Granny squared!

Greetings!  Ahrgh, 2 days back at school feels like a week!!! Mainly because there were train strikes on both days meaning I got to school at 9.30am and 9.00am respectively! Wasn't a good start to term having no time to get ready! That said, it wasn't too bad (except a year 2 lesson being observed by a student teacher. Went terribly- kids half asleep and annoying).    Lesson were fine and I had a nice first session of choir. We are preparing for our concert at the Royal Albert Hall and I thought I had 26 children but I've had a spate of late admissions so I am up to 32 now and they are sweet and enthusiastic. We started learning a really cute song in the style of Mozart called 'Alla Carte' which is a round.  As I was walking down the corridor on Friday afternoon, my favourite class (14 of whom are in choir...) were all getting their stuff. One of the girls was standing in the door way and I tapped her on the shoulder and sang, "Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart..."- to which, without missing a beat, she replied, "Had a lovely little Go-Kart!" whilst grinning at me! It was funny!

Here's an outfit to go with the waffle (and a glamorous shot of my dressing gowns hanging up)

I hadn't paired together this assortment of items before so I thought it was worthy of a blogshare.

You've seen the skirt before, just before Christmas- Indian vintage skirt from the charity shop- decided to do a Vix and wear my Summer skirts with thick things underneath. I wore it with a black Primark ribbed turtle neck and a fairly new purchase- a second hand crocheted Granny Square waistcoat from from Depop. I have been after one for a while but only wanted second-hand and very fussy over colours. It's lovely and cosy and great to add as an extra layer over a jumper or dress.

 It needed some fun coloured accessories so I wore my Nickat Sequin necklace and my Lorelai LQ bubble-envelope heart earrings (all her earrings are made out of repurposed plastics and materials and her site currently has 20% with a code HAPPY2023- she's currently having worries about paying her tax bill from last year so if you fancy some fun eco-friendly, colourful earrings, go and have a look- they are wonderfully light!).

I've achieved very little today- not really sure where the day has gone- disaster!!! So much work to do!

Hope that all is well with you all!

xx

Grecian blues

Hi there,

Ang reminded me it was Zerowaste week last week and I fully intended to put together a post but I confess that the return to school absolutely knackered me out and I couldn't think of doing any blogging in the evenings at all...I will be doing this so if you come back, I'll do something.  I've also got a few other things I wanted to share but again, I have got home late or been doing other things and just can't seem to be creative!

Anyway, I found I quite like having a random waffle followed by an outfit I liked seems to be the way things have gone around here in recent times.  I DO like sharing outfits that made me feel pretty or happy- that may seem pretty frivolous, but it's something that makes me happy!

Let's start with the outfit:

This dress is a great favourite of mine that I have owned for about 10 years now and I bought it after I played the part of Luciana in The Boys from Syracuse- this is a musical based on Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors and I had to wear a Grecian dress which I loved! I ended up buying this one from Asos AND a black version.  I wore this lots on my honeymoon including on the Glacier Express in Switzerland.  I know that Ivana is very partial to a Grecian-shaped dress- what about you?  I wore this with my charity-shopped quilted Oasis jacket.

Jewellery-wise, I wore my Labradorite pendant which my friend Ellie gave me when she was clearing out some jewellery pieces. I wore them with these beautiful Autumn Aurelia Galaxy cloud earrings. She's a lovely girl with chronic illnesses who makes the most beautiful acrylic jewellery.

So, my last week.

Well, school was hard, I can tell you that.  It was really good to see the children and a lot of them were pleased to see me.  A lot of them were really sweetly dismayed on my behalf (and theirs) about my room but the majority tried very hard to do their best with the situation.

The year 3's were really excited about their first recorder lesson and were suitably interested in the history of the recorder, enjoying hearing and seeing all the sizes of recorder and, funnily enough, being really impressed and excited that I had met and played the recorder with Carl Dolmetsch who played an important part in the history of the recorder.  The new year 4's were really excited learning about time signatures and learning to conduct time signatures.  The year 6's, learning a Ghanaian song, Nanuma, were enthusiastic and responsive in all aspects.  The year 5 lesson went a bit more slowly than I would have hoped but the kids were enthusiastic.

And then we have Key stage 1...

