Does anybody else make their own clothes or re-work thrift store  finds, or do stuff with outgrown kid's clothes?

My daughter loves fashion and we started off  with me showing her a simple seam and trying to help her bring her creations to life. But I'm just learning to sew myself.

 at Easter, Grandma is going to teach me some simple quilting. (I have five pairs of cordoroy girl's trousers), With one boy and one girl I don't get to do 'handmedowns' much.

I love bags and I want to make a nice tote for my knitting but I'm not sure where to start! 

There seems to be a big trend for recycled fashion (though of course 'vintage' and 'collectable' are big) but often there are nice fabrics in thrift store clothes that just need a bit of a tweak to look great. I'm not sure if my sewing skills are up to it though. 

 

I have reworked a lot of clothes in my time! When the kids were younger I used to take a day or two and just go through the stash of hand me downs or garage sale clothing and be as creative as possible with them. I've done it for myself, too, but didn't have much luck with my husband's things.

If you're looking for inexpensive material, don't overlook things like full skirts or bedding. Sometimes you can come across some really neat material like that.

I was looking around The Dollar Stretcher site (again, I know...) and I found this: Hand-Me-Down How-To's with some good ideas for kids clothes that I wish I'd thought of back then!

 

I love to take a pattern and make something new from it; for example, by changing a round neckline to a v-neckline. You'll have a lot of fun as you learn how to sew. Look on-line for "Free Sewing Patterns" and you'll be surprised how much is out there for the taking. super eggplant: tote bags 101 Here's a tote bag tutorial I found. There are many free tote bag patterns--it's an easy beginner project. Good luck and enjoy!

Oh, that's a nice example, thanks. I did a 'google' and found a great site that has links to dozens of great bag designs, some with patterns to print (a nice little clutch purse) and some with just simple rectangle shapes. I'm not too sure about interfacing - I bought some 'iron on' stuff - I gather it is to stiffen floppy fabric, right? And I also have some quilt batting... I need to go to the library today, so I think I'll find a really basic sewing book. You just can't beat a good book for stuff like that!

 Though I did find a fantastic knitting site called knittinghelp.com that has actual videos of the techniques, which is brilliant, as sometimes I find pictures hard to follow when you're trying to figure out which way to wrap the yarn. So that has helped my knitting immensely.

 I kicked myself yesterday - I was umming-and-ahhing over a gorgeous orange crochet tablecloth at the thrift store, but decided against it, and someone else nabbed it before I could change my mind. It was such a lovely thing, I'm sure I could have made it into a very trendy jacket - that sort of old-fashioned knit is really 'in'.

 
I have a huge stack of gorgeous, really beautiful furnishing fabrics that I got from a furniture store in town, outdated fabric swatches. There are about eight different colours with two designs - a stripe and a sort of brocade - in each, as well as a bunch of old-fashioned ticking and 'blue plate' style prints.

I recently became interested in this myself.  Our oldest daughter is sprouting up but her waist is still tiny so it's getting almost impossible to find pants/shorts/skirts that fit.  I found a couple of books (I look for a book for everything I need to know!):

Sew Subversive by Rannels, Alvarado, and Meng

Rip It! by Elissa Meyrich

Both of these were published in 2006 so they have newer style ideas, but they teach the basic steps so it can be applied to other designs.

I also came across a Better Homes and Gardens sewing guide from many years ago, but sewing is still sewing and it was only $3 so I grabbed it.  I've already been using it to learn some basic stuff.

Sheets (bedding) from thrift stores are the best yet for frugal sewing!  Only for major projects, like the coat I am making now, is it worth buying "real" fabric.  You have to look at the price that you'd pay in a store for the item, & make sure that the cost of your fabric & the notions (buttons, etc) is less than the store price.  In this case, I use prices from a store like Ross or Target, not thrift store prices for the clothing. 

 It doesn't seem worthwhile to me to borrow library books on sewing, because you won't have them around when you need to learn about a specific technique.  I scour thrift stores for sewing books.  I've never paid more than $3, & I have quite a nice library of them now.  An OLD edition of READER'S DIGEST COMPLETE GUIDE TO SEWING is the best book on the market -- & an OLD edition will be cheap.

 BTW, fusible interfacing is too expensive.  Just use regular (sew-in).  Sew a 1/4" seam of the interfacing & the piece which is to be interfaced.

 You can get cheap notions, interfacing, etc from 2 sister companies.  They are HOME-SEW (800) 344-4739, & NEWARK DRESSMAKING (800) 736-6783.  Phone for their catalogues.  Get on their online mailing lists, too.

 Yours in thrift, Deb 

I love doing this! I only buy name brand clothes at thrift stores and recently came across an almost new Baby Gap denim jumper in 4T (my daughters' size) that had 3 large initials monogramed across the chest.I bought it and brought it home.I made a paper pattern of a heart that would completely cover the monogram.I cut the heart out of a scrap of white rose textured chenille fabric then using a blanket stitch and hot pink embroidery floss appliqued it on.Then I outlined the raised rose pattern on the fabric with different shades of pinks and greens.I topped this off with a matching handmade hairbow.I like to keep up with the current trends in kids clothes by checking out the websites of clothes I really like (Gymboree,Lilly Pulitzer,Baily Boys) then keep an eye out the next time we go thrifting for something that can be embellished or changed around a little to look brand new and trendy.I find it's way cheaper to buy name brand stuff at thrift stores and snap up whatever little embellishments to stockpile than to buy a pattern,fabric and notions and sew from scratch.It's a lot faster and more fun (to me anyway) doing it this way.I also like to make matching hairbows for most of her outfits so she looks more pulled together.

I just saw a great technique on TV: REVERSE APLIQUE - you pin your aplique piece (eg a flower motif cut out from some 'vintage' thrift store curtain) face down on the inside (wrong side) of your item, then stitch around the outline several times using free-form stitching with the feed dogs down. Then you turn it over and cut off the fabric from the other side, leaving about and eighth inch or so to ravel back when it's washed. Brilliant.

 The designer then used tear-away interfacing to stitch a design on the front, joining on to the flower design. Just a single stitch so that the interfacing (also called stabilizer?) comes away clean. (I reckon that heavy tissue or tracing paper might work too?) - then after the interfacing is removed, stitched over the design. Looks amazing!
 

I do reenacting so I'm pretty adapt at period things but I do want to sew more modern things. However by the time you buy the fabric it's more expensive than the thrift store.

Dear baking23, If you can sew period clothing -- lucky you! -- contemporary clothes will be a snap for you!  (although zippers were not invented then, & some folks find them hard to sew -- another reason why a comprehensive reference book like READER'S DIGEST COMPLETE GUIDE TO SEWING (any edition, the older the cheaper) is such a help.  As to the fabric, sheeting that you find at a thrift store will do fine for cotton/polyester clothing.  Although some folks say that wide & long skirts are a source of (woolen) fabrics, they are pieced so that it would be very difficult to lay out a pattern & cut the pattern out.  Instead, I suggest that you find a woolen blanket at the thrift store.  (Acrylic is a nice substitute & is easier to find.)

Yours in thrift, Deb