Addicted to stuff

Turquoise and red ochre paired together always makes me think of Egypt.

That magical country is never far from my thoughts at the moment, it will be a year next week since we were there and I can't wait to go back.

My dream trip to Egypt would include a train journey from Aswan to Alexandria...

...some time exploring the white desert...

...and to finish off we'd spend a few weeks in wonderful Marsa Alam by the Red Sea coast. 

There we'd hang out with our Facebook friend & diver extraordinaire Ahmed. 

I got to know about Ahmed when I stumbled across his fabulous blog last year and I would love to go diving with him in real life. 

Both Mark and I are big fans of him and his blog.

Maybe if I cosmically order a big windfall, this dream journey will come to pass ;)

 Anyway I was ecstatically happy to see a small scattering of holes in the thick blanket of cloud yesterday morning. 

The never-ending drizzle had dried up overnight and the temperature was slightly more agreeable so that I could bare arms and wear a low-cut cleavage dress...

...whilst basking in the glory of Ra ;)

It's not just the sun that brightens up my day though, you wonderful peeps spread love and light on to my screen as well. 

I'm humbled by each and every comment left & I love the fact that I can pop over and have a read of what you've been up to as well, it's blooming grand!

To my last post a few of you lovelies commented on how brilliant it would be to find bags of forgotten about clobber. Truthfully, it's a strange mixture of horror and joy. 

I was addicted to hoarding stuff for quite a few years and I am now dealing with the result of that addiction. I would just buy loads of  stuff every week,  wash & dry it, fold it away, stick it in a bag and forget all about it. If I was looking for something, it would often take me days to find it. Like most addicts I was living in denial and if you'd asked me a year ago to stop doing what I was doing, I'd probably come up with some lame-ass spiel about how it was the only thing that made me truly happy (cue the violins). A year ago I still wasn't quite ready to face up to my addiction but the thoughts were certainly forming in my head and shortly after our return from Egypt I decided that enough was enough. I had found something else that made me happy, something that enriched my life beyond my wildest dreams. Diving in the Red Sea was like my wake up call. All of a sudden I just wanted to sell & save so that I could go diving again. My Sunday morning trek to the car boot sale, the jostling with knife elbowed bargain hunters and the inevitable bringing home of yet another bag of stuff stopped at last, hallelujah!

In the past six months I've only been to three car boot sales and on all three occasions I've kept to a strict budget and I've only bought stuff that I know with get used or sold.

It feels great to be free of the buying demon and it feels great that the albatross that has been hanging around my neck for years is finally getting lighter.

Yes, of course I love finding forgotten about frocks but at the same time I am looking forward to a day when I don't anymore :)

I'm not sure if my hoarding addiction was about the need to own stuff or just to get that fleeting buzz from the thrill of the chase/purchase, probably a combination of the two.

It doesn't really matter now, what matters is that I've got a hold on the situation and that I'm working towards liberating myself from the result of years of  accumulating stuff.

I also love how getting dressed seems a thousand times more enjoyable now, mainly cause I don't have to spend  hours hunting down garments that I want to incorporate into an outfit.

That makes me very happy indeed :)

Vintage 70s coat by Spinney, 70s maxi dress by Richard Shops, slouchy hat, 70s boots, Frocktasia grumpy suns earrings  & Ankh necklace, a plethora of brass bangles, opera gloves and retro sunnies.

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by having to much stuff in your life?
Hope you are all having a wonderful Wednesday :)

No tune today but here's the brilliant George Carlin on 'STUFF'...

Loads of love,

Jennie

xXx

Diving into fun

Two posts in one day, how very extravagant of me!

Truth is I'm playing catch-up :)

Yesterday Mark and I went down to Dive Wimbledon to book me in for my Emergency First Response course. 

Mark actually took the EFR instructor course late last year but hasn't actually done any instructing yet so he's going to sit in whilst lovely Jon is doing the instructing to really learn the ropes. 

Completion of the EFR is a prerequisite for the PADI rescue diver course which is next on our diving to-do list.

So now I've got my course material to dive into over the next few weeks, not to mention my very own private, in-house EFR instructor, to help me along should I get that sinking feeling at any time whilst reading the book ;)

After my morning coffee yesterday I popped up to the loft and found yet another bag full of forgotten about frocks.

There are actually still bags up there that I haven't looked inside for yonks, bonkers!

Inside the bag that I brought down was this delightful crimplene creation from St Michael, I believe it's from the sixties...

Vintage 60s floral print crimplene day dress, 20s tail tux jacket, repro Victorian lace-up boots, tights, driving gloves, mohair hat, soapstone & macrame heart earings, Frocktasia horse-brass necklace & Lanta Animal Welfare tote bag.

Although I absolutely love its yummy raspberry colour and ditsy floral print, it is sadly just a little too large for me so it will be joining the cornucopia of fabulous frocks in my market stock, speaking of which...

I'm very pleased to announce that Frocktasia is now booked up to be a part of  the wonderful Dandy Lion family for three more months, yay!

The next market is on Saturday the 6th of April so a preview post is in the pipeline for that, probably just after Easter.

If you are thinking of coming along to peruse my goodies and have any special requests as to what you'd like me to bring on the day, please feel free to e-mail me with any suggestions or requests on frocktasia@yahoo.co.uk

I will of course also be telling you about my fabulous fellow sellers in a pre-market post cause they are BRILLIANT but not all pitches have been confirmed as yet, so that will be done after Easter too :)

Can't wait for this to roll around, it's so much FUN!

Hope you are all having a great week!

Today's tune is by Inner City....BIG FUN, enjoy :)

Loads of love,

Jennie

xXx

Excitement and Adventure and Really Wild Things!

Hope you are all doing grand :)

I've just returned from a three week magical mystery tour to Awesome Asia, namely Thailand and Malaysia.

This was my first ever Xmas in the sun but I don't think it will be the last. 

I was mega excited about rolling up my wetsuit and packing the regs knowing that rather than waking up to a bunch of tiresome traditions on Christmas morning, I'd be taking a giant stride into the Andaman Sea;

an unbeatable way to spend Crimbo in my opinion!

Besides scuba diving with Lanta Divers we managed to squeeze in two visits the wonderful Lanta Animal Welfare, several long walks along the many lush beaches of Koh Lanta & loads of dips in the sea...naturally!

We celebrated NYE on the beach together with just about everyone else on the island, dodging fireworks and drinking fresh coconut.

On New Years Day we took a (near death experience) boat trip to Langkawi where we stayed at the brilliantly located Mutiara Burau Bay Beach Resort for five days.

We hired a car and explored the islands many wonderful waterfalls and beaches and we went jungle trekking, saw loads of macaque & dusky leaf monkeys, monitor lizards, hornbills, eagles and we were even lucky enough to have a close encounter with a flying lemur.

Excitement, adventure and really wild things...

just the way I like it ;)

My holiday wardrobe had to be significantly slimmed down compared to the huge amount that I brought with me to Egypt last year, mainly cause we were travelling with a lot of our own scuba kit this time around and we weren't just staying in one place. 

So I only brought a couple of dressy frocks and some more (for me) "casual" gear.

Surely I am not the only one who goes hiking up a hill dressed in a sequin top ;)

I have an excuse though all my other garb had been drenched in saltwater after the horrid boat trip from Koh Lanta and was absolutely sodden...

needs must and all that jazz!

Here follows a pic-medley of my holiday outfits with a few other photos thrown in...

much more to come :)

After our first dive day hubby made this little greeting/trailer for our chums at Dive Wimbledon...

On our second dive day we went to Hin Daeng and Hin Muang where we saw a Manta ray....

I almost wet my wetsuit, so Frigging AMAZING!

Hubby caught it on camera, so hopefully I'll be able to share it with you soon :)

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx

Underwater Love 2.0

My passion for getting dressed up in vintage garb, donning wigs and a face full of slap is pretty well documented here on my blog but this is only one of my many passions.

A more recently added love of mine is diving, no slap & no wigs involved in that.

The attire you don CAN be snazzy, however any sensible diver would choose comfort & fit over style any time.

When keeping yourself comfortable, warm and dry is of paramount importance, looking good takes a backseat.

