Does anyone do mending anymore?
Someone wondered what one of the props was on an old TV show. She thought it was a light bulb. “It’s a darning egg,” someone else said.
Of course — a darning egg. A wooden oblong form to jam into a sock to have something to stitch over when you’re mending a heel or toe. In use 1905.
But we don’t mend much after supper by the fire anymore. I buy new socks and use the holey ones for dust rags. When I lose a button off a shirt, it goes on top of my sewing basket for a few months. When pants have shrunk up and their hem needs to be let out, I hang them up and forget about them. And if jeans have a small rip, in today’s fashion world, all the better. Most everyone hopes it will get bigger instead of hiding it until it can be fixed.
The rule is, for sewing on a button, use two threads; for a hem, a single. When darning a sock (or jeans like the cute example above), stitch a row of parallel thread or yarn across the hole, and weave another row at a right angle, just like those placemats in elementary school.
It’s just not like it used to be. Thimbles are much smaller now (Was anyone else ticked off when they took that token off Monopoly?) and they make the holes in needles so hard to find. Manufacturers of sewing supplies must be responsible. It couldn’t be me.
The Amazing Bird Collection 
Bring back the thimble. Monopoly players of the world, unite!!
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Right on!
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