Week 3 update (days 17 - 22)

I've been a bit quiet on here this week - but have a little look round the blog and you'll see why. Isn't it so much prettier!

New background, new navigation (look at About this Blog to see what's where), AND a page where you can browse everything I'm selling on ebay. The task of listing everything I'm not going to wear on ebay is a bit epic so I'll add 3/4 new items a week all year.

So how has the week gone? We'll I've spent some time reflecting on minimalism (I'll do a post on this later in the week), I've had a small panic about what I'd do if we had a heatwave...and then it rained loads and I stopped worrying about it.

Oh & thanks to my very first Clothes off my back ebay sale - to a lovely lady named Rachel we reached £900 fundraised in the last 3 weeks! And that's before gift aid. Thanks everyone for your generosity - keep it coming! If you want to help out with the fundraising by selling something on ebay here's how.

I added another pair of shoes to the rotation this week - my old faithful black heels - you are going to see a lot of these chaps!

So here is what I've worn this week:


Day 17

 

Day 18

Day 19

Day 20

Day 21

Day 22

 Have a good week folks.....
 

What do you call a fear of washing machines?

So in the middle of last week I did my first clothes wash since beginning the clothes off my back challenge. And then proceeded to experience nail biting anxiety for the duration of the wash.

My mum was really good at preparing us for the world, by the time we left home we could all cook at least 4 meals (tuna pasta bake, spaghetti carbonara, shepherd’s pie, toad in the hole), we could change a fuse, iron and put on a wash – we knew (and largely ignored) the importance of living within our means and putting something away for a rainy day. We were essentially pretty well rounded human beings.

And then we left the sphere of her influence and it all went wrong. I’m sure during the next 6 years of living in shared houses I must have done some washing, and at least some of it must have been successful as I always had enough viable clothes to convincingly cover my bedroom floor, but somehow I appear to have lost the knack.

As the size of my wardrobe got increasingly out of control I began to see the washing machine like the hand of god. Yes many jumpers, dresses and skirts did not survive it’s harsh judgement, but I appreciated it’s role in keeping the overcrowded population in my wardrobe down.

So now – 17 years after leaving home I put on the first wash where I genuinely needed everything to survive. 10 items, 10days into the challenge is simply far more than I can afford to lose!

Thankfully on a 30% wool wash everything came out clean and approximately the size and shape it went in.

But this did make me wonder – what is the real cost, physically and environmentally of all those clothes my carelessness ruined? How much good could have been done with the money I saved if had less clothes and they lasted longer? I can’t take back 17 years of waste.But I can hope that this year shows me a new respect for the clothes I do own that lasts a lifetime.Too much to hope for? 

I hope not but if so at least we're raising money for a good cause!

Clothes Diary (Day's 10- 16)

Blowing through clothing options at a frankly terrifying rate. Up to and including Day 16 - I've worn 16 items. That is 46% of my allowed clothes.......in 4% of the year.


So Day 10. I worked from home which explains the scruff levels

 

Day 11. Broke out my favourite frock

 

 

Day 12 - Denim & Boots

  

Day 13 - New Skirt & stripes

 

 

Day 14- Shirt,  Mini & exciting new trainers!

 

 

 Day 15 - Picnic in the park for Carey's 1st Birthday. Abley accessorised by Keith & Tom

 Day 16 - Are you getting enough? Stripes and skirt at Gods own Junkyard

Your clothes off my back mini summer challenge.....

Hello again,

Well I don’t know about you but next weekend launches me solidly into wedding season, I have 4 friends weddings between then and October, and between that, hen and stag do’s significant birthdays, and my parents ‘cancer didn’t kill us’ party  it feels like I’m booked solidly throughout that time.

