Jingle Belle

Greetings from a warm and cosy sofa in the living room. I'm currently watching The Secret Adversary (Agatha Christie, Tommy and Tuppence) after having watched Doctor Who Joy to the World and The Romans (William Hartnell Story).  Just been to the kitchen to chop potatoes and prepare sprouts whilst CBC prepared chestnuts.  

I've failed at photographing the Christmas outfits which is a shame as I've worn lots of favourites including the best Christmas jumper.

Here's what I wore on the 23rd when we went over to Mum's for Red Dragon Pie.  It's my Joules Christmas top which I've not paired with a red beret before (I LIKE the Parisian look!) plus my Holly necklace, favourite Seasalt Corduroy Asphodel trousers and my Legero boots.

Here's my coat.   I bought this from Vinted and is a Gharani Strok Toscana hooded sheepskin coat.  I've had it saved in my favourites for a year and have really wanted to buy it.  After I regretted not buying the sheepskin coat in T2 in October, I decided to buy it.  Considering its original price tag was £800, I consider it a bargain for £35!  It's so cosy but it has either been too wet or warm to wear it!

On Christmas Eve, CBC and I headed over to Oxfordshire to his sister.  We were SUPPOSED to arrive at 12.30pm for a pub lunch but sheepishly arrived at around 2pm!  For some reason, we didn't think it would take us almost 3 hours to get there. Luckily, the pub were kind and allowed us to order and I had a fish finger sandwich with skin on fries rather than the 3 course meals everyone else had which I am glad I didn't go for!

After this, we drove straight to a village church, St Mary's Longworth for their 4pm carol service.  It was jam packed and we ended up in the very front row which most people avoided!  As is our family custom, we sang loudly and in harmony although I shied away from the descants which, in retrospect, I am GUTTED about as I always love to sing them, and there was a whole row where there was a sign saying, "Reserved for anyone who wants to sing the descants!".  Still, I did a good job of doing a mixture of Alto and Tenor with CBC's brother singing bass, CBC doing some bass and some melody, his mum doing mostly alto and his sister doing some descant and soprano!  We got complimented on our singing as we left the church!

We headed back to the house and settled down for some tea and TV and then had a massive cheese platter later!  CBC and I had bought a whole load of cheese the night before!

Christmas morning, we awoke and then had breakfast of eggs on toast (others had smoked salmon or veg.. I didn't want too much rich food) after cereals.

Christmas dinner was brilliant, amazingly cooked by J and her husband!  CBC's brother and I went for a quick 1.5 mile walk before dinner.  I helped by doing the washing up!  Grandma's Trifle was the dessert- I just had one spoon of custard!

We ended up watching more TV and then having more cheese later!  I missed most of Doctor Who (watched TODAY!) as I was phoning family but watched Wallace and Gromitt, Vengeance Most Fowl which was fantastic! I don't remember having been particularly bothered by any other Wallace and Gromitt adventures before but this was really compelling AND witty!  We didn't do presents this year although J,MiL, disobeyed and bought me a couple of lovely books.

The next morning, we had a breakfast and then headed out for a walk from some Schutchamer's Knob (funny name for an Iron age barrow the burial place of a Saxon King Cwichelm! When they excavated it they found a stump which could have been a post for the beacon but maybe not necessarily the burial ground) to some memorial near Wantage which a lady erected in memory of her husband. It was super impressive so she must have been very rich.  The walk was quite boggy!

Loved watching their cat Chloe and her cat nip toy!

Forgot to post that I really liked this card from one of my favourite pupils- She comes running from anywhere in the playground to come and give me a hug when she sees me!

I've got to point out an eco-friendly 'present' I received from my Godmother.  She sent me a parcel of all her husband's (Leigh who died earlier who I posted about) handkerchiefs.  There were 29 all in all. You may find it a strange gift but actually for me, brilliant. They had been boiled, cleaned and ironed and will come in great use!

I should also point out my completed Advent forest which I made 2 years ago and I really enjoyed constructing through Advent.

After that commercial break, back to Christmas.  

After we got back from our Boxing Day muddy walk, we had dinner which was Salmon and side salads and potatoes.  It was delicious!  

