Atomic winter

I sometimes have the oddest thoughts! 

As I was hanging the washing out on the balcony the other day, freezing my fingers off, I started thinking...

"What if this is it, what if winter becomes permanent and this is as good as it will get temperature wise".

I know, the stuff of nightmares right?!

It is thought that the climate would be profoundly effected if for instance nuclear war was to rage across the planet or perhaps a supervolcano decided to erupt or a comet or an asteroid happened to slam into the globe.

The theory goes that if vast amounts of smoke and soot was to be ejected into the earth's stratosphere, the little spinning ball that we call home would be plunged into perpetual winter.

Horrible thought, eh?!

Of course the snow covered naked branches of the trees are pretty and create spectacular backdrop but I have to say that I am now officially fed up with winter and I want spring to march on in and sweep the bastard thing away once and for all!

I was very happy to see that the bird lovers had come out in force today,  there was seed scattered everywhere on top of the snow by the pond.

I'm not the only crazy bird lady around this neck of the woods, I'll have you know ;)

The other day this sweet little girl came up to me as I was hand feeding Lilo and asked if she could have a go. I lent her my "feeding glove" and she was absolutely ecstatic when the Lilo started eating seed from her hand, so sweet!

It's been snowing heaps here today and there's still some snow fall forecast for tonight.

When will this snowy madness end? 

Vintage coat by Spinney, 90s velvet catsuit, hooded cloak dress, Handmade African necklace  gift from my mum, DM boots, 99p stores snood, gloves, slouchy hat & Frocktasia earrings.

I'm playing catch-up with my 'daily ensemble' pics, this is what I wore to go and see Leslie yesterday...

My sister in Copenhagen sent me this awesome 70s bright red needle cord maxi skirt. I'm guessing that the flowers were hand-painted by Inger Leth.

The stunning necklace was a car boot sale bargain from last year, it's a really unusual piece. There's an inscription at the back which reads 'By Laurent Guinci'.

Vintage 70s cord maxi skirt, 70s suede lace-up waistcoat, 80s butterfly belt, 80s boots, 90s floral lace leotard, I also wore a great big faux-fur coat, a faux-fur hat, gloves and snood...it was freezing and damp outside yesterday.

Leslie sent me this pic from last months Can't Buy Me Love market...

There's me peddling my gear to a very dapper chappy. You can also spot  Mark looking on proudly as his wife gets into the swing of things & lovely Sara from Hello The Mushroom :) The pic was borrowed from the CBML blog.

I won't be there this month because my other sister is popping over from Sweden for Easter and we are heading up to Edinburgh for a few days which will be ever so splendid.

If you are in London on the 30th of March you can still go and see Jet-Marie, Leslie and all the other brilliant sellers that will be there at the Can't Buy Me Love Easter Special.

I'm hoping to return there next month, so watch this space ;)

Today's tune is Atomic by Blondie, enjoy :)

Hope you are having a great weekend!

Loads of love,

Jennie

xXx

Would you buy a used car from this woman?

It's gone all Baltic & dreich again but I'm keeping myself upbeat by looking at old commercials and comedy clips on YouTube. 

I thought I'd share some of my favourites with you :)

I remember being mesmerized by commercials when I was a kid. That was back in the day when you only ever saw them when you went to the movies. 

In Sweden we only had two terrestrial TV channels until 1994.
When I was growing up the programs would usually start at half past five and stop just before midnight. There would only be morning & late night telly at the weekends. 

Towards the end of the 80s commercial TV stations mushroomed when cable & satellite TV appeared on the scene.
When I talk to people in their twenties they find it hard to imagine a time before TV on tap and as for the Internet, how did humanity ever cope without it? 

It is quite amazing and perhaps a little bit scary just how important a tool it has become for most of us in such a short space of time. I know I would struggle to cope without it now. 

As for television, there came a point last year when we decided that our brains were cluttered enough without the constant tsunami of reality TV shows, celebrities acting like desperate attention seeking monkeys and commercials, so the old box was unceremoniously binned.

Do I miss having telly in my life? Not one single bit!

I can still watch comedy, documentaries and nature programs on YouTube, when I feel the need.

I have no interest whatsoever in celebrities or soaps, I'd rather watch paint dry.

How about you?

H&M tiger stripe rockstar coat bought in 2000, amazing vintage 60s psychedelic print dress that was a gift from my sister in Denmark, cropped lurex jumper, 99p stores snood, Repro Victorian lace-up boots, layered tights, velvet gloves, hat, faux-amber pendant & Frocktasia earrings.

 In other news...

Here is my favourite stateside boho babe Reva, sporting a fabulous Indian tunic dress that I sent her because I knew she would totally ROCK IT, as is blatantly obvious from these magnificent pics...

What a Babe!

If you are not following Reva already, then I have to say that you are really missing out big time cause she is a true gem in the blogoshere.

You can keep up with the lovely Reva on...

Her fabulous blog

Bloglovin'

Facebook

Twitter

This one is for you Reva...

and just because you are so AWESOME another one :)

I'll finish off with one of my all time comedy heroes Bill Hicks, enjoy ;)

Hope your weekend has got off to a brilliant start.

Loads of love,

Jennie

xXx

You make me feel like I am fun again!

Have I told you lately how fabulous you all are and how much I appreciate having you wonderful peeps in my life?

Yes, Jennie stop going on about it or we'll have to make the bucket beside us a permanent feature, K?!