One of the exciting things for me about the clothes off my back challenge is dodging the ‘how to dress for weddings’ bullet. Despite the fact that I must have attended 30+ weddings I’m still not quite sure what to wear. I don’t have a clue what smart casual means, or black tie or white tie and as I’m naturally a bit of a scruffpot (a friend at sixth form once accurately and cruelly described my look as ‘slightly stoned primary school teacher’) I tend to go way, WAY too far the other way. As in when my sister Julya got wed I wore a 1950’s ballgown, and no hat – despite the fact hats were the only thing she requested on the invite!

The result of this anxiety tends to be that I throw money at the problem – I am exactly the demographic Coast built their business model around. It seems rude to wear something old to a wedding (why? I don’t understand this at all & have deep respect for this blogger who wore a well loved and worn frock to her own wedding) so I spend a small fortune on some floral strapless number that then gathers dust in my wardrobe. These dresses are not at all suitable for my daily life, and I won’t dare wear them to another wedding (for reason of the above mentioned rude factor) but they cost a little bit too much for me to feel ok chucking them in the charity shop bag.

I’m guessing most women have at least one of these dresses in their wardrobe that makes them feel horrible and guilty every time they see it. So by way of a #clothesoffmyback lite I have a little challenge for you. Carve out 20 minutes of your life this week, and follow the guide in yesterday’s blog to listing clothes on ebay for charity to just sell one of those frocks.

If 100 people list just one item and it sells for £20 that is £2500 (including gift aid) raised for Contact a Family and if you pass this challenge on to people you know – well, the sky is the limit!

So go on – de guilt your wardrobe – and if you do have a wedding to go to maybe search #clothesoffmyback on ebay and buy a frock from another fundraiser…

Meanwhile I’ll be wearing my everyday clothes with a nice pair of heels to this year’s weddings and I’m sure feeling (& looking) a lot better for it! 

PS if you like the beaded jacket I wore to my sisters wedding (in the photo below) the listing opens tonight at 9 on ebay just search #clothesoffmyback and place a bid .......

How to sell unwanted items on ebay and raise money for Contact A Family

Hey there,

Thank you all so much for the positive messages you've been sending about my challenge and the blog. It's been brilliant to feel so supported.

I realise taking a challenge this extreme is not for everyone, but none the less lots of you have been asking about how you can help. If you want to you can donate here or you could consider getting rid of something you no longer want by selling it on ebay for us.

This post is a detailed step by step guide to listing items for Contact A Family in a way that will raise the most money. I've used clothes as an example but really you can sell anything, got an old bike in your garage? Furniture you no longer love? Selling these things online with ebay's direct donate function is really easy and every penny Contact a Family receives is put to good use.

So here goes

Step 1 - identify the item you want to sell. Clean it up & make it photo ready. While you are doing this note any features or damage someone buying it might want to know about.

Step 2- Take photos. You can load up to 12 photos free, so take detailed close ups as well as photos from as many angles as possible.

Step 3 - Make a cup of tea and boot up your computer. If you've never used ebay before the next stage will take up to 20 minutes, if you are an old hand you can get a listing up in 6.

Step 4- Go to www.ebay.co.uk  If you have an account log in if not you'll have to set one up (there are easy instructions and it's very quick to do) - or use a friend's account.

Step 5 - Along the top of your screen you'll see a 'sell' tab. Click on it. On the top right of the page you have the option to 'switch to advanced tool'. Do this - ebay is going to ask you if you are sure. You are - it's the only way you can automatically donate to charity, so confirm 'switch'.

Step 7 - Fill in a basic title for your item. I typed 'pink jacket'. This helped ebay suggest a category I  could list in. You can choose 1 category for free, and if you want a second it'll cost 35p.

Step 8 - Once you've pressed enter you should be on the real listings page. Your first job here is to revisit your title and make sure that you have as many keywords as possible in it. Keywords are the words people would type to try and find an item. My item title was 'topshop beaded jacket pink blush wedding festival 12 14 #clothesoffmyback'. I included the hashtag so Contact a Family supporters can find everything that is being listed for us, if they want to help out by buying you item & so we can promote your item on social media.