The year 2's were the ones who are in the shared hall and oh my goodness, it was SO hard to teach in there, so,so noisy.  The kids at the back of the 'room' couldn't hear me and I had to talk SO loudly.  In the end,I resorted to taking the class onto the stairs and getting them to sit in tiers on the stairs to sing so they could hear me. I was hoarse after 2 lessons.  It was even worse when I taught the one year 1 class up there.  These are children who I've not taught before, who are used to being in reception and not used to a full music lesson. There were some who really need one-to-one...I didn't know any of their names...it was really hard! It was slightly easier with the 2 year 1 classes that had their own rooms (including the ones in MY room...sob!) but it was still hard...usually when they enter MY territory, there is a natural sense of they learn my rooms and there are ways they sit etc, but when they are in their room, they are less likely to learn my way or doing everything...and then there's the lack of my vocabulary and posters which are SO integral to my teaching! 

I spent a lot of time moving instruments and preparing...and losing things! I lost 3 cardigans last week and my mug about 30 times...and my memory stick case...and my rucksack...and my 'box with paperwork'... I accidentally tipped a basket of claves over into my supermarket trolley and they rolled all over the place...and the year 1 class has stained my carpet with playdoh...

I spent a lot of my time in the evenings labelling recorders and recorder cases...I've undone 54 knots in recorder cases and attached labels...a fiddly job but in the long run, a lot less recorders go missing if I do this, as parents never did this when I asked them to in the past. 

This weekend, I had the most wonderful performance I played in at the Colourscape festival on Clapham Common which I will share soon. Saturday was a day at home which included weeding!

Hope you are well.

xx

Cherry Tree Lane

 Hi there!

Hope you are well!

I went into the monster suitcase of doom in my spare room wardrobe (actually, monster suitcase of doom x2) to look for Summery items of clothing that live in there and found this lovely dress from Tu at Sainsbury's.  I really like Tu at Sainsbury's items- well, certain ones- most of my Tu items have actually come second-hand from Charity shops because I don't usually find them in my size in store, when there is something I want to buy, rather than just admiring.   It's cotton and fitted and even though it is a fitted 8, I can get it over my head to wear, without claustrophobic panics when I can't find the 'exit'!  

The good thing  about dresses is that you can pretty much just wear them as they are- you don't have to worry about matching components- I struggle when packing skirts and tops when I go away anywhere summery, as I can't seem to find things to match as I am a pattern-o-holic!  This one was styled with a simple straw hat (charity-shopped), my second-hand Birkenstock sandals and some acrylic jewellery that has no particular link to cherries...can you make a link between daisies, lobsters and cherries?

Hope you are well!
x

Rainbows raced around the room as he danced with me

This morning, I saw my Marks and Spencer Vintage Madras check dress (charity-shopped) falling out of my  dumping pile clothing basket and decided it would be a good choice as a floaty item of clothing on a hot day!

I decided I wanted to embrace the rainbows today!

I folded down the top of the dress into the skirt and then added a turquoise button vest top (I think this came from Lidl when I was too sweaty on my way up to orchestra from school)

Today, I was all about the embellishments.  My earrings are actually made from plastic drinking straws!  Lorelai LQ makes her jewellery out of single use plastics that would otherwise be chucked away.  Do they look heavy to you?  They are SO light- I can barely feel them!

A starry rainbow necklace from The Crafty Anteater and a wired headband from Primark.

 Let's not forget the rainbow shoes!  Did I ever tell the story of these shoes?
I was going to play at CBC's school concert and I asked him to take my viola case and my black clothes and these shoes to change into for when I got there.
When I arrived to his school and took my things, I could only find ONE of these shoes! I was perplexed. I was certain I'd put it in the bag but no, it wasn't anywhere to be seen.
When I went onto stage, I had to go on in my black-socked feet as the shoes I'd worn to school were brightly coloured.

When I got home, I still couldn't find the other shoe.
When CBC got to school that day, he discovered my shoe, looking very bedraggled and muddy after a night in the rain, on the path to the school entrance!

Mind you, I think my black-socked solution was better than what the leader and co-leader did in an orchestra I used to play with.

It turned out that the leader had forgotten his black shoes.  I should point out, this concert was at St John's, Smith Square in Westminster- a very large, impressive venue, where the audience looks up to a stage where the orchestra sits.  And, the leader of the orchestra always walks on  to stage alone, whilst the audience look on applauding.

What was their solution to this difficulty?

The Co-leader lent him one shoe.

They both wore ONE shoe!

Right at the front of the orchestra, in the direct eye-line of the audience.

And the leader walked onto stage with one shoe, limping slightly from the difference in height.

I am quite sure there were BETTER solutions than that!

