I couldn't haven't even come close to coming up with such a succinct desciption of the nausiating wave that has swept across from the trendsetting borough of Willamsburg NY, to the fair isles of the wet UK of being a "hipster". It has become a diluted version of the hipster in its original form, to say the least. But without them, (the original Hipsters,) we would't be able to coin the infuriating level and rise of the NORMCORES.
You'll see them, you'll most likely know one, in fact you may even unwittingly BE one. If you believe you need to really know the origin of your coffee and the eco-footprint of your delivery from waitrose, there is a good chance you have been brought into the normcore fold.
Allow me to extend the description further, do you think that something your teenage daughter is wearing would possibly be a good look on you, and are you over 30 and have you bought something from topshop? The stakes are rising for you then... It's the trend to LOOK like a hipster, to behave like a hipster, to purchase the lifestyle and desires of a hipster, to voice your opinions of shunning mainstream employment and believe you should embrace your inner "nerd" and wear some geek glasses... with clear glass in them.
REAL hipsters decided that as they DID need to wear specs, they would shy away from the norm of being embarrassed by them, kick-back against the rimless, lightweight frame and really go all out. They were rebelling against the popular culture at the time. Little did they know that their sub-culture would rise and rise to become popular trend-defining and leading stuff.
I feel sorry for the real hipsters. They had care and thought and they were genuine about the neck tattoo they got, (when only lifers in prison and violent gang members had them), and I don't mean those who have been tattooing often since they turned 19, I mean the normcores who think - "I can be cool, and hip and trendy and fashionable, I can rebel against the system - heres my super cool tattoo to prove I'm Hipster like the best of you."
They felt passionate about being the only one of their friends who rode a bicycle anywhere, and not a brand new super-posh road bike, but some tiny, no-name, no-brand-something-their-cool-friend-in-berlin-customised-for-them bike.... I bet they never thought that some moons forward those "customised" bikes would be available off the rack, online and delivered to your suburban door in Chelsea.
Ah - the posh normcores... possibly the worst offenders, driving their oh-so-gritty Land Rover defenders, (brand new of course), wearing their oh-so-cool Zadig & Voltaire over-priced cashmere, that they bought looking distressed and their $300 jeans... that Erin Wasson wears.
It doesn't matter how much they try and deny it, these are the absolute pinnacles of normcorers. The desire to look like they are bucking the Boden trend, not wanting to be judged on how perfect their parenting skills are by not wearing Whistles and instead embracing their inner lost teenager.
I fear for where the lost real sub-culture of Hipster-ville will naturally fend back to. They must reclaim their sub-culture of non-conformity, but how??
There could be an infinite number of ways, but unfortunately with the ever encompassing existence of our social media and instant connectivity NOTHING stays sacredly secret for a nano-second. You could tell your friends how passionate you are about a new artist that has just returned from travelling in the uncharted jungle with glorious unique works of art and have decided to make... hats... Those 'hats' would be so achingly cool that Topshop and Century 21 would have them on their production lines in weeks... That earthy artist might have been perfecting that unique design acquired on their travels, only to have someone tweet it, instagram it, pininterst it and add to to their tumblr and facebook feed - KERPOW - its old news and hot property...
You poor hipsters, maybe the normcores have it right, in this day and digital era, following really is the ONLY option.
Currently running at the moment is a very important and interesting campaign called Time to Change, advocating the speaking up on the issues of mental health. Trending from time to time on twitter has been #timetochange and you may well have seen billboards, adverts on television and posters in doctors surgeries. Don't ignore this campaign.
You can add a 'pledge' by clicking the link above - and make your committment to change
I have had mental health issues. It's much harder to say than you think! I actually really dislike the phrase "MENTAL health" because it has no positive conotations or associations whatsoever. Herein lies much of the battle this camapaign is facing. And whilst I applaud the tenecity, I must follow suit and lead by (small and insignificant) example.
As soon as someone mentions mental health we have sad images, negative assumptions, immediate questions and often JUDGEMENT.
In all honesty it took me over 18 months to even realise I had a mental health problem. I was roughly 19 - I had been faced with an unspeakably difficuly time forced upon me by two very bad parents. As the eldest sibling I felt duty bound to shoulder the responsibilties my mother had walked away from and watched on as my father sank into more and more despairing and crazy bahaviour.
Looking back it was a harrowing time, culminating in some very bad problems that eventually landed me in the hospital, weak, sleep deprived, broken and extremely ill. Thats mental health really at its worse, when it almost breaks your spirit as well as your body.
Stark moments pop out in my memories that resolved over the following years, one of them being, "I think I need some help" sobbing and yelling and broken holding my car steering wheel so tightly I thought I might break it off.
Another was the first time I filled my prescription after having been offered Fluoxitine from a locum GP, after taking the first terrifying step in seeking some 'help'.
It wasn't a long appointment, I had to go alone and spoke very little indeed - I was asked to complete a 10 question form that roughly assessed how close I was to suicidal thoughts or any act of harm or violence. Other than that form, I'm sad to say, for the next 6 months that was the only 'help' I got.
It took me a further 2 weeks to take the first tablet - why? Because no one had explained what they were, what would happen to me or why I was taking them. At this stage in the road I still didn't know I was suffering with accute depression.
I wanted to sleep day and night, not eat, (my appetite drops, but some people experience the opposite), my hair began falling out and I was having extremely upsetting yet seemingly unrealted physical responses to stress. Heart palpitations or panic attacks, (2 of which lead to a trip to the hospital) and complete amenorhea, (loss of or irregular menstrual cycle) - and along with the hair loss, ovarian cysts and kidney infections- my body was shutting down.
After the 3 months of tablets ran out I was no closer to knowing why or what was happening and unfortunately I was grossly lacking the support that is vital to anyone with mental health issues.
This episode or "cycle" lasted roughly the next 2 years, during which I became unreliable, irratic, full of anger and rage, exhausted, confused, and somewhat a danger to myself by drinking, smoking and putting myself in dangerous or precarious situations without any thought for my saftey or future. It was a self-desructive period. There is no fight or flight response - typically, its a gross succumbing and acceptence of complete failure in many cases. Resulting in a narrowing, downward spiral, with loss of control over the mundane and the neccessary normal aspects of life for most people.
I know now that this is a relatively common expression of depression if it is left untreated to grow and fester.
I managed (with difficulty) to work and do my job as an actress and a dancer and supplemented my income with a raft of side jobs in department stores, fashion boutiques, cafes, bars and nightclubs. (The last place anyone with mental health issues should be is drinking alcohol in a nightclub!)
By the time I reached 21 my personal life was in tatters, and finally my long-suffering boyfriend ditched me. I can't blame him. Unfortunately relationships ending can be a huge trigger for people with depression and once again the spiral down began. Always the same, exhausted, loss of appetite, loss of all drive, (just getting dressed and brushing your teeth can seem larger than life when depression is in full swing)....
Things began to change when I was swept up by an old school friend who allowed me to convalesce in her home for 3 months without working, then helped me find a very quiet secluded stress-free job in a small luxary clothing boutique. This was a turning moment, I began taking the time to shop, eat healthy food, spend time IN, in the evenings, relaxing, taking care of myself and learning how to "be".
I went back to the GP once more and sorry to say the second round of medication came with no further instructions than the first - no follow up help, no secondary point of call or alternative therapies. But this time the internet was becoming more readily available. I began taking the time to research mental health.
Learning you are not alone and not "going mad" (which I actually thought I was), understanding that it is just a phase and it WILL pass, realising that its not your fault per se, and that you can help yourself, became what has since become a passionate hobby of mine- learning and understanding mood disorders and the depressive scale. It was another defining moment.
By now I had an excellent new boyfriend who despite fighting in Iraq at the time with the Army, was whole-heartedly supportive to my struggle, my plight and at the same time very 'british' - stiff-upper lip, dont wallow, you have a choice, "do whats neccessary, do whats possible and before you know it you're doing the impossible" That person was a gift that came from nowhere, a chance obscure meeting - sometimes it only takes one person to help you turn a corner.
Having someone who has nothing but high hopes for your recovery is paramount to a speedy recovery. And someone who is strong enough to listen and take on board what may sound like absurd emotions and silliness, is imperative.
Its not hard - if you suspect someone you know is acting out of sorts, they may not neccessarily be incredibly down or crying, however they may be very typical in this way, some younger people tend to hide their mental health problems with drinking, and promiscious behaviour and drugs or even unpredictable violence - all of these thigns can indicate mental health problems, anxiety, stress, depression or even response to trauma.
Reaching out and calming them is easier than you think, making them as safe as you possibly can, offer them somewhere to stay if you think they aren't managing where they are, some home cooking, fresh towels, clean bed and cup of tea can really work wonders. Then.... they may begin to talk. They may however not want to or even know how to. Present them with some ideas, some preliminary solutions; seeing a GP, going to a therapist or counsellor, reading a particular book or article online - all of which you can assist someone in many ways.
Pick up their laundry for them, help them with their to-do list, accompany them to any apppointments they may need (keeping and making a schedule can be particularily impossible task when mental health issues are present) - if their problems are OCD or phobia based, be gentle and just understand - you CANNOT understand and accept them, for now.
Phobias are often the result of emotional trauma, we want to protect our world that has made us afraid or hurt us in some way - whether its agrophobia or needing to wash your hands 300 times a day - never tell anyone to just, "get over it".
No one chooses to have mental health issues and least of all WHEN to have them. I've had a major breakdown that has come out of the blue whilst it was snowing in Central Park, New York - I was in a strange city, alone and seemingly enjoying myself, but emotional issues can strike like lightening with no regard for when and where they hit. I folded like a napkin that afternoon, and sat crying into the snow, in public. This was another broken moment.
I hope this makes someone talk to their friend, child, neighbour or collegue today, offer them a cup of tea, pay them a compliement, invite them someowhere or offer to help them with a small and menial task - inside they may be crying for help, you may be their wonderful new turning point. Be calm, smile, and let them feel safe to tell you what they are experiencing. Don't judge. Mental health can strike anyone at anytime, NO ONE is protected.
This post is dedicated to a dear friend Alex Holland, who committed suicide following his battle with dpression 1st April 2010. Alex - I, like many others, miss you.
I do enjoy a bargain! But I- like many- have been lead to believe that there are some things you just SHOULDN'T scrimp on; shoes, (you KNOW they will be painful after an hour!), haircuts, (its not worth it) and generally well understood - Skincare.
However, with most good brand names coming out with a new product roughly every 3 months, and the top-end of the market secreting creams that retail for £1000+ (I'm not joking) its hard to know how cheap can you go and how do you know?
I worked in Harrods Beauty Hall for over 2 years. I really loved it and it was one of my favourite jobs. I learnt so much about skin, and skincare and much of it I still draw upon when I'm making purchases today.
see what runninginheels.com has to say about on their blog here
Its not just Tallytagg that is a huge fan of this site - and for very good reason - its becoming a growing first class ticket to health and beauty.
We are supposed to be bamboozled by the "science" its the 'bifidus-digestivus' placebo. (come on... thats not a real word!)
Basic rules are fairly easy and well understood, however roughly 80% of people have under-hydrated skin. And it does take a long time to pyhsically re-hydrate. You won't plump out your skin with just one glass of water alone. It take a few weeks. That means that even if your skin is in fact greasy or oily, it can still in fact be dehyrated and 'thirsty'.
Wash; try as hard as you possibly can a find paraben free, alcohol free, sulphate free facial wash. Try cleansing balms, or even cleansing oils if you have dry skin, or dislike that tight feeling after you wash your face.
temptalia beauty blogger has voted Shu Uemeru top facial oil for the last 3 years!
Personally I've been a HUGE Origins fan, probably the biggest there is since before the brand even came to the UK back in the early 90's. They discontinued (what was in my opinion the best facial wash ever made!) called Crystal Clear - (I bought the last remaining 3 BOXES in bicester village for over £200 - an investment I still think was imperative.) However, they have come back with this -
This is their new cleansing oil - and I believe anything by this brand is pretty darn fantastic.
Feed; this can be done with a good serum - and they dont have to be expensive, as a general rule most of them are fairly similar in consistency and do roughly the same job. There isn't a product out there that actually penetrates the skin, so dont believe the hype. They may address the first few layers, but nothing can sink right in. That - has to be done from the inside. And, yes, there are actually products that you can buy that do this.
This 'Product B' isn't yet available at all in the UK- its something I am sure that will EXPLODE onto our health scene as soon as the company are given the green light - safe to say it has passed the Australian health board (which is much more strict than ours) and is truly alive and turning over billions in the US market - THIS little nifty product WILL change our way of thinking on the little green island. Watch this space!
You can achieve the same thing my eating nutrient rich raw vegetables and yep- lots of water!
If you want to really boost your skin, it has to be done on a holistic approach - inside out, not outside layers only. Its superficial.
Water (Moisturize) - Oil, essential oils, balms and HEALTHY moisturizers (SLS free, paraben free alcohol free) are imperative... This is one of the few places that the big brands really fall down on. They use a whole manner of ingredients to do very specific things that in my opinion are such short term gain for such a lot of money they won't give you the long term effects you need.
So where to find all these things - try TKMaxx for some brands that are reputable, try factory outlet stors and shopping outletes for discounted big brand names, and online there are an amazing array of apothacary's, that are fabulous. Online is pretty much the best place for these niche markets that are literally still emerging ... So quit Boots and do your skin a favour....
My purchases today;
good skin: microcrystal skin refinisher £4.99
La Petit Olivier - 100% pure argan oil for face, body and hair - £5.99
I poo-pooed the media in my previous post, accussing them of brainwashing the majority to believe "we" will never achieve or look like "them". And by "them" I mean the nubile, tight, lean, ripped bodies clad in designer bikinis and mortgage inducing wardrobes, that grace every single tiny-weeny space of every magazine and cover.
There is little denying that 99% of the time they do look relatively good (as good as one can in a silver leaopard print bikini with purple jewelled nails and diamond encrusted sunglasses!) But... It is very deceptive to look at many hollywood stars and models and think they are quite literally perfect - in an unobtainable way.
As I look out across my desk and into my garden its so dank and dark I can't even see the end of the garden, and it feels like its still 6:15am.... Bbrrrrr. The last thing I want to see is tiny bottoms in tiny bikinis cavorting in St.Barts, however... those tiny bottoms and perfectly perched sunglasses on perfectly shaped noses, DIDN'T always look as perfect as you might think.
Can you recognise this woman.... ?
(She looks like the pretty girl who works in our local Co-Op to me!)
Here are a number of REALLY recognisable women... in some less than well circulated photos of them PRE-PhotoShop, pre-surgery and teams of beauticians to coiff and polish.
If Carling made face-creams!
So here looks like the results of; (at an educated guess), a chin implant, a brow-lift, nose job, jaw botox, and possibly even neck and chin liposuction... Angelina... You Sham!
Giselle Buncheon, before her assets really increased....
Megan Fox.... with some alarming results. I can't work out whats worse - blue eye-shadow, or no facial expression?!
How can THIS be the same woman.... as...
THIS....
Photoshop has a LOT to answer for.
