2021 Fashion On The Ration Challenge

Laura_Elsewhere

@Liverpool_Anne hurrah that the medical thing has been done - enjoy the extra fruit and veg! 

I can't see why rubber car mats wouldn't work perfectly well. You might need to experiment a bit - possibly a one-piece might be too stiff to allow comfortable walking but you could always make them kind of 1/3 for the 'heel' and 2/3 for the 'sole' so your foot can flex more easily in the middle. OR you could make them slip-ons so your heel lifts up as you walk (although I'd worry about tripping or slipping in those). 
You could even do a pair of overshoes to keep by the back door that you just slip your house-slippered feet into to go outside? 

Liverpool_Anne

I have just seen one of the posters is thriftwizard I should have known and just asked here lol

CraftyLittleLisa

 @CraftyLittleLisa I like that t-shirt. Is it a stretch fabric? I’ve not worked with that much – it makes me nervous as I don’t have an overlocker to manage it.

SezzaF - I used viscose for this t-shirt and it was very simple to use.  I haven't done much in Jersey myself but I have got some I want to make into a dress.

CraftyLittleLisa

I have just caught up on all the rest now.  I have recently (last couple of years I suppose) turned pescatarian - I eat fish but no meat.  I didn't eat a lot before but I realised that when I was buying meat my shopping bill increased considerably.  I thought I would find it difficult but now I actually don't really like the smell of meat cooking or otherwise so I don't miss it at all.  I try to focus on a healthy diet and I also came across a sustainable diet for the planet on the BBC (a couple of years ago I think) and have tried to stick to that.  Its a lot of pulses and vegetables but has some meat in it as well.  I think it is called "The Planetary Diet".  I have felt a lot healthier since then. 

I don't think being vegan (no leather, no dairy, no meat) is really achievable for everyone so I just do what I can to do my bit.  I buy renewable energy, use the car as little as possible, buy as little as possible and just don't waste anything.  As individuals we can only do so much but that bit can help - I have recently influenced a consumerist friend so much she actually made another scratch post out of two old worn out ones for her cat instead of throwing them both away.  She messaged me this morning to say she had done it and that I was obviously having a positive influence on her.  I don't preach to her but she just knows about what I do when I talk to her and it makes her think.  Just think what a difference that makes if we can all just make one person think differently about their choices.

I haven't got any spends to report this week but this weekend I want to attempt to make a summer top out of some more remnants again.  I will see if it works.  After that the remnants that can be used will have been used up and then I can start thinking about the material selection I have in my craft cupboard and making outfits with it all. 

Have a good weekend all and stay warm.

Laura_Elsewhere

I think it's one of the things I most admire, and am in literal awe of, re women in wartime Britain - each of us can only do what we can do, hence why we all have different approaches to various environmental/ pollution/ waste topics even though almost by definition being in this group means you actively try not to waste "things"! 

But in the war they ALL had to do ALL of the things... I just don't know how they managed... and for years and years and they didn't know when it would end. We do, now, but at the time, February 6th 1945 must have held no real confident certainty about whether they'd see a sixth wartime Christmas... 

And we complain about lockdown?!?! 

Jings... 

MrsCD

Oohhhh another baby!  Are you going to make something for it, @MrsCD?  

- Pip

I don't know the couple at all, but I keep in touch with my cousin and his wife now and again. I might make a cot blanket for them once I've finished the meadow blanket that I'm working on at the moment. 

Cherryfudge

You all type so fast I'm having difficulty keeping up!

Village baby? Wonderful news! So lovely to have that to look forward to, and I can hear a steady whir of knitting needles coming into action...

Wedding dress: my sister made mine (meringue-style) on Mum's treadle sewing machine, and I decorated it with tiny pearl and gold beads. It's in a bag in the loft: it came out briefly to let my daughter dress up when she was about 12 so it's probably not been checked for 15 years.

Food: I eat a bit of everything but tend towards plant-based. Just feel it suits me very well and is better for the planet, environment etc.

I don't have much news: I found some stray knitting needles and fed them into my stash, realising that 40 pairs is a conservative estimate and I had better put some of them to work. My darning wool has arrived off t'internet so I may be able to save some long socks as the heels always go long before the rest.