However saying that I really rather like the action woman silhouette that a snug neoprene wetsuit creates and as for the drysuit it makes me feel a bit like an adventuress about to explore another galaxy, ready to endure all the excitement, adventure and really wild that I will encounter.

We did our PADI open water diver course back in February here in the UK, the water temperature back then was +4 degrees Celsius, it was bitter.

 My life flashed before my eyes several times whilst kneeling on the training platform trying to preform my skill tasks  but I survived to tell the tale and managed to bag my open water diver certification.

This weekend we were going for our advanced open water diver certification and after the diving we did in Egypt I was so much more comfortable below the surface this time around.

On Saturday we went to Wraysbury, which is where we did our open water diver course. 

I have to admit that I was a wee bit apprehensive at first, thinking back on the watery stone cold grave scenario of February but after seeing the lake surrounded by lush leafy trees in the blazing morning sunshine my mind was soon put at ease and I couldn't wait to get in. 

 We did two drysuit dives and one navigation dive. 

One of the drysuit buoyancy skills involved an underwater egg and spoon race, which was hilarious to say the least. 

The navigation dive was crazy. We got lost and had to surface, descend and repeat the skill again. This was because a group of other divers who were doing a search and recovery dive a bit away from us kicked up so much bottom silt that we had virtually zero visibility, it was like swimming through pea soup. 

We will be doing two more navigation dives when we continue with the navigation specialty course at the end of the month and hoping to do a bit of compass practice on land before then. 

On the Sunday we were doing our deep, wreck and PPB dives at the national dive and activity centre outside Chepstow. 

So after our day at Wraysbury we went straight to Victoria to catch a coach to Bristol. 

We got there just before eleven at night so we had to take an excruciatingly expensive taxi "to" the dive center. 

The taxi driver didn't know where the dive center was so hubby and I jumped out and walked around for half an hour to find it, just as well Mark had stuffed a couple of torches in the bag cause it was pitch black...all good fun though. 

We slept in one of the wooden wigwams on the NDAC site, they are only £40 a night for two people but you have to bring your own sleeping bag.

In the morning the other Dive Wimbledon crew arrived and after brekkie we kitted up for our three training dives.

The first dive I was a little bit apprehensive about because it was the deep diver one but after the briefing I chilled out for a moment away from everybody else and tried to visualize doing the dive before actually doing it and that really calmed me down. We went down to 27 meters and swam around an aircraft at the bottom a few times, ascended and preformed the all important safety stop  at five meters for three minutes and then surfaced. I was a bit scared that I would freak at the bottom cause ascending rapidly from that depth is potentially fatal but I was surprisingly calm throughout the entire dive.

The second dive was the wreck dive and we went down to explore a double decker bus. We didn't go inside the wreck but when we do our wreck specialty dive there will be a wreck penetration option, hubby is keen but I'm not that bothered about going inside stuff, I'm happy poking my head in to have a look but who knows as my skills get progressively better I may be looking for further challenges?

The third dive was delayed because unfortunately a couple of divers had an accident on a deep dive (40 meters) and had to be taken away in helicopter to a recompression chamber. It certainly puts things into perspective and makes me want to adhere to safe diving practices rigorously and checking my equipment prior to diving even more closely. The most important thing though is to keep calm, yes, of course things can go wrong but panicking makes things a whole lot worse and as you never dive alone there is almost always a way of dealing with an emergency without bolting to the surface. I panicked back in February whilst trying to perform the mask remove and replace task and had to be brought back up to the surface by my instructor, he held me down so that I wouldn't bolt and then slowly brought me up whilst trying to keep me calm, what a star!

The third dive of the day was a peak performance buoyancy dive or PPB as it's called in diver circles. We descended to a training table did a bit of hoovering and then swam back to the exit point exploring the area, we swam around a troop carrier maintaining neutral buoyancy and spotted several gnomes. You can bring your own gnome and add to the family and I am definitely doing that next time we go.

After the last dive I was so shattered I could hardly get back up steps of the pier, exhausted but very happy and guess what I jumped in as a open water diver and emerged as an advanced open water diver...huzzah!

An absolutely fabulous weekend was had and I can't wait to get cracking on the four specialty courses that we've got left, diving is so much fun and I love it!