After this, we watched a BRILLIANT documentary from the Disney Channel about the Composer John Williams.  It was absolutely superb and I really recommend it if you can get hold of it to view!  I love this composer and it was thoroughly informative. We then did some more watching and then CBC and I adjourned to the kitchen to play Carcasonne, we were then joined by his brother to play it again, we had a brief 11pm break for Christmas leftovers, and then T and I played Qwirkle which was fun! I won!

The next morning, after a breakfast, we headed off.  CBC and I dropped off his Mother and brother to Oxford Parkway station and attempted to get Bicester Village to see if we could get CBC some new work clothes but abandoned it after an attempt to get a parking space.  The drive back to Essex was extremely tedious and slow and we went to Chelmsford to attempt to get CBC a hair cut (it was closed).  We had a quick look around for some Wellington boots for my dad (fail!) and picked up some bits from the Refill (I came prepared with containers stashed under the seats!) and then it was time to head to my friend Lara's house which wasn't so far from Chelmsford.  We had a superb time with her and her husband, lovely food, played Pictionary and then headed home rather late. I changed the duvet cover and sheets when we got back and plugged in the electric duvet which meant a cosy night's sleep, really necessary since the heating had been off in the house for 3 days!

We awoke very late on Saturday. I read in bed with tea and things were fine until the Washing machine decided to go wrong AGAIN!  The whole afternoon and evening were spent getting very stressed trying to diagnose the issue, and the same load being attempted to be washed several times and being on the phone to Hoover to try and book an engineer.  We were both very stressed and annoyed with a load of sopping washing to wring out and hang up and I suggested we go out for dinner.  We ended up in the local Indian (I wanted Thai but CBC didn't want to go further afield) and ended up both feeling very blue.  New Year blues and nxieties which led to an anxious night's sleep (not actually had much sleep... I wish I wasn't but I am highly sensitive and unfortunately get intrusive thoughts and interrupted sleep when anxious). I ended up getting up for the THANKFULLY later church service to play my flute.   The service was at 10.30 as the 9.15 and 11am church services were combined so it was lovely for my tiny little country church to be packed. Was a lovely service but my lack of sleep and thoughts preying on my mind led to me feeling very emotionally fragile and crying a lot throughout the service. I felt really stupid and I do genuinely think that there is some sort of spiritual attack when I get completely freaked out.  My friend Sue was so kind to me and everyone was very loving but now I feel ridiculous now.  I love my church friends and just wish I had discovered this church when I first moved there. I think Lockdown would have been very different with my church friends.

After a day at home and talking a little to CBC about my feelings, I feel less anxious. Don't worry, I'm fine, but I like to be honest here...it's not all swings and roundabouts!

We are off to my Dad's for new year which I look forward to.

xx

 

TARDIS Tuesday- Yasmin Khan and her unidentified critters!

Hi there! 

I had a break from TARDIS Tuesday last week but I am back with something SEMI new!. I Last featured this outfit on the blog in November 2022.  It was worn by Yasmin Khan in Revolution of the Daleks for a short while.  FINALLY, she got out of her leather jackets and got into Corduroy... for about 10 seconds....grrr!!! It is one of those outfits where I IDed one of the garments myself- the lovely G Star Deline corduroy jacket but the actual shirt ID eluded me.

Fast forward to last week and my Insta Yaz fan friend Rebecca had managed to ID the blouse! I am pleased because I actually helped her with this.  I shared these screen shots and zoomed in on some to point out some smaller details and other colours and she did some work on lightening and adjusting the colours AND all of a sudden, she noticed there were not just flowers but creatures!  Knowing Yaz had a couple of Oasis blouses, she searched for Oasis AND FOUND THE BLOUSE!!! And once you saw her blouse, you could IMMEDIATELY spot the unicorns!!!! 

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Rebecculous (@rikkuriffic)

And then we had lift-off!!!!

She shared a link to one or two on Vinted but I found myself one for £3 only and it arrived on Sunday to be picked up from the very useful INpost lockers.  I love these!  It's always exciting to

a) try and guess which door will open

b) try and complete the transaction in as short a time as possible as it tells you how long it took you. My current record is 18.2 seconds but I'm definitely up for decreasing this!

I wore my blouse for school today (Tuesday) but by posting time, it's already past midnight!

Here's my take on the outfit.

