Buckles and velcro and zippers, oh, my!

 PIC

My latest Covid hiatus is on it's last day today. I have been out since mid November. Tomorrow morning at 4:30AM I will get up  and get back to work for 14 days then will be out again for almost three more weeks. Whenever the weather afforded it I was out walking or hiking or working outside. That has come to a stop as it is now so cold and raw. I have been sewing. Many things in my queue have been stitched and of course more await. However, if you are like me, there is a small corner of your sewing space with something that is always awaiting your loving touch and that is mending. I figured it would be a good time to get caught up on the pile but ignore it I did. I continued to delve into the "fun stuff", the items I longed to make and dreamed of all those working, rushing days. Eventually, as my queue lightened, I made a pledge to myself. You know my crazy pledges. I said, "Self, every time you finish a garment, you are going to grab one, JUST ONE, of those things off the mending pile and get it done before you move to the next exciting item in the queue." And I have. Most mending is pretty mundane but I have done a couple of things that I think would be fun to share. 

The first is a pair of ski pants. My kids have been skiing since they were little things. Here in New Hampshire, if you are in the early grades of grammar school, you learn to ski through school. It's hard to remember when they didn't ski and we lived, literally, five minutes from the local slope, a quite good one. Today, they and their families all ski, both downhill and cross country every weekend of the winter and quite into spring. DD passed on to me a pair of ski pants that no longer fit her. For my sewing friends who live in warmer climes, I'd like to share with you the miracle of modern engineering these pants actually are. They don't just keep you warm. They are made to be flexible, warm, comfortable, hold precious things safely, be easy to get in and out of as well as keep you dry. There is velcro, zippers, buckles, snaps, and things I don't even recognize on ski pants. The fabrics are high tech too. Let me give you a little tour and then show you the mend that intimidated me at the start but came out rather well. Above is the fly area. 

In this pic you can see everything is triple topstitched. There are metal loops connected to fabric loops connected to wider fabric loops so that when important things are connected to the loops they are not lost in the speed of the moment. There are closures as you can see on the top left that I don't recognize. There are rivets and there are zipper pockets inside of pockets with more zipper pulls with the ability to hang items off of themselves as well. You can also see the adjustable velcro waist. I know DD liked to snug these up tight when she wore them. 

Let's open up that velcro and fly to see what is inside. The waistband is all lined with a rather furry type of facing. Down below that is another layer of fuzzy type lining that goes against one's lower back and legs. You can see these are made by "Marker" and the sizes are clear for several languages, the only one of which I understand is USA size 10. Underneath this lower back flap which I assume is for warmth, you can see the entire pant is lined. 

The softer upper lining stops and the more nylon type of lining starts below the crotch.  Sorry for DD's lint issues. These are old pants. 

We've looked on the inside but what is REALLY inside these pants? If we open up those legs there is even more function happening. The outer fabric you see has a waterproof backing integrated into the outer shell fabric. Then there is a layer of poly batt functioning as an interlining to the pants lining for warmth,  busy place in there!

Let's move on down a bit more, to the spot where I have to do the big mend!

My job is to shorten these pants four inches so I can wear them myself. They also will be well washed when the mending is done so no judgements, please! What we have here is the outer pant. You can see the outseam is triple topstitched all the way down to the zipper. The zip and surrounding lining, interlining and shell all need to be shortened that four inches. Underneath that pant layer is another layer. It consisted of a different fabric that appears to have a black waterproof backing as well. The bottom is gathered into a casing that is topped by a stip of rubberized lines, the better to cling to one's ski boots and prevent any snow from getting through. It is snapped shut but also velcros as well. The outer pant zips down nice and snug over this inner moisture preventer. 

I marked the cut line of the hem edge and ripped out the zipper stitches with my favorite seam rippper all the way down. The top of the zip was left in place. I cut the zip and the hem off at the cut line that you can see marked. I pinked that edge. The ends of the zip were folded back into the hem space. The hem was triple zigzagged into place and the zipper was topstitched into it's old home, just shorter. Now on to the underpant.

For this I went to my classic method for shortening jeans. It is the one where you fold the jean up half the desired length of the shortening. So if you want to shorten the jean 2 inches, you fold it up one inch. Here I needed to shorten the inner hem four inches so I folded it up 2 inches and pinned that in place. As in the jeans, I then sewed right up to the original hem business. Here it is the button tab and rubberized strip. Again I used the triple zigzag. I then pinked off the excess four inches. Done!

Done!

One inner pant leg done!

One pair of ski pants, washed, mended and ready to wear this season. Are you as exhausted as I am? Pardon the crazy wrinkles and waves in a lot of these pics. I had to really over do the contrast to make things visible on the black. The pants are quite lovely now that all that detritis from  DD's years of use has been removed. I will be warm and cuddly and ready for our 3 days of supper cold hitting Wednesday. Back to regular sewing and enough of the Mending Pledge for now. I do have another biggy for you  but enough already...........................Bunny