Mending travel pants

As usual, just as I was about to open the October meeting of the WES Group, I checked my phone for last minute apologies or messages, only to see, on the screen, a message from my friend Ken: I think we are close to "end of life treatment".

My heart almost stopped as I opened the message, to find it was accompanied by the photo on the left.  He was referring to his travel pants, which I have mended numerous times before!

End of life? The message took a few minutes off mine, but the trousers will continue for a while yet  if I have anything to do with it!

I picked them up last week after eating the very good Vegetable Bake with Sausages, that Ken had cooked (with many questions about temperature and timing). The next day I dug out some of the batik I have used before for the same purpose. Placing a large piece on the inside of the pants, I machined around the tear on the outside, then appliqué the piece down on the inside. The original orange cotton is too thin to patch the outside only.

I could then patch the outside with more of the batik fabric, matching the pattern to where I'd patched last time.

Unfortunately, there is wear and tear on other parts of the trousers as well, particularly the waist and the cuffs.

These took more thought, and a good deal of bias tape, which I happened to have in a reasonable colour match.

I added a bias tape edge to the cuffs, and triangles of batik to the seam, where the stitching was pulling apart and fraying.

The wear at the waist was a a bit more of a challenge, with three rows of elastic to contend with. However, the bias tape fitted neatly over each row of elastic, so I stitched it by hand over the front section of the waistband, which was the most worn. (top 2 sections on photo on left show before, bottom section shows fix).  Ken has suggested hanging the trousers on the wall as an exhibit. While I can go on adding batik patches to the whole of the original fabric until there is no more orange left, I admit the wear around the waist has me worried.

The current fix will suffice for a few more wears but I'm not sure how possible or effective it will be to cover the whole waistband should it continue to wear, which, of course, it will.

My granddaughters think this is a definite improvement on the original orange - but that I should teach Ken how to mend them himself!

I’m always up for a challenge, but that, I think, is beyond my skill level! 

Impossibilities? Certainly. Miracles ? Probably not.

Mending celana oranye untuk bepergian

I last mended these cotton pants back in March 2021. They belong to a friend who bought them in Indonesia a number of years ago and used them as comfortable pants to wear when travelling (celana untuk bepergian) - particularly on planes. When they split, I offered to mend them, using patches of Indonesian batik, of which I have plenty. 

They are now patchwork pants and keeping them going has become an amusement, challenge and narrative. With another long flight coming up in a couple of months, my friend discovered yet another split.

Of course it's mendable, say I. 

I raided my container of cotton off-cuts for a suitable piece to reinforce the inside of the tear.

The tear was against a pocket. It didn't take much to undo one pocket edge to place the patch underneath.

I  zigzagged around on the outside, then stitched down the edges on the inside. This won't be seen.

I could then place a patch on the outside to cover the mend. This time I used a piece of Dancing Spirit Brown from the Aboriginal Fabric Gallery in Alice Springs. It fitted with the colour scheme, and seemed appropriate. 

I'm invoking protection for the wearer, rather than protection of the pants!

It was an easy matter to stitch the pocket back down.

So the pants can keep travelling, and protecting their wearer. There's a way to go before the orange disappears and the orange travel pants become batik travel pants. When that happens it will be time to introduce orange patches. 

Salamat Jalan!

Fat Pants

I have quite a stash of fabric purchased over the years in Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand, mostly batik and ikat. I also have a couple of pieces from Africa, given to me by one of my daughters.  I always intended to make use of this fabric. Although in the past I have used it for cushions and tablecloths, I no longer have much use for furnishing fabric, and intended to use if for clothing. After a recent reorganisation of parts of my stash, I decided to make an effort to sew myself some fat pants for summer.

A friend, with a similar stash, was also keen, so I went in search of a pattern that we could both use. Spotlight were having a pattern sale - three patterns for $12, or $18.50 each!

I bought two patterns with possible elasticised pants  (one pyjamas!) and a third pattern of a top I might use one day.

I selected two pieces of Malaysian batik. The softer of these I think, belonged to my mother.  The other I bought from a beach seller in Bali.

These were both sarong lengths.


I added a piece of Indonesian batik, purchased by the metre in Denpasar.








The pieces I really wanted to make into something wearable were two from Africa, a gift from my daughter.

One is from Ghana

and the other from Morogoro, Tanzania. This one is a slightly heavier, more open weave - exceptional quality.



I began with the largest piece, the Indonesian length,  and the largest pattern - the pyjamas.
 Because I like to carry my phone in a secure pocket, the first thing I did was to design a pouch pocket and attach it to the front left-hand side front. This meant I was not going to confuse the front and the back - in the making or the wearing.



This first one became my first prototype. It was VERY large.