Don't misunderstand me, I too have my lips injected, my forhead smoothed with botox, my eyebrows "reset" with more injections, my teeth whitened etc etc.... But - I don't pretend I wasn't a bag of spanners before! And... Neither am I hounded and followed by paparazzi, sacrificing me on the alter of women's ego's as a verifiable role model to the young and old.
And you thought those luciuous lips were real????? Don't be silly!
Both are terrifying... but demonstrate the point... Dramatic change is possible, but it doesn't follow that all change is GOOD change....
There is only so much most of us can do, on a laymans budget and what we are willing to endure, perhaps a superb facial once in a blue moon, a new lipstick every now and again, a trip to the hairdressers when we can afford it or find the time... But even if you DID have all the money and time in the world, would you neccessarily want to "look" like any of these after pictures? I really don't think I would. At all. Ever. They look outrageous, bizzare, unatural, scary and strange. But thats what happens if you start messing about with things too much. Its a fine balance.
Be careful what you wish for is the moral of the story. Skin, hair, nails, teeth and even the brightness of your eyes is actually all just down to diet, excercise, sleep and stress. Our skin is an organ. Did you know that? The largest organ of the body. And it needs nutrients. You wouldn't keep a tomatoe plant in a room without sunlight and water and expect it to grow nice, bright, plump tomoatoes would you? You wouldn't expect it grow any tomatoes at all if you gave it lemonade and starbucks lattes to drink- would you?!
In my opinion this girl could do with a bit of excercise and a detox, with cellulite appearing before you are 30 - its a clear sign your diet and fitness regime is failing your body.
I'm no better - I'd happily drink black coffee all day and red wine every evening if didn't care what my skin would look like. But- Water, and lots of it, has magic properties. Literally - Supernatural. 2 weeks of drinking NOTHING else other than quality water - will see you easily drop a dress size, lift your skin, depleat your flab, your sag and your dark circles, add into that 4 nights of 10+ hours of sleep... and you'll look a million dollars. And feel mega!You need to consume over 2 litres a day in order to make the chemical balance in your body shift.
Every single page of every single magazine, paper and article says how to lose weight, get fit, slim, healthy, active... And I've a little perspective on this.
Why?
Why January? Why Spring? Well supposedly we start off with all best intenetions following on from being slobbish and unhealthy during Christmas. (Personally Ive never understood this... I want to look great during Christmas, I'd much rather slob out in the sunshine and a Kaftan than during Christmas when its party dresses, high heels and no sunshine...?!)
Change in attitudes, permenantly, would shift this desire to shed extra quality-street-pounds. Food re-education is huge, and seemingly women are the worst offenders. Men seems to care less about their bodies, but on the whole look after them for longer than women...
Women skip over the fact that during their teens and early twenties with the bare minimum work they can literally look their best when they wake up, this changes, of course as we age, but its no good suddenly waking up at 40 and saying,
" my GOD - I look like an old woman!"
I DON'T think "eating chocolate" made Nigella Lawson look like this, she has had a LOT of work done.... And eating "Salad" didn't make Gillian McKeith look like a corpse, not bothering to take care of her fitness did...
Prevention is of course best, but if the preventative window is barely open to you anymore then its going to take a massive shift in your mentality to gain some control over your health and your body and... A New Perspective.
Muscle memory; the importance of getting in shape early on in life is imperative, if you are/were lean and fit at 18, chances are you will be in fairly good shape still at 45 - because of muscle memory. Without it, working out and trying to make those New Years Resolutions realties at 38 or 48 is going to be as likely as climbing a mountain in a pair of flip-flops; You'll only get there if you change your footwear to something more suitable... And sustainable!
Start with the things you can do. Setting a pace with a personal instructor that is so far out of your daily routine and lifestyle isn't going to stick for very long. Small changes can make big differences, and they last much longer, hopefully forever, but theres the key.... You shouldn't be focusing on "losing 14lbs", you should be focusing on throwing away every item of clothing that will no longer fit you after you have changed your lifestyle... because.... then youll never need them ever again.
Short term goals are fine, if they are just milestones along the way, but focusing on a weight loss will do nothing to help you stay at that weight once you've reached it, unless you have paved the new path along the way that you intend to keep walking.
What you EAT and DRINK makes you who you are. (Bold statement but look a little closer.) The choices you make about the foods you eat, cook and buy show you what kind of person you are. (The same goes for drinks, no SMART, INTELLIGENT person would drink or buy a bottle of coke a cola... because it makes your body almost rot with sugar and salt!)
If your trolley consists of noodles, bags of frozen chips, grill steaks, bottles of sauces and microwavable items.... then you are someone who doesnt see food as important; therefore you have other prorities - what are they? What do you dislike about shopping or cooking? These root-cause and answers will enable you to change habits.
If you hate trapsing the shoppng isles - work out WHY? If you hate cooking work out WHY? If you drink frizzy drinks - ask yourself WHY?
Learning to shop, means learning to cook, learning to cook means having the best control over your own body, (health and mind), and learning to have to control over these things empowers you have more control over other aspects of your lifestyle too.
If you find you just dont know WHAT to eat - then shame on you. All these Jenny Craig diet-meal planners, delivery to your door in a tin box nonesense.... Come ON. Its almost embarrassing yourself. If you can't feed yourself - which is supposed to be a basic human function, you have some serious questions to ask yourself. Learning to shop and learning to cook are going to make you far happier than spending any money on "getting thin by drinking celebrity slimshakes".
Buy a cook book - not a diet book per-se, but a good, comprehensive cook book. Go onto amazon, browse for 15 minutes, those 15 minutes spent buying a couple of books will be the best 15 minutes spent, and last far longer than 15 minutes in the gym!
DON'T BUY THIS ONE!!!!
Start with mastering basics, and I only say this, as this was how I taught a friend of mine to cook. Mastering basics, rather than following recipes is what you need to gain control. Basics I consider;
All of the above are cheap, quick and can be tailored EASILY to your own preferences, and can be done very leanly too.
SoFeminie.co.uk do a daily recipe to your inbox. I used to really like this when I was in my early 20's and living on a tight budget - It meant I could pick and chose the recipes that appealed to me, go oline and order my shopping from Asda for the ingredients, make sure I have everything planned out for the following week, learnt how to cook a few things, having gotten the right ingredients and after a few months, I stopped really needed the recipes for anything other than a bit of fancy inspiration.
Budget is such a deciding factor when trying to get fit as we are conditioned by advertising and media to believe 3 things:
1. Famous people, "other" people, Rich people are thin and attractive.... We are not "them".
RUBBISH
2. Wonderful food costs a lot, thats why restaurants charge lots of money for the priviledge of it.
RUBBISH
3. You can only get fit if your join a gym, hire a personal trainer, pay for a studio class or a professional person to help you.
RUBBISH.
Dispell these notions of rubbish from your brain and thoughts as they are all designed to make you spend money that you needed never have spent to try and achieve something that THEY say you can never achieve anyway... Its like a cruel form of brainwashing to keep the general public controlled by the media.
You dont ever need to join a gym just to get fit. Buy a really good pair of trainers, the best sports bra you can afford and a decent system to play music through headphones that you can fix to your arm with a velcro strap. If you want to splash out, get a blow-up swiss-ball and some smallish dumbells... the rest you can improvise!
You can absolutely look fantastic at 20, 30, 40 and 50.... But you need to believe you can. Perhaps you used to, and now don't, perhaps you think that having children and aging is just the price you pay for being 4 dress sizes bigger than you would like to be... Wrong - it is just an excuse. And just because its "the norm" and the national "average" does NOT make it ok!
Yes - you have to put in LOTS more effort, both with what you know about food and excercise, but its not information that is kept under lock and key and secreated to the chosen few who happen to have lots of money to pay for... Honestly!
5 things YOU can do today that will change your whole body in 6 weeks...
Don't drink sugar.
