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

Getting high on flash fumes...I wish!

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water, winter comes back like a fierce predator and nips you on the neb.

I kick started my spring cleaning this week thinking that spring was here to stay,

how wrong was I?!

I managed to completely gut the kitchen and scrubbed all those manky surfaces that I never normally get around to doing. 

The top of all the cupboards, skirting boards, ceiling, walls and underneath the fridge, washing machine & cooker.

Spring cleaning is the proverbial can of worms, cleaning one corner makes the rest of the room look even more filthy and there's no bleeding end to it either.

After five hours of almost scrubbing your fingers to the bone, you think it's all done, so you boil the kettle to make a cup of celebratory tea, sit down to admire the fruits of your arduous toil only to find that the underneath of the blinking cupboard needs a jolly good scrub too, argh!

The skirting boards laugh in your face and the knobs of the cooker flip the bird in your general direction..."Hehehe, missed a bit!"

We've lived in this flat for over ten years, we rent, so in all that time it hasn't been decorated and it is really starting to show now. 

Everywhere you look something is flaking, corroding, peeling, cracking, breaking or is already broken.

I try to make it look nice but it really needs more than me donning marigolds for a week on a cleaning mission, it needs money spent on it.

It needs new carpets, new kitchen, new bathroom and a proper decorator coming in and giving the place a long overdue face lift. 

This is the big draw back when renting, you are having to wait until your landlord sees it fit to do something about it, which in my experience tends to be NEVER or just after you've moved out! 

It may sound as I'm making excuses but it is truthfully nigh-on impossible to get this place looking clean even if I spend days on my knees scrubbing till my hands are almost falling off and my lungs are getting sore from breathing in flash fumes.

You do what you can and that's all you can do, eh?!

It was drizzling all day today and even though we made our daily jaunt up to feed little Lilo and the other birds it was just way to dreich to get the camera out to shoot some outfit pics in the park.

We quickly nipped out onto the balcony when we got back home to snap a couple...

Vintage 70s lurex leaf print kaftan dress, vintage boots, Ankh earrings & gloves.

I bought this Miss Jeannie dress from a market in July last year and today was its first outing.

I used to have one in teal blue that was sadly a bit too big for me so I sold on eBay back in 2005. 

These were  the auction pics...

Wearing this frock with my Ankh earrings today made me think of Egypt. 

It is almost a year since we went there now.

I totally fell for the place, the lovely people, the awesome diving  and the totally amazing scenery.

Here are a few of the pics from the two little desert photo sessions that Mark and I did. 

If you want to see more you can either go back and check my April posts of last year or have a peek in this folder that I made on facebook :)

Hope that the start of your weekend went off with a bang and that the rest of it will be fantabulous too :)

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

Meanwhile at the base of the Pyramid

We've been back home for almost two weeks, the post holiday radiance has all but ebbed away and the dreaded back in Blighty blues has come knocking.

When I went back to work after Easter I found that my hours had been changed.
I'm doing more hours, more work (for the same pityful pittance) and as if that wasn't bad enough they've given me a much crappier shift too.
Employers really have the knack of wringing every last drop of joy out of your soul don't they.

What really infuriated me though is that I wasn't even consulted beforehand about these changes just expected to fall in line like a good little epsilon-minus semi-moron, needless to say I'm back on all the jobsites looking for another gig. 

Och, the joys of being a wage-slave.

One day I will be my own boss and it will be frocking fabulous!

A bit like this awesome get-up that I won on eBay last year...

This was in the same bundle as the INTERLINKS - LONDON frock that I also brought with me to Egypt. 

I really hit the eBay jackpot that day!

Again I apologise for the mirror image overkill but I really like the Rorschach effect that you get when you do this. 

Just look at the pic above, can you also see the big face in the desert sand?

I think that one is quite obvious but when you study the others mittor image pics a bit more closely you can see all-sorts of weird and wonderful things... 

if you just let your imagination run riot ;)

This is a very versatile get-up, so ideal holiday garb.

You can wear the top with shorts on the beach, the skirt with casual top for an outing and it looks just like a frock when you wear the two pieces together, so that's the evening wear snorted too ;)

Only two more days until the weekend, huzzah!

All we need now is for the weather to get its bleeding act together.

Come on it's May soon, give us some Sun & warmth will you :)

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx

She who knows the widow spider

Holiday frock number ten is fit for an Egyptian goddess...

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The Frock:

This is my "Winged Isis" frock & needless to say it was one of the first garments to hit my suitcase.

It's labelled 'David Butler at Pressler' and I bought it off eBay some years ago.

I sometimes take a punt at auctions with shockingly bad pictures and this was one of those occasions.

You never quite know whether the postman is going to bring you a parcel of hotness or a parcel of notness when you do it like this but when I received this spectacular frock I felt like the cat that got the cream.

The black parts of the dress is made from a slinky sun-ray pleated material and the bodice and top of the sleeves feature a stunning three coloured taffeta fabric with glitzy lurex & fabulous flocked detailing.

I really felt a bit like an Egyptian Goddess wearing this stunning frock in such a magical place.

The Legend: 

"Osiris, Isis, and their brother Seth were all gods. Osiris was god of vegetation, Isis the goddess of fertility and Seth the god of the desert. Osiris was a "living god", like Horus he was embodied as the pharaoh. When he became pharaoh, he took Isis to be queen. Seth became jealous and murdered Osiris. He cut Osiris' body into pieces and scattered them throughout Egypt. When Isis heard, she took the form of a bird and searched until she found all the parts of his body. After reassembling Osiris' body, she beat her wings and breathed life back into him." 

The End:

I hope you've enjoyed my little post medley of holiday frocks as much as I enjoyed creating them.

A special thanks to my beloved husband who kindly gave up three holiday sleep-ins to help me take all the photos. 

Also many thanks to all you lovelies that have taken the time to comment on these posts, it really means a lot to me.

I will be doing a couple more 'holiday clobber' posts which will include random outfits that don't fall under the category frock but are frigging fabulous anyway even if I do say so myself  ;)

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx