2024 Fashion On The Ration Challenge

thriftwizard

Thanks for the encouragements for DD2, ladies! At the moment she's busy using up stash, much of it garnered from my auction buys of job-lots of yarn, some of which usually goes down to my mother's care home where they knit blankets for the "old dears" in hospital - I should mention that Mum, at 98, is something of a spring chicken; the oldest knitter is 108 - some goes onto my stall & some goes under DD2's bed in vacuum packs! But I can see that that isn't going to last her long, at this rate, and her own coupons won't keep her going for long either. So yes, I expect we'll have to put a case to the Ministry that this is essential war work - though her lovely lacy stitch patterns definitely wouldn't do for sea-boot stockings!

Much to my surprise, I've acquired a pair of "Mom" jeans secondhand; I had two costumes to get together for the upcoming dance weekend. The galabeya is all but finished now, just a few more sequins required (come on, postie! Dress rehearsal tomorrow) but I needed a "Night at the Movies" costume for the Saturday night party, and decided to cheat a bit; everyone else from our group is doing something girly like Arwen from LOTR or Cinderella or Elsa from Frozen, but I decided on something different & am going as a very short & curvaceous Zorro! DS3 "did" Zorro some years ago, so the hat & plastic sword (rapier, actually?) were already hanging around; I just needed black fabric for a cloak (had some on the stall) a black shirt, trousers & a pair of boots - which I already owned. So we went down to the recycling warehouse for a shirt & trousers & I picked up 3 shirts & 2 pairs of trousers, total cost £2.50. 2 shirts (one Next, one Primark) have gone straight into the charity-shop bag but the 3rd (also Next) will be fine once I've added an old bootlace at the neck. Both pairs of trousers fit well, but the jeans will be too warm to dance in; however they're so comfortable that they've been added to my everyday wear! My eye-mask has been cut out from the cut-off legs of a pair of overlong leggings & I've added a band of coffee-dyed lace to DS3's old hat. I have an old elasticated belt with nice buckle that will work, but the 'tache will have to be eye-brow pencil. I think I may have missed my calling as a wardrobe mistress...

flamingo747

@thiftwizard that sounds fun!

florianatwobob

@thriftwizard this reminds me of a Halloween party where I ended up dressed as one of the Three musketeers, another friend came as Dogtanian from the cartoon. I have to say I did enjoy swashbuckling around that night. 

Cherryfudge

That sounds great fun @thriftwizard! And so does yours @florianatwobob.

I want to dress up now!  

Wraithlady

 Go to a Rocky Horror stage show and you can dress up all you want!

Cherryfudge

Ha ha @Wraithlady, I had forgotten about that! My DD was in a school production of it when she was about nine. I'm not sure how she'd react if I dressed the part nowadays!

thriftwizard

@Wraithlady we did Rocky Horror last summer - I did Magenta, as did several other people - other hotel guests got  somewhat confused as to why there were all these maids dashing around! We had to dance the Timewalk 3 times as well as fending off requests to unblock sinks, hoover rooms etc... I quite envied my friend's Columbia top hat!

MrsCD

My daughter sometimes does the Timewarp on a morning, with her Early Years class to get them warmed up and ready to work!

alicef

January has been spent mending - thought I had reached the end - then OH put a tear in his newest work trousers. 

I have gone back and forth over the pattern for a sweater from stash, (brioche or double moss stitch pattern), and can't decide so I have put that aside and cast on for the stranded colourwork sweater.

In a moment of weakness I bought 4m, (so rounding up 4.5 yrds), of Stof cotton in the sales.   (9 coupons)   I have the will power of a gnat.

PipneyJane

alicef said:

January has been spent mending - thought I had reached the end - then OH put a tear in his newest work trousers. 

I have gone back and forth over the pattern for a sweater from stash, (brioche or double moss stitch pattern), and can't decide so I have put that aside and cast on for the stranded colourwork sweater.

In a moment of weakness I bought 4m, (so rounding up 4.5 yrds), of Stof cotton in the sales.   (9 coupons)   I have the will power of a gnat.

Big hugs @alicef.  You aren’t alone, so don’t beat yourself up.  My personal weakness is <cough> yarn </cough>.  As the other Ladies will attest, every year I vow “No more wool!” And most years, I fail completely.

One of my big hopes for 2024 is to actually knit through a few dozen skeins that have been lurking in the stash for a while.  Of course, it does help that I’ve just started 6 months of chemo, etc and won’t be going anywhere near a yarn shop for the foreseeable.

Also, you are short changing yourself by a coupon.  You have only spent 8.  Please re-read and bookmark the first post.  In our world, 1m = 1yard of fabric.  No penalties for width.  Only difference in coupon cost is whether it’s wool or other fiber (e.g. cotton).

- Pip