Don't buy anything you put in the microwave to heat it up.
Go for a walk, a brisk walk, either on your lunchbreak or just down the road, until you feel your bum muscles start to get tired and your breathing start to become more noticeable... If it doesn't, you certainly arent walking fast enough!
Clear out your kitchen cupboards of ALL the crisps, chocolate, tinned-soups, snacks, cakes, and other stuff your body seriously has ABSOLUTELY no need for.
Learn and Do - Sits-ups, Lunges, Leg stretches, a plank and a push-up - and do them EVERY DAY.
These BASIC excercises will cover your most important muscle groups that you will need to engage before you can start really working out. And here comes the bad news - you have to do them every day. That means either get up 40 minutes earlier, or set aside 40 minutes in the evening to do them...
Sit-Ups.... various degrees of difficulty but start easy. Why not! If you can manage 3 reps (repetitions or 'lots of-' 10 then you are doing really well... If you can only do 5... fine... just make sure that the next day do 6. Miracles dont happen! They take time.
If you can only hold a partial plank for 30 seconds then fine - if you can hold a full plank for a minute fantastic... if you can hold a push-up plank for 3 minutes... then fabulous... but it may take you 6 months to get from one degree of difficulty to the next.But its no good being able to do this if you don't do it EVERY DAY.
Trick is small changes and consistency. Don't slack off, don't think "oh sod-it".... or there is no one to blame but you for your flabbiness. Sorry... harsh words are often the truest.
Get your minds out of 50 shades of beige - I don't mean that sort of Leather and Collars...
With most fashion fads, they are fairly predictable about a year ahead, or at least a couple of seasons, as most of them are based on a fairly formulaic repetition from the archives of bad fashion choices, revisited in a better light.
Leather is clearly having a well over-due revival. Based, I think, mainly on this years weather being so bad. I know that sounds a bit daft, but many people think leather can pe a pricey fashion investment. Trousers, dresses, coats, blazers. Definitely not a faddy purchase. But this years british weather has been actually very consistent. Wet and Cold. All year. So leather is suddenly becoming a really good idea. At fighting the cold, real skins are second to none. So leather and real fur are sure to enjoy a massive resurgence because of this.
This girls "right up my street" with the leather fetish... Don't knock it until youve tried it!
There is no way I could do a whole piece on leather without mentioning Cheryl Cole's leather dress this week. Wow. Even for her muted dress sense of short Herve Ledger dresses and platform stilettos, our Cheryl managed to look fairly refined.
Plum coloured, leather collar from glam.co.uk. £20.
However, this site, lushlee.com, has a vast array of really beautiful leather collars, that are so elegant and delicate I think Id buy one in every colour - (if I could).
I have been determined to find a leather shirt, to no good avail. I'm thinking of going to a bespoke tailor - its the only way,
The Vintage Dressmaker blogspot - I dont have these skills!
As I am sure by the new year shirts will be the top go-to item, changing only in sleeve length for the summer, seeing a 50's look return. Short sleeved shirts, ankle cropped tailored trousers and flat shoes. Seen this classic and wonderful look anywhere before?
It was only a matter of time before we returned to the full "classic hepburn" look. Hurrah!
We have already begun to embrace the return of the collar for the last 3 years, in various forms, collar necklaces, peter-pan collars, studded collars, button-down collars, sheer shirts and collars, soft collars; Its a short stretch to see the return of the "popped" collar look.
However - its undeniably flattering, add a blazer and its lovely for work, add a cardigan its lovely for the weekend, add some colour its great for a day at the beach, add some good underwear underneath it all and you look like a pin-up girl.
Shirt and Trousers, NEXT and ZARA, from fabulousmag.co.uk
In fact I'm sure the pin-up image will be one gracing the look-book stories by autumn 2013. Combined with our fascination for all things a little bit raunchy at the moment (thank you slummy porn), we will finally be harking back to some decent images of sexual distraction for women, that isn't short skirts, stripper heels and tight tops.
Instead we will see a return of the stocking and most importantly - the corset... mark my restricted words...
personally I think it won't be long before the over-sexualization will have us crying out for a bit of this instead...
I'll make this quick - most magazines seem to feature pages of fabulous clothes, adverts for exceptional avent-guard creations, and models that albeit beautiful and scarily tall, don't ever need to think about getting their raincoat on over 'That' at 8:30 am on a wet windy morning whilst carrying a Ben-10 lunchbox.
Elle Macphearson on the school run.
Personally I accessorize most of my attire with a Hello Kitty lunchbag and an Angelina Ballerina drawstring kit-bag. Really sets off my flat boots and my cereal covered jeans!
When I do get dressed for purposes other than to just cover up, I actually LOVE fashion, but it has to be practical, affordable and look-the-business. We all know how slightly odd Elle Macphearson looks collecting the kids in leather trousers, a Balmain jacket and Louboutin platforms, but we let her off... I don't think many of us can get away with it.
Everyone ELSE on the school run!
Here are the best solutions to stop you looking like your own worst enemy.
Obviously this fleeting season sees a return to some brilliant colours, Wine/Burgundy red, Forest greens and Mustard yellows. All go well as interchangeable and if you think, "whats the point in buying anything fashionable, its only in fashion for 8 weeks then its over"- then look at the cheap versions.
All of these are current in shops, and online right now at New Look, most £20.00!
I've discovered some rather surprising things in places like Miss Selfridge, New Look (yes!) and H&M. Not normally places many mothers shop, but I have to admit, quality vs. £ and its not that bad.
1. Cords and Trousers (swap your jeans for something smarter - GAP are perfect but can look a bit frumpy, try River Island or even better NEXT, for some great slim-leg, ankle length trousers in Navy, drak green or maroon.)
River Island cropped length (is amazingly flattering if you are under 5ft 5") and COS is definitely the very BEST casual knitwear and trendy label right now. I LOVE it.
2. Jumpers; stock up on some current shapes, always buy 2 sizes bigger than your normal dress size in jumpers as only teenagers should actually wear tight jumpers. Length gives away staleness in your cut of jumper. Its really the most variable thing next to colour that makes it current season or not. Discard IMMEDIATELY anything that sits above the pocket line on your jeans... (unless you are a svelt size 6 with a 26" waist). Sorry but its true - as lovely as cropped jumpers may appear, you need to wear higher waisted jeans, a belt and NEVER have any inches to pinch.
Best in the shops now -
Again - ALL at New Look.
3. Get a haircut. Most mummies neglect their skin and hair when they are rushing. A really good haircut shouldnt need blowdrying. Umberto Gianni himself told me this. If your haircut is done well you can disgard your hairdryer on a regular basis. So make an appointment for something that suits your face, and preferable stops you from always scrapping it back it a rough ponytail. Change your shampoo - go to a salon and be prepared to spend at least £10 on a conditioner. It will be worth it. You will need to use less than any supermarket-bought ones and it will make a big difference to you being able to leave your hair down.
Best easy haircuts to print off the picture and take to your salon ; Rule of thumb most women over 29 look better with shorteer hair - leave the long locks to the teenagers unless you have wonderful hair. Most women will suit ONE of these hairstyles. Current trends are long or NO fringe, longer at the front than the back, soft and NO straightening! Keep it simple.
All of these are stunning, easy and flattering.
Plus don't wash it everyday unless you absolutely have to. Fortunately freshly quaffed hair isn't that "in" anymore, so unless you are Kate Middleton ditch the tongs.
4. Shoes - flat shoes are having an unmissable revival. Mothers we are officially TOP of the fashion stakes accidentally.
However, Go brave. Studded biker boots, buckles, lace up brogues are not only superbly practical, they now don;t have to cost loads. Office currently had some great boots, brogues and flats all for less than £45. Hard to resist them at that price. They haven't got to last forever - think of them as more disposable than that. Top picks.
