Category: Black Doris

victory gardens / mend and make do

I’m very inspired by World War Two imagery around Victory Gardens and Mend & Make Do campaigns. I’m also fascinated by the Land Girls / Womens’ Land Army, and the way WW2 changed work life for women in the West forever.

I recently had a pile of WW2 social history books out of the library and wanted to share with you some of the images. (Sorry I didn’t have the time/patience to scan them, so they are photographs of book pages. Not ideal. Forgive me.)

I don’t at all idealise the 1940s. I’m know it was a very hard time, a frightening time, lots of death and fear and sadness and people worked very hard just to keep their houses clean and keep their families fed. All the same, I enjoy the parallels between the Victory Garden movement and the 21st zeitgeist of backyard chicken farming, raised bed gardening, community gardening, CSA schemes, Seed Banks, recycling, upcycling etc….the similarities are strong.

There’s a great shop on etsy which sells modern day ‘victory garden’ posters – great witty designs. It’s called ‘The Victory Garden of Tomorrow’. I so want to buy something from the shop for my kitchen, but I can’t make up my mind which one I like the best!

Here are some of my favourite WW2 images from the books:

Women darning their tights….

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In today’s world of ‘from sweat-shop to landfill’ fashion, I’m proud to say I DO mend my clothes…as below…

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Dig for victory NOW!

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I would join this girl gang of happy gardeners!

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Have you ever seen a sugar beet? Not the most inspiring of vegetables…. 

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The lawns of Kensington Park in London were dug up for food production….

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Love the way the word ‘FOOD’ is made from vegetables here… 

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Even Yardley face cream got in on the victory gardening trend for it’s advertising… 

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WOMEN MUST DIG!

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old roses

Black Doris did really well on Friday. She made me a little bit of cash and garnered many compliments on her fine appearance. Fun was had.

*

I’m having one of those times of life where the dial goes from ‘happily busy’ into ‘OVERWHELM‘ *cue obnoxious siren noise, flashing lights, general chaos* …

When the dial is up this high, I find it hard to move purposefully forward and expend too much times metaphorically running around in circles like a simile chicken.  (Poetry nerd jokes.)

Soooo…..

Here’s what I will do:

a) drink tea

b) make a comprehensive to-do list

c) accept the bottom 10 things on the list may not get done any time soon. C’est la vie.

d) forgive myself for the dirty oven, the weedy garden, the imperfect parenting…

e) talk myself down from quitting my volunteer work (again); talk myself down from giving up trying to be a writer (again); talk myself down from running away to Iceland carrying only a little brown suitcase (again) …

f) drink some more tea. The sound of the kettle helps me relax. Breathe, tea coming. 

g) leave an unsubtle hint on my blog that I would like some nice snail mail, please, as all the bills and letter from the IRD are not helping the sense that life is all grown-up obligations and worldly worries…

h) do more yoga. I always let my yoga slip when I need it most. AND I’M A YOGA TEACHER. Gah. Get thee to the mat, woman.

i) find the jar of French bon-bons which I bought in Greytown at the start of May. Suck on a sour apple bon-bon whilst sitting on the back step and watching the chickens grab a bit of winter sun.

j) do the next thing on the list. then the next thing. then the next thing. Try just to do the next thing, rather than the thing I WANT to do. Accept ‘good enough’. Accept ‘hanging in there’. Accept.

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k) Take pointless photographs of old roses, just because.

Hope you are doing okay, too, whether you are living the dream or just treading water. X X X

 

 

 

 

Tonight!

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Brrr…..it’s absolutely freezing here today, but there is hot food and live music at the Brown Foxes Night Market, so hopefully that will entice people away from their heaters…. & Black Doris will be there, not in her swimsuit…

Palmerston North City Library, 5-9pm, TONIGHT! 🙂

having a go at the Brown Foxes Market

This Friday, PN City Library, 5-9pm I am having a stall at the Brown Foxes Night Market, trading under the name Black Doris.

I love the market poster! (below)…

I’ll be selling mainly vintage things, from Victorian times through to the 70s, (I’m going to be in the vintage room) plus a few handmade things…

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This is the first time the organisers are having a whole area dedicated to vintage stuff, so I hope it works out well for everybody. I have sold vintage stuff on trademe before, but never ‘in the flesh’. I am steeling myself for people tsk-ing about prices / kvetching about vintage traders who onsell op-shop stuff …but hopefully that won’t happen and it will just be ace, upbeat people who will smile and buy things.

Nothing on my stall is over $20, so yeah! there are BARGAINS to be had.

It has taken way more work than I anticipated sourcing / cataloguing / pricing / labeling everything, but enjoyable work. I’ll let you know how it went next week!

Here’s a peak at some of my stock.

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