I hope you are well.

I am off to school for the next two days.

At the moment, I am only going into school 2 days a week as, whilst there are enough adults for the bubbles, my deputy head wants to minimize my travelling on public transport which is really kind.

Another day this week, I think I might share a summary of all the times I've worn this dress as I think I've worn it in quite a few creative ways!

xx

Flautista

How are you getting on with isolation? It still feels utterly surreal, especially as I have not had to go to school since Monday.
One positive is that, because I have not had to commute to work is that I am actually getting enough sleep. I don't know if it is because I'm not 100% well but I've been sleeping longer which is really good for me. I think I was burning the candle at both ends for too long.
Anyway, I'm not sure I ever shared this necklace.  I play with a flute trio called Flautista and we wear red shoes as our trademark. We wear black dresses with red and white details.
I had an idea for a necklace for wearing for our concerts so I approached Dotty Flamingo who I know make name necklaaces to order.
To my delight, Juliet, the lady who makes their items was able to oblige me and managed to make me a necklace with our name, a beautiful acrylic flute and sparkly red shoe!

I debuted wearing it for our recital on February the 21st.

xx

Dinosaurs with jumpers

When I search for a particular garment or put away washing, I come across another one garment I have forgotten about and I really would like to wear it.
Yesterday, I located my Cath Kidston dinosaur dress which CBC's mum bought for me for my birthday a few years ago. It's a sleeveless, thin cotton dress (though lined) so not really appropriate for January.

However, there are ways around this, especially when you spy another garment you'd forgotten about!
Yes, it's easy to wear a cotton summer dress if you wear it with a thin turtle neck jumper underneath.
This blue ribbed one comes from H&M and has cute curly edges.
Leggings, thick wool socks and boots complete the Winter adaptation.

Accessory wise, I don't have a dinosaur necklace (although I just thought I should have worn my Lochness monster!) so I added my Betta fish from Lorelai LQ and my Bookworm necklace.

This was a good outfit for a hot building at work- it was warm enough for travel but didn't make me sweat inside!

What do you think?

xx

Rainbows to herald the sun

Oh, WHAT a joy the sunshine was this weekend in South-East England. We were all rather taken back by it and made the most of it.  The traffic to the coast was heaving since everyone wanted a piece of the seaside. That's the funny thing about where we live now, we can do that more easily.

Thus, on Saturday morning, when getting dressed (ahem, about midday, mainly because CBC arrived home at 11.15am and I had spent every moment from the time I woke up, cleaning, tidying, putting away to make it look all lovely when he got back. I wasn't quite finished by the time he returned so I was still hoovering around him!), I wanted something bright and ebullient to acknowledge the sun!  It WAS, however, still a little chilly, despite the brightness.

I began with a daisy dress but then, when looking for a black skirt to go over the top of it, I found this charity-shopped, rainbow, knitted skirt and knew that superseded any other clothing plans!  I added simple black long-sleeved t-shirt and red cardigan and then my newish charity-shopped Clarks Originals red boots.   The obvious jewellery choices were my lovely Lorelai LeQuilliec rainbow earrings (which were a birthday present from myself to myself almost exactly a year ago!) and my Nickat sequin necklace and a simple turquoise hairclip.  

Simple, a bit quirky and definitely not the type of outfit being sported by the women of the seaside town we went to for late lunch with our friend.  There, you are smooth, coiffed and blend in!

What do you think?  Too much or just right for a sunny day?

xx

Maxi appeal

Greetings! 

Hope all is well with you!

I am so glad it is another weekend!  Particularly looking forward to this one as I going to my Dad's for his birthday tomorrow and then spending Sunday with my Mum!

Here's an outfit from last week.  I've been cycling to work for 4 days a week since we've come back so I've had to think a little more carefully about my wardrobe choices to ensure that nothing gets caught in the wheels of peddles.  There are certain choices I SHALL NOT be repeating. I missed my train to work yesterday because I wore a knee length full circle skirt and it was a very windy day.  Consequently, I had to keep stopping to readjust its position to protect my modesty!

I wore this outfit on one of the days I walked- I've decided to walk one day to ensure I still get some walking in!

This maxi skirt was a charity shop purchase from that time I went to the church in the town we were supposed to live with. On that subject, THANK YOU everyone who contributed to my blog post on church choices- so kind and helpful of you all! I'm going to try and visit some other ones!

The skirt is excellent on a warm day and it is unbelievably long enough for me- a rarity!

The whole outfit is charity-shopped except for my Tiktok necklace.  Comfy, cool and modest- that's good enough for me!!!  NOT, I hasten to add, for a cycling day!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!

xx

5 brooches or rather necklaces #66

I haven't done a 5 brooches post since November!  What with moving and getting straight and leaving cameras in Kent, I got out the habit of photographing my brooches or necklaces or posting pictures of them!

I seem to have been wearing more of my necklaces recently so I wondered whether to call this 5 necklaces but I'll stick with the normal name.

Yesterday, I went with the fishy look!  The acrylic necklace was a purchased from Kirsteen Stewart in Kirkwall in the Orkneys and is a great favourite.

 Jammy Dodger badge at the Steampunk event I went to with Sophie at the Museum of Power

My work colleague knows how much I like foxes and her daughter made me this fox necklace for my birthday!

This starry night necklace is just so pretty!  It came from Kimchi and Coconut

Finally, I bought this slightly damaged necklace from Sugar and Vice because it is Tik Tok from Return to Oz! I love anything Oz.

Only 1 brooch today and the rest necklaces.

Any favourites here?

x

Science Week outfit- Space Girl

We had Science and DT week at school this week.  On Thursday, the children were encouraged to come dressed up as something connected to Science.  A whole assortment of Doctors, Nurses, Vets, engineers and people in white lab coats turned up.  Then there was the odd robot, Rubix cube, Einstein, rockets and a few calculators and undoubtedly others I didn't get to see!

I thought about what I had and could dress up as and decided that I would come as The Universe!

The main garments which my outfit consisted of were:

A Red Herring Galaxy dress I bought for £7 in the Debenhams 70% off sale 3 years ago.
A Topshop pewter glittery jacket I bought for £6 in the Sue Ryder Charity shop last year.
Matalan pewter Glittery leggings bought from a charity shop for £3 in Hexham.

 Underneath, as the dress is sleeveless, I wore a royal blue and black stripy cotton t-shirt whose sleeves you can see poking out and a silver headband. Terrible positioning means the Chandelier cord looks like some sort of unusual head-dress!

And then we will talk about the adornments!

 I went into my brooch box to see what brooches I had with a space theme and discovered rather a lot!

Starting from the left-side,
Sputnik brooch from Kimchi and Coconut subscription box.
Geordie La Forge from Battle Born Pins- a prize in an Instagram competition.
Topshop pink Saturn and rainbow rocket brooches-

Right hand side
Two Saturn pins
Erstwilder Alien brooch
Laika the Space Dog from Kimchi and Coconut
Doctor Who badge free with Doctor Who Adventures Mag.

 And the Rocket necklace (which says "Fly me to the Moon") was the third item in the Kimchi and Coconut box.

The children loved my outfit and I am quite happy with the Science-discussion that ensued in Year 1.

So, a child asked me why the Dog had a space helmet on.

I explained that Laika the Dog was sent into Space and they asked why and if she lived. 

I went onto the Class computer to a website called Space.com and we found information on the dates and why she was sent.

Interestingly enough, it didn't explicitly say, "She Died," so we did some reading comprehension Inference and reading between the Lines, assuming that, "Eventually the power to her life-support would have run out," and "Sputnik was burnt in the Earth's Atmosphere," to mean she died.

I asked them if they thought it was fair that a Dog was sent into space and one girl horrifiedly said that she would not send her animals into space.  This prompted a discussion on how animals are used in experiments and we talked about how this isn't fair since animals can't say Yes or No.  I mentioned that people protest against Animal testing and experimentation and one particularly articulate chap (5 years old) said, "Good, someone needs to!"

They then asked questions about the first man in space and we read up on Yuri Gagarin. Apparently, they had been discussing space travel this week and knew about Neil Armstrong and his famous words but not actually about the aforementioned.  I was very pleased that my outfit had prompted such a deep discussion for 5 year olds. It was then repeated in the other year 1 class.

FYI, didn't wear the boots for school as it was rainy, wore DMs instead!  And these leggings were extremely irritating given that I spent most of the day hoiking the wretched things up as they sagged down at my waistline and left me with a rash on my thighs from them rubbing! 

Next year, it would be fun to come as something like a Micro

What do you think?

x

A whimsical "Not buying ANYTHING in the sales," wishlist...

Since Christmas is now over and this won't sound like a big Christmas list, I thought I'd share some really nice and cute items that I think are great and would gladly own! As we are now mortgage-payers though not yet moved (more on that soon), I won't be buying any of these, much as I would LOVE to!  Maybe you might like them too! Or at least be entertained by my novelty tat-likes!

Fox blouse from Sugarhill Boutique

Firstly, I saw this blouse on my IG friend Charrrlie a while back and I confess that I adore it!  It's now in the sale at £29 and I would dearly love to buy it- in fact it has hovered in an online basket about 6 times now but I have not made any sale purchases as finances are going to be limited for a while so I won't be getting it, but it is rather gorgeous!

Fox jumper from Sugarhill Boutique

The fox blouse has been accompanied every time by this delightful foxy jumper, £35 in the sale- I think it is really cute but I do already have a fox jumper so alas, I must resist!

Rainbow jumper from Sugarhill Boutique

This rainbow jumper is also from Sugarhill Boutique but is not in the sale! It is rather jolly! I do love me a good rainbow!

Lolly Jar from Lottie and Lu.

High up the novelty tat (but expensive!) stakes is this aaaaaaaaaaamazing sweetie jar brooch from Lottie and Lu! Oh my! What a clever idea!

Button jar from Lolly and Lu by Martini & Slippers

Similarly, this button jar brooch is utterly adorable and I can think of clothing this would go beautifully with!

Sausage Fox necklace from Little Moose

Continuing the foxy theme is this marvellou Sausage Fox necklace from Little Moose! It is a lovely tortoiseshell acrylic and very sweet. They also do a Weasel which I love too! It is around £27.99

Sausage Weasel necklace from Little Moose.

Oh look, here is the weasel!

Cheshire Cat necklace from Little Moose

Little Moose have had this Cheshire Cat necklace a while and it is one I always go and stare at lovingly, well, when I remember that  Little Moose exist!

Apatosaurus necklace from Little Moose

This Apatosaurus necklace is HUGE and I adore it!

Mountain range necklace from Little Moose

This Mountain and Cable Car necklace is really sweet- it's another one I occasionally go and drool over...

Firework necklace from Tatty Devine

Finally,no way could I ever afford this but I do think this Tatty Devine necklace is amazing! CBC would KILL me if I bought and/or wore this!

Any ones you like here or are they all a bit too novelty for your tastes!?

xx

5 brooches and friends #62

Welcome to a rather belated 5 brooches. It seems a while since I have done one of these!

 Brooch no.1 was a rather delightful surprise from the lovely Lisa who made it and sent it to me attached to a lovely Bicycle shirt. Alas, my husband has stolen said shirt from me, since it turned out to be a man's shirt, after I only wore it once. I am sure we can share though!

 My Cath Kidston dino dress obviously was lacking reptiles so I added my fish necklace (from Orkney island based Kirsteen Stewart) and a mirrored Triceratops.

 And lest you feared my outfit was not complete, I was wearing Brontosaurus earrings in a clashing shade!

 A moving boat and wave necklace from Kimchi and Coconut.

 My Impossible Girl necklace...

Finally, here is what I wore for our Alice in Wonderland themed Summer Fair at school.  The little bottle pin says Drink me and the necklace (a gift several years ago from my ever kind deputy head teacher) features the White Rabbit.  Unfortunately, I ended up having to run the Bungee run stall in this get up on a scorching hot day.I had signed up to do the raffle but got swapped. I would have dressed more appropriately had I known!

Any favourites here?
Have you worn any brooches or necklaces?
xx

5 brooches and friends #61

In today's offerings of 5 brooches, the necklaces almost equal the brooch number. Ah well! 

When I wear this Emily and Fin ice-cream dress, I want to go full Freezer-clad so I like to add this '99 ice-cream cone which I crafted out of Shrink plastic a few years ago! Plus my Nan's sparkly flower necklace because I couldn't find my cat ice-lolly necklace. Cursing my inability to organise jewellery!

Oh look, where is the brooch or necklace? It's there somewhere! Peacock butterfly camouflage alert!

Another non-brooch. This cute necklace has a moving part- the boat moves around and comes from Kimchi and Coconut!

 Custard cream brooch from Nikki McWilliams but bought from cute gift shop in Leigh on Sea. This was a guilt buy as I felt bad about browsing for so long and picking up every novelty item in sight!

The last brooch is this pink flower corsage which is usually attached to a hat. Stay tuned for the next installment of Style imitating art in which the whole outfit will feature!

Any broochy action from you lately? Or novelty tat in general?

xx