Both from Office and under £50.
Matalan Aldo
Doesn't get any better than these fashion icons in flat brogues!
5. Coats are so hard when you have kids, especially if you have young children, as they inevitable need picking up and they will get their muddy little boots on your coat. There is no avoiding it, and if you walk to school in the morning its got to be warm and a little bit splash-proof.
Don't bother with something expensive unless its going to last you every winter for the next 10 years - Barbour is the fail-safe but my GOSH they are pricey. However eBay will turn you up wonders at this time of year. Watch all items you are vaguely interested in. Look for items finishing at odd times, these tend to be cheaper final price, and bother less about marks and missing buttons. Second hand coats are great- and you will worry a lot less about wellies and paw prints.
Blanket coat £100 Oasis Gharani Strok Cardigan coat Barbour International
If you go for something new, get something practical - pockets and large sleeves are vital for mummies. The more pockets the better, (like cup-holders in cars) and sleeves, don't buy something that's going to be 'fitted', as you'll never get any of the current season jumpers in the arms. Capes, blanket shawls and knitted cardigan-coats are great, as they will go over everything.
Apiece Apart coat
Some labels to look for online - Gharani Strok do great angora/mohair jackets, All Saints do good macs and parkers. Espirit is a very practical fashion brand. Good quality and easily found in a department store/shopping centre. Don't buy a coat from Topshop - you'll be seriously disappointed with it. They are designed for 6th formers. You are not a 6th former!
6. Get a geleration jessica manicure. This WILL last un-chipped and maintenance FREE for at least 2 weeks, even if you do the washing up every day, walk the dogs and vacuum/dust/mop/scrub. I promise. Its £30 well spent. Takes an hour, uses UV light to set the gel, its hard as nails and goes straight on your natural nails. There are no tips (making you look like a WAG), and is super shiney. Gives the impression you are very "polished". I am a convert. I factor it into my tiny personal budget, I make one last me a month and it means I always look finished.
Red, Burgundy, Browns all look timeless, easy and on-trend.
7. Investing in good underwear - I get a kick out of wearing fabulous underwear on a daily basis. I make-sure anything with a hole, faded or colour-run goes in the bin immeidately. I try and always wear matching underwear. I never shop in Ann Summers and try and get as much as possible in TK Maxx. True story.
Gossard full cup Pleasure State Sherherazade Gossard full corset at ASOS
Go for designer labels in the sale rails. Very few women fit Calvin Klein underwear well. Its cut for small ROUND boobs - (no women with children has ROUND boobs anymore.) Get something that has good straps, fits right the way around your under-boob and lastly make-sure you are the buying the right size! That means when you are shopping try on the size up/down bigger/smaller than the one you THINK you might be as every designer has different cuts and fittings. You may be a 36DD in one bra and a 38B in another make. Anything under a D cup, get a moulded bra if possible to give shape and everything over a D cup get a full-cup shape otherwise you get 'double-boobs'.
A flattering full cup from pleasure state Practical structure from Gossard.
Have fun shopping and don't be afraid to let go of your fleece. No one looks good in fleece! Ever. Don't buy boot-cut jeans unless you have LONG legs and wear heels and if time is short in the mornings cheat! I am commonly known to only shave my ankles and shins in=f I'm wearing trousers. Gross I know, but who has the time to shave all the way to the knee!!! Its winter!
Just added some more to Fridays post on "Throwing a Christmas Party At Home". (Its for normal people - like you and I, not people that buy Pippa M's book on party-throwing). Also added some lovely shots taken from UK Vogue's street-chic style. More than a fair share of clangers on there, but things like the MASSIVE maroon-suit, the quirky winter boots and how to look cool ice-skating are superb. All added into tomorrows full post on these snippets.
If you don't live in a boots advert, have a team of fabulous best friends that all have wonderful close families with comfortable, stylish, cosy homes then join the club. I don't. I occassionally miss not being a 'working' woman, because I miss the Christmas parties that come with clients, office relationships and the ability to pop out after work for "drinks" before going home.
www.weddedluxe.com
After a brief lament to the change of now living in a small sussex village with two children, where babysitters are as rare as unicorns and no-one lives anywhere near their own family (this I've learnt is a very southern thing) - The only way around missing out on Christmas parties is to throw one. If, like me, you are the type of person who thinks,
"no one is going to come, its going to be a disaster, they are going to judge my really old bathroom, and my felt-tip covered sofa."
Here are a few hints and tips on throwing your party at home;
RELAX! People prefer the chilled out you, to the up tight stressy you. FACT!
In order to try and impress, (which we all really do want to do, for all kinds of weird reasons), I'm digging deeper and deeper, having gotten carried; food, cocktails, decorations, invitations, waiters, fireworks - my poor husband is having a cold sweat about the credit card bill.It doesn't have to cost lots, but if like me you do little entertaining the rest of the year, its actually a nice way of giving something to all the people you like and love. So never be stingy. Set yourself a reasonable budget - then add half on again... Try and keep either a stack of reciepts as you shop, or a quick list of totals on your phone, otherwise its easy to loose track of the £12.93 you spent on something vitally unimportant that you deemed vitally important for your party!
However, when having a party the logistics are tricky - where do you put everyone? What music do you play?
Its Christmas - unless you have a core group of friends who are heavy metal fans, its fairly safe to say, Christmas music. However, in my opinion, avoid anything by Cliff Richard, anything your mother says, "Oh I like this one", and generally anything that was written in the last 12 months - (as its rubbish and no respectable person would listen to it.)
What do you do with the first slew of people to arrive?
This question I really worry about - the first people to arrive WILL be the people you know the least, or the most. Obviously if they are your best friend from down the road, great. But chances are they will be the parents from your childs class who you have never met ever before as they always send their nanny, (who you like very much and contemplating inviting!). Get them a drink, and be upfront, "lovely to meet you, I've no one to introduce you to just yet, youre the first to arrive, let me get you both something really good to drink, and please take a look around the house,"
Its a really good idea if you have room to put some food out in the room you plan to entertain the most in- NOT nuts or chocolates. No one wants to start cracking nuts or worrying about sticky fingers in their new LBD. Make sure some music is already playing before anyone arrives and put husband/boyfriend/best friend on "social duty".
When do you serve food? Is it best to serve food early to avoid hunger, drunk people, or once everyone has arrived?
A little bit of both. If you have been organsied enough to arrange hot food, make sure you set yourself a time you want to serve, 8:30 perhaps, prior to which make sure there is plenty for people to help themselves to. Then all you need do is waft about excellently with about 3 trays of hot canapes and voila, you look super organised and hopefully its in time to soak up all the red wine and gin people have been knocking back.
Should you serve beer?
NO. But do have a few in your fridge, there will be one awkward person who won't drink anything else. I have stuck by a personal rule for celebrations and gatherings, pick a 3 or 4 drinks and serve nothing else. Red wine, (Mulled if its Christmas), Gin and Tonic (easy to clear up if spilled), Champagne or Prosecco and thats it. (save for the spare beer in the fridge). These choices cover most ordinary peoples taste. The prosecco is better than serving white wine, because people prefer fizz, and Gin or Vodka are clear and colourless. If you start offering coke, lemonade rum etc etc, your kitchen/bar will be chaos and your carpets and surfaces will be sticky and yuk. By removing choice from people altogether you would be suprised how much nicer they find it. Your house - Your rules.
Do you allow people to smoke in the house?If you make people go outside should you put heaters out there?
