2020 Fashion on the Ration Challenge

thriftwizard

Laura, I now have total skirt envy; that's a wonderful garment. Really useful & also rather becoming. In a similar vein, I keep trying to persuade His Nibs that he needs a Utilikilt or something similar, but he's resisting frantically. Don't know why; he's got the legs to wear one, and I could stop hauling round his cash, keys etc. in my shoulder bag.

Also not terribly domesticated here! I try, I really do, but somehow the chaos just leaks out & smothers every bare surface. 

TwibbleDee

The 13-year-old cunningly got out of making brownies...by dropping a lid down a sink drain.  She's in their bathroom with hubby, learning about P-traps and sink drains and figuring out why plumbers make so much money.

@Laura_Elsewhere, I want sausage rolls!  One of my favorite foods pre-GF was Li'l Smokies (baby sausages) wrapped in canned biscuit dough and baked.  Haven't had any good ones in AGES.

@PipneyJane, Thanks!  I'm currently taking a break while the brownies are baking.  People are starting to ask about lunch...I suppose we should probably heat that up at some point.

Laura_Elsewhere

thriftwizard said:

Laura, I now have total skirt envy; that's a wonderful garment. Really useful & also rather becoming. 

Thankyou! It couldn't really be any simpler, y'know. It's four quarter-circles with a little arc cut out of the right-angled corner, sewn together with three long seams, and buttoning strips sewn onto the fourth long join. Sew it onto a waistband 1" wide and an inch longer than your waist. The pockets are enormous squares sewn on top, with a box-pleat along the top edge (take a square; put it with a point down, diamond style; fold the top corner down so there's a straight edge, make a box-pleat in the middle so you end up with c.7" opening on a square about 11" square. Hem skirt. Wear skirt  

thriftwizard

Oooh, I wonder if I have any needlecord stashed away? Don't think so, but I might yet be lucky; I've just won "a good quantity of fabric remnants" at auction! One of those auctions where you go to "view" certain items, none of which are as good as you'd hoped, but then something else catches your eye; in this case a fairly vast stash of decent fabric, so I risked an online bid and won it just above the starting price. Something in there (or on the three part-rolls that come with it) will be suitable for a walking skirt... and coupon free!

ETA: I actually picked up a 1945-6 clothing ration book at the market today (whilst looking for gammon - as you do!) which still has some coupons left in it. I know that I'll be able to sell it on at a profit IF there's enough normality next year to do at least some of my "vintage" events, but it's an intriguing thing to have in any case!

Laura_Elsewhere

@thriftwizard, ooh nice win! It doesn't need to be 4 quarter-circles, of course - whatever your fabric will work with. I am happy with anything from 3/4-circle to full-circle - the one thing I would say is that if you plan to use the pockets to carry the kitchen sink and all, like I do, then belt-loops to wear a hefty belt with it are essential to stop it sagging inexorably under the weight as you trot home with your two pounds of foraged apples...  

thriftwizard

Just 2lbs, Laura?! And - only apples? What about the walnuts, hazelnuts, rosehips, elderberries & sloes all available on one of our regular walks? I generally have to carry several bags...

Laura_Elsewhere

Ooh you have walnuts?! Lucky you... no, we have at the last count 13 different fruits to pick, just on the usual local trips to supermarkets... on Thursday's walk we acquired a hat full of sloes which I had in yog later that evening, delicious... and I'll be packing up fat chestnuts to post to my mum and a friend - but this is a very small flat, with a smaller-than-normal fridge-freezer, so I can't bring in everything I could do. I did get about 9 pints of elderberry syrup made, to help keep respiratory infections at bay this winter more than ever... and some rosehip syrup... and I'll be making sloe jelly in a week or so (sloes in freezer)... but most of the best foraging weeks I wasn't picking as it was when My Intended was convalescent and I obviously can only carry one thing at a time in my head Now I have the time and energy to do some preserving, it's nearly all over... 