I then made the largest size in the second pattern. This was Prototype 2 - quite wearable, but a little snug.

I then made a pair using Prototype 1 with a few inches removed.

and another of Prototype 2 with a couple of inches added.

At this point my friends tried them on for size, to determine which one would best suit them. Like me, they chose Prototype 2 with a couple of inches added as their preference!

 I used it to make my final pair from the Tanzanian fabric. I didn't have enough for the waist band and got the good idea of using stretch fabric rather than elastic.  While it looks good, the waist needed bringing in further than I could stretch the band, so it also has elastic.






I then removed the elastic from the original pair and inserted a 2" tuck all the way around below the waistband. They are still baggy in the legs, but comfortable and wearable.








The African ones are the smartest and my favourites - but I'm going to enjoy wearing all of these in the coming Summer.

Sentinelle Cushion

For the last couple of months I have been working on some of my Dijanne Cevaal panels. I began with the Sentinelle - for the sheer enjoyment of doing it. When one of my granddaughters expressed enthusiasm for it as it emerged, I conceived the idea, first of making it for her, and then of making a 'Guardian' cushion for each of my grandchildren. This was helped along in conception by Esther Vigil, who has made an angel embroidery for each of her grand-children.


The term 'sentinelle' relates to the English term 'sentry'. It is someone standing guard, watching over, guarding.

I began this one with the halo. Given the shapes in the screenprint, I looked to see if I had any round beads and found a couple of packs of heart shaped ones almost the exact size I was looking for.

Having done that I needed bugle beads for the outer edge.






While I was buying these I found the large lozenge shaped mauve beads that fitted well with the other shapes on the cloak

From the beginning I had the notion of using shisha mirrors on the cloak. The circular motifs seemed to cry out for it.

I experimented with metallic thread to hold them in. Somewhat to my surprise, it worked quite well. It took a bit of time, and required working with a relatively short thread , but proved fun to do.

I worked the mirrors in first, then added the surrounding spokes and the lozenge beads.
















Because I was, at the same time, obsessed with Colcha embroidery and Colcha/Bokhara stitch, I used the stitch for some of the embroidery on the cloak. It worked well for the long folds - stitched on the diagonal rather than the full length of the fold.

For much of it I used chain stitch. I also ran some gimp down the edges of the folds. This was quite hard to keep tight, no matter how hard I tried. I tightened it several times.

I also worked out colours as I went - working from a general notion of the effect I wanted.



The metallic mirror surrounds worked the same way - I used two metallics in dark blue and bluey-red.



I filled the background in using a black synthetic with silver - very easy to use and providing some texture along the lines of the print








I also used a very fine copper metallic to outline the facial features and more bugle beads on the head band.








Here"s the finished panel, being blocked, ready to be mounted in batik. The blue of the panel is truer here than in previous photos.

Once again, I'm delighted with the batik - from Crissy at Batik Fabric Online.

Again, I worked a border in one of the Kantha edges from The Art of Kantha Embroidery, by Niaz Zarman.

Here she is, very crumpled, in all her splendour and, on the right, with continental pillow insert on Christmas Day.

In the next couple of weeks I will post the other three guardian cushions.

Dijanne Cevaal Figure 3: First Dragon Cushion Finish

 As the dragon panels were a little smaller than the two Medieval project pieces (queen and king) I had worked, I had chosen and purchased, from Batik Fabrics Online a piece of batik that was slightly smaller than the previous ones.  the batik was overprinted with interesting paisley patterns.

When the panel was finished I decided not to cut the batik to edge the panel, but to applique the panel to the background fabric. This however, required a transition fabric on which to mount the panel. A friend and I paid a visit to Riverlea Cottage Quilts on Unley Road, not far from me to enrol in a class for next year, and I took the panel along to find an edging fabric. Paige, who was in charge of the shop at the time found the perfect fabric - a blended stripe in gold-brown.

Once I had mounted it, my plans for another Kantha border melted away. The fabric dictated a different approach. I had been considering embroidering some of the paisleys on the batik fabric, but once I saw the mounted piece I decided to continue some of the paisleys into the border using embroidery.


It seemed to work. I had a bit of trouble finding thread that worked. Silk thread had the best texture but not the best colour match. I found an almost perfect colour variegation amongst the Embroiderers' Guild over-dyed thread collection, but it was a fairly course and heavy texture.

over-dyed thread

silk thread

In the end, a combination of the two, plus care not to overfill the border had me happy.



I made the cushion cover up using an overlap at the back. It is still fairly large but not enormous. It looks rich and sumptuous.




I don't have a cushion of the right size as yet and this may end up as a gift, so I have placed it, temporarily, on a cushion a little smaller than the cover.


I have another dragon and a Sentinelle to go in my Dijanne Cevaal binge!