If anyone in the London area is thinking of learning how to dive I couldn't recommend Dive Wimbledon highly enough, the instructors are ace, they are very engaging teachers, meticulously organized and make you feel very safe when you are diving.

Here's a few snapshots from our awesome weekend :)

I hope from the bottom of my heart that the divers involved in the accident  yesterday pulled though and will have a speedy recovery.

Have a great week y'all!

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx

One Thousand and One Outfits (not really)

Hope you've all had a splendiferous weekend.

I've finally finished sorting through all the holiday pics, huzzah!

 As I mentioned in an earlier installment I would do a 'random holiday outfits' post as well, so here it is.

First off is a caftan that I bought from a car boot sale two months ago...

This stunning turquoise caftan is perfect for throwing over a bikini when going for lunch or just as a cover-up when doing a spot of beachcombing.

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I brought a few pairs of lightweight trousers with me cause I read that it can get pretty nippy out in the desert at night.
 These ones I bought several years ago from an Indian clothing shop, they are double-layered with a stunning cream jacquard fabric and sheer black chiffon...

This quirky top was another car boot sale buy and I've teamed it with one of my Indian choli tops that I won on eBay last year.

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These are the trousers that I for some obscure reason deemed suitable to travel in.
Wide-leg trousers are possibly the worse thing to wear when traversing the London Underground during crush hour and especially when you are loaded up with heaps of luggage.
My foot got caught in the swishy trouser leg but luckily I have cat-like reflexes and I managed to grab onto something instead of loosing my two front teeth, phew!
I do love these trousers though, just not to travel in.

Emporio Armani top teamed with another one of my Indian choli tops.

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I got this wine red mesh top from the car boot sale the week before we went away.
The design is really quirky and its even got a hood.

Harem jumpsuit, tribal mirror & coin belt, Topshop hammered brass disc necklace that I scored from the car boot sale for a quid.

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We went to Luxor for an outing and visited the very impressive Karnak temple complex, The Valley of the Kings & Hatshepsut's Temple.
It was a real whistle stop outing and we even managed to cram in a short boat trip on the Nile.

Those double-layered trousers got another outing,  I teamed them with a rose print silk blouse by Diane Von Furstenberg and my trusty vintage jazz dance trainers.

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I brought my harem jumpsuit & two pairs of harem pants, I'm still in love with this roomy trouser style...

Indian silk harem pants, tassel-tastico hippie top and in the last picture my beloved vintage 70s suede vest/waistcoat.

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The second pair of harem pants have more glitz than you can shake a stick at...

Bronze harlequin diamond patterned harem pants teamed with a sequin embellished mesh top and low-slung leather belt.

Shake your tail feather! OMG, I think I've just attracted a randy ostrich ;)

Here I've added an embroidered chiffon top and my funky sequin elephant cap.

PIMP MY CRIB!

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 We also went for an awesome day out to the stunning Sataya reef where you are sometimes lucky enough to swim with dolphins.
Unfortunately the dolphins stayed away until we were on our way back home, so we saw them from the boat, however we did get to swim with a huge-ass Napoleon fish and we also managed to do some pretty spectacular freediving.

Those Indian silk harem trousers again,  this time teamed with a cut-out butterfly Tee, turban fashioned from a sarong and my bestest fashion accessory ever...my hubby of course!

Early morning at divers paradise Tondoba Bay, chilling before scuba ;)

As we spent most of the day on the beach or in the sea I was sporting a bikini or my wetsuit most of the time...

I brought two bikinis and one tankini. The fabulously colourful one was a gift from the divine Helga.

Hubby scored this Mares wetsuit on eBay...what a kind, clever and awesome man I am blessed with.

Snorkeling, freediving  and scuba...I absolutely LOVE IT! The Red Sea is awesome and I couldn't recomend Egypt and Marsa Alam highly enough.

Last but by no means least my underwater kit...Mares fins, Scubapro snorkel and Cressi mask all purchased off eBay.

That's it folks...now you've seen all my holiday get-ups.
Now I'll have to put my thinking cap on to figure out what to blog about next, any requests?
Have a fantastic week!
Lot's of love,
Jennie
xXx