Step 9 - Describe any faults or quirks the item has in the condition box.

Step 10- Upload your photos using the basic photo uploader. Make sure your best photo is on the far left as this will be your cover photo. There are little arrows on the bottom of your uploaded photos that move them left or right use these to give your best photo top billing.

Step 11 - In the details box, describe your item. Talk about it's size (dimensions are especially important for furniture),style and condition. Cut and paste the below text and links into the details box.

I am listing to raise money for Contact A Family. In their 2014 research they found 65% of parents of disabled children go without essentials like clothes in order to provide properly for their children. (The research is here along with the number of families – 33%- who can’t afford to heat their homes). This year a member of our team is raising money by selling all her clothes (except 35 key items) to raise money for Contact a Family to continue their work supporting these families. As a part of this she's challenged people to join in this summer by selling one wedding outfit on ebay for Contact A Family, if you want to get involved you can find the challenge here, and if you want to donate you can do so here.

If not- please bid generously - because this item is gift aided every penny you pay plus 25% extra is donated to Contact a Family. Happy Bidding.

Step 12 -Tab down to choose a format and price for what you are selling. Start as low as you would be prepared to part with the item for, items with a low starting price often end up making more than higher priced items as people become attached with repeat bidding.

Step 13 - Set a start time and duration for the auction. You want your auction to finish on a Sunday evening - that's when items make most money

Step 14 - This is the important one! You'll be asked if you want to donate all or part of the sale to charity, if you don't get offered Contact A Family as an option click select another charity, search for and select Contact a Family. Then you'll be asked what percentage of the sale you want to donate. Obviously I'd suggest 100%.

Step 15 - If you are planning on selling more than one item for Contact A Family Thankyou! You should tick the save this listing box - it'll make listing your next item much quicker!

Step 16 - Confirm your listing.

And you're done!

We can help you promote the things you are selling to raise money for us. If you tweet me @edarcherthinks or Contact a Family @ContactAFamily with a link to your listing we'll try and help you get the word out.

Thankyou for your time and support

Edx

PS here is what my finished listing looked like

  

Second hand is grand (most of the time)

As the youngest of 10 children I know what it is to wear secondhand clothes. I and all my siblings have always been accustomed to passing things between us to get the best wear out of them, and if I am honest I've always quite liked it.

Nothing makes me happier when someone compliments me on an item than to crow 'hand-me-down! My sister/ mum has such good taste'. I wear clothes that belonged to family members when I feel nervous or upset because I find it comforting that someone I love has already worn them. My grandad died when I was a teenager and when my mum asked if there was anything of his I wanted I asked for his gardening shirts. I still wear them regularly.

Of course it wasn't just clothes that were hand me downs. If you wanted to take up hobby or play an instrument and you were in the younger half of the family you'd better hope an older sibling had had the same idea first. My tennis racket- Julya's before mine. The rollerskates - everyones before mine (this didn't worry me much as I was terrified of them). The dolls - well some of those were mine first, but you could tell the ones that had passed through Vanessa's hands because their noses or fingers would be bitten off (she works in a primary school now - which I bet is comforting to all you parents).

And bra's, well bra's are an expensive item - so your first 'passage to womanhood' training bra was bought new from Marks and Spencer, and after that you worked out who in the house was the closest fit to you and got the ones they were done with (Clean is as good as new remember). This wasn't as bad as it sounds - some of my sisters were a fair bit older than me so had jobs and nice stuff so the hand-me -downs were usually good quality. And I was particularly lucky as I was closest to mums size so got her spares, which as I got older moved from the bras that didn't quite work for mums work (where she did a lot of lifting) to, when I left home the underwear dad bought her that there was no way she was wearing. This meant I had nicer (& fruitier) underwear than most girls my age, and didn't buy myself my own bra until I was 22 and had to finally accept that I am bigger than my mum. So I did the logical thing and went up a back size and that is the size I've worn ever since. It's convenient as it's the same size as Julya so if we buy something and don't like it we can swap. No problems.