Yes and yes - there will always be one old chap who wants a cigar next to the fire, and nowadays most people over 25 remember the pre-smoking ban, and don't care. Play it by ear - we are now trained by society to go outside, so make sure its comfortable, warm and maybe even pop up a coat stand with a few warm coats or cardigans for ladies to slip on and off it they nip outside instead of disturbing the PILE of coats in the spare room upstairs.
The questions are quite literally endless. I don't have all the answers- I just loved finding lots of ideas.
This website helps with the guilt of not being perfect-
Another is the beautiful trend of colour themeing your food and "spread" - Chloebleu.com
Although this does tend to look best done with dessert tables, its also possible to create really scrumptious looking canapes, that dont look like a pile of butter new potatoes and flabby pre-shopped things that smell like seafood.
this last picture is from yarahdesigns.blogspot.com
I've decided this year to employ two "servers", staff can aleviate the pressure to be the hostess-with-the-mostess, giving you the time to circulate, chat and actually enjoy your guests, thanking them for coming and making the right introductions. This cost addition was minimal as they will be serving the drinks, collecting the empties and ensuring that ashtrays, napkins and canape remnants are whipped away with haste, leaving everything running smoothly. (She says optomistically)
Last good tip - smell - dont buy anything you plug in, or spray, (unless its really good quality) - your house needs to smell of christmas the moment they walk in the door - try real cinnamon, cloves, put some mulled wine on the stove - the smell alone will make it inviting. (Call it Christmas Fog!)
I've also decided to put on fireworks at 10pm, as I think this really gives the party a focal point, its something that always makes everyone smile, no matter whether your the designated driver or not. We have naturally had to invite and inform neighbours because of this, but the more the merrier - It's Christmas after all! The dogs won't thank me stuck in the greenhouse, but its about making it something special.
As I move into the ever directional phase of what is beginning to look like a career, it is more and more evident that I am less and less hireable for a "normal" job. Writing a CV was something I did on an almost monthly basis before I had children, but having technically been a stay-at-home mum since my first one was born, what on earth do us mothers put on our CV's after a few years? It literally causes me to have cold sweats when someone says, "...Thats great - just email me a CV and I'll get back to you..."
This has got to stop. A CV? I can't write a CV anymore. I could hardly write one when I paid taxes and pension contributions let alone now where I just dump receipts in plastic bags at my husband who shakes his sorry head at the utter rubbish way in which I conduct my grown-up life. A bag of recipets is my idea of book-keeping. I know plenty of accountants (and my bank manager) who strongly disagree!
So many mothers (and fathers if I'm being PC) now have fluid incomes that are drawn from much differnt sources than 5 - 10 years ago. Blogging, micro-sites, twitter advertising, online editorial, they even made a new word for us - MUMTREPRENEUR's.
(I hate that word) but it is however accurate about what so many of us do in order to earn our daily bread. I am not "employed" by anyone, I have dribs and drabs of income from weird sources, (I'm HMRC's nightmare) and I could not begin to explain on one or two sheets of paper what I do. Is the CV dying out? And is our online imprint our new calling card. Small business's are springing up hourly, mainly because a lot of mums just do not have an alternative to return to employed work. We need something that fits around school holidays, parents evenings, school plays, guitar lessons, doctors appointments etc etc, and we have brains, we just can't explain that to many people who are still harking on about CV's.
I'm also a writer, and just this morning contacted another agent, who before asking me anything just said, "Send me a CV".
I thought what the devil for? Thats not going to tell you whether Im the next JK Rowling is it? Where I went to school, if I passed French? I also worked as a secretary, a temp in the city, a make-up counter girl, a dancer, a small business owner, an online start-up, and fashion stylist. I don't think ANY of that is at all relevant to whether or not I can write??? But said agent was having none of it - I ducked and dived the topic, saying I'd been at home with my children for some time, making my own money from little things - know what she said - "prove it!"... We ended the conversation there as I thought, "shouldnt I be asking you what you can do for me, and not the other way around?"
I'll be honest, if someone applies to me for work, the first thing I'd do is google them. (There are other search engines). I'd check them out on twitter, facebook, pininterest, instagram and so on. And its fair to say you can build a MUCH more accurate picture of a person nowadays with this information, rather than their GCSE results and what they majored in at university. Is it just a woman thing though? Is it just us mum's who are having this problem? I teach drama and acting, and have recently considered joining forces to a much larger organisation doing just this - (I don't want to, but if you can't beat em - join em and get paid less!) And without even chatting to me for more than a few moments I was fed the "send us a CV line". Oh dear.
I've taught now for over 5 years in my subject and recently begun branching out into special english as well for exam preperation and what-not. Yes I said what-not. Because its extremely hard to explain that as a mumtrepreneur, we CAN tailor each little 'job' to suit the client, therefore no two are the same. I currently sit on two charities, and my tasks there are flung far and wide from drafting letters, to collecting money and sendng invoices to marketing and branding. I'm not specifically trained in any of these areas, but applied common sense and Voila! Job done.
But who can vouch for us? If we require references, who can us home-employed people call upon? Our friends? Tad unprofessional. And what would they say? "She makes a mean quiche, is great at photoshop, always has a clean kitchen floor and has taught her children to play the piano, can make a school play costume, diligent maths homework-checker and very organised when helping at the village fete"?! Its not going to fly!
I don't have the answer, but I know in an age where "mummy is building her brand" she is likely to be holding down 25 other things as well, none of which you could legitimately put on a CV or "special skills".
I think it definately holds many women back who would desperately like to return to work after a break. As I've spoken to some who said they just couldn't work out how to write a CV, after having had 3 children and 8 years out of "work". I'd hazard a fine guess that they are more capable at getting most jobs done than a fellow candidate who had spent the last 8 years dutifully adding to her CV by doing desk work and not having a family.
I overheard one mum say she couldnt even get a job in a department store as a sales assistant on minimum wage, as "she wasn't deemed qualified enough". Now, I've worked in Harrods and as a department manager in said store, and I know for a fact I would have hired her over someone who did a BTEC in business management. But it doesn't work like that. We are generally made to feel like we have wasted ourselves, by giving up meaningful jobs to become parents. (I hasten to add - it is no help whatsoever if you're being interviewed by someone who has never had children).
So I think I've reached the time (not age) where writing a CV just isnt relevant - or possible. I might as well hand over a card with all my contact details and say "google me"!
I haven't read it - not in full anyway. In fact, given that there are roughly four grammatical errors in the first opening paragraph, it put me off. I thought, "Well if you are going to write about the rules of fetish, the regimental ties of Domination and Submission in their best possible way, I doubt you can do it well if you have a double split infintive in the first sentence." Thats sloppy.
Hard to say how I came across "the scene", but I have read some good, some bad and some shocking books on the very subject, in depth and by quantity. This however - 50 shades of Grey, in my opinion was a poor substitute. I took to the darker corners of the internet, to actually speak with the fetish community on their thoughts on publisizing their underground movement into the mainstream. One word - OUTRAGE!
I had to agree with all they said. It painted a sorry look at their lifestyle choices, it was bland, unappreciating and generally lacked heart. Heart was a big word that jumped out of their thoughts. These were people I knew in all walks of the community - right out there, and more subtle. But I can tell you now - RULES and HEART are at their core beliefs and actions.
Truly, never have I come across SUCH a respectful group of people as those in the fetish world. Respectful, learned, knowledgable and strict. If you don't have rules these are risky games to play - they say!
50 shades lacked the rules - you can't break them. Not even if you fall in love. So Mr. Grey in my opinion, (and that of many a heartfelt fetishist) - was a very WEAK Dom.