And... I found 0xfam online sells wool and patterns. There go another couple of evenings...

Cherryfudge

Laura_Elsewhere said: in the war they ALL had to do ALL of the things... I just don't know how they managed... and for years and years and they didn't know when it would end. We do, now, but at the time, February 6th 1945 must have held no real confident certainty about whether they'd see a sixth wartime Christmas... 

And we complain about lockdown?!?! 

So true. I've found that 'remembering' the war (okay, so it finished 18 years before I was born, but I have my parents' stories of London in the Blitz and travels around the Middle East in uniform) has been a big help over the last year. We think of the war as '1939-1945' but the lived experience was 'This has been going on since 1939, someone is trying to blow us all up and make any survivors live under an oppressive regime, my sons are at the Front, I'm worn out from fire watching all last night AND we haven't got enough sugar for Dad's cuppa'. They didn't have an end date, and they didn't know how long they would have to make supplies stretch. A sobering thought.

I know many people have it a lot worse than I do: we bumble along from day to day, I still see my work colleagues and my son has already had Covid, without the more dangerous symptoms. We have two incomes, albeit less than they were. I can go to a well-stocked supermarket so long as I wear a mask - not even a gas mask! We all need a bit of reassurance sometimes, though, and thinking of the women of 1942 certainly gives me both perspective and hope. 'Once this is all over', as they say, we will still be left with the pressures we are putting the planet under: huge waste and pollution in terms of food thrown out and fabrics going into landfill, overuse of resources, mono-cultures destroying biodiversity etc., so the sooner we get ourselves clued up, I think, the better.

(Jumps off soap box, goes to put kettle on, using only the minimum water).

PipneyJane

Cherryfudge said:

Laura_Elsewhere said: in the war they ALL had to do ALL of the things... I just don't know how they managed... and for years and years and they didn't know when it would end. We do, now, but at the time, February 6th 1945 must have held no real confident certainty about whether they'd see a sixth wartime Christmas... 

And we complain about lockdown?!?! 

So true. I've found that 'remembering' the war (okay, so it finished 18 years before I was born, but I have my parents' stories of London in the Blitz and travels around the Middle East in uniform) has been a big help over the last year. We think of the war as '1939-1945' but the lived experience was 'This has been going on since 1939, someone is trying to blow us all up and make any survivors live under an oppressive regime, my sons are at the Front, I'm worn out from fire watching all last night AND we haven't got enough sugar for Dad's cuppa'. They didn't have an end date, and they didn't know how long they would have to make supplies stretch. A sobering thought.

I know many people have it a lot worse than I do: we bumble along from day to day, I still see my work colleagues and my son has already had Covid, without the more dangerous symptoms. We have two incomes, albeit less than they were. I can go to a well-stocked supermarket so long as I wear a mask - not even a gas mask! We all need a bit of reassurance sometimes, though, and thinking of the women of 1942 certainly gives me both perspective and hope. 'Once this is all over', as they say, we will still be left with the pressures we are putting the planet under: huge waste and pollution in terms of food thrown out and fabrics going into landfill, overuse of resources, mono-cultures destroying biodiversity etc., so the sooner we get ourselves clued up, I think, the better.

(Jumps off soap box, goes to put kettle on, using only the minimum water).

Exactly my thoughts, @Laura_Elsewhere and @Cherryfudge.  I find myself wondering how we’d manage, under the same conditions as our wartime sisters.  Imagine working a 50-60 hour week then queuing at the shops for groceries, doing all the housework and cooking, as well as trying to be as self-sufficient as possible by digging for victory in the garden.  Add to that the broken nights’ sleep from the bombings....

- Pip

Shropshirelass

I've been trying to catch up with you all, but the chat goes so quickly ... When I was pages behind, I decided to just look at the pictures, but then I had to read about them, and then I had to go back and get the details of course.
 Anyway, here I am well into February, not spent any coupons yet. I finished knitting a jumper for myself which needs a skirt to really set it off. Also made 2 pairs of bedsocks for myself, and a child's cardi  to add to a collection for local Baby Bank.
So any suggestions fabric-wise for a gathered or soft-pleated grey winter skirt?