2021 Fashion On The Ration Challenge

Liverpool_Anne

Love the jumper Pip.
Running definitely not for me at the moment until they have worked out why I fainted while walking. It was 1of my challenges for 2021, the c25k but not on the horizon right now. I did try running a good few years ago as my xoh was a marathon runner, might still be for all I know lol, so I gave it a go. I hated every second of it but I did get up to running about 2 miles 3 times a week. I had decided to try it again using the weekly steps, repeating for several weeks if I felt like it, just to see if I could do it, I am very much older and less fit now though and I have had knee surgery so it would be a challenge lol.
Laura the petticoat sounds amazing, I love the idea of it being red but in our alternative world you would have had to "liberate" the fabric from a spiv lol.
On the coupon front I am going to have to get some new slippers soon. Honestly I have never spent so much time in slippers but I wear them all the time. This will be my second pair in less than a year and usually a pair of slippers will last me about 5 years, still I suppose it is saving my shoes lol.
Take care everyone in this beautiful but hazardous weather.

skogar

Polly - As Mrs CD said the famous red flannel petticoat is in the railway children where it is used to stop a train. Hence my previous cheeky comment that Laura would be well equipped if she needed to stop any trains heading for disaster. i do love the idea of a red petticoat though especially under a grey wool skirt - a bit of secret winter colour.

Fiwen - your dog coat looks great. Better than many commercial ones I've seen - some have a tendency to slide round when worn. As you've made if yourself you will have been able to make sure it fits nicely.

dolly84

Pip - your jumper looks very pretty, I'm quite tall and like longer length tops but if they are a bit shorter I put something underneath like a silky sleeveless blouse that is longer then they can ride up a bit but because it is a silky fabric the top layer will slide back down.

skogar - I cycle too and cold feet and ankles are a problem, I wear knee high ski socks under my cycling tights with another thinner pair of socks underneath those.  You can buy waterproof overshoes which will stop the cold air rushing into your shoes.

PipneyJane

fiwen30 said:

Late to the village, but hoping there’s room at the tea table?

Almost everything I own is secondhand, and so my wardrobe has been suffering with lockdown - both with decluttering and donating, and augmenting with ‘new’ things.

66 coupons seems like a handsome sum, when I’ve spent the last 7/10 months in ancient loungewear with varying amounts of emulsion paint on them, or pyjamas, and the other 3/10 months in retail work uniform! In the current climate it’s difficult to imagine ever going out and buying a new outfit, to go to some place that’s not the living room.

If I’m being honest, I could do with some ‘new’ non-COVID-everyday clothing, which isn’t holey jogging bottoms, but the lack of open charity and vintage shops rather puts me off the idea of buying brand new - from a frugal perspective, and an environmental one. eBay is a fickle mistress when it comes to buying clothes, one persons size 12 is not like the other. I do sew, but have never been happy to wear anything I make, and the materials often cost more than buying something manufactured, which I’d wear to pieces. I can knit you a rectangle in any size, but nothing else of note.

Do household textiles come out of our clothing coupons? Our new home needs at least 3 sets of curtains, and we could do with at least 1 new duvet set.

How about dog clothing for a medium-sized crossbreed? Our boy is rehabbing at the moment, and costing an arm and a leg. He’s already had 2 fancy coats this year (1 new, 1 mercifully secondhand and half price), though his third coat was handmade from a fleece blanket we never used, which was sacrificed to the sewing machine. The leftover fleece also made him a snuffle mat, and might even extend to a new cover for his bed, if I make it a patchwork affair.

Looking forward to seeing exactly what 66 coupons will get me this year, and how much I can make it cost in ££.

Welcome @fiwen30.   Yes, of course, there's room at the table.  Piece of cake?  I'm sure Scruffy will share the mat in front of the fire with your dog.  What's his name?  Why is he rehabilitating? 

Household linen isn't part of the challenge.  We'll just pretend that you suffered bomb damage and got the extra coupons from the Board of Trade.

- Pip

Laura_Elsewhere

PollyWollyDoodle said:

@Laura_Elsewhere I’m trying to think what the red flannel petticoat reminds me of - one in a book somewhere. It sounds lovely, 28 feet of ruffle, wow! 

It's the Railway Children - Bobbie takes off her red petticoat to wave to stop the train from ploughing into the landslide! 

And here's mine (without a landslide, or a train for that matter - but in the event of needing to stop a train, I'm sorted!)

Baileys_Babe

Lovely jumper @PipneyJane the pattern is beautiful, I prefer my tops longer as I don't like my kidneys getting cold, as my Grandma would say.

