When I posted about my room, a couple of you made a comment about clothes, and Rapunzel said if she’d been there she’d have asked me to get up and do a twirl.
Recently she was kind enough to do that very thing for me on her own blog, and if you scroll down a bit you can see the photo of her in her beautiful home-made outfit here – plus description of how she made it; not only homemade but adapted from second-hand – hurrah for simplicity!! Well done that girl!
My criteria for clothes are that they should be modest and feminine, preferably made with natural fabrics, in quiet colours. I love old and faded cloth, so I like to make hats out of old tea-towels and skirts from old sheets or tablecloths. I like to make use of second-hand pieces of fabric (old sheets and duvet covers are the best) from charity shops, which pleases me because they are local, second-hand and in support of a good cause – so that blesses Mother Earth and the human community, and all at a fractional cost.
Some of my clothes come from regular shops – my very favourite are White Stuff and Landsend, and I scrutinise the social policies carefully online to make sure I am not buying from horrific slave traders. Underwear bottoms come from Patra – pure silk, cool in summer and warm in winter; underwear tops usually from Marks & Spencer.
This is what I’m wearing today.
I think my face looks a bit strange in this picture, but I am not great at having my photo taken, plus the Badger had gone down on one knee to take my photo, and I was trying not to laugh.
I like to have not too low a neckline and a modesty over-boob layer, either a cardigan or just a couple of layers of clothes like one naturally does in winter, or a sleeveless tunic pinny kind of thing like the one I’m wearing today. I got this from a market stall – so self-employed sole trader with low carbon footprint plant, low price clothes; and it was made in Italy which is probably a good thing as they’re struggling a bit over there at the mo. I love the design of this pinny thing. It’s asymmetrical at the back.
Once the weather turns chilly, a gilet (Ha! Chilly gilet! I like it) is good for both warmth and modesty.
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That furniture behind me is what I had before the Badger made my lovely shelf unit.
Some days in the summer it’s just too hot for layers, as it was the day the Badger and I went for a wander in a water garden near Norwich, where we met this amazing tree.
Here’s the Badger on the other half of the same tree which was too big to get all of it in the photo.
It was a sapling during the time of the Battle of Hastings (1066AD).
Sometimes it’s too hot even for a hat or a modesty layer – almost too hot for clothes really – and then I look like this.
Top from White Stuff and skirt is a re-made duvet cover that was second-hand from a charity shop and blessed our bed for several years before we were given a new duvet too big for that cover – so it became two skirts. The train is a dear little 15-gauge railway steam train. We went on a long ride through the Norfolk countryside in it. Because it's so small, we rode along at the same height as the grain fields and the wild flowers - oh, we had such a lovely time. Why aren't all things small and simple?
But most of the time I wear hats which are either scarves or fabric stitched by me into caps.
The scarves tie up like this
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Looking like this from the side.
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This is a long thin shape of scarf (bought from a small family business in the little market town where my beautiful mama lives). I cut the long ends down to make a long thin triangle instead of a long thin rectangle. When it was a rectangle it looked like this and I thought the effect too bulky.
Now it sits more neatly.
Some of my scarves are large squares of ultra-fine Indian cotton – they used to be found everywhere but are surprisingly hard to get hold of now. Here’s a dark blue one I have.
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It looks like this from the side.
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So, similar to the long thin triangle one but a bit more substantial.
Most days though I wear one of my favourite home-made hats – this one
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Or my very favourite, which is this one
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Which looks like this from the side.
For the colder weather I have some beanies and wind a scarf round them, like this -
- which I like but is way too hot for summer weather.
My shoes are very precious, being hard to source because I have feet like a frog’s – long, wide, soft and shallow. They blister very easily, need a wide footbed but not a deep shoe, and are too long for the women’s range in almost every case. So all the closed shoes I have are men’s shoes, but either Italian made or barefoot shoes, which makes them less deep and heavy than men’s shoes generally are. I have to get this right because I don’t have a car, so when the Badger is away I walk (at least as far as the bus stop!!) when I go out.
I wear Birkis (I have 2 other pairs) and Vivo Barefoots (I have one other pair).
I have two pairs of sturdy winter boots.
I have a snuggly pair of Shepherd slippers that the Badger bought for me in York when we went up to visit the nuns, and the black shoes are kept for taking funerals.
And when it gets cold I have my big grey fleece hoodies to wear over the top of everything and keep me warm.
Everything packs down neatly and folds up. The old duvet skirts are jolly good because they are poly-cotton so don't get so crumply. I don't normally iron anything. I feel comfy in these things. I wore trousers for a while but a) I put back on the weight I'd lost and they looked atrocious and b) I always feel vaguely undressed in trousers. Like my head doesn't feel finished off without a hat.
Now you may feel a little bewildered by this outburst of narcissism, but I know I really love it when my friends post photos of themselves - I spend ages looking at them. And the Wretched Wretch likes to have pics to look at on his mummy's computer of his friends and family near and far. So there we are. That's my simplicity journey wardrobe as of the present time. I feel it lacks some American homespun checks but have been having a little bother with shrinkage so that project may take a while.
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Monday August 27th to Thursday 6th September
A great heap of all kinds of stuff - a mop, a basket, a box of assorted hardware, a basket of electrical equipment - loads of things!
I wasn’t quite sure whether to post this – if it is exactly a thing given away or not – but I thought I would, because I think it’s relevant. In chucking out stuff, a lot of boxes and wrapping etc has become redundant – and some of the things I weeded out were papers and letters, various old documents. But I didn’t just put them in the recycling bin; if they could be burned I kept them and they were handy for occasional fires – the breakfast time sort that are welcome but don’t need to go on for a long time.