Orange cartoon!

I really want to continue to blog about Antwerp but I keep trying to email myself photos from my phone and they don't seem to come through! Not sure what to do about this!

In the meantime, an alternative post!

Today's outfit is based on a special request from Sheila to see the Cartoon bag, which I recently bought in a charity shop, in action.

I first saw this bag on the blog of a lovely girl called Florrie. She blogged at Intrinsically Florrie and showed this bag once.  It looked crazy as it looked like a 2D cartoon bag.

And here it is in action.  I've been using it as my handbag since last Saturday.

My entire outfit (except for the belt, brooches and boots) is charity-shopped.

I decided to wear my FabIndia blockprint skirt with an orange M&S sweater

I decided to take inspiration from Ann (Polyester Princess) and add a belt to create a clean line between the skirt and top- it's a stretchy Primark one

For accessories, I decided to wear 3 brooches on my jumper- originally the two little ones are from Punky Pins and the big one from LadyBird Likes.

The earrings come from Lorelai LQ and are made from drinking straws.

Sadly, the most thrilling action this outfit saw was a trip to B&Q with CBC to pick up some curtain hooks for our new curtains. And lots of hoovering and cleaning out of the utility room and washing up. Dull, dull, but necessary.

We had a lovely time on Sunday meeting CBC's French cousin, who is doing an internship in the UK for 5 months, in Clerkenwell.  That was much more thrilling!

Hope you are well!

xx

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

Creating a festive outfit

Creating a festive outfit doesn't have to be about wearing a Christmas jumper or even a Christmas dress, it can be about whatever you want it to. I am not a fashion or style expert and I have always done my own thing and you should too.

The end.

However, how I did that here was in the cunning use of bright colours and patterns.

 This beautiful dress is from Palava Folk (once called Poppy England, then Bryony&co) and it is handmade in England.  100% cotton, pockets, lined. What's not to love. Even better, I bought it in their summer sample sale at about 70% less than the normal price.
I thought it worked as a festive dress because the lolly pattern was quite synonymous with Christmas baubles and also made me think of the Land of Sweets from the Nutcracker ballet

 The gorgeous skies in Blackmore as I took these photos.

 I took the bauble idea and wore this personalised Christmas decoration as an oversized pendant. This was a free gift from Punkypins which I received last year with an order.

 I added these wonderful parcel bow earrings from Hazel which were a simple touch without being too overpowering...

The final detail was my Croc shoes. Although turquoise wasn't an obvious choice, I felt it worked well!

And that's how I created a festive outfit! How would you have created one?

xxx

Sailor heart

What ho, tis I, Le Kez!

Hope that your day was successful and fun.

I had a slightly bizarrely successful afternoon which only resulted from me going off on a tangent!

In year 3, I went to teach a lesson. I was introducing the concept of Time Signatures - which would then lead into them getting the feel of time signatures, learning to conduct in those time signatures, listen to some music to identify time signatures and then answer some other comparison questions between 2 songs- Tomorrow the Fox and 'Didlan' (based on The Ashgrove folk tune).

Anyway, I introduced it by asking them what comes first on the stave in music (the treble clef).  I asked them what that told us (that it was a high-pitched instrument playing).  Then, as a reminder, I asked what the name of the clef was that means it's a low instrument (they dutifully answered 'Bass Clef') - I then added the Alto clef as a tangent which was greeted with "Cooooool!", "I love this!"  (??????)

I then started to say as a mere note aside, that a key signature comes next and somehow got into explaining key signatures, how they work, what sharps and flats are and what they mean etc' and somehow, they were highly enthusiastic about this and were really getting into this (I'm talking boys and girls who can be a bit disruptive) and were just amazed to be learning all this (I think I maybe did ok by starting the Alto clef comment by saying, "You don't need to know this, but I know some of you like knowing harder, extra information," which meant everyone wanted to be THAT person I was inferring) .  So we had this massive tangent on key signatures and sharps and flats and enharmonic equivalents and they were just bizarrely really with me on it!!  There was no distraction, no one who had to be called to order or made to face the correct way. We're talking a solid block of music theory!

When I introduced the time signatures, the delight of learning how to conduct and what conductors are really doing was a delight!! 

