Naughty Valentine

Some people follow trends and hanker for the latest lust-have but I tend to intermittently obsess over fabrics.

I bought this 'Miss Jeannie' dress on eBay a few years ago when I had a huge thing for all things lurex.

This fabric certainly isn't everybody's bag with its often quite raspy texture but that is one of the main reasons to why I love it so much...

its raspy and spangly qualities is what does it for me :)

There is also something rather space-age about lurex that really appeals to me.

At the post office earlier the cashier asked me if I was wearing red because of Valentines day...as if!

Roses, chocolates and champagne

 Last table booked down lovers lane

Twice the price, sans ambiance

Will expensive gestures induce romantic trance

A pricey card with a contrived poem 

Because on February 14th you have to show them

Thanks but no thanks, Mr Valentine

I think I'll just choose a different day to express mine

Vintage 20s tux jacket, 60s lurex dress, 90s mesh top, lurex tights, fishnet knee-socks, tartan  print boots, sequin beret & 90s silver sun earrings.
If you do happen to be a fellow lurex lover then I've got a stunning floor-length 90s bodycon dress up for grabs in my eBay auctions, go check it out, it's got more cosmic girl sass than you can shake a stick at ;)

I was in two minds about sharing this next pic but then I thought to myself...

"Jen, since when did you become such a prude"? 

For Valentines day 2001 I wanted surprise Mark with "naughty"card. 

This was back in the days when digital photography was still a bit of a rarity and most people (me included) had to traipse down to snappy-snaps to get their photos developed.

So I took some near naked pics wearing just some self made nipple covers and a barely there thong.

Was I worried about handing my film in?

Thankfully, the local chemist that I used didn't have an in-house lab 

so I was spared any blushes when I went to pick up my little envelope of saucy pics.

I bought some heart shaped stickers placed them strategically and the card was all sorted.

Needless to say my beloved was thrilled ;)

This of course begs the question...

If you were to become famous tomorrow, have you any reason to fear the scandal rags?

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx

Cold hands, adventurous heart

I have no rose tinted tales from the nineties for you today only an outfit...

Vintage 70s suede jacket , 60s dress, 50s booties, 90s lurex jumper, M&S tights, knitted mohair hat, soapstone & macrame earrings, a plethora of bangly things (all thrifted from car boot sales and markets)

We went for a quick stroll around the park earlier and it was VERY cold.

I forgot to bring my gloves, so by the time we got to the park I had what I would describe as "hypothermic hands".

Last time I felt like my hands were going to break clean off was in February last year when I was kneeling on a training platform at the bottom of Wraysbury lake.

The water was three degrees Celsius and my life was flashing in front of my eyes.

Still one of the best experiences I had in 2012.

I'm absolutely hankering to go diving again...hurry up spring!

Hope you are all enjoying your weekend :)

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx

From the seventies but still not going downhill

The awesome vintage ski jacket I was wearing today was bought for a tenner fifteen years ago in a Fort William charity shop. 

At the time hubby was doing snowboard instructing at a ski center and I was trying really hard to find a job. 

As we were quite skint we rented a microscopical room in a house owned by what we thought to be a widower.

Only after we'd moved in he told us that his wife had not long eloped to Spain with another man.

It was an odd experience to say the least, we'd hear him argue and plead with his wife on the phone in the middle of the night and whenever we went into the kitchen he'd corner us and talk incessantly about her. 

He was also rather keen on wandering around in his underpants when he'd had a few too many swallies. 

Our little nook comprised of a double bed that dwarfed the room and a chest of drawers with a black and white camping telly & a kettle perched on top of it, there was also a small built in wardrobe, that you couldn't open properly cause there wasn't enough space. 

There were no jobs in Fort William so I spent a whole month holed up in that tiny room watching crap daytime TV and eating Pot Noodles. 

In the end I had to leave my beloved to his snow covered hills and jump on a bus to London.

