2021 Fashion On The Ration Challenge

diminua

I'm another one who doesn't wear tights or stockings - it has to be very warm before I even think about a skirt - but I'd come down on the side of encouraging natural fibres that can be mended. Could we assume the individual without links to the armed forces has a kindly relative somewhere who sends them decent stockings for Christmas? 

PipneyJane

thriftwizard said:

Re the wool/acrylic/nylon issue: there's a world of difference between cheap & cheerful acrylic yarn, and, say, a posh hand-dyed silk/cotton blend! I can see that it'd be a nightmare to set a "cost" for each potential type, not to mention the everlasting debate as to whether it's actually "wool" if it didn't come off a sheep, (think alpaca, yak, camel, qiviut for example) but surely we need some way of differentiating the easily available fibres from the luxury ones in terms of coupons? Perhaps based on actual cost?

Hmmm.....Perhaps we should flip the costs to strengthen our green credentials, i.e. Natural Fibres are 2 coupons per 50g, acrylics 4 coupons?  We can define "acrylic" as something that is more than 50% man-made fibre.

Luxury fibres are self-limiting because of they cost a lot to purchase so most people ration them automatically.  For example, I couldn't afford the money to blow 6-10 coupons on bison or qiviut for a jumper.  2 coupons on one precious skein for a neck-warmer?  Maybe.

- Pip

Cherryfudge

I don't wear nylons either so I can see it's a bit unfair on those whose work dress code makes it necessary - though I think there have been news stories about people challenging work dress codes in the far east, and probably here as well.

@PipneyJane, I like your thinking. After all one of current battle lines is the environment so a higher coupon rate for artificial fibres could be justified as helping the war effort. I will happily go with the general drift though.

Baileys_Babe

PipneyJane said:

thriftwizard said:

Re the wool/acrylic/nylon issue: there's a world of difference between cheap & cheerful acrylic yarn, and, say, a posh hand-dyed silk/cotton blend! I can see that it'd be a nightmare to set a "cost" for each potential type, not to mention the everlasting debate as to whether it's actually "wool" if it didn't come off a sheep, (think alpaca, yak, camel, qiviut for example) but surely we need some way of differentiating the easily available fibres from the luxury ones in terms of coupons? Perhaps based on actual cost?

Hmmm.....Perhaps we should flip the costs to strengthen our green credentials, i.e. Natural Fibres are 2 coupons per 50g, acrylics 4 coupons?  We can define "acrylic" as something that is more than 50% man-made fibre.

Luxury fibres are self-limiting because of they cost a lot to purchase so most people ration them automatically.  For example, I couldn't afford the money to blow 6-10 coupons on bison or qiviut for a jumper.  2 coupons on one precious skein for a neck-warmer?  Maybe.

- Pip

I support flipping the coupon cost for man-made and natural fibres, particularly as many of us will be trying to tread lighter on the environment. 

florianatwobob

Happy to flip the coupons too

PipneyJane

Baileys_Babe said:

PipneyJane said:

thriftwizard said:

Re the wool/acrylic/nylon issue: there's a world of difference between cheap & cheerful acrylic yarn, and, say, a posh hand-dyed silk/cotton blend! I can see that it'd be a nightmare to set a "cost" for each potential type, not to mention the everlasting debate as to whether it's actually "wool" if it didn't come off a sheep, (think alpaca, yak, camel, qiviut for example) but surely we need some way of differentiating the easily available fibres from the luxury ones in terms of coupons? Perhaps based on actual cost?

Hmmm.....Perhaps we should flip the costs to strengthen our green credentials, i.e. Natural Fibres are 2 coupons per 50g, acrylics 4 coupons?  We can define "acrylic" as something that is more than 50% man-made fibre.

Luxury fibres are self-limiting because of they cost a lot to purchase so most people ration them automatically.  For example, I couldn't afford the money to blow 6-10 coupons on bison or qiviut for a jumper.  2 coupons on one precious skein for a neck-warmer?  Maybe.

- Pip

I support flipping the coupon cost for man-made and natural fibres, particularly as many of us will be trying to tread lighter on the environment. 

Ok, we'll do that for next year.  

