2026 Fashion On The Ration Challenge

Cherryfudge

Nelliegrace said:

6 coupons used on thick, non-woollen socks in the sales at Aldi. Such an extravagance! I didn’t need them, my socks last for years, but they were reduced in price by half and then three quarters, and I forgot completely about ration coupons and no unnecessary clothes buying. £4.97 spent.

I think I wanted cheering up because of the wretched virus and the weather.

Dirty days hath September,
April, June, and November. 
From January up to May,
The rain it raineth every day.
All the rest have thirty-one, 
Without a blessed gleam of sun. 
And if any of them had two-and-thirty,
They'd be just as wet and twice as dirty.

That rhyme really made me laugh! I think the socks practically count as medicinal.

itsthelittlethings

Oh god! I popped in the village shop on the way back from mum's and who was in there but the tailor. She said she's had some new bits and bobs come in from London. One is a blouse in just my size like the one I got off her last time but with long sleeves and a high neck, and one is some sturdy trousers which will be perfect for my land girl work (not that I've done any yet), or just walking in the fields at the weekend (gym). Would be 9 coupons.

I do tend to get a lot of second hand clothes (honestly don't see the problem with that) so maybe I'll splurge and then just do without for the rest of the year.

Mother barely uses her coupons and told me she'd get me some wool when she goes to see her friend in Scotland later this year. I also have more than enough wool. Ho hum. Once the coupons are gone they're gone. I really find it quite hard to find people who sell under the table anyway.

Laura_Elsewhere

Like @pixtotts we don't use any heating either we have heaters but we're just still waiting til we need them... 12 years now...!  

People say, ah but you get the heat from the flats below you- but we had one year with both lower flats empty from summer til November and we still hadn't started using heating. We have thermometers and the sitting room is generally around 15-16 degrees except in a really cold spell. It did go down to about 12 degrees one winter, which was uncomfortable- but then it was -12°C outside overnight so...!
we have three Victorian "stone pig" hot water bottles which stay properly hot for several hours in a knitted cover, a good ten hours covered by bedclothes and even uncovered as a footrest at a desk will still stay hot for well over an hour... 

We do struggle with other people's hothouses!!  

I'm still working on my reversible dress but we've had various upheavals (plumber, landlord doing work, Mr E's ex-wife in poor health potentially moving to nearer their son which is good but probably leaves us to clear up and organise selling the house, etc...) so I haven't got on as I'd hoped....

itsthelittlethings

Used the phone this morning and rang the tailor (she said I can ring any time after 7 as she is a very early riser). I said I'd take the two things she mentioned and she said she'd throw in a swimsuit for coupons only. She sounded a bit down and said she hasn't had a letter from her husband for four weeks. I didn't know what to say.

Back to work today. I'm not going to take the job at the other company as I have thought about it and I don't think it's the right thing to do. I'm going to work on my typing and see if I can get into the typing pool. It's very competitive though. Even if I can't, I'm always ok somehow. I may regret taking this expensive room if I have to go back to char work but it is nice to have the space.

PollyWollyDoodle

I’m reading a book which may have been recommended in here, I can’t remember - it’s called ‘Private Battles: How the war almost defeated us’ by Simon Garfield, and it’s a collection of Mass Observation diaries from 1941 to 1945.  It’s all about the realities of living with rationing and the Blitz, hearing the news and so on. 

This entry from 1944: ‘Clothes; my underclothes and night attire..suffer most. Coupons nearly all go on top clothes. I had a fairly good stock of clothes to start with which has been pressed and cleaned and turned and renovated to give variety and interest. On paper (my wardrobe) would look extravagant but actually most of it is now five years old and beginning to look very shabby. I keep a few items to wear on special occasions only, the rest does duty every day - and very hard duty’.  

She goes on to say that her nightwear is so tattered that she hopes she never gets bombed out when wearing it!  

It’s a fascinating book. I had not realised that food shortages varied depending where you were in the country, one correspondent is sending dried fruit to his sister in Yorkshire where it’s very hard to come by.  Several correspondence receive food, including fruit, from friends or family overseas. Highly recommend this book. 

Keep up the good work, rationistas!  

pixtotts

@Laura_Elsewhere you really do get used to it don't you! My boyfriend is the polar opposite he has an electric car and his heating and air con can all be controlled from his phone so he is ALWAYS in a steady 18 - 19 degrees everything pre heated or cooled before he goes in - apart from when I'm there and make him turn the heating off at night, then he complains it's cold  But it also means going from the house to the car he finds super cold! 

I might have to get a themometer just out of interest... I'd be quite intrigued to see how it varies across the house - my bedroom was one of the later additions so has double glazing and insulation, where as other than two brick walls where the fire and aga are the rest of the house is hollow wooden frame and I wonder if it's worth upgrading the rest at some point. 



Another Vint. sale so I'm up to 3 coupons in my pot now hoping to get a couple more things listed today then I'm off to my boyfriends for the weekend x

PipneyJane

PollyWollyDoodle said:

I’m reading a book which may have been recommended in here, I can’t remember - it’s called ‘Private Battles: How the war almost defeated us’ by Simon Garfield, and it’s a collection of Mass Observation diaries from 1941 to 1945.  It’s all about the realities of living with rationing and the Blitz, hearing the news and so on. 