This jacket was bought with giro money on my last day in Fort William and I remember wearing it for the entire duration of the ten hour bus journey down south cause it was absolutely freezing. 

I sat together with a bald, toothless weegie who had just been paroled & he was plying me with sickly sweet MD 20/20 and telling really crap jokes but he still had me in stitches.

I've had fifteen years of wear out of this jacket and it is still going strong.

70s ski jacket,  80s Wrangler cowboy boots, 90s velvet jumpsuit, wide mock-croc belt, knitted scarf & sequin beret.

I'm not the only one in this house who poses for pics by the way. 

Here's Mark showing that anything I can do, he can do better...

Mark has been feeling a little bit blue this weekend cause the ski center that he used to instruct at is open for business with powder galore, I believe my man is pining for the hills.

To cheer ourselves up we revisited the pub that we went to last Sunday cause they were hosting a vintage jumble today. 

I'm hoping to get a space here myself next time, fingers crossed. 

The pub has got a really nice, laid-back vibe & the monthly vintage jumble was well stocked, cheap and cheerful, just how I like it.

Did I buy anything?

You will just have to wait and see ;)

Have a fab Sunday folks!

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx

Apocalyptic Ragamuffin

It's been ages since I dropped a blog in the sphere, so here it goes ;)

For the past month I've been having a massive clear-out, I've sold a couple of huge job lots on eBay, taken umpteen bags to the local charity shops & another umpteen to the recycling bank. 

Even though at least seven massive bags (too heavy for one person to lift, unless you happen to be He-Man or Pippi Longstockings) containing hundreds of items of clothing have left the house, I look around and hardly notice the difference.

It's a bit disheartening at times but at least it's all moving in the right direction, albeit at a snails pace.

All this hoarding I've been doing over the past  ten years has made me "materially obese" and I've got some serious slimming down to do and just like weight-loss it is a painstaking and slow moving process that takes a whole lot of effort but it is my intention to Feng-frigging-shui the whole lot.

This year has been a year of great change for me, maybe not ostensibly but in a way of revelations and personal realizations. 

I have become much more in-tune with myself, slain some debilitating demons and finally feel as if I'm travelling down the right path.

Where to?!

It's not so much an actual destination as it is a general goal, the name of the game is to free myself from the albatross that's been hanging round my neck for all these years and once I've done that, once I am freed from the chains of possessions, things that I own that in reality own me, I'm going to go where the wind takes me.

As I watch 'Why Poverty' on the BBC iPlayer, I know in my heart that the wind is destined to blow me in the direction of those who struggle to survive. I want to help, really help, not just by sending a token sum a month to some charity and hope that the money is spent where it is most needed and doesn't simply melt away in the administration & bureaucracy of it all. I want to be there, get my hands dirty, help people face-to-face. That is the path I see myself travelling down. 

Being livid about the injustices of the world, frothing at the mouth over the wrongs done by the sociopaths that lord over us and raving on about the strip-mining, dismantling and all-out destruction of the planet by cold fish companies isn't doing it for me anymore...anger on its own is not enough!

Anger without action feels utterly impotent.

So I've chosen a path of action, positive action.

Right that was the serious bit, now for something with a slightly lighter in mood :)

  I was clearing out my hard drive the other day and came across folder upon folder of old daily outfit pics that have been taken over the past five years.

I thought it would be fun to do a little roundup of some of them, a crazy cluster of outfits that I felt feel into the same style category.

A strong style inspiration for me has always been sci-fi movies and comicbooks. 

As you can probably gauge from the vast picture medley below I'm really drawn to the  warrior princess, comicbook heroine, sci-fi apocalyptic ragamuffin aesthetic.

Here are a few of my favourite style inspirations...

