2022 Fashion On The Ration Challenge

Wraithlady

I've just planted my seeds indoors this week, doesn't help I can't find my heat mat.

I keep feeling I ought to spend my coupons, but I look at things and go 'do I REALLY need this' - usually the answer is no.

Though I plan to get some fleece when I get paid,  to sew my own version of OH's 'Jedi robe'  - the people who made his seem to have stopped doing it, and it's really just a djellaba (sp?) for which I have a pattern.

Laura_Elsewhere

I've not yet sown any seeds - My Intended has promised to add another layer of decking planks to raise my Kitchen Garden bed higher, "by Easter", so I hope this year things will thrive better. The L=shaped garden is clawed out of a bit of local woodland; the middle is coppiced but the outside is simply native field-maples, and the ground is builders' rubble from the 1990s construction of the estate mixed with the local solid clay and with a dense mat of fibrous fine tree-roots, and after two seasons trying to dig, I sensibly gave up and have been concentrating ever since on building new soil upwards. The kitchen garden bed is now about 4-6 inches deep, and I have a decent heap of some really good well-rotted hedge-clippings and lawn-mowings and autumn leaves, thanks to the chap who maintains our estate's little bits of landscaping: they're happy as they don't have to pay for it to be taken at the local recycling centre (green waste costs to deposit if it's professional waste) and I get a good pile of stuff which after several years is now black gold...). 
It's an L that faces south and west so gets baked hard by the sun - luckily a nice neighbour, Mrs Hosepipe, is happy for us to use her outside tap and hosepipe, and if I really keep at it, it can be a productive little corner. 
My biggest problem is the school run mums - about fifty to sixty extra cars a day use our flats' private car-park area, and a lort of them sit for half an hour or more with their engines running for heat/cooling and it really bothers me that my salads end up polluted. The littler is a problem too, but we've given up asking them, as they turn nasty very quickly and some local people have been forced to move because of the aggressive school-run. This year I am going to try just sending letters to the school repeatedly asking them to remind all parents to be pleasant to local people and not to keep engines running. I wondered about maybe putting a homemade sign out near the garden politely asking for engines to be turned off... it never used to be a problem but about 4-5 years ago the primary school pretty much doubled in size and there is no place at all for dropping children off or collecting them. The car-park surface is collapsing too, but getting 26 owners to agree on getting that re-surfaced is never going to happen! Maybe if it gets pot-holed enough the school-run will go elsewhere...

But I do manage to grow some veg, herbs and fruit each year. 

This is late March 2020 and you can see the big pile of grass-clippings in the background!  The bottles have tomato seedlings in, and are cut in half so I can open the flip-top to harden them off, closing it at night like tiny tiny one-plant cold-frames... 


And then last year I got a bit behind with everything, and all the flowers as well as veg and salad all just had to be heeled-in in the kitchen garden! All a bit overgrown, April 2021:

weenancyinAmerica

Bob Flowerdew was once asked if something could be planted now. I don't remember what it was, but his answer was something like  "You can plant it. It won't grow but you can plant it." I always remember that when deciding when to plant anything.

Laura_Elsewhere

weenancyinAmerica said:

Bob Flowerdew was once asked if something could be planted now. I don't remember what it was, but his answer was something like  "You can plant it. It won't grow but you can plant it." I always remember that when deciding when to plant anything.

He's a good gardener, is Bob Flowerdew. Unfortunately I always remember *that* photoshoot they did for GQT being from a Naturists' place.... 

Be careful about clicking the link below - you might never be able to take Bob Flowerdew's advice ever again!  

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/918935.stm

florianatwobob

@Laura_Elsewhere 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Wraithlady

I bet you any money 99% of the people who read your post, @Laura_Elsewhere, will automatically click on the link just out of curiosity!

(Yes, alright, I did)

nannygladys

I did before I read your post Wraithlady!!!

TwibbleDee

A friend who is pregnant, running out of clothing options, and smaller than I am is going to come raid my too-smalls this weekend.  I have a LOT of them.  Might as well get used, right?

I need to figure out a basic style I like and will wear and can have in several different colors and then get rid of almost everything else.  My closet is atrocious.

Laura_Elsewhere

TwibbleDee said:

I need to figure out a basic style I like and will wear and can have in several different colors and then get rid of almost everything else.  My closet is atrocious.

Yay!! Hurrah and well done! 

It took me aeons to figure that one out... still working on making it all but at least I know now   

maryb

Well, those things I ordered from Marks went straight back!  I held the jumper up to the light and it was transparent - and that was through both layers!!  What is the point of making such tat?  So no update to coupons required