When they came to do the listening- everyone was totally focused.  Bizarre how that happens sometimes. I usually find them really hard work. That said though, they are quite a musical class- they are probably one of the best singing classes in the school.

Anyway, if you have survived that long and waffly tangent, well done, have a gold star, biscuit and a cup of tea, you deserve it!

I thought I'd share 2 pictures of two of my Charity shop purchases which featured in 'The Buyer's archive' post. The gorgeous Topshop sailor jumper from Sue Ryder and the heart skirt from Barnados!  Just needed the tiny addition of some navy knitted tights, gold Toms and my Punkypins Bee necklace and I was good to go! 

I love my new tree with its crops of daffodils! What will I do when they all die!?!? I've never quite had such a happy blogging posing spot!

xxx

SIA: Be kind to books

http://librarianforlifestyle.com/2015/10/06/sia-round-up-book-club/
I haven't shared a Style imitating art outfit for a long time so I thought it was time to remedy that!
The poster above was a Banned Books poster and it had particularly striking colours.

I wore this skirt and top to represent the majority back plus this Monsoon Charity-shopped cardigan for the blue.  Of course the orange was minimal so I wore my orange felt leaf brooch and used my orange watering can handbag.  The photo was taken at the park where we went for a walk and an ice-cream last Sunday!

I'm also linking with Spygirl Anne Bray with her 52 pick me up link with the theme of sunset
http://spygirl-amb.blogspot.co.uk/ my bag and leaf, combined with the blue of a muted sky and silhouette black

If you want to take part in Style Imitating Art at All with Jess, this week's inspiration is:

Leopard I by Megan Carn, acylic on Canvas 2015.
Send your inspired outfit to Jess at animatedcardigan@gmail.com

Since this was a book-themed Style imitating art, I thought I'd do an accompanying book review:

The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents by Terry Pratchett

I'd been recommended this book for a long time. The book begins as Maurice, the rats and a rather stupid looking pipe-playing boy called Keith are off for a final heist to pull the Pied Piper routine on an unsuspecting town.
Maurice is a cat and he and the rats suddenly began to be able to talk, think and philosophise after eating a pile of rubbish that obviously had something magic in it.  Maurice is essentially a bit of a crook, a very convincing street-wise one.  The rats have varying personalities such as Peaches to has a cough to rival Dolores Umbridge, Dangerous Beans, the prophet and Hampork, the leader who doesn't like this talking milarkey and wishes rats could just be rats again.

Unfortunately, the aforementioned town, Badblintz appears already to have a rat problem. A rather sinister one and it's up to Maurice and co to try and sort matters.

This book is full of Pratchett's hilarious thoughts upon the world from eccentric characters, genius description, quirky characters and a surprising amount of mystery and tension- just WHAT is going on in Bad Blintz keeps you reading and guessing up to the last minute, with a horrible dark concept as the denouement!!! Plus, Death makes an appearance and I always love it when Death turns up!

I recommend it (and of course, found it in a charity shop!).


Hope all is well with you!

xxx

Little white one

One of these days, I'll tell you about the original, 'Little White One'.  About 2 years too late.
My neighbours bought an adorable little white kitten a few months ago. Ever since I saw her (apparently it's a boy but the 'she' pronoun has been too long in my vernacular regarding this kitty) first, I have adored the kitty but she/he was always a little shy of actually being stroked and would bounce around the lawn crazily but never would deign for contact.

Fast forward to a week before Easter, my neighbours, two along,  gave me a lift to the station in the rain and I discovered they were off to Canada for two weeks.  Little White One was being fed by the neighbours on the other side but was obviously lonely as she started trotting along when I arrived. Finally, she allowed me to stroke her and was adorably affectionate and enjoyed a cuddle. Over a few days, we established a rapport and she came running whenever made that kissy kissy noise that we humans seem to think our feline friends like. She'd follow me and even crept in the backdoor a few times.

On Friday, when CBC and I were on our way out to a friend's, she was walking across our lawn. "Baby!" I cried and she rolled over and then sat on the grass.


Having asked CBC to take one or two shots of me (yes, ignore the hair, I know!) , she ran over and insisted on being in the shots.