Aeryn Sun (Farscape), Lara Croft (Tomb Raider), Pris (Bladerunner), Barbarella, Modesty Blaise, Chiana (Farscape), Xena: Warrior Princess, Catwoman (Batman), Tank Girl, Aunty Entity (Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome)

...and here follows a rather extensive medley of past outfit pics in the apocalyptic ragamuffin vein, hope you enjoy ;)

I don't take daily outfit pics that often now, I got a bit fed up with it to be truthful especially with having to take pics for the shop etc, maybe one day my gusto for it will return, who knows?

I still go bonkers in the boudoir & play dress-up on occasion, so don't fret I haven't been abducted by the sweatpants and fleece brigade just yet ;)

Although I am perhaps just a bit too keen on wearing my trusty old "swamp jumper"...
it's bloody cold around here, that's my excuse and I'm sticking too it! 

Hope everyone is doing grand out there?!
Have a fabulous weekend whatever you get up to.
Lot's of love,
Jennie
xXx

Highland Games

It's raining, it's raining,

There's pepper in the box,
And all the little ladies
Are holding up their frocks.

Hubby and I went for a wee stroll in the park in-between downpours yesterday and staged an impromptu game of good old Highland caber tossing :)

What I Wore:

FROCKTASIA revamped denim shorts

90s Alien clubbing top with grey cami underneath

Miss Selfridge tights

Steve Madden kick-ass boots

Crochet knit beanie

Turkoman bag

80s sunnies

An assortment of bangles

Caber tossing action, hai-yah...

I'm hoping to revamp some more of these funky cut-offs in the near future. 

I've got a whole stash of hubbies old jeans, a mega lot of Dylon that I scored on eBay a couple of years ago and more decorative buttons and embellishments than you can shake a stick at ;)

I've also got a rather fabulous book about different tie-dye techniques that I'd like to try out.

When I made these two pairs a couple of weeks ago I just winged it with a whole bunch of rubber-bands.

I still think they turned out really cool though...

Last but by no means least here's some caber tossing action by my beloved hubster...

Hope you are all enjoying the weekend :)

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx

Spring Mourning

The weather here in Ol' Blighty has been pretty friggning dreadful for weeks now.

The sweet fragrance of lilacs that usually fill the warm spring air on our balcony have been overpowered by the dodgy smell coming from a clogged drainpipe next door. 

Our drainpipe kamikazeed off the wall during a ferocious rainstorm last week, so now when it rains we have a waterfall display from the roof onto the balcony & into the kitchen if you happen to leave the door open.

Och, grumble grumble!

Despite it being a dreich and grey morning, I still braved an excursion to the car boot sales yesterday and I am very happy that I did cause came back with vintage dress treasures galore, every cloud has a silver lining as they say!

Last night I spent taking pics for my upcoming eBay auctions and today I played dress-up with all my new purchases :)

Besides frocks I bought a stunning gothic maxi skirt that I wore today.

Opening the curtains this morning and peering out onto yet another day of dreichness made me feel decidedly morose, so I decided to wear something to mourn spring...

Vintage 70s maxi length underskirt, sequin cami top, metallic swirl patterned mesh long-sleeved top, Demonia heels, leopard print tights, Frocktasia PVC headdress and DIYed chiffon & sequin cape poncho made from an Indian hippie skirt. All clothing items were purchased from various car boot sales bar my wig that came from PAKcosmetics.

Here are some gratuitous shots of some of the gorgeous garb up for grabs in my current eBay auctions ;)

SIZZLING REPRO 50S PIN-UP STYLE LINGERIE DRESS:

 FUNKY 90S CLUBBING MINI DRESS:

 

AWESOMELY HOT 90S BLACK VELVET MINI DRESS:

 

 TRIPPY TRIBAL PRINT MINI SHIFT DRESS:

 

SENSATIONAL VINTAGE 80S HOT PINK COCKTAIL DRESS:

VINTAGE 80S SCARF PRINT DRESS:

I'll leave you with a little of my eBay auction inspiration ;)

Hope you will all have a fab week!

Lot's of love,

Jennie

xXx