I'm wearing my G star jacket and Oasis shirt but I wore more school appropriate black trousers rather than blue jeans and added a pair of Yaz Dune boots. We don't see what she wore with this outfit but I'm betting it was boots!

I look fatigued and old but still smiling! Wore my Avon Lacey initial letters in place of Yaz's more expensive Alex Monroe ones. I'd love to own the actual Alex Monroe floral initial ones, they are SOOOO pretty but so expensive!

I thought I'd share some details of the pretty shirt. It's viscose but feels nice to wear.

Here's how I styled it when I got home work! Let my hair down and added my black furry gilet plus my crocheted slippers! IN TARDIS Blue of course!

Hope all is well with you! My day was quite successful! The year 3 classes had actually practised Jingle Bells at home and many were able to successfully perform it in the class. Singing Assembly went well learning You shall go out with joy, our trademark end of Carol concert song.  Year 2 and 1 were quite successful.  The usually difficult year 1 class LOVED recapping In and Out the Dusty Blue Bells and even more loved the new game, Here comes Barnaby  and came up with some very inventive ways of parading down the aisle of clapping children! Year 3-4 Choir went well as they finished learning my new Christmas song and seemed to like it- PHEW! Hoping you will get to hear it just before Christmas!

Can you guess what the title of it is?

xx

TARDIS Thursday- Village of the Angels Yaz

Hi there,

Greetings from Lurgy-ville! I started to feel a bit unwell on Sunday night and now I have a fully blown cold.  Yesterday, I took 18 children from my Year 4 recorder club to perform in our local borough's annual recorder festival.  It was the first one since 2019 and is a festival I have been taking part in since about 1988! We had a lovely time (although had to wait 30mins for the last parent to collect their child!)   It was sad that only 3 schools (plus the music school) accepted the invitation to take part.  In past years, there have been dozens of schools. I wondered why? Is the recorder not being taught so much (wretched Ukelele)? Was it too last minute? I do hope that it will develop again more next year.

My children were really proud of themselves and really excited but nervous to do their first performance with other schools.  When I look at the children I took (one last minute was not able to come), I laugh at some of the children I have who used to be really difficult in Year 1 and who are now proudly playing the recorder and turning up to a lunchtime club voluntarily on a weekly basis! I am so glad to offer them this opportunity! The audience was very warm and receptive and appreciative and the parents were really excited to see their children perform.

For TARDIS Tuesday today, I am featuring Yasmin Khan again- 13th Doctor companion.

It comes from Series 13 episode, Village of the Angels.  This was a creepy but brilliant episode with tension in bags!

She wears a navy silky floral shirt from All Saints (The Adeliza Spirit shirt) plus a brown fur coat from Zara (and NOT her usual leather jacket!) plus black buttoned down jeans, tan belt and Dr Martens Leonore chelsea boots. She wears a bright red top underneath and her  Y and Z initial necklaces.

https://tellyvisions.org/article/doctor-who-flux-episode-4-recap-village-angels 

Here's my version:

 Not sure what is going on with my camera but it was very washed out!

With the exception of my All Saints blouse (which has a lovely jacquard fabric with nice big loose sleeves), the rest of the outfit is all other items I own anyway (the usual ASOS trousers, brown boots plus my G Star Deline coat from another Yaz outfit. I forgot to don my tan belt!

This was a good school outfit on a Spring day.

I hope all is well with you!

xx

TARDIS Tuesday- Goodbye Sarah Jane Smith!

Today for TARDIS Tuesday, I am referring to one of the Spin offs and that is The Sarah Jane Adventures.  Out of all Who companions, Sarah Jane Smith, the reporter, was one of the most iconic.  She enjoyed great success in this modern Who series for children but ALSO had a Classic Who spin off called K9 and Company!

She had an almost 'uniform' in this spin off series that usually consisted of:

Collared top (shirt or jersey top with collar), waistcoat, jeans, knee-high boots and often a leather jacket over the top.

The outfit I am featuring today was featured in a later episode called Goodbye Sarah Jane Smith and is a softer take on her classic look

Image from  Sarah Jane Closet

She wears a pale blue jersey top with a collar from Joseph, a soft knitted Cornflower blue waistcoat from Whistles and her reading glasses. Presumably wearing her jeans and boots.

I decided, since this is almost a perfect outfit for school, to adapt it so it would work for a school dress code.

