The fabric of my career includes earlier work with the Rural Press Club network which is a great forum to discuss how farming and agriculture feeds into the health of society.

While the specific topic of this morning’s RPC breakfast at Tattersalls was rural health services, I loved catching up with Margie Milgate about her ideas around bush paleo and paleo agriculture – doubly so after watching The Men Who Made Us Fat on ABC TV last night.

We can learn a lot by reflecting on where we’ve come from, how things used to work and complementing modern-day practices with practical old-fashioned solutions –  because almost everything old seems to eventually become new again. 

A stitch in time saves nine so they say and there was some delight for me to discover the mending business Doree in Tattersalls Arcade with its 1934 advertisement which says: “My dear, everyone knows the way to save clothing coupons and money is to send your clothing to be invisibly mended, darned, altered and generally repaired by Doree.”   See photos below, which include me wearing Sew 147 and Sew 148.

Another day another upcycle with Sew 157, which is a History Skirt doubling as a poncho when worn with a hand-knitted scarf as a neck warmer. I made this particular skirt from unworn jumpers – with eight panels being stitched together to form circle. I used the bottom of a maroon jumper to form an elastic waistband and cut the rest of maroon jumper into strips which created the hem trim. I’m looking forward to travelling to Central Queensland next weekend for a two-day History Skirt workshop sponsored by Biloela Arts Council.