It has to be said though, in the past few months my lust for blogging has returned with a vengeance & a cursory glance at my yearly blog archive spells it out...

...this years post tally is speeding past the previous years at a rate of knots.

I personally put it down to your encouraging continued visits to my little nook of the blogosphere :)

For a long time I isolated myself, I became the silent onlooker to a party that I felt unworthy of part taking in.

I watched you all being fabulous and having fun, interacting with each other and even though I wanted to join in I felt  too craven to do so. 

I felt that through my silence, I'd lost my place in the gang.

Then one day I started taking tentative steps back into the circle and was very happy to find that there were still people there ready to welcome me back with open arms.

Then all of a sudden I felt as if I was fun again!

It was like a flower bomb of colour and warmth had gone off quite unexpectedly.

I started commenting and getting comments in return.

I felt welcomed, encouraged, inspired & enthralled.

I felt like busting open the bags and diving into the drawers to unearth fabulous clobber to wear.

Thank you for rekindling a fire that had all but gone out and thank you for being there for me after my long absence, I guess that is the mark of true friendship, virtual or otherwise.

I just wanted to tell you how much you mean to me...gush over (for now).

Vintage 70s velvet psychedelic print maxi skirt,  60s lace panel top, 70s suede jacket, 50s booties, 60s velvet painters beret, opera gloves, brass bangles & Frocktasia 'Grumpy Suns' earrings.

 Today's tune is 'Lovesong' by The Cure,  enjoy :)

Loads of love,

Jennie

xXx

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

The Chandette

After we went to the Hunterian Museum last Saturday we popped for a quick pint at The Chandos in St Martins Lane. 

It is a Samuel Smith Brewery owned establishment that only stock Samuel Smith products.

Back in 1998 Mark and I spent seven months working there as a live-in bar couple, it was my first ever job in London and I have some fond memories of that time.

When we worked there you could get a pint for less than £2 but our round on Saturday (two pints) came to £8.50, how times change.
I wonder if the wages have followed suit?
N'ah!

These pics where snapped outside the pub. 

I remember getting black fingers from shining that bloody brass behind me every morning.

The pub is slap bang in the middle of the West End near Covent Garden, Leicester Square and Trafalgar Square.

It's a real shame that the beer prices have shot through the roof cause it's a fab place for a lengthy drinking session.

Vintage 70s floral print maxi dress, 90s teddy faux-fur jacket, repro Victorian lace-up boots, mohair hat, gloves & Frocktasia earrings.

Here we have 'The Chandos' class of '98 having a wee swalley on a Saturday night which incidentally was  both pay & beer line cleaning day, loads of free booze, happy days ;)

I'm the one draped on the sofa (no surprise there) & the dude sitting next to me is Matt, who is my brother-in -law.

Other news...

The lovely Sacramento bought a vintage shirt from me the other week and here she is ROCKING IT in one of her fab outfits :)

 Raven haired sauce goddess Sarah put her photoshoppin' skills to good use last Friday and grafted the heads of some of my favourite bloggers onto the glowing orange, trashy clad bodies of retro catalogue models. 

At long last my dreams of walking in the footsteps of Samantha Fox have been realized, thank you Sarah ;)

My fellow models are Tamera, Helga & Vix.

The original catalogue scans are from an awesome blog called Retrospace. 

If you haven't heard of it, I can highly recommend adding it to your fave blogs, it's one of my daily doses of unadulterated vintage & retro fun and inspiration.

Today's tune is 'The Model' by Kraftwerk, enjoy :)

Loads of love,

Jennie

xXx

Just call me Kelly Kildare

In honour of Saint Patrick's Day I decided to squeeze in to my Irish dancing frock and pretend that my name is Kelly Kildare. 

There's just enough room in this dress for my lungs to keep functioning properly so they'll be no binging on colcannon & Guinness, as for dancing and listening to fabulous folk music...bring it on!

I'd been on the hunt for a traditional Irish dancing dress for ages but on eBay they were always either too small or too expensive.

I couldn't believe my luck when I stumbled upon this beauty at a car boot sale a few years ago.

It was more than affordable, the chap selling it said that he was happy to let it go cheap if he knew it was going to a loving home.

I love the fabulously bright cherry red colour.

It came complete with cape sash and crochet collar, I simply couldn't have asked for more!

Sure it's not in mint condition, it's got a few nibbles and marks here and there but it is worth every single penny that I paid for it!

Just look at the Celtic knot applique & embroidery...stunning!

It's been very dreich outside today and the drizzle has been pretty much constant.

We'd run out of bird seed, so we popped to poundland to get a few more bags.

On the way back we stopped off to feed Lilo and friends. 

They weren't that interested  today cause I think they'd already had their fill.

Sometimes we don't bother going up on a Saturday or Sunday cause there are so many other people feeding the birds over the weekend but I do like to pop up if it's a particularly cold or damp day, just in case.

It's been rather windy lately & my flimsy fine hair is being swept in all directions making me feel like The Baldy Man :)

I don't use hairspray so I guess I'll just have to live with it...

Today's Ensemble:

Traditional Irish dancing dress, vintage 50s velvet jacket, Victorian style lace-up boots,  Celtic  folk art inspired earrings, patterned tights, gloves & Frocktasia black rose headdress.

Hope you've all had a fabulous weekend...

 Beannacht Lá Fhéile Pádraig!

Today's tune is by one of my all time favourite Irish singer songwriters Luka Bloom, enjoy :)

Loads of love,

Jennie

xXx