Sustainable Sewing and Knitting
Sustainable sewing has been mentioned on several blogs lately, such as So Zo What Do You Know (http://sozowhatdoyouknow.blogspot.com). I find this topic very interesting since I have been thinking of how to do my small part of taking care of our planet for my kids and their generation. I have found an easy way to do my part while not feeling guilty about maintaining a stash of fabric. I live within an easy day's drive of S. R. Harris, which is a fabric outlet store that sells designer fabric at a discount. My theory is that they sell mill-end and surplus fabric to be able to sell at their amazing discounted prices. In addition to the prices, the quality of every bolt of fabric I have looked at was top-notch. I actually feel great about buying fabric now since I save money and I know that the items I sew will last as long as possible, while I help use the fabric that may otherwise be discarded. Who would have thought it would be so easy to be rewarded for using fabric that otherwise might not find a good home!
Although I live in the upper Midwest and am a very amateur knitter, my children and I grow cotton organically to spin into yarn. The cotton plants my children and I grew last year started and ended their lives indoors under a grow light, but they successfully produced enough cotton bolls to spin small skeins of yarn. I am still in the process of carding the cotton, but hope to spin it using a drop spindle soon.
When I looked around for cotton seeds, I was amazed at the variety of colors available in heirloom cotton plants. I chose the Erlene's Green and Arkansas Green Lint varieties, but I also want to try the Mississippi Brown. We also grew the typical Red Foliated White cotton. The seeds came from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (http://www.southernexposure.com) and Running Bug Farm (https://www.runningbugfarm.com). We are very happy with the seeds from both online stores! After carding the cotton and before spinning it, we have big ideas for dyeing it using wild plants from my parents' acreage.
We found many suggestions for natural pest control after noticing an aphid infestation on the cotton plants. The first approach we tried worked wonderfully. It consisted of several drops of dish soap in a squirt bottle that was filled with tap water. We rinsed the plants later in the day after spraying them with the soap solution so we did not do any damage to the plants. We will try fertilizing the soil with egg shells and epsom salt this year since cotton plants need good fertilization.
