Using up old yarn - can anyone beat this?

When mil moved from a large house into a little flat when she was older and frailer we cleared out the house and came across a huge bag full of balls of wool she had left over from knitting baby clothes for our boys who are nearing 40 and also cones of single ply wool from when she used to wind her own wool in colour mixes to crochet blankets for everyone in the family . I told my husband that I would not throw it away and I'm now two thirds the way down it and have crocheted many many blankets for our caravan and camping family members.

I can't claim that I have used up old wool but this thread has reminded me that my mum use to buy skeins of wool and, as a child,I used to help her wind it into balls by stretching the skeins between my two hands. She was an amazing knitter and I still have the beautiful shawl that she knitted for my first born. My two daughters and son all wore it to their Christenings. I can knit but nothing like she used to do.

Another reminder here, my Mum would unwind older handknitted articles then I would sit with her in the kitchen and we’d wind the wool round the back of the kitchen chair to form skeins which we wet and then dunked into warm soapy water and drip dried and rewound into balls to be reused. The stretching and dunking would take a lot of the kinking out of the wool. I’ve worn many 2nd and 3rd hand knitted school cardis ?

Tanith, I was thinking just the other day of when it was cheaper to knit a school jumper than buy one. Ditto when it was cheaper for my mother to make our school summer dresses - from a prescribed Butterick pattern! - than to buy them. Who on earth would ever make a school summer dress now?
The long-gone days when most clothes were made in the UK rather than with much cheaper labour in China, Vietnam, etc. Anyone else remember the signs in M&S saying that over 99% of their goods were British made?

Back to using up yarn - I have lots of different coloured leftovers from a blanket I made when Gdd was on the way. I think I'll have to contrive another doll's blanket - when Gdd visits I have to find small hand towels for her to use as blankets for her babies!

I found a half-knitted jumper I was making for DD when she was about 7 (she's 36 now) and finished it to send off for a refugee child. However, before I posted it off DGD arrived with a flimsy summer dress on the other day and was cold playing outside. I found the jumper and she wore it for the afternoon .

Oh it's so lovely, going back to making these small things with love. My youngest GS was given a pram and I found twin 'babies' to fill it. Then had the pleasure of making blankets etc. Now my beautiful GGD visits and she also loves the 'babies' and their pram. Happy days.

DGD always strips the dolls (why?) and I always dress them again - in clothes that my mother knitted for DD's dollies over 40 years ago.
Actually, they are the same dolls!

Jalima my nearly 3 yr old DGD does the same, always strips their clothes off. She says it's because her babies are going to have a bath or they're having a poo. And yes, these are the dolls that belonged to her mum, dressed in clothes that I made nearly 40 years ago!
There used to be a big bag full of dolls clothes I'd made, but Heaven only knows what happened to them

Not wool but left over fabric from when I made dresses for the children who are now in their 30's. I used it up making sundresses for ' Little dresses for Africa' charity appeal. Very simple and very satisfying.

I have fabric which I bought to make the DD dresses (over 30 years ago) so perhaps making little dresses for Syrian refugees could be an idea, as long as they're fairly simple. I am not into sewing much these days.

The naked Sindies go driving around in their car Bathsheba
Or just wearing a mac

Jalima you're going to have to watch that one when she grows up

she keeps her own clothes on (mostly)

This is slightly different, it was my granny who used up pieces of fabric. She was a bit of an amateur dressmaker and in the 1950s the neighbours would ask her to make all sorts for them. Dresses, cushion covers..... Often using fabric from another garment. Granny would often be left with pieces/scraps of fabric that were saved up.

She had a pattern for a dress that was sleeveless and had a square neck, with a panel down the front. The scraps were used to make me my summer dresses.
I would have been about 8 years old.
One patterned fabric was used for the main part of the dress, another patterned fabric was used for the panel. Not much attention was paid to coordination of the colours or fabrics. Many's the dress I had that bore no relation to anything found in a dress shop. I recall a red check dress with an orange and green floral panel. In those days it was a case of needs must!!

I have been looking for a couple of dolls to dress, without much success, been on Amazon, E bay etc. nothing to my liking.

Do they have to be new, BillyBob? If not, might be worth trying charity shops.

I've now finished the hat and have started the multicolour blanket. Seed stitch borders and the odd 'stripe', garter stitch in between.
Still have to work out what to do with all the other oddments stuffed into a drawer. Some are chunky, so won't work with the bits of DK.

I have an unfinished blue sweater that my dear mum was knitting for my daughter. My daughter would have been about 6, she's now 42. She now has an 11 month son, so one day I will finish that sweater and give it to him. It's going to be something special from his great granny.

Talking of doll's clothes reminds me of my grandmother. She made me a beautiful set of doll's clothes when I was about 6 (71 now) and I still have them and the doll. There is a wedding dress and veil, black velvet trousers and a knitted pullover, sequined evening dresses and all sorts of lovely garments. I had two sons that wanted to play with diggers and spaceships and my only granddaughter lives in the USA so not enjoyed by anyone but me.

Ah, this thread has reminded me of school days when everyone had jumpers knitted out of real wool by their mothers. When it rained and we sat in the warm classrooms we smelt like a herd of sheep. Happy days.

Almost 5 years ago my Mum died. She wad always obsessed with cleaning. When we had to sort out her house we found boxes and boxes of cleaning products u used, my Mum called her stock. We found a few boxes of washing powder and a bottle of bleach had pre decimal stickers on. Mum used to buy more to replace what she used but did not rotate her stock. We did have a chuckle and my sister took it and used and said it was fine.

Oh Lilyflower yes, that smell of real wool in the rain! This thread is bringing back many happy memories. As for me, I have loads of bits of fabric that I will use ‘one day’ including some that I inherited from my granny. DGD is into sewing now so she may end up with it all ....

Do you remember the Rosebud dolls ? They were about 9 inches high and I used th knit their clothes from Women’s Weekly patterns on the thinnest needles and yarn.

Yes Gin, I have three Rosebud dolls.

I have loved dressing 2 x GD’s in some of my own DD’s gorgeous dresses that I have saved. I still have them in perfect condition for DD to pass down to her GC.