I was lucky, thanks to the magic of Vinted to find both the SA top and waistcoat for less than a fiver each and they are incredibly comfortable as well as, I hope,looking smart.

I decided to team them with my Seasalt Asphodel black corduroy trousers and Clarks lace up black shoes.  Probably skinnier trousers and knee high boots would have looked more accurate and stylish but this look for me, is about comfort!

Attempted to take a photo in pose from the photo above though I do look rather miserable!

Hope you are well! I had a nice surprise this weekend. I didn't attend my usual church service as I had a headache and woke up late. CBC gave me a lift to the linked church a few miles away who have an 11 o'clock service (same service that is done at my church). It was a really lovely service and a great sermon from David, a retired South African vicar.  After the service, Sue, who plays piano, suggested I ask this man for a lift as he doesn't live too far from me.  When we were chatting in the car, he remembered me from a previous service and he is a musician too, a viola-player.  As we were chatting, it turns out he will be playing for a concert that I am page-turning for my friend for, in a couple of weeks so we were pleased that we'd had the chance to chat.  I did feel a little sad in the service that I hadn't gone to this church (well, the linked church) when I first moved to the area around 5 years ago, it was only because of lockdown and discovering them on Youtube, that I realised this church had a weekly service. For some reason, I thought it only had one once a month. I wonder what life would have been like if I had joined then? Ah, well, I will never know.

By the way, on the subject of horrid things going on in the world, I would love to talk about them and comment, but we have been told/advised at work that we should not be talking about things online as we have to be seen as neutral. Rest assured, I am praying, caring and learning

Hope all is well with you!

x

Crocheted catchup

 It's been a long couple of weeks!

I've looked back at my blog and realised I haven't really said much for a couple of weeks!

I thought I'd start with today's outfit:

This was worn for a day at home. I didn't leave. Not once.  I completely missed church since I woke up at around 11am, despite having set my alarms. The clocks going forward didn't help,nor did my Saturday adventures. More on that anon.

Outfit first.

I love my Seasalt corduroy trousers- these ones are the Asphodel trousers and they are super comfortable. I own them in Onyx and Burgundy shades. I teamed them with a River Island stripy turtle neck I bought secondhand from LorelaiLQ. I really like this top. Then I added my 2nd hand handmade crocheted waistcoat.  The Dr Martens boots (also bought from Lorelai's instasale) were just worn to go out into the garden for some teabag ripping and composting and the photos.  The black velvet hat was secondhand and I wore it indoors all day.  I love it because it reminds me of my 90's black velvet hat that I used to wear for Windband on a Saturday morning at the Music centre. My conductor, Mr Beal used to call me Paddington Bear when I wore it. Nostalgic vibes of happy times.

So...what have I been up to?

Well, on Monday 13th March, I took my 33 children from the Year 5-6 choir to the Royal Albert Hall in London to sing at our borough's biennual choral festival.  I realised that this was my 30th year of taking part in this concert (should've been in 2022 but for Covid putting it back a year).

The amount of prep for this seemed quite alot, not helped by travelling by coach with 2 other schools to save money (they asked us to join us me on our coach).  We arrived a little late as there were several annoying road closures which weren't on the SATnav so the poor driver had to loop around several times which made us waste about 20minutes.  We ate our lunch outside fairly swiftly then went inside.  We were placed right in the middle of the choir stalls so we had a really good view.  There was some annoying kerfuffle over putting coats in yellow bin bags. I had come prepared with my own big holdall bags.  The kids were really excited and I have to say, they were the best-behaved choir I have taken to this festival in 16 years. I didn't have to tell anyone to be quiet at all- the headteacher of a local school even complimented them to my headteacher a couple of days later. I was amazed as the rehearsal was really long and involved lots of sitting around so they did really well.

After the rehearsal ended around 5.15pm, after the children having been in the arena (apart from loo breaks) since 12.50pm, we went outside, hoping to go to Hyde Park for a play.  Alas, it looked like rain so we sat on the steps and ate our second packed meal of the day. We managed to take a team photo before the rain started and we had to head inside. Typical!