Begging and mewing for a cuddle...


Gazing up at me affectionately.

Until this last photo where she grew audacious and high-fived me!

This isn't the most interesting or amazing outfit but I quite liked the new blouse I ended up buying with a Sainsbury's voucher I had. I think it will make a nice comfortable alternative to my other black shirt/blouse. Also, I don't think my crazy skirt which my dear Canadian teacher friend gave me has even been seen on the blog.

Do you have neighbours with friendly cats!
I must ask what her/his name is!!!
xx

Update: His name is Prince!!!

Novelty bag: watering the plants

My husband frequently tells me I ruin a perfectly good outfit by teaming it with an unsuitable, unstylish or ill-matched bag.  I usually ignore him but occasionally he has a point- sometimes what I add doesn't really go AT ALL. It just looks incongruous.   I don't really care to be honest.  However, what I DO love is a statement, novelty handbag.  I absolutely LOVE novelty handbags.  The number around has surged recently and I've spied many fabulous bags.  Kate Spade has an amazing, very expensive selection (oh look, they've got a watering can for £240!), New Look and ASOS often have classics and other places.   Blogger, Char at T-rexes and tiaras has a classic collection of fun novelty bags as does Louise at Polka Dots and Freckle dots.  Both their collections are brilliant to look at. The ultimate collection must belong to Pink-haired Princess,  Gem but I can't seem to find a post with all of them in it- follow the link and you'll see them in different posts which I've selected.

My trouble with the majority of novelty bags (at least the affordable ones. Irregular Choice have good sizes but too expensive) are the fact they are just TOO small for me.  I just couldn't buy them because I couldn't fit anything in them!  I would LOVE to own most of the ones around but since I feel the need to hoik the kitchen sink and several tons of garbage around with me on a regular basis, they just don't work.  It's like I am allergic to just carrying the essentials.  Any time I've tried to use a small clutch, I've ended up taking a second larger bag to contain all the other miscellanea that I can't fit in the first one.  CBC looked at me at a wedding last summer and said "WHY have you got TWO bags, Kezzie!?!?!?!?" - one small delicate one, bulging at the seams and a secondary sack with everything that woudn't fit in the first one! Yes, I somewhat spoilt the delicate look with having 2 bags! You shouldn't really add luggage to wedding photos really!

I am, I confess,a veritable bag lady, rather like the old hag from Labyrinth who carries round the world with her.

Anyway, that was supposed to be a short preamble into the main point.  I acquired this rather fun novelty bag a while ago, just before the start of Lent and the shopping ban/fast for Lent.  I'd seen it some years ago in Octopus and always wanted one.  The good thing is it fits a book, camera, phone, large purse, hand sanitizer, oyster card etc etc so it passes muster on the novelty + capacity test! I can survive with this.


I've been swapping between various handbags but decided it was time to give the watering can its outing. I look forward to the children's reaction tomorrow.
 At some point, I'll share the few other novelty bags I have, but for now- Tschuss!

See you all soon.
xxx

SIA- “Louison and Raminou” by Suzanne Valadon:

This week's Style imitating art with Salazar at 14 shades of grey is this great CAT painting!!!! I love this one, and the artist led a very interesting life!  I  used to own a Ginger Tom.  He was called Noddy and he didn't meow, he quacked. He really liked Bacon frazzle crisps and would always harass me when I was eating them.  He was a big bruiser but also a big softie! Nothing quite like a Ginger tom! It was sad when he died- he had FIV, caught from one of his many tustles with other male cats in the area.


That's him with the scraggy kitten playing Piggyback. Look at that benign expression.

A couple of ideas struck me about this-
The shape of the cardigan (probably a Pelisse), the colour of the cardigan, the colour of the cat and her hair- notice she resembles her cat?

















Here's my take on the look:
I went with the cardigan neckline and colour and matched accessories to this and then added an orange and white cat dress (that's practically a ginger tom surely?!) and orange tights.

I lack a ginger cat (we have a black and white one who prowls around but he was nowhere to be grabbed seen, so instead I grabbed my orange cuddly crab who made his Style imitating art debut back in the summer.  It's silly, but I do like it if I can imitate the pose somewhat!

What would you have worn for this?