I'm another who won't be joining the running club, joints that bend the wrong way or give way when they feel like it. What I do need to do is increase my walking.

Your wool skirt with the red petticoat sounds wonderful both warm and stylish. In my mind, you can see the bottom of the petticoat below the hem of the skirt, is this accurate @Laura_Elsewhere or my flight of fantasy?

Laura_Elsewhere

@Baileys_Babe - my Gran used to say that too about anything I wore that was very short or skimpy - "you'll get a cold in your kidneys, my girl!"

This skirt just covers the petticoat, so you would only see it if I were climbing over a stile - I am considering turning the hem up just an inch, though, so it may yet become a little more visible! 

And it is SO WARM! 

Layers today were total overwrap, as my weather apps said -5C until after 9am, so I had a cashmere vest next the skin (present from late aunt about 15 years ago), a 70%silk-20%cotton-10%wool poloneck next (charity shop find, about 10 years ago), dark green cashmere jumper (quite old but very very good, eBay bargain a couple of years ago), and my Tiki cowl-neck over that (made last year using wool bought in 1987 and silk bought in late 1990s), with my ferret-edged waistcoat (gilet bought 20+ years ago in New Look edged with vile tatty fake-fur, so I requested family permission to cut up Gran's mink stole on ground that nobody was ever going to wear it; permission granted, mink added to gilet; subsequently several vets and gamekeepers have pointed out kindly to me that it is quite identifiably polecat-ferret, which makes me laugh like a row of drains as Gran was THE biggest snob and I know she wore her "mink stole" to various events with distant or foreign royalty...!!! Mink? Nah, bit of ol' ferret, luv... )
Under that, cotton leggings, over-the-knee woollen stockings, thin woollen socks, leather lace-up shoes and ice-studs; red flannelette petticoat and grey wool skirt. 

I was BOILING!!!!  

Cherryfudge

@fiwen30, your little dog is so sweet! Welcome to the thread.

@Laura_Elsewhere, I love that petticoat! (and the 'mink' stole ). I was sorting through some of my skirts this morning and realised a proper full petticoat needs to go on my 'when I get to sewing' list as fuller skirts work a lot better with a layer or several underneath. If any of you has ever read 'The Good Master' by Kate Seredy, the copy we had was most beautifully illustrated and the multiple layers of petticoats in traditional Hungarian costume, shown off to full advantage.

At present I am distracting myself with minor mends and a small craft project so large projects are on hold.

I don't want anyone feeling they have to justify not running, by the way. Lots of people can't or don't want to. I have all the enthusiasm of a convert - as I said on the 2020 thread somewhere, I learnt from an early age that 'I am rubbish at running', but started when I was 53 to lose a bit of weight and very unexpectedly discovered I love longer distances. (I'm not a sprinter but that's okay by me). Hence my raving about it. Walking is more sustainable, though - you don't have to think as much about warm-ups, stretches, nutrition, supportive bras, the right footwear etc. etc. And you get longer to look at the scenery.

SezzaF

Hello all
Hope you don't mind me joining in. I've been sitting in the corner of the hall for a while admiring all your makes and trying to see if I can break my dreadful black market habit and stick to my coupons. So far it's going well!
I had to pipe up today because I once had to stop the trains on a line that had been blocked and I did bemoan my lack of red flannel petticoat!

Laura_Elsewhere

SezzaF said:

Hello all
Hope you don't mind me joining in. I've been sitting in the corner of the hall for a while admiring all your makes and trying to see if I can break my dreadful black market habit and stick to my coupons. So far it's going well!
I had to pipe up today because I once had to stop the trains on a line that had been blocked and I did bemoan my lack of red flannel petticoat!

Welcome SezzaF - and oh wow, I am really startled that this still is A Thing That Could Happen!!!! 

I do have a fair bit left... a very kind dear friend saw me comment elseforum that I would love a red flannel petticoat and the next thing I knew FOUR enormous kingsize sheets arrived! We use one on the bed in winter, and I've left one still wrapped, one was used for this petticoat with some left over, and I've still got one with the excess dye washed out ready to cut up - I'm planning to make the dead simple long shirt which, made from linen, was worn right across Europe for hundreds of years, pretty much identical for men and women for much of that, maybe a wider lower section for women in some places and centuries, but basically it's two rectangles (front and back), with a slit for front-opening with ties, square gussets underarms, rectangles for sleeves, stroke-gathered into narrow cuff, and the back of he body stroke-gathered into narrow standing-band collar, with triangular gussets either side of neck. Dead easy, pretty rapid to make especially as I shall machine-sew all the long straight seams, and incredibly quick to 'cut' since it's almost entirely just torn along/across the grain! Zero-waste, as well...