Seam rippers are so useful! Just this week I was using mine to remove labels from new clothes for my children (they both have sensory processing issues which make Labels Next To Skin the Worst Thing Ever).
As I was on the last one I had the bright idea that the older one could do it himself with some coaching, and it'd be a useful skill for him to have: just as I ran out of items to coach him on. Oh well, one or other of them will grow again soon.
I was just thinking, as I took apart these old garments, how glad I am that the trend in new garments seems to be to have the labels screen-printed on instead of being sewn in. I don't have particular issues, I just find them annoying. (Though, useful when dressing in the dark, as I often do, to tell front from back; hard to do that with screen-printed little labels.)
I was also thinking, as I wasted tons of time at work (well, I was working, so I could more or less consider having my hands occupied with the seam ripper) that seam-ripping apart serged seams on commercial garments is almost never actually worth the time, and I should be taking these apart with scissors and just be done with it. But that's something I'll have to really hone my standards on later, as I do this more (presumably)-- stuff like jeans is never worth seam-ripping, but homemade things with straight-stitched seams generally are.
The thing in the photo is a scarf I bought in Ireland in 1997 and the seam was a single line of stitching, all turned in on itself, so it was absolutely worth unpicking. Some areas of the fabric are sun-damaged and fragile, so I'll have to cut around them, but not having torn them all up trying to undo the seam is a big helpful start. But the flannel pajamas I spent all of yesterday on were probably not worth unpicking, I should have cut them, and will use scissors on the rest, and just discard the hems and waistbands and cut-up seams.
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Date: 2019-02-09 07:13 am (UTC)As I was on the last one I had the bright idea that the older one could do it himself with some coaching, and it'd be a useful skill for him to have: just as I ran out of items to coach him on. Oh well, one or other of them will grow again soon.
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Date: 2019-02-09 01:19 pm (UTC)I was also thinking, as I wasted tons of time at work (well, I was working, so I could more or less consider having my hands occupied with the seam ripper) that seam-ripping apart serged seams on commercial garments is almost never actually worth the time, and I should be taking these apart with scissors and just be done with it. But that's something I'll have to really hone my standards on later, as I do this more (presumably)-- stuff like jeans is never worth seam-ripping, but homemade things with straight-stitched seams generally are.
The thing in the photo is a scarf I bought in Ireland in 1997 and the seam was a single line of stitching, all turned in on itself, so it was absolutely worth unpicking. Some areas of the fabric are sun-damaged and fragile, so I'll have to cut around them, but not having torn them all up trying to undo the seam is a big helpful start.
But the flannel pajamas I spent all of yesterday on were probably not worth unpicking, I should have cut them, and will use scissors on the rest, and just discard the hems and waistbands and cut-up seams.