuts, but nope, I just had to find it out the hard way. I got done sewing and admired the tidy outside edge:

And then I flipped the jacket over.

GAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Time for the white flag of surrender, and to break out the seam ripper. It's a good thing they don't measure mileage because boy, has mine done a whole lot of picking out stitches.

Best gift idea for anybody who sews: a full size, super nice quality seam ripper. You might as well revel in a tad bit of luxury while sulking over whatever you messed up.

I packed away all evidence of my failed mending mission, and decided to soothe my soul by embarking on another set of placemats. I should mention that this entire time, the Husband had been kicked back and watching the Masters on TV. I hadn't gotten five minutes into sewing patchwork squares together when he moseyed along and said, "I thought you were going to fix my jacket!"

I'm sure you can appropriately imagine my inner reaction. But I kept my response civil and informed him that I had in fact been wrestling with his jacket for quite some time. This whole time since lunch! Being a smart man, he recognized when to drop the subject, hahaha.

So his jacket is still draped over a chair in my sewing room. Meanwhile, I have 3 of these placemats done, and am nearly finished with the fourth. Then I'll make a matching trivet as a bonus :) I'm amazed by how much more streamlined they seem when I don't put binding on the edges; it changes up the whole feel as well as the look.

Each placemat has a different arrangement to the squares, but they each have 6 chickens :)

Reverse sides!

Definitely feeling better after accomplishing something, and lessons learned for next time! Happy #NeedleworkMonday everyone!!