2019 Fashion on the Ration Challenge

PollyWollyDoodle

PipneyJane wrote: »

Excellent tip, Polly. Where did you do the course? (I'd love to do one myself.).

It was The Thrifty Stitcher , but I am not sure she's running this course any more. This is where I also learned a brilliant trick for turning up jeans or sleeves by taking a tuck in the fabric so you retain the finished edge.

Laura_Elsewhere

PollyWollyDoodle wrote: »

It was The Thrifty Stitcher , but I am not sure she's running this course any more. This is where I also learned a brilliant trick for turning up jeans or sleeves by taking a tuck in the fabric so you retain the finished edge.

And it often looks better if you lengthen sleeves, trousers or a straight skirt by adding one or more contrast bands of different colour of texture a couple of inches up, so you retain the original edge (more difficult on a flared skirt as the hem needs to become wider if it is lower down, but fine on a straight or near-straight tube).

I didn't know turning inside out and pinning a taking-in wasn't how everyone else already did it... maybe one of the advantages of rarely using bought patterns to make my clothes, that I don't know how many things I'm not supposed to do, so I just go ahead and do them?

PollyWollyDoodle

I've always said you are a bit of an expert on these things, Laura! I learnt to make clothes from my mum but I don't remember doing alterations.

I think there are a lot of things in life that, if you've always done them, you don't think are difficult. Inserting a zip holds no terrors for me, and I have always thought eclairs are easy because my mum used to turn out a batch on a Sunday morning while cooking lunch .... you can scare yourself off doing things because you think they're going to be hard.

Edited to add: That will be why the sofa cushions I began three months ago are still waiting to be finished ...

Laura_Elsewhere

I wouldn't say I'm an expert but then I've seen the disasters

I just had a fairly unsupervised teenage era with a hand-cranked sewing-machine and several fabric shops... I made some fairly bizarre outfits, with great enjoyment, many of which fell apart on every occasion - I always carried a couple of needles ready-threaded with the right colour, as well as pins and safety-pins!
Gradually I accepted it was easier to make something with a bit more attention to detail in the first place, rather than endlessly repairing it because I'd not bothered to have wide-enough seam allowances on a very-fraying fabric, or whatever.

But yes, it helps a lot if you don't realise you can't do things - I always thought I was dreadful at pastry because my mother was so famed for her feather-light pastry. Actually it turns out I am quite good at pastry - I just use different methods from hers...

PollyWollyDoodle

So how are others getting on with plans to change their wardrobe?

After I'd culled quite a few items, I had a shopping spree on Friday. I managed to get a linen jacket, two pairs of black work trousers, two blouses and two T-shirts all for under £25 and NO coupons! I've also bought a denim skirt and another linen jacket on fleabay, again coupon free. It's unusual for me to buy so many clothes in one go, but the wardrobe really needed a bit of a boost, and the shirts and one of the T-shirts are patterned, rather than the plain solid colours I usually go for. I'm still not sure what I want my 'new' look to be, but I've got an awful lot of black and grey, time to brighten things up.

I'm going to sit down and have a really good look at what I need for the rest of the year, I still have some sewing ambitions when time permits.

Laura_Elsewhere

I've got several trips in October to my parents', and their local shops have a dozen good charity shops along about a mile, so maybe I'll have a think about specific things to go systematically hunting for then...

I've decided - before I've quite finished making it! - to dye my green linen skirt black.

1 - my black linen skirt looks much better since I changed the pockets but it still doesn't look great.
2 - the shape of the green skirt is really lovely - it's a full circle, and properly mid-calf length, with large pockets and front-buttoning

When you add that the green linen, which was a thoughtful and kind present, is actually really quite low-quality and so when I washed it initially, the fabric acquired hundreds of irregular lines across and across it at all angles, where it folded in the wash and the cheap fibres broke. The dye comes off those more, and so I've got an olive-green skirt that looks like I slept in it, and it just makes it look a bit... military... as in, at the end of a long campaign!!!

It will still acquire pale lines after dyeing it black, but they'll look less obvious and less bad. The shiny bits, also irregular, will look less bad on black too.

So I shall finish making it and wear it next week when I have a few days away working (and get a photo or two taken to send the kind-hearted friend who gave me the linen), and then machine-dye it black, change the buttons to something that works with black, and I'll just hand-oversew the buttonholes which are in pale pink which works with the buttons with pink flowers and green leaves on the green linen but won't look right on black. I'm doing all the hem and pocket sewing in dark 100% cotton thread which will dye with the linen.