Style imitating art: Untitled by Larry Poons

I have been taking part in Style imitating art recently but forgotten to actually post here! I really do enjoy this challenge since it's very educational!

Up this week is "Untitled" by Larry Poons, chosen by Jess of Animated Cardigan, one of the trio of super hosts.  If you stare at it for some time, the shapes seem to dance.(and you notice more of them!)

Here's my take on it.


The light in my house is absolutely dreadful for taking any outfit photos since it just renders any bright colour drab and so you can't really see that the colours of the hat, skirt and pashmina are the shade of the painting!

I have had this Monsoon skirt a while but I did think it was serendipitous (possibly my most overused word on this blog since I got bored with ubiquitous!) that I received a hat (from Mother in law), scarf (work colleague) AND earrings (boy in year 6) this Christmas which were all this colour!    The cardigan was a nod to the spots and I'd never have chosen to wear this cardie with this skirt but I quite like the result!  I am always delighted to share any hat on here, since I love them (and hats was what made me start sharing outfit shots in the first place on this blog!). It comes from this awesome hippy shop in Hexham called Gaia which I love going into and I was actually admiring these hats 2 days before Christmas so was really pleased to receive one!!!  They also have these AMAZING large felted hats in there that were 70's style big floppy hats with flowers on them and I'd LOVE one of those too!! There was a great black one with red flowers on (very Eliza Doolittle) and a fab green big one too!


Yep, I have recently started to not like closeup selfies, so I am now choosing to accentuate the wrinkles flaws!!! Never mind, God loves me anyway!

Head over to SIA for more Poons-action!


Oh and I forgot to share the previous SIA:





Jen chose the cover and illustrations from a children's book entitled  Snowy Day for her stimulus, which I thought was a really fun, creative stimulus!  I actually saw a Liz Clairbourne t-shirt in a Hexham charity-shop over Christmas which was ALL these shades (stripes) which I contemplated buying BUT I knew I had this cool Jane Norman dress coming in the post which I have to thank the lovely Claire Justine for finding for me on Ebay after I asked about her one!!!







































I was so happy to win it as I have liked hers for ages and it reminds me of the one that Clara Oswin wears in Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS! (and she was my wedding hair inspiration here!)

I chose it for this Inspiration because of its bright orange colour, mimicking the character's coat and chose the blue tights and blue cardigan to colour-block like the sky and chose the boots (my only sale purchase- from Next) to mimic the fence.  The necklace, headband and earrings were a nod to the snow!

Sharing with Claire's Creative Mondays . Thank you Claire for finding me the dress!!! (Check out her blog header where she is wearing the same dress!)

Woman walking in an exotic forest

Yesterday was Style imitating art with the beautiful Salazar of 14 shades of grey and we had another cracking piece of artwork to educate me:


Oh how many possibilities there were for this wonderful painting! It's Henry Rousseau’s “Woman Walking In An Exotic Forest“,
Had I had time to think about this one, there was LOADS I could have attempted- hat, white frilly dress, florals, leafy shades.
However, in the end, it came down to a scrambled last minute- "Oh look, what I am wearing works -sort of!"


The top and cardie are thrifted and the trousers are Primark from a couple of years ago as is the headband.  Cat shoes, embroidered by moi!

I have to say, I don't think my love of big trousers over tight ones will ever abate. Especially nice floaty summer ones!  I loook over my trousers past and present and the only ones that have ever stood the test of time are the big ones!   Right from teenage years of wearing 1970's vintage flares that someone gave me (wish I still had them! Too small though!).  What about you? How do you feel about trousers?

I had a teaching observation today from my headmistress. It apparently went really well according to a quick passing comment from her but I guess it's hard to view your own work objectively! In my head, all I see is the bad bits- the children who couldn't make a minim last for 2 beats but ran it into 1 beats!!!
Ah well!

Hope all is well with you!xxx

FffffFlotsam but no jetsam (SIA)

From Flotsam, by David Wiesner
Watercolor on paper, 2007

HOW awesome is this painting!?!!! I adore it!  What is going on with Robofish on the left?!?!