But what I am coming to is this. I have never been measured for a bra in my adult life. I've read all the articles, and had friends wax lyrical about the wonders of properly fitting underwear and thought, yes, sure - but what kind of idiot doesn't know what size of bra fits.

It turns out an idiot like me. Last week I went shopping for underwear to see me through the challenge.  A certain high street store offers £5 off a bra if you get measured first, so I did. I went down 2 back sizes and up 3 cupsizes! And I've been wearing the wrong size all this time because of hand-me-downs!

Now I find this story funny, I think it reflects how close and ok with each other my family is. But I hesitated putting it up because I also knew that some people don't believe that clean is as good as new, and would just find the whole thing a bit grim. And if that's you then I'm sorry - because here's the thing. My family were broke but we were not living in real actual poverty - it was tight because there were a lot of us but we always went to bed with full stomachs (though I know on occasion my parents didn't). 

Real poverty is worse and 1 in 4 disabled children are living in it, 33% of families with disabled children regularly miss meals. And it's getting worse - Contact a Family's campaigns manager Una Summerson reacted to welfare proposals by saying:


"While benefits relating to the additional costs of disability will be protected, the overall freeze on working-age benefits and tax credits means that families with disabled children will be worse off under proposals set out today in the Welfare Benefits Bill.

"A two year freeze in these benefits means families with disabled children will face a cut in their incomes in real terms.

"This will be worrying news as many families with disabled children have been hit time and again by cuts in recent years. A third have already been affected by social security changes and many are experiencing delays in vital support services for their child. They are not in a position to shoulder anymore."

Every penny you donate makes a difference and you can do so here

All my friends are posers (Day 6, 7,8 & 9)

So I've told you I hate having my photo taken.

I've told you I gurn and move around, and blink, and genuinely actually feel mortified when a camera is pointed at me, yes?

And you are about to say everyone feels like that right? Wrong!

Not my friends, I am somehow friends with the most photo ready gang the world has ever seen. I don't pick 'em 'cos they are photogenic - I'm delighted to say I pick my friends to a one because they are fiercely intelligent, opinionated and can make me snort with laughter.

But weirdly they also are all totally unafraid of cameras and look delicious in every photo ever taken.

So on Thursday I went and hung out with these posers....

Jo (never taken a bad photo in her life) Dowbekin

Laura (fabulous pout) Edwards and Bob (shamelessly cheesy) Cooper. Not only are these guys totally fine with getting their photos taken, but also they are pro's.

Both Laura and Bob work professionally in photography and Jo (alongside the fab work she does with young people) models.

These are 3 of my best friends and I trust them totally. So I asked them to help me with the photo issue.

Here's what they told me:

"Stop bitch talking yourself and the way you look, it just makes you feel uncomfortable, then you look uncomfortable, and then you talk down to yourself some more. Be nice to yourself"

" Stand sideways, look over your shoulder, shoulders back, bum out (anti- instinctive that one), chin forward"

"Don't worry too much about about looking natural, go ahead and pose. Once you're good at posing it'll feel more natural, and will look that way too"

"Delete the crappy ones. It's not dishonest everyone does it!"

Anyway then we had a play, Laura taking the photos, Jo stood behind Laura showing me how to pose, and in less than 2 minutes we had this photo - which I actually bloody like!

 


 I think because I was laughing so much that I stopped being bothered about the camera.

So there you go. Over the next 3 days there were 3 more daily photos - 2 taken by my husband, which I like & felt comfortable in and one taken on Walthamstow market where I was really aware of everyone around me and so felt stupid & look terrified.

So the best advice from my guys I think was the stuff about comfort, - if you're happy it shows!

Here are the other pics

Day 7

Day 8

Day 9

Obviously the photo taking thing is still pretty hideous for me. But genuinely every donation makes me super happy & it'll make a huge difference to families too. Anything you can spare I'll be grateful here's the link