The glory of hem tape…OK, so they call it “Fabric Fuse Tape,” but I call it hem tape, because that’s what I use it for.

I’m on a college parents Facebook page. It’s a page on which parents of students at my daughter’s future college can post about different things. Sometimes…occasionally…I get helpful information. I also see lots of ridiculous posts where parents are looking for roommates for their kids or trying to do other things for their kids that they should be doing themselves. It can become quite comical. But recently, someone posted that her daughter needed to know where she could get a long formal dress hemmed within 24 hours. Good luck with that. If she had Fabric Fuse Tape, she wouldn’t be in a panic.

One thing that will definitely be in my daughter’s “emergency kit” (not her first aid kit, but the kit with safety pins, extra buttons, rubber bands, etc) will be hem tape. And before we take her to college, I plan to make sure she knows how to use it. Call it trashy. Call it cheap. But hem tape has saved me on more than one occasion, so we keep it in our house all the time.

What is hem tape, you ask? It’s special double-sided fabric tape you can use to hem clothing items. Since I’m 5’2″ on a tall day, I have to hem pants on the regular, and if I don’t have time to take them to the alterations place, I do them myself…with hem tape. The kind I use (link shared at end) comes straight from Amazon. When I need to hem an item, I turn it inside out and fold it where it needs to be hemmed. Then, I cut two-inch sections of hem tape and apply them one by one around the inside of the new hem, pressing them firmly in place with my hand/fingers as I go. No ironing needed…just firm pressing…and it holds. It’s no joke. I have “hemmed” a pair of pants in less that ten minutes when I needed to get out the door. It works even through washes.

A couple of weeks ago, our daughter had her Sadie Hawkins Dance at school. She had purchased a lovely dress that crossed at the hem in front. It was a short dress, so if the crossed hem opened while she was walking or sitting, it would have been indecent. She asked if she should pin it with a safety pin, and I said, “No. I have the perfect thing.” I got out the hem tape and cut a short tape. She was already wearing the dress, so it was easy to figure out where to place the tape. We held the two pieces of fabric together and placed the hem tape strategically…and she didn’t have any issues with it the entire evening. No, it will likely never detach, but it’s not an issue, because she can get into and out of the dress with it there.

I have lots of pants of different weights on which I have used hem tape. Heavy denim fabric? Check. Lightweight fabrics? Check. And i’ve used it when jeans came with frayed hems I didn’t like. Just fold under and apply hem tape…it will hold indefinitely.

So yes, we have hem tape all over the place at our house…in my bathroom drawer…in “the” kitchen drawer (you know, the one with all the paper clips, safety pins, thermometer, etc). I had never used it before a few years ago when I ordered it. I had gone to the alterations place at prom time, and the line was out the door. I didn’t have time to wait, so while I sat in my car contemplating what to do, I looked on Amazon and placed my first order for hem tape. It totally saved us.

So yes, I have it on the list of necessary items in the college emergency kit…and I think it should be a staple in any home.

To order your Fabric Fuse Tape (hem tape to me) from Amazon, click here.