After the toilet break and putting our bags in the fancy 1871 bar area, we went up to our seats.  Every previous year, I have been envious of schools who had made a banner to hold up so this year, I'd got the children to make individual letters in our school colours from cut up cardboard boxes (ever the recycler) which we held up. Unfortunately, the photo I was hoping for wasn't quite achieved as we couldn't get a photo with everyone in face on without lots of other schools in the way.

It hit 7pm and the concert began. The children were excited and sang brilliantly. I was very proud of how accurate they were with their singing, counting and rhythms (they commented that other schools weren't doing some of the rhythms correctly! My pedantry over their counting seems to have been passed on to them!) The theme of the concert was the Queen's life and Jubilee with some other pieces thrown in for good measure.  To make things even more exciting, we had been given tiny LED lights in red, white and blue to wave during 'Sing' by Gary Barlow, flags to wave during the National Anthem and our own flags to wave during Sweet Caroline. 

Unfortunately, as we were in the middle of singing a song called Hope, when all the lights were on us, composed for this concert by my school friend Kayleigh, my lovely choir assistant L turned round to me to say that one of our pupils, a boy with ASD had just said he felt sick. In the moment I stood thinking, "Where is the sick bucket?" and "Should I take him out now?", he then proceeded to projectile vomit in about 5 directions!!! It smelt very strongly of smoky bacon.  There was absolutely loads of it. As she led him out, I went to try and find some paper towels (I had used our supply during the rehearsal to clear up a spilt bottle of water.). I managed to find a roll outside. By this point, the performance had moved onto 'Sing'. Myself and our Assistant head were on our hands and knees trying to clear it up during the song. It was awful! It was absolutely everywhere including inside L's carrier bag on her cardigan, down the back of a girl in the school in front, all over her chair, under his chair. I felt really helpless! In retrospect, I should have just carried on singing and waited to clear it up (apparently, it was allvisible to the audience according to our parents and Head who saw everything!)

During the interval, I went out to go and find out what was happening with the boy.  He still felt sick and had thrown up again in our bucket. He had some icy water from the First Aid team.  I felt really bad for him as he is not always able to express his feelings. He looked very sweaty. After a while, he said he wanted to go back in. I took him but then thought better of it, so the ushers allowed us to place a chair near the door so he could exit when he needed to.  Our kind Assistant Head told me she would sit with him as I needed to be with the kids to sing.   Apparently, he was continually being sick during the second half but really wanted to come back in to sing.  The  AH was one of the best people to be with on this trip as she is so good humoured and just laughs at stressful situations (whereas I spent the whole second hand fretting). 

The concert was amazing- the children were so excited and buzzing about their experience.  2 of our children had been filmed for an interview about preparing for the concert and they said some really beautiful things!

At the end, we had to wait for an usher to tell us when we were allowed to exit our seats.  The concert had ended some 30minutes later than it was due to and then we seemed to not be called to leave. I was getting worried about leaving so we tried to make our way back to the Bar where our coats and bags were but the exit we'd been using had been blocked off.  We ended up going on a massive wild-goose chase right the way round the hall to get back there with an usher and eventually got our coats.  When we finally made our way back up to the top and kids had been to the loo, we tried to find my AH and the sick boy, but our sick bucket had gone missing whilst being washed.  We were worried as he was still being sick. I tried to call a parent who was coming back on the coach with us and the coach driver to find out where he was.  It was so stressful getting out as there were still masses of parents and children waiting.  As we walked, one of our parents started to ask me if she could take her child and I'm afraid I was rather abrupt in my negative answer in my anxiety to get the children safely to the coach. 

We got on the coach and I hoped and prayed that we would not hit awful traffic like we had done in previous years.  The sick child was thankfully sleepy so he started to go to sleep (though he did wake up to vomit once later....).  I was so thankful that we didn't hit traffic and only got back to school around 30minutes late, 11.07pm exactly. All the parents turned up! 

I got a lift to my interchange station with my AH as she lives near my midpoint train change station. We were almost crying with laughter at her hilarious retelling of the events of the evening despite how tired we were. I had to wait 25minutes at the station and got home after getting a taxi around 12.50am!!! Only 6 hours till I had to get up again!

That whole tiredness stayed with me for the rest of the week.  We had 2 days of teacher strikes that week but this time, we opened for a few classes so I did have to go in (my union didn't strike). 

I had a really useful gamelan rehearsal on the Wednesday night- there were only 6 of us there but we got some focused practice done.