I think opening up myself to more on the subject is somewhat risque; but I did put together a group of pictures, some are personal pictures and others ones people have been kind enough to share with me from their own collections. I think in their world where everything is about the visual and the touch, pictures in this case really do speak. (Particularly when bound and gagged). Some people will be amazed, other intruiged and others horrified. One thing I must point out clearly - These pictures have rules. They were taken with rules, by rule-abiders, and for genuine purpose. MR. Grey - listen up;
I can obviously understand why this book flew off the shelves, as I have been peacefully saying for some 5 years now - "we are poised perfectly for a sex novel of our time" (I wrote one) but I did know that our society was crying out for this. However, disappointed was the end product, given its flimsy nature in comparison with some of the beautiful literature that IS already in print that few people read - The classic Story of O - WILL change your life and the way you look at Love and Sex. FACT.
However it was written in 1954. Hear that E.L. James; 1954! She improved on this classic erotic novel none- and Shades of Grey is literally pale beige in comparison. And these pictures remind me plenty of O.
I'm fairly fit, but in the grand scheme of things and not kidding oneself, I'm not healthy. I still smoke each day, albeit in the evenings and only a couple, I do like wine, and cocktails and beer... I am not a member of a health club, gym or spa. I do not have a personal trainer, dietitian or chef, I do not wear lycra or have a strict fitness regime... at all. But I was stood corrected two weeks ago by a friend who I'd not seen since before I had my children. She seemed surprised at my physical appearance and after a couple of glasses of wine I decided to tell the truth. I look a lot fitter than I possibly could be...
I like to LOOK fit is what it boils down to. And therein, I think, lies much of the secret battle. I think if push came to shove we all like the quick fix, the shortcut and the easy route so this is what I know. But we need to stop mistaking dieting and getting THIN, for being fit and getting healthy. HUGE difference. Its no good eating weighwatchers every day if you aren't going to change your lifestyle and fundemental outlook at food and excercise.
And this is the deep-rooted problem with all "diets". They aren't addressing the root-cause of the weight/health issue, merely masking it with clever products designed to make them money and you keep getting thin/fat/thin/fat. It vicious!
Being fit and looking fit are slightly different things. Its one thing to want to look tremendous in an amazing bikini, its another thing to run the London Marathon! Far too many trainers and fitness nuts focus on BEING 100% healthy, when for the largest majority of the population even looking healthy would be a big start. Truth is, unless that's your job, its hard to be healthy 100% of the time, in fact, I'd say its impossible unless you move to a small inhabited island without contact with the rest of the world.
Rules of the anti-diet are knowledge. I'm always shocked to my core by how little basic biology and some chemistry most adults understand. This compiled with a growing nation of people who drive everywhere, education cut-backs stopping P.E and home-economics (cooking) in schools and - Voila! You have a pretty scary obesity problem.
I know that this information is universal, solid, seemingly common-sense and at time obvious, but I'm seeing more and more, it really needs to be said. There are lots of options that you can use, but no matter WHAT "diet" you are on, what you think you know, or what some celebrity idiot has tried to tell you about food and diet - all it boils down to are these rules. For EVERYONE.
There are things that can be added into these rules, like by-laws, for certain common medical conditions, such as diabetes, thyroidism, post-natal etc etc, and where I can, I will include all this as well.
Water- Our bodies are made up of a huge percentage of water. (I shan't bore you with the statistics) If you are breathing you need water. All the time. ALL the time being key. Hydration, using plain old tap-water, is fundemental to weight loss and health. If like me you do like a glass of wine (or 5) in the evening you HAVE to understand that for every glass of wine you need an ADDITIONAL two glasses of water to even MAINTAIN your hydration levels. If you remain hydrated continously your brain, (and fat cells and skin cells) will begin to recognise it doesn't NEED to store as much fat. This is simple science. We store fat for survival. We either burn it off and use it efficiently or we don't. Its thats simple.
This is not a drink! This is an addictive tool to make you spend money.
Excuses - there are a thousand excuses and reasons why you "can't" lose 'weight' and trim down. But at the end of the day - we both know that unless you have a diagnosed medical condition or problem that actually directly affects your weight or ability to burn the food you eat into useful energy, then non of your excuses are valid. Not a single one of them. So lets understand that. "I've tried everything" being THE WORST....
This is actually called "negative calorie chocolate cake".
DO NOT BELIEVE ME! ITS RUBBISH!
Simple formulas - The Skinny is you have to eat less and excercise a lot more. When you are completely sedentary (which most town dwelling non-gym-going-desk-working people are) Excercise is NOT a brisk walk to the bus-stop. NO! Exercise must make your heart beat faster for a prolonged period and eventually sweat. (Don't forget to drink more water!)
If you think that eating a bowl of Special K and "only 90 calories" snack bar will help you get fit and lose weight - you're in for a very long wait!
Advertising and Marketing- DO not succumb! Whatever you may be told, no amount of cartons of orange juice and tinned tomatoes ACTUALLY count as your 5-a-day. Unless you have to peel it, cut it or wash it before you eat it- then it doesn't count. Apple JUICE is not an apple. (A glass of wine is NOT a handful of grapes!) Catch my drift? So put down the shakes, soups, packets, ready-cook crap... and go and fill your fridge with things that you can either eat raw or can be easily steamed.
Education - weight-watchers was made for fat people to pay to meet other fat people to support them all in encouraging each other to pay for more lower-fat things they don't need to stay fatter as long as possible on their road to getting healthy so that they pay more money to weight-watchers. FACT! Unless you actually cannot read at all nothing stops you from going online and looking up the basics. Read a few books on vegetables and diet and nutrition. NOT DIET BOOKS.
[ I mean written by people with qualifications, NOT people trying to make money by selling you stuff. If you dont want to read the books, frankly you might as well stop reading this.]
"Diets" are bad for you. Yes. A good 'diet' is essential to being fit and healthy. The difference is one is part of your lifestyle, the other is something you read in Heat magazine. I Love food. I love GOOD food. And I don't really deny myself anything strictly. However I know that eating a whole chocolate bar would take me about 6KM on the treadmill to burn off. Did you know that? So if you actually wanted to use the right amount of energy you're consuming you NEED to ensure that your calories roughly stay below a daily average of 2000. Every day. Every week. Every month. (Perspective; a huge plate of chinese takeaway is about 3000 calories).
Will Power. Got any? Nope that's ok. You just need to retrain your wistful brain. You need to do WHATEVER it takes to crack the habits. And for all too many people now they are literally lifetime habits. That's hard. Additives and Preservatives in our supermarket bought food have become a toxin waste dump in our body. You NEED to detox first.
Detox- go cold turkey! I do not advocate any kind of starvation. But fasting and flushing your system is like emptying the dirty bath water, scrubbing the bath clean and then filling it up with crystal clear new water. Which would you rather bathe in? The old scummy, oily, scaly, brown residue or the nice fresh blue pure stuff. Imagine that if you put all the food and liquid in your bath tub throughout the day- and then at the end of the day when you were going to sleep you then had to get in that bathtub full of food and liquid, that would smell and be lumpy and frankly sickeningly disgusting.... well hey presto YOU DO! We just can't see it... So think, fasting for a day whilst drinking hot water and lemon ONLY will do you NO harm. NONE. Only once in a while. Eat a light meal of raw and easily soluble vegetables, celery, cucumber, tomatoes and an apple before bed, and yes you may FEEL hungry but remember.... you're just draining the bath water.
Get measured NOT just weighed. You need to know your vital statistics if you intend to change them. However you and your flatmate can do this. Height, Weight (in kg), waist, thighs, chest, arms, bottom, and even your neck are what you want to be changing. Get familiar with the BMI Calculator app on a smart phone. It will give you the tools to not cheat and tell yourself you're doing better than you are. It has an easy graph and chart interface. Fill in your basics - it plots them on a chart that tells you exactly where your BMI is. Get used to doing it daily. If you see no change after 14 days - you're cheating and lieing to yourself!