I'll end up with a nice long, full black linen skirt, fine alone for summer or with petticoats for winter. It won't last forever, but since I was given the linen and have done the work, it makes sense to spend an extra 12 quid on two lots of dye and have a skirt I'll wear.

Laura_Elsewhere

Also, I've been so busy trying to get the preparation done for the paid work later this week, and having to clear the flat for visitors while I'm away, and trying to finish making that skirt (done except pockets!), that I realised today I haven't lined up any socialising while I'm back at my parents for 6 days.... so I've decided to treat it as a holiday - go for long walks, read fiction, knit, crochet, and maybe explore some of my packed-away stuff so I find out what clothing I do or don't have there that I might retrieve for use.... who remembers last autumn's visit when my parents produced the pair of 1991 ankle-boots which are now my handy wet-weather boots, and the jumper that was the last thing my Gran ever knitted me? I wonder what else might lurk there...

And a lot of time for making lists and plans.... one of my very very very favourite things to do... lots of clothes-planning, and rationalising, and working out what I never wear and what I should get rid of.

Also, I've lost 10 lbs in the last 10 weeks. Close to a hundred still to go, but it's a start...

PipneyJane

Laura_Elsewhere wrote: »

Also, I've been so busy trying to get the preparation done for the paid work later this week, and having to clear the flat for visitors while I'm away, and trying to finish making that skirt (done except pockets!), that I realised today I haven't lined up any socialising while I'm back at my parents for 6 days.... so I've decided to treat it as a holiday - go for long walks, read fiction, knit, crochet, and maybe explore some of my packed-away stuff so I find out what clothing I do or don't have there that I might retrieve for use.... who remembers last autumn's visit when my parents produced the pair of 1991 ankle-boots which are now my handy wet-weather boots, and the jumper that was the last thing my Gran ever knitted me? I wonder what else might lurk there...

And a lot of time for making lists and plans.... one of my very very very favourite things to do... lots of clothes-planning, and rationalising, and working out what I never wear and what I should get rid of.

Also, I've lost 10 lbs in the last 10 weeks. Close to a hundred still to go, but it's a start...

Ooohhh..... Good luck with mining the storage cupboards. I hope you strike gold! Have a good trip back to your parents.

Also, well done with the weight loss. I appreciate how hard it can be - I've been fighting the weight war for a very long time - and how discouraging when you do lose weight but don't see any results. ("What do you mean, I'm still the same dress size? I've lost nearly a stone!" That was me, a few years ago.)

In my news, I have some knitting to share. For anyone who doubts that you can possibly knit a lady's jumper from 4 coupons-worth of wool, this is how far a 100g skein of 4-ply gets when knitted in the round on 3mm needles:



There's 286 stitches on that needle and the first ball went for just under 11 inches plus the 6x6 inch swatch*. This is my Hand Knit Charm sweater, started on 28th June.

- Pip



* I gave up trying to get a photo showing the exact length. I'd have needed another pair of hands to do so, since the jumper would not lie flat on the floor.

Laura_Elsewhere

And for comparison, this took 115g of 4-ply-held-double and 160g of thin-DK, on 3.75s, knitted in the round And that's for a fairly large circumference of 17-stone me!
But 275g for a sleeveless pullover isn't bad...

PipneyJane

Laura_Elsewhere wrote: »

And for comparison, this took 115g of 4-ply-held-double and 160g of thin-DK, on 3.75s, knitted in the round And that's for a fairly large circumference of 17-stone me!
But 275g for a sleeveless pullover isn't bad...

It's a beautiful sweater and 275g is quite frugal.

What are you planning to take with you to knit at your folks? We're driving to Scotland tomorrow for the weekend and I'll be knitting during the journey. I'm really tempted to break the habit of a lifetime and take my knitting bag so that I can work on Hand Knit Charm throughout the trip.

I normally just take socks away with me and try not to lug too much yarn around. But that brings another problem - I'm half way through the foot of a second sock for DH so have to decide what to make with the remains of the skein when his sock runs out. (I bought 2, so the second skein will be in my case.) To my eyes, the yarn is too busy for cables or lace but I need something that will make the second pair of socks distinguishable from the first, since the second pair will be for me.



Not the best photo but you can see what I mean. I may fall back on Monkey Socks since I know the pattern by heart, but I think the design will be obscured by the yarn.

- Pip