Thursday, I only had the Year 6 children because of the strikes but I had decided to organise a second performance of our Albert Hall songs with another local school for the parents who couldn't afford to watch the concert so we tried out the songs with some of our children singing the parts the secondary children sang including solos.

At the weekend, CBC and I headed out to various towns to try and get some supplies as well as camping gear for our forthcoming trip to walk some of the Pennine way.  We ended up at Lakeside to visit Go Outdoors as other camping shops had closed down.  We managed to get a few supplies and then had a look in TK Maxx too. We bought a new Bamboo chopping board as our Joseph Joseph one had snapped last week.  We ended up in a Thai restaunt for dinner which was yummy.

On Sunday, I headed over to my Mum's for lunch to give her some Mother's Day presents. It was so nice to see her. I ended the day at a Gamelan rehearsal in London.

Sadly, my Monday flute quartet rehearsal was cancelled due to illness.  School was busy this week.

We had a rehearsal at the local school for the choir concert next week. Their piano is dreadfully out of tune! I managed to play all the piano parts for the songs.

This weekend had two more Gamelan rehearsals on Thursday and Friday. The Friday was great as one of the Balinese dancers had bought cooked Balinese food for all of us! It was amazing!

On Saturday, CBC had a concert and rehearsal in the afternoon and evening. His brother came out on the train to do a practice trek with me for our family trip to walk some of the Pennine way in the Easter Holidays.  He's doing 9 days of trekking whereas CBC and I are only doing 4 (though 17.5miles each day with camping gear- eek!). CBC was rather cross about this plan since he had to do the concert rehearsal  despite having been in the Whatsapp group where it was arranged so I felt a bit miserable when we started. 

Once I'd met my BiL at the station, we went to buy some rolls from the bakery and set off on our walk.

It was remarkably muddy in places which was a bit difficult in places.  We ended up getting lost and finding ourselves in the 'Poo farm'! The sewage treatment works really! After a few wrong turns, involving a tiresome railway crossing closure, we ended up stopping in a churchyard for lunch. It was SO nice to sit down!  The weather was mostly kind to us though we did get rained on!

By the time we got back to my house, we'd walked 23.3km! We were so tired. We had some tea, biscuits, showers, cheese and crackers and then walked the mile to town to find dinner. We tried the Indian restaurant which was full so we went to the Italian instead.  The food was delicious though took a long time.  CBC got back to town just as we were finishing so we met him at the station and my BiL got the train home!

Today, I spent most of the day cleaning and tidying and preparing my camping stuff for the Pennine Way.

I should probably go to bed!

Hope you are well!

xx

Not my usual style

 Hi there!

I hope you are well.

I've unfortunately got yet another cold. It started Wednesday night with swollen tonsils and blocked sinuses.  Thursday I didn't feel well but Friday, after a good night's sleep, I felt better.  Friday night, after a gamelan rehearsal at LSO St Lukes, I went home. When I went to bed, I felt a bit snotty but during the night, it felt interminable- I couldn't sleep, I was totally bunged up and my throat was really raw so breathing through my mouth was hard. I kept drinking water and then kept needing the loo, then I kept coughing. CBC finally came to bed after conking out on the sofa, after a work meal out. I went to sleep in the spare room and settled down better in there but still had to get up a few more times and my sleep was broken. Why are the nights so long with a cold!?

Once I got up, I felt better. 

I cancelled my flute quartet session as I was obviously not wanting to share  my germs in a small room. I was relieved that one of the other flautists was also still not well so had been thinking of cancelling. We had some cake and cheese-related banter on our Whatsapp group.

CBC borrowed my Brompton to catch a train and rescue his car which he had left near the restaurant last night. I went and ripped open 155 teabags from the school 'teabag compost' and emptied the compost. I then did all the washing up from the past few days (yes, I know. Don't judge), put some washing on and put away clean washing and cleaned the kitchen worktops.

I eventually showered and dressed to head into town to pick up some supplies from the Refill shop quite late on my bike, prepared with mask.

Alas, it was closed (Google lied) so I went to have a look in the charity shop for something I was looking for. It's very spacious and was totally empty. I didn't find it but I did end up buying a suitcase! My good-sized travel bag has got holes in the bottom of it and a rip at the seam by the zip (can it be fixed?)  and I knew I'd need. It's medium-sized so it was perfect for a short trip of a few days.

I also bought a brand new pair of TurtleDove Cashmere wrist-warmers and a geography game.

I thought I'd share what I wore as it's very much different from my regular style (well, that's what everyone who has seen me wear this jacket says).

I bought this denim coat from Primark with my niece about 4 weeks ago. I had no intention of buying it or anything like this. My niece wanted to try a couple of things on when we were shopping. I decided to try this coat on to take some pictures in the changing room mirrors as it looked similar to a coat which is going to be worn by new Who companion, Ruby Sunday (who I am not going to cosplay for TT as she is just too young and hip!).  It's not my style so I thought it would be a something to try whilst she tried her things on.When I tried it on, it felt SO cosy and comfortable- it is thickly quilted. My niece really liked it and somehow egged me on into buying it.  I have not bought anything from Primark for at least 4-5 years so I felt a bit uncomfortable...

That said, I've worn it on a few weekends and everyone has commented how much they like it!

I wore it today with this striped turtle neck from RiverIsland which I bought from Lorelai LQ's jumble sale, with a cotton waistcoat from Whistles (2nd hand)

The trousers are my green Porfell corduroy trousers from Seasalt which I bought from Bury St Edmunds in October. I have worn them so much- they are the perfect Winter trouser.

The boots are from Leggero and I bought them from Finale, Corbridge in 2020. They are Goretex, totally waterproof and still going strong. Lined with Sheepskin, they are the perfect Winter cycling boot.

 I added my F&F snow-leopard print beret and have been cosy and happy all day.

I am so glad it is half-term. It's been only 5.5 weeks but the Jan-Feb half-term is usually the miserable one. It's been hard but ok.  Having had 2 Wednesdays where I wasn't in school (once at the LSO for INSET and once the teacher strike day) has made the difference.

There have been some positive lessons and some hard ones.  The Year 4's have made some good progress and I haven't dreaded their lessons as much term.  The Year 6's have been good and have produced some admirable performances.   Singing Assemblies have been positive.

I've only had a few Gamelan rehearsals and that one concert last Saturday so I haven't been too overwhelmed with rehearsals either.

I'm looking forward to some rest AND fun at half term. Just need to kick this cold away!

xxx

TARDIS Tuesday- the obscure Yaz outfit from Revolution of the Daleks

 This week for TARDIS Tuesday, I am going a little niche and obscure! Jodie's era is over but I'm not done with trying to recreate outfits from her companion Yaz (who, random fact here, is the only companion in Doctor Who history to remain with her Doctor throughout the Doctor's whole era).

I featured Yaz's main outfit from Revolution of the Daleks in December 2020 and revisited it in May 2022 but, when the episode aired, it was a little seen outfit that she wore right at the start of the episode that really caught my eye and heart.

Here are my screen grabs of it:

It's the corduroy coat that did it. I LOVE corduroy. I can't tell you why but I have always loved it. My Mum used to tell me about a beautiful pair of petrol-blue Levi cords she used to wear in the 70's which sounded wonderful to me.  In the 90's my viola-friend Chrissie acquired a pair of pale blue Levi cords from her sister. We used to share them in the viola section. Me, Maz and her used to wear these cords. I bought a pair of Bottle green cords from Laura Ashley from the charity shop which I owned until recently but they just got a little too tight.

The coat is navy blue corduroy with a shearling collar and buttons.  She wears it with a black floral shirt with little white flowers and either brown or green foliage. She wears blue jeans and her floral Y & Z necklaces from Alex Monroe.

Back to the corduroy coat. I really liked it and I did a little search on eBay for a navy corduroy coat and by accident, managed to find the Screen accurate coat.  I knew it was the exact one because of the features but also, when I rewatched the scene above, I saw the tiny metal G of the G star reflecting for a split second in the screen. (Later on, I found out that G star items have been worn by Doctor Who characters before)

To my knowledge, no one else has identified the coat so this is its first outing as the identified coat!

The coat is called the G Star Deline coat in navy corduroy. Its retail price was £220!!!! I saw one on eBay in XS for £12.  I didn't buy it at the time as I wasn't sure whether XS would fit me and I am glad I didn't because I managed to find a S version for around £17 later on which fits well.

