2023 Fashion on the Ration Challenge

Laura_Elsewhere

We are tackling Unsorted Stuff this afternoon, including lots of shoes and clothing... wish us luck, and I hope to let go of plenty - I thought I'd pop in and mention it here so I can be firmly reminded that I don't need to keep everything, I don't want to keep everything, and that frankly it would be better to donate to help the 'War Effort' - good clothing and shoes can be sold to raise funds by charity shops, tatty stuff can be recycled even at the rags-stage! 

I don't need to keep it all. 

I don't need to keep it all. 

I don't need to keep it all...

Cherryfudge

Good luck @Laura_Elsewhere! I find it helps to remember the Flylady adage about allowing our stuff to bless others... that won't work for everyone.

Today I'm wearing a top I bought years ago and rediscovered fallen behind something in the wardrobe (blush). Do I like it enough to keep it? If I let it go, I would have a bit of space for some future item.

Does it help to ask if you would buy/make that item now?

skogar

Cherryfudge - a found a top I had forgotten I had - in a drawer. It had been worn so much the fabric had thinned and there were quite a number of holes close to the seams - certainly not worth repairing. Cannot understand how it got lost in a drawer or why given the condition I hadn't got rid of it. :-D

Laura_Elsewhere

It certainly helps, finding moth larvae...!!!  

Sadly, those things will now go into landfill, which I *HATE* doing, but it's simply not fair to risk contaminating a charity shop's unsorted stock by knowingly donating items which almost certainly have moth eggs. We have pretty powerful spray, but it doesn't guarantee killing the eggs (nothing does!) - for the few things I'm keeping, we can monitor and re-spray and so on, but a charity donation store hasn't got that option. 

Yet another reason for me to STOP KEEPING EVERYTHING - if I had sorted this stuff a year or three ago then it could have gone for charity donation or for recycling... 

PollyWollyDoodle

We've all been there, Laura!  I hope your yarn collection is safely stored in moth-resistant packages. I've got a ruined Oriental rug that I had left rolled up after moving, I was so upset when I found moths in it. They love the dark.  

I find it helps me to do all of the above; ask myself if I would buy it now, ask myself if I would want to wear it tomorrow (often there's a reason that something is not being worn - too tight, too scratchy, doesn't quite go with anything) and try to picture the joy that someone else will feel on finding it in a charity shop.  I've spent too many years comprising and my aim now is only to have clothes that I love and in which I feel great. 

Cherryfudge

What a shame about the moths @Laura_Elsewhere I think you will have everyone's sympathy there. At least you discovered them now, not in some future where they had spread.

I assume they were in things you've not used for a while? If so, perhaps it's a form of natural selection?

You are making me think about getting stuck into my clothes and mending collection: there's a lot in the loft that really ought to be rehomed as I never get round to doing anything with it. There are a handful (how big a handful, I don't know) that I would love to remake or copy. This needs to be the year I at least get the sewing machine out! (That reminds me to investigate the lady who does sewing machine classes - if she indeed still does them).

skogar

Very annoying Laura - a relation had stored some wool in the loft and when we looked at it recently the moths had been at it. A shame as some of it was quite nice.

Laura_Elsewhere

@cherryfudge - no, it was a bit of a nightmare as unfortunately Mr E had been all efficient and "helped" by putting things in bags and boxes before Xmas - except he managed to mix up things which had lain below the bottom shelf untouched for eight years (we think - they were the mothed things), all in with more recent things - including things in current use - all my everyday winter vest5s, for example!!! 

Made it back out alive, though...  Three large bags and several boxes now reduced to one small box to keep, a pile of books to ask the secondhand bookshop if they will buy them, three books to re-read and decide about, and eight books to keep; bags for charity shop after washing and tumble-drying; bags for textile rags after spraying densely with moth-killer; bags of stuff that could have been donated or recycled had it not got badly mothed so is going to landfill

I think the most ludicrous justification was a pair of cheap cotton-blend ankle-socks, white with turquoise spots, faded by washing in mixed washes - which I eventually worked out I was keeping not because I like them - I never did - no, I was keeping them because they came as a two-pack with a pair of dark-blue and white narrow-striped ankle-socks which I really loved and wore to rags years ago... so Mr E suggested these spotted ones were "the ghost of the striped ones" and I realised they weren't even that, they were the socks that had lived next door to the striped ones, with whom I could share memories of the striped socks, they were the socks who had *known* the lovely striped ones... er, yeah, right!!! 

So... 

Some to keep after washing; some to donate after washing; some to recycling after spraying... 

I think Mr E is in shock... Normally I burst into tears half a bag into it... but this time we "did a Stacey" and although we didn't have a warehouse to lay it all out in (Sort Out Your Life on iPlayer, a lovely woman with a very very gentle way of making sure people really do the work), we emptied it all out onto the bed and then I chose my favourites and we jettisoned the rest, and then I went through the favourites seeing if any of those could go... 

skogar

Sounds like you have been really productive Laura. Love the sock story.

Wraithlady

Laura_Elsewhere said:

I think Mr E is in shock... Normally I burst into tears half a bag into it... but this time we "did a Stacey" and although we didn't have a warehouse to lay it all out in (Sort Out Your Life on iPlayer, a lovely woman with a very very gentle way of making sure people really do the work), 

I love that programme - she really is incredibly sympathetic to the 'target' family. Was watching it this morning and was inspired to go through my DVD collection which is getting out of control - 10 put in the CS bag and about 20 to watch (some of them still in their cellophane wrappers) to decide. Still got quite a lot, but they're all ones at least one of us likes!