This entry from 1944: ‘Clothes; my underclothes and night attire..suffer most. Coupons nearly all go on top clothes. I had a fairly good stock of clothes to start with which has been pressed and cleaned and turned and renovated to give variety and interest. On paper (my wardrobe) would look extravagant but actually most of it is now five years old and beginning to look very shabby. I keep a few items to wear on special occasions only, the rest does duty every day - and very hard duty’.  

She goes on to say that her nightwear is so tattered that she hopes she never gets bombed out when wearing it!  

It’s a fascinating book. I had not realised that food shortages varied depending where you were in the country, one correspondent is sending dried fruit to his sister in Yorkshire where it’s very hard to come by.  Several correspondence receive food, including fruit, from friends or family overseas. Highly recommend this book. 

Keep up the good work, rationistas!  

I may have recommended the book, @PollyWollyDoodle.  It’s part of a series of 3 books covering the War years and immediate postwar period, and probably the best of the 3.  (You set me to look for the exact entry you quoted: Maggie Joy Blunt’s diary from Thursday 13th April 1944.). Definitely one to buy, keep, and re-read.

@Laura_Elsewhere and @pixtotts a room can be cool but you won’t feel cold, so long as it isn’t drafty.  Laura, I’m sure you’ll finish that dress at some point but, for now, it sounds like you have a lot on your plate.  IIRC, MrE’s ex is hard work at the best of times.  We’re here for you, even if it’s just for a hasty cup of tea somewhere where you can’t hear her complaining.

@itsthelittlethings, excuse me for being confused, but please remind me about your purchases for this year,  I’m really surprised to see you talking about running out of coupons already.  Although unspent coupons can be rolled into a new year, we start each year with a clean slate.

I have two spends to declare:  12 coupons on 6 skeins of grey “Light Arranmore” DK tweed in the shade “Allis”, which is a blend of 80% wool, 10% silk and 10% cashmere.  (100g/300m per skein.). I’ll admit that I went a bit mad when I discovered that The Fibre Company are shutting up shop.  It was a “now or never” purchase.  Fortunately, there was enough cash in my Mad Money to cover it.  £123 paid, including shipping.  It arrived this afternoon.

The second purchase was one of the aforementioned bodies from M&S, which I ordered off their website.  I’m assuming they count as “Blouse, shirt blouse, shawl, other than woollen” and are, therefore, 4 coupons.  

I’ll collect it tomorrow.  Something weird happened after I placed my order: as well as the body (£16), I purchased a pair of loafers for £89 and paid for the whole thing using some gift vouchers work gave me at Christmas.  £105 in total.  However, when I realised that I didn’t get the 20% discount for shoes loaded to my Sparks card, I cancelled the loafer purchase.  (You can cancel within half a hour, if you get buyer’s remorse, and no questions asked beyond “please select the reason for cancellation from this list”.) Seriously, I was only motivated to buy them because of the 20% discount and I did sit here arguing with myself that I don’t need more shoes and won’t need to replace my current loafers for at least another year... Anyway, inexplicably, they refunded me £94 in vouchers for the shoes - which is £5 more than I was paying - plus two £5 vouchers, so a total of £104.  As a result, the £16 body has only cost me £1.

I’ve checked and double checked and can’t see what I did to trigger the additional £15.

This brings my coupon spend to 16/80.5 leaving 64.5 coupons for the rest of 2026.

- Pip

PollyWollyDoodle

What a bargain, @PipneyJane! 

It may well have been your recommendation for the book, and if so, thank you very much. I requested it as a Christmas present and I am enjoying it so much, I don’t want to get to the end.  

alicef

I have retreated indoors as the light is going.

@PipneyJane it's sad news about The Fibre Co.  Brooklyn Tweed also stopped producing yarn mid last year.    

I've just about completed 2 pairs of socks for the OH from stash.  He said that one colourway (Goldfinch) was quite bright. Perhaps he fears, sartorially, my makes are tending towards the spiv!  

Caught 'Operation Mincemeat' on the iPlayer, which was a lovely watch.  

 

PipneyJane

Liverpool_Anne said:

Hi all,

….

Off to meet my friend from Paris for lunch as she is over for a few days. I haven't seen her for over a year so lots to catch up with 😁

Take care everyone

Ooohhh…. Hope you had a lovely lunch and a great catch-up @Liverpool_Anne

pixtotts said:

Gosh it does move quick in here! 

…

I have yet to make any move on sorting the stuff that needs sorting, 2026 so far has been a blumin nightmare, my phone broke, my laptop had a wobbly, I slipped on ice and bruised my tailbone, and today a dog has gotten into our chickens and had all but one (we only had 4), thankfully she got away unscathed. But overall I'm done with this month already, and I still have  my tax return to do! 


… x

@pixtotts Big hug.  Have another cup of tea and a chocolate cake - we saved you one ‘specially.  So sorry to hear about the chickens.  That, on top of everything else, must have been devastating.  

Good luck with your tax return.  Hope the bill isn’t too painful.  I submitted DH’s this afternoon.  Funny to think that I used to do them for a living, 30-odd years ago.  (I did mine in July.  He insists on procrastinating.). Virtually all my personal bookkeeping/money-management was taught to me by the clients whose accounts/VAT returns/tax returns I prepared as a trainee accountant.  I learned from their examples.  As a result, we both have savings accounts labelled “Tax” and put aside 25% of untaxed income, so no unexpected tax bills.

- Pip