Workouts hurt. FACT! As someone who has learnt and taught dance and drama I never cease to be surprised by people who tell me they can neither touch their toes and that "their knee/ankle/shoulder/toe hurts" Fooey! Unless you have a medical condition and by that I mean something that requires ongoing pain killers, stitches or a large dressing (not a plaster) You're fine. If its swollen - ice it, if its sore, ice it, if it aches, ice it. Get the picture - most things where you aren't bleeding can be resolved with a bag of frozen peas. Stiff shoulders and sore calf muscles ARE NOT an excuse for not exercising - they are in fact the very reason TO exercise.
If you are unfit - YOU WILL HURT for about 6 weeks. Sorry. There is no way around that one. If you want the omlette you gotta crack the egg. You will be tired. You will be sore, things will ache, pop, bulge, swell, blister, bruise and throb. If you do it properly. But you will heal. Excercise carefully, and by that I mean stretch until your eyes are about to water, not until you can just feel a slight twinge. Soak in the bath after you run. Alternate your workouts to give muscle groups the rest they need to repair and grow, yoga, swimming, ballet, pilates, weights, running, rowing, these are good things.... they are proper workouts. Zumba, Salsa and stretch class in the village hall is not.... Don't cheat yourself... If you can't feel anything whilst your doing it, if it doesn't give you stitch or force you to stop for breath, then face it, it ain't really excercise.
this is not a real sit-up!
The Loop-holes - Yes you can eat cheese, drink red wine, have a pudding after a fancy meal and enjoy a takeaway - BUT not everyday! Come on! (well the wine you can have most days!) But if you want a flat tummy and want to drink alcohol then put the glass on the floor in your living room, turn on the tv to something easy to watch and reward yourself after each set of 20 situps with a slurp of wine. Take a 1 minute rest, fill your glass up and do it all again.... Keep going until the alcohol has made your stomach muscle stop hurting and Grand Designs has finished and then stop. Repeat this as many time as you need.... (try not to finish the bottle). The loop-holes are all of the above taken into consideration all of the time and in moderation. Only an idiot drinks a bottle of vodka every day, but you're not an idiot if you have a couple of vodka tonics at the weekend. The difference is using all of the tools and rules to create a healthier, more balanced and fitter version of yourself.
You don't have to be fighting fit and super skinny, but we could always improve your lifestyle in a variety of ways. Implementing changes is terribly hard work, but so is dancing until 2am in high heels but we see the benefits for the smiles it puts on our faces, only with diet and excercise the smiles come at the end, and not during. Changing our frames of reference and altering our perspectives to cut out all the nonesense is nothing but worthwhile. Davina Mcall and other cash-rich celebrity who brought out a workout DVD are peddling you a unicorn. Literally. Never believe that doing 20 minutes of bobbing about to rythmically will make you look like them. Never.
NO. This is not a get fit DVD- its made by a woman who locks herself in her own bathroom getting high on narcotics while her kids are downstairs. Get real girls!
The bare facts aren't pretty. But thats because they are dipped in chocolate and promising you empty myths of total body transformation. There are short-cuts and more extreme versions - I'm afraid I'd be called all sorts of strange things if I stated them all in one artical
Over the years I've developed a strong passion and fairly comprehensive understanding of some mental health issues in a bid to overcome certain struggles and problems I have encountered in both myself and others, finding out so much, that it has lead to a perfectly agreeable reading hobby that has sustained my usually fleeting interest indefinitely.
One of the main things I tend to try and understand is depression and mood inbalancing mental health. Upon many years of gentle advice I have finally begun to be more open and less upset about my own condition and difficulties with cyclical depression (currently spanning over a decade). But more recently I have begun investigating personalities, primarily the personality scale. Introverts and Extroverts.
As children we are (and were) all encouraged to speak up, be confident, join in, work together, share, sing up! And some of us managed it more easily than others. Today this is even worse, with most classroom work being based on group participation, working collaboratively, sit in clusters. In fact very little primary school aged teaching now is geared towards solitary work, autonomous thinking and self-engaged thinking. This concerns me very much; as an Introvert.
The common misconceptions really do need addressing, just as we addressed the Autism spectrum and Dyslexia and other learning difficulties, I do believe that Introverts should be given the opportunities to develop at their own rate and within an alternative set of teaching environments occasionally. Introverts are NOT shy. But they do view interaction differently. I, for years and years, have struggling with "fitting in", social situations, team sports and other environments that challenge my natural instinct and personality which is in fact to work alone.
This was in my case channelled into dancing. The perfect non-verbal expression that can be done very solitary. Despite popular belief, introverts do not shy away from performing, nor from being heard, they merely require a much greater need for solitude and individual time. I found the liberation of only having to focus on my own movements and my own precision and my being entirely responsible for my own outcomes the only time I felt truly at ease.
We aren't! I was merely battling to "fit-in". Its been found that the percentage of introverts within the populations on a whole rapidly increase with IQ.
Here are a few more insightful misconceptions blown open;
Myth #1 – Introverts don’t like to talk. This is not true. Introverts just don’t talk unless they have something to say. They hate small talk. Get an introvert talking about something they are interested in, and they won’t shut up for days.
Myth #2 – Introverts are shy. Shyness has nothing to do with being an Introvert. Introverts are not necessarily afraid of people. What they need is a reason to interact. They don’t interact for the sake of interacting. If you want to talk to an Introvert, just start talking. Don’t worry about being polite.
Myth #3 – Introverts are rude. Introverts often don’t see a reason for beating around the bush with social pleasantries. They want everyone to just be real and honest. Unfortunately, this is not acceptable in most settings, so Introverts can feel a lot of pressure to fit in, which they find exhausting.
Myth #4 – Introverts don’t like people. On the contrary, Introverts intensely value the few friends they have. They can count their close friends on one hand. If you are lucky enough for an introvert to consider you a friend, you probably have a loyal ally for life. Once you have earned their respect as being a person of substance, you’re in.
Myth #5 – Introverts don’t like to go out in public. Nonsense. Introverts just don’t like to go out in public FOR AS LONG. They also like to avoid the complications that are involved in public activities. They take in data and experiences very quickly, and as a result, don’t need to be there for long to “get it.” They’re ready to go home, recharge, and process it all. In fact, recharging is absolutely crucial for Introverts.
Myth #6 – Introverts always want to be alone. Introverts are perfectly comfortable with their own thoughts. They think a lot. They daydream. They like to have problems to work on, puzzles to solve. But they can also get incredibly lonely if they don’t have anyone to share their discoveries with. They crave an authentic and sincere connection with ONE PERSON at a time.
Myth #7 – Introverts are weird. Introverts are often individualists. They don’t follow the crowd. They’d prefer to be valued for their novel ways of living. They think for themselves and because of that, they often challenge the norm. They don’t make most decisions based on what is popular or trendy.
Myth #8 – Introverts are aloof nerds. Introverts are people who primarily look inward, paying close attention to their thoughts and emotions. It’s not that they are incapable of paying attention to what is going on around them, it’s just that their inner world is much more stimulating and rewarding to them.
Myth #9 – Introverts don’t know how to relax and have fun. Introverts typically relax at home or in nature, not in busy public places. Introverts are not thrill seekers and adrenaline junkies. If there is too much talking and noise going on, they shut down. Their brains are too sensitive to the neurotransmitter called Dopamine. Introverts and Extroverts have different dominant neuro-pathways.
Myth #10 – Introverts can fix themselves and become Extroverts. A world without Introverts would be a world with few scientists, musicians, artists, poets, filmmakers, doctors, mathematicians, writers, and philosophers. That being said, there are still plenty of techniques an Extrovert can learn in order to interact with Introverts. (Yes, I reversed these two terms on purpose to show you how biased our society