Meanwhile, I won't have to spend any coupons on my new handbag!  DH is buying it for me for Christmas.  Hexagona confirmed that they have an Amazon.co.uk store for sales in the UK and that the one I want (this one) is legitimate and comes from them.  Amazon just does the legwork, to enable them to get around the mess that is Brexit.

On the knitting front, having done the body, the sleeves and most of the yoke, I finally tried on my work-in-progress only to find that there was far too much fabric at the back.  There were at least three "gores" too many.  It hung all wrong.   Sadly, no photos.  I've frogged the yoke and the body and cast the body on again, this time with 8 gores on the back and 9 on the front, instead of 10 on each side.  That's 6 weeks knitting and 6 weeks procrastination wasted.  (I think I procrastinated at least as long as it took to knit the body - 4 weeks - and the yoke - 2 weeks.)

On the plus side, at least I got the sleeves right and the yoke shaping.   ETA Oh, and I've probably saved over a skein of yarn.

In other news, I may be a little slow at answering messages/responding to posts from now on.  Did I mention earlier in the year that my employer had been sold to another company?  Well, I finally got my new work laptop up and running today and I don't think I'm able to access my personal email on it, although my IT colleague reckons we were meant to be given "VIP Access to the Internet" to enable us to do so.  It just hasn't been rolled out yet.  (He came with us from the last company, so hasn't drunk the new one's Kool Aid.)  I haven't tried logging into MSE on it, yet.  There are a few other quirks with the damn thing, but at least it seems to be working now.

- Pip

TwibbleDee

@PipneyJane  One of the perks of my job is that I'm the one who would ask the IT company to block anything.  So far, nothing has been blocked.  If I don't bring up IT stuff, just about everybody else in my office is quite willing to assume it doesn't matter, if they think about it at all.

florianatwobob

TwibbleDee said:

@PipneyJane  One of the perks of my job is that I'm the one who would ask the IT company to block anything.  So far, nothing has been blocked.  If I don't bring up IT stuff, just about everybody else in my office is quite willing to assume it doesn't matter, if they think about it at all.

I used to work for an IT company. Someone in their wisdom blocked the website for the local pub. There was uproar. The website was swiftly whitelisted again! 

PipneyJane

TwibbleDee said:

@PipneyJane  One of the perks of my job is that I'm the one who would ask the IT company to block anything.  So far, nothing has been blocked.  If I don't bring up IT stuff, just about everybody else in my office is quite willing to assume it doesn't matter, if they think about it at all.

Some of this stuff is just plain stupid and petty.  Whoever designed our IT has also applied the same constraints to the guest wi-fi.  Our office is in a converted barn, in the middle of a field.  It is almost impossible to get a signal from a mobile phone network - I was shocked when DH called me last week and the call got through.  However, nobody can access their emails on their personal phones while using the company Wi-fi - they just don’t update - so don’t even think about catching up on things while you’re eating your lunch in the kitchen.

Another example:  I have a licence for certain software which I use in my job.  I am going to waste a large portion of my morning tomorrow, trying to get the full version installed on my machine.  I can open it in read-only format but the setup won’t let me log in.

Frankly, I am not impressed.  It would be unwise of me to say any more but I could rant for hours.

- Pip

Cherryfudge

PipneyJane said:

On the knitting front, having done the body, the sleeves and most of the yoke, I finally tried on my work-in-progress only to find that there was far too much fabric at the back.  There were at least three "gores" too many.  It hung all wrong.   Sadly, no photos.  I've frogged the yoke and the body and cast the body on again, this time with 8 gores on the back and 9 on the front, instead of 10 on each side.  That's 6 weeks knitting and 6 weeks procrastination wasted.  (I think I procrastinated at least as long as it took to knit the body - 4 weeks - and the yoke - 2 weeks.)

On the plus side, at least I got the sleeves right and the yoke shaping.   ETA Oh, and I've probably saved over a skein of yarn.

Massive sympathy over the knitting, @PipneyJane. Saving all that yarn and having the sleeves ready is some consolation, but having to take out all that work... that's awful. Hopefully it will knit up a little faster as you're so used to the pattern now, and by Christmas you'll be able to send photos.

Laptop sounds a nuisance too.