Liverpool_Anne

Hi all, I have finally joined this forum after following it for months. I am absolutely in awe of the skills you all have. I will not join in the challenge at this stage of the year but to be honest what with Sheilding and now going into a local semi lockdown I haven't had much chance to buy clothes etc. So far this year I have bought 1 pair of slippers, 3 pack of socks and a jumper reduced in the sale. I have also bought 1 ball of wool to knit a cardigan and hat for a colleague's new baby and a massive 6 balls of wool to crotchety a baby blanket for another colleague's expected grandson.  I used to knit a bit when I was younger, and crotchety. My Mum was a demon knitter specialising in Aran styles and helped me when I got stuck. She only did a little crotchety but allowed me to make various blankets from her left overs. I did also sew a bit, both on her machine and by hand. I have inherited her machine but sadly it is sitting in the loft waiting to be serviced while I am trying to get the house retirement ready, lots of work has been done but it was interrupted by the lockdown so the sewing will have to wait.  I have no stash of anything other than a few balls of random yarn that I bought just because I liked them and some small pieces of fabric that I got for free with a view to doing something crafty. I am into my last year teaching so expect to have time to do stuff soon and hopefully if this forum continues next year will be seeking advice from you all.

Cherryfudge

Hello and welcome @Liverpool_Anne I think 'a few balls of random yarn' qualifies as a stash.

I'm sorry to hear you have a local semi lockdown, but hopefully that will give you a safer area to live and work in (though it's so complicated with schools - how can you not be incontact with a lot of people?)

@Laura_Elsewhere , you have inspired me to go and see if there are any sloes left! There were plenty a few weeks ago and as I'm not needing any more sloe gin (honest), I didn't get any. However, I now need to try them in yogurt. Thanks for the idea!

As for me, I've added a drawstring to some leggings where the integral elastic was giving up, and now I'm attaching new elastic under the bra part of a vest top in the hope of giving it a longer life. No coupons spent, as mending doesn't count if I remember rightly.

PipneyJane

Afternoon All

Welcome, @Liverpool_Anne.  Please pull up a socially distant chair and join us around the wood fire stove in the (virtual) village hall.  You are Much Mending’s new “school mistress”.  There’s hot tea in the pot and today’s cake is honey cake, baked in honour of last month’s Jewish New Year, to sweeten the year to come.  The recipe says it will keep for a month, but I don’t know how, since there is never any left after a week.

We have ways of using up your stash, even if you only have odd balls of yarn.

@Cherryfudge, you are right.  Notions for mending or sewing are coupon free (elastic, thread, zips, etc).  Speaking of which.... I went a little mad in L!dl yesterday.  They had a small supply of knitting and sewing equipment. I ended up with 4 bamboo circular needles (4mm, 5mm, 6mm and 8mm), a packet of stitch markers and a pattern-tracing kit.  They also had “crochet kits” containing 3 balls of crochet cotton in assorted colours, but the colours weren’t to my taste so I ignored them.  £10.96 spent but no coupons.

@thriftwizard, when you start doing vintage fairs again, please post the details on here.  I would love to browse your stall and to say “hello”.

@Laura_Elsewhere, I am in awe of your foraging and industry.  

The only foraging I’ve done this year is harvest sloes from a bush at the end of our street, which came down in the high winds.  The sloes are in the freezer.  There’s probably enough for one 750ml bottle gin, so the other half of the bottle will have to wait until next year - or if I get lucky on a walk later this month.  My recipe is from www.Sloe.biz.  I quote:  “Buy a litre bottle of gin.  Drink half. Add 5oz of caster sugar to the bottle, then enough sloes to raise the level of the liquid into the bottle neck and seal.  Shake well, daily for 1 week then weekly for 3- 4 months.“. Sloe gin is a great way of using up gin that you don’t like, since the sloes mask the flavour of the gin and the sugar sweetens it up.  You can always use vodka instead.

- Pip