Know when to fix 'em, know when to nix 'em

One of the most basic problems of the ecofrugal life is that nothing lasts forever. No matter how much effort you make to choose things that will last—clothing, shoes, products for your home—they'll still wear out eventually. At some point, you always find yourself facing the same old dilemma: Can I make this last a little bit longer, or is it time to give in and replace it?

Unfortunately, there's no simple rule to answer that question. There are a few general principles that can help you decide, but mostly, you have to tackle the problem on a case-by-case basis. Just in this past week, I've faced this same question three times, and I came up with three different answers: one yes, one no, and one maybe.

Case #1: The worn-out trousers

About two years ago, I reported with pride on how I'd managed to take in the oversized waist on a new pair of pants with a piece of elastic. That repair has held up reasonably well, but unfortunately, the rest of the pants didn't. Within a year, they fell victim to the same ailment that affects all my pants eventually: severe wear in the thigh area, which is a lot harder to patch than a rip at the knee. I attempted to patch them with some grey fabric, and this kept them going for a while, but after another year, the patch itself had developed holes.

At this point, any normal person would have given up on the pants, but I just hated to let go of them right at the beginning of winter when they're the warmest pair I own. So I decided to take one more crack at fixing them by removing the old patches and sewing on new ones. This time I went with black fabric from a pair of fleece-lined leggings, putting the soft and comfy side facing in and the smooth side facing out. I hoped this new patch would be both more durable and less noticeable than the original one. 
I used the same method as before, cutting out two large squares that reached all the way from the crotch seam to the spot where the holes were. This allowed me to stitch them down against the existing seam on two sides, making the seams more secure and a little less noticeable. Then I just whip-stitched them into place around the other two sides. I also went around the edges of the hole on the other side and stitched them down against the patch, so they wouldn't flop around.

Well, I can't say yet how durable this fix will be, but I can say it already looks a lot less obtrusive than the previous set of patches. When I tried them on and showed the patched area to Brian, he said he could barely see it; the only reason he could even tell it was there was because I told him. So I have good reason to hope this repair will give me at least one more winter's worth of wear out of these cozy flannel pants before I have to discard them.


Case #2: The snapped-off toilet brush

You may recall how disappointed I was last year to discover that IKEA had stopped carrying refills for our old toilet brush. This was particularly irksome, because the money-saving and waste-preventing refills were the whole reason we'd bought this fancy toilet brush holder in the first place. We tried to tweak one of IKEA's new replacement heads to fit the handle, but it was too wobbly and eventually snapped off at a the handle joint.

However, since we had a second one of the replacement heads on hand, Brian decided to take another crack at fixing it. He inserted the new head into the handle, then reinforced it with some Sugru polymer adhesive to keep it from wobbling. We expected this to be a short-term fix, but to our surprise, the repaired brush actually held together pretty well, and we actually thought we might be able to make it work at least until the head wore out.

Unfortunately, this week we discovered the limits of this hack. After performing faithfully for about a year, this new brush finally snapped off right at the handle, just like its predecessor. And since we're all out of refills, there's no way to repair it again.

So at this point, our choices are: (1) Go back to IKEA, buy some more of these not-very-suitable refills, and attempt to MacGyver them into place yet again; (2) Go back to IKEA and buy one of their new toilet brush holders, which will work with the new refills, but won't work nearly as well with our bathroom; or (3) Just give up and buy a cheap disposable brush. Of these, I guess option 2 is probably the most likely to work, but I'm not exactly happy about it.

Case #3: The not-so-waterproof boots

About two years ago, I declared with great triumph that I'd finally found the perfect pair of winter boots: a good fit, leather-free, decent-looking, comfortable, warm, and dry. They were a bit expensive at $80, but I figured that was a good deal for a pair of boots that should "see me through the next several winters."

Fast-forward to the start of this winter, and I've discovered that these boots no longer keep out water the way they used to. A week or so ago I wore them outside on a rainy day, and although I did my best to avoid the deepest puddles, by the time I got home both boots were soaked right through—and it took several days for them to dry out fully.

At this point, I could have just dropped another $80 on a new pair, but it hardly seemed worth it if they were only going to last me through two winters. And it was frustrating having to toss them when they were still in basically good condition, with the uppers still intact and even a decent amount of tread left on the soles. As far as I could tell, the part that was letting in the water was the joint between the upper and the molded sole, and it seemed like there ought to be some way to patch that.

So I did a little hunting online and found this page that suggested two ways to deal with this kind of leak in a winter boot: either a urethane sealer or a natural wax-based product called Sno-Seal. The Sno-Seal seemed less hazardous to work with, and we actually happened to have an old tube of it on hand, but it also appeared to be designed specifically for leather boots; a few sites said that it could actually damage a a nylon boot like this one.

The product recommended most often for synthetic boots was called Aquaseal SR, so we headed out in search of a tube. We eventually managed to locate a similar product, Aquaseal FD, at Dick's Sporting Goods, and I headed home to try it out. I cleaned the boots carefully and applied the stuff kind of like caulk, squeezing out a bead along the seam and pressing it in with a gloved finger. So far I've done the insides of both boots; they'll need about 24 hours to cure, and then I'll do the same along the outsides.

So it's too early yet to say how well this fix will work. However, it only cost $8 to try it, and if it enables me to get even one more winter's worth of wear out of these boots, that will be enough to bring their cost down from $40 a year to less than $30. Plus, it will save me from having to go back to the drawing board looking for that elusive pair of truly durable winter boots that will actually fit both my feet and my lifestyle.