Patching Jeans (not genes)

      No, they are not genetically modified, but they are jeanetically modified.

     They are my work jeans.  They have holes in the knees.  I know, I am perfectly in style wandering around the farm with my knees showing.

      I also am perfectly aware that when I kneel down to plant a seed or work on a piece of equipment, bare knees on bare ground isn’t always a pleasant meeting.  Think of pebbles below and body weigh above the kneecap.  Or thorns and stickers, or dried cedar needles.

    Thus, I look for ways to patch jeans.  My time-tested means left the earth over twenty years ago.  My mother, I mean.  She would sew on jean patches whenever I needed them.  She also would wrap glass gallon jugs with burlap, gunny sacks, too, but that’s beside the point right now.

     The Goodwife would occasionally patch a pair of jeans, but sometimes the pile of holey jeans got quite high before anything joined the patched pile.  So, I set out to patch jeans myself.

     I have never learned to operate a sewing machine.  I think I should learn that, but the time is never right to set out on that adventure.  Probably too frustrating for a guy who already cusses at broom handles that won’t stay put leaning against the wall.

     I tried iron-on patches.  They worked well until I washed the jeans.  Then, the edges commence to curl like a pig’s tale.  Quite annoying, not to mention dangerous, if a protruding patch should find itself in contact with a roller chain operating a part of a machine.

      In despair after two separate attempts to use iron-on patches.  I sent a batch of holey jeans to Goodwill.  Heaven only knows if I might have met a young lady wearing them in church.  I guess I would have had to gone to church in order to see that.  But you catch my drift.

     I also looked into fabric glue.  I knew enough about quilting to know that there are products out there that are supposed to hold two pieces of fabric together with glue.  When I asked the young lady in the quilt shop if she had any, she said they had nothing permanent, that what they had was just to hold things in place until you could stitch it more permanently.  Scratch that idea.

      The best ideas come from chance occurrences.  Several times a week, in fair weather, we stroll down the street enroute to the walkway around two separate lakes, or ponds if you are east of the Mississippi.  Our initial ”good day” greetings have, in a few cases, expanded into genuine conversations with some of the folk working in yard or garage along the way.

     Thus it was, I asked Mike, as I eyed the knee patches on his blue jeans, if he knew how to run a sewing machine.  Mike calls himself a garage rat.  We call him a fair-weather barometer.  If it’s a nice day, Mike’s garage door will be open, and as often as not, he will be doing something in his garage, like building a set of speaker boxes out of plywood.  He’s always willing to step out of his garage and shoot the breeze in the sunlight.

      Mike looked at me blankly and asked why I would ask if he could run a sewing machine.  I pointed out his patched knees.  He laughed and said, “Silicone.”

      “Silicone?” I asked.  Yes, silicone, plain old window and door stuff or bathtub and sink stuff that comes in a squeeze tube.  You cut the patch to fit and coat the edges with silicone and apply it to the holes in the pant legs of your jeans.  Let it set for a few days, and voila!  You have patched jeans.

      It took a while before I could attempt using silicone to patch my jeans.  When I did get to it, I thought  that in light of recent changes to my middle, such as having to move up from 32-inch waist to 33-inch waist, I had better choose carefully the jeans to patch.

     After my despairing cull job, the candidates were not particularly numerous.  Having selected a likely pair, I grabbed a tube of caulk designed for tub or shower.  I carefully applied the silicone around the holes in the pant leg and to the edges of the patch itself.  I carefully placed the patch into position with seams bordering the sides and centered over the failed jean fabric on the pants. 

     A few days later, as I checked the jeans, left on the cement of the basement floor, I found the caulk unset, still a jelly.  And still sticky.  I had a mess.

     While the caulk wouldn’t dry, it would spread to other surfaces and be rather hard to remove.  Faced with two choices, I decided to reclaim the project rather than trash-canning it.  My first stop was the trash basket where I recovered a few used paper towels and napkins.  Snotty Kleenex need not apply.  (You wouldn’t expect a person patching jeans to use new paper towels for a job like this would you?) 

     I managed to get most of the recalcitrant caulk off the jeans.  The granite kitchen counter cleaned up nicely.  (It’s probably fake granite, but it still cleaned up nicely.)

    I was ready to try, try, try again.  I had another old tube of silicone, but this time I determined to try its effectiveness before I applied it to the jeans.  I applied a shaft about two inches long to a near-to-hand 6-pack holder.  A day later, it had turned to rubber and adhered nicely to the cardboard.

    Onward with the experiment.  I re-applied silicone to around the knee holes and the edges of the patch.  I carefully aligned the patch between the seams and over the hole and returned the jeans to the basement cement floor where any leakage could be cleaned up and wouldn’t be forever in a carpet.

      Two days later, the patches were firmly affixed to the jeans.  But the experiment isn’t over.  The patches haven’t been subjected to numerous genuflections and kneelings.  Nor have they encountered clothes washer, dryer, or clothes line. 

 

     Later:  The patches weathered the work world well.  I got into a dispute with a couple of hydraulic hoses, resulting in dirty jeans, not to mention oily spots all over my glasses and additions to grease spots on my shirt.

     A trip through the washing machine was required.

 

     Ouch!  Back to the drawing board, or just ash-can it?  I need to talk with Mike again, to see if his patches weathered the washing machine.  

     Three possibilities:  1) The silicone was also old, even though it set up well.  2) I used window and door caulk.  Should it be the tub and shower variety?  3)  Change brands of caulk?  I used Ace Hardware variety.  Try another brand?  (GE need not apply.) 

     My apologies that there isn’t a better ending to this story.  Stay tuned!