Here's my coat. It is quilted on the inside and is really cosy and comfortable. It became my favourite Spring coat when I acquired it earlier this year before it had to go away for late Spring and Summer.

I managed to find a H&M black floral shirt that did as good a job as any for the shirt and it has become a staple in my Autumn work wardrobe

I don't have blue jeans that are that colour but I wore the outfit with these indigo denim trousers from ASOS instead.

I added my Screen accurate Dune Pacey boots (which Yaz wears in her first series. I don't know what she wore in this scene.

When I first put together this outfit (last Saturday), I first wore my handmade Y & Z necklaces (made out of silver mirrored card) but to actually go out (we went to the theatre and saw Sweeney Todd at the Palace theatre in Southend), I wore my alternative necklace- my K & Z necklaces for Kez rather than Yaz! They are the best, cheapest alternative to her real Alex Monroe necklaces which retail at £95 each in silver) and are the Avon Lacey necklaces. I am rather fond of them!

A small detail is the silver crystal studs.  They were a Christmas present back in 2005 from my Stepdad's daughter in law!

I wore my hair up in a bun this day and it miraculously stayed up ALL DAY! Twas a miracle!

This is an outfit I like very much. Comfortable and cosy & very easy to wear for work with different trousers!

What do you think?

xxx

On Wednesdays we wear orange.

We used to have this tradition at work on Wednesdays which we called Colour Wednesdays.  Each week, someone would suggest a colour or theme, e.g. spots, stripes and as many members of staff as possible who wished to participate would come in on Wednesdays wearing that colour. I really liked it- it was funny and sometimes the children clocked onto it when they saw several members of staff wearing the same colour!
Someone evidently had been thinking of this as on the board last week, someone wrote:
Wednesday: 50 shades of blue.  I saw it too late but this week, I saw 50 shades of Orange on the board.

So, today, I remembered and planned accordingly...

 I bought this dress second-hand in around September. It's from Palava Folk and is made of Organic cotton corduroy

 It needs very little to add to it so, apart from my Peach heart earrings from Lorelai LQ, I kept it simple. Black leggings and black boots- the Clarks men's ones I mentioned in a previous post and a black belt.

Comfy and hopefully fairly stylish!

xxx

TARDIS Tuesday- Jon Pertwee's 3rd Doctor in The Time Warrior

Hi there!
Hope you are well.
I thought, for a change, for a TARDIS Tuesday, I would dress as one of the original Doctors.  I have done this before HERE back in 2013- in fact this outfit, but slightly different- only the jacket is the same.

So, in an episode called The Time Warrior, where he meets Sarah Jane Smith for the first he wears an olive green velvet smoking jacket, white ruffle-fronted shirt, a greeny/grey bow tie and some black trousers.

Image borrowed from this Pinterest

The ruffle-fronted shirt is quintessential Jon Pertwee for me- he was indeed a Dandy in Doctor Who.

Image borrowed from Metro

And here is my version:

I should point out that most of the outfit is charity-shopped and not for the purpose of this outfit.

Let's start with the jacket.  I bought this Per Una Olive-green corduroy  jacket from a charity-shop well over 12 years ago and it has proved really versatile. I remember CBC being very envious of it when we first met.  It's not as long as his but then it is a female shape.

The trousers are a pair of ASOS trousers I charity-shopped not so long ago, a few months and they were brand-new with tags and I have worn them lots already- at least 10 times if not more.

My brown men's brogues are the only brand-new item here- they come from the men's section of Clarks- where size 8 shoes are significantly cheaper in the sale.

The one piece I DID buy with Jon Pertwee in mind is the Boden ruffled shirt.  I saw it in a charity-shop a few months ago and thought, "Oooooooooooooooh, that is LOVELY and looks very Jon Pertwee!!"

Look at those ruffles!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But, I do worry about whether my ironing skills are up to it once I wash it. I am going to have to wash it since I spilt Indonesian Soto Ayam (which has Tumeric in it! AHGHGHGH!) down it on Sunday at the Indonesian Embassy!

The bow-tie is also second-hand but it came from a vintage shop in Hexham that I always feel sorry for and worry it will close down!  It is an amazing labyrinthine building with so many sections to peruse!

And there we have it- my first male TARDIS Tuesday in quite a while?

What do you think?

x