Anyway, it's the inspiration for this week's Style imitating art with Jess at Animated Cardigan blog






I was all set for plain orange and turquoise and then remembered this awesome t-shirt I bought from Primark in the sale for £1 last year!  They're all unique and show an underwater scene!

T-shirt:  Primark, Skirt- Per Una at M&S, Cardigan- thrifted
Orange and turquoise is a nice colour combination- it always makes me think of dancing costumes from my childhood.  The Tuesday school (I was the Wednesday school) always got the best costumes and the best dances (and they always got props like umbrellas, canes etc!!!!) and one year they did a dance to Greased lightning with amazing 50's jive skirts in different colours with halterneck tops and ribbons in their hair!  I really wanted the turquoise and orange combination that a girl called Janine was wearing so my friend Lucy and I managed to persuade our parents to pay the dressmaker to make us a turquoise skirt each for our birthday present! I wore it for stacks of parties! Who'd have thought that 20+ years on, I'd still be loving poufy 50's style skirts with petticoats!

You're wondering about the fish? Well, when I lived in Indonesia, my university provided the opening ceremony to the Bali International Arts Festival- the president came and everything.  We were in a massive parade across Denpasar in costume with dancers and instruments galore and some of the dancers were on a massive float (and dancers appeared from inside human-size, fake flowers.  At the end of the ceremy, I and some of my fellow musicians, didn't want to walk back to Uni so we hitched a ride on the float which was covered in these very cleverly hand-made fake fish (out of foam, wool etc) and as we alighted from it, they totally trashed the float, taking off all the fish and decorations (I think it needed to be cleared) and so I took my opportunity and ripped off this big fish.  I then shipped it back with my instruments and books etc! I love to think what the customs-guys made of my inventory, 1 bronze metallophone, 1 double-headed drum, 1 fake gold-fish....

The crab is totally cute- I bought him during my final placement of my PGCE when I was in a year 2 class doing the topic, The Seaside, past and present. The crab was an item 'for sale' in my seaside shop!!!  He was a charity-shop purchase- he's so cute!!! His name is Crabbe (as in HP!)

x

Linking to Visible Monday with the fabulous Patti and a whole host of lovelies!

The colours of swirling leaves

Apparently, this is post number 750! (There are a few unpublished ones lurking in there of course!) Yay me!  I like reaching a milestone...

Anyway, thanks to Sophie and Mel for sharing ideas of how to upload photos to the blog avoiding my limit!  Yay Sophie, I used your way!  Many thanks!

I wore this cosy outfit on Friday to school (together with burgundy duffle coat to complete the Autumn pallette).  It features my only thrifted pair of shoes.  I find it hard to find size 8 shoes and any I have found usually ended up hurting my feet so they didn't stay long!  This pair of brown suede boots were a particular happy find a couple of years ago when I wanted boots like this from M&S that cost £30.  These were £3.  If you are wondering why I didn't wear these on Monday when I bemoaned lack of boots well, one of them went missing for a LONG time and I found it mid-week in a bag on er- my spare bed!  The skirt is also a thrift (Jigsaw) as is the green satchelly-type bag!  I spent most of my trip in Florence looking for a green leather one but scuttling away at the prices so it was fortunate I found one in a charity shop last week!

Also featuring an orange hat! (hmmmm, one doesn't combine those two words together very often in life!) Not thrifted sadly but ahem, something that also found its way into the shopping basket when I bought a small suitcase recently for Florence from the wonderful TK Maxx.  The cardie is from Max C.  I like it- it combines several of my favourite things- it looks a bit nautical in the neck shape, it's brightly coloured and it has a vintage look to it!  The necklace was a Christmas present two years ago which SHOCKINGLY, I have not worn!!!  Anything that has its own box tends to sit in a drawer, forgotten about!










Today is called 'Christ the King' Sunday- the Sunday before Advent is called that.  I am looking forward to taking part in Floss's A Pause for Advent  over the next month.  I adore Advent, such a sense of excitement.  Do join in if you can!

Voice is slowly but slowly improving! I can sing quietly, even if I know I shouldn't be!!! (Professional singer friend told me off for singing when my voice was like this last year and I now know the warning signs.  It's impossible with my job not to though.  I also feel like some neurotic primadonna...) I have two hours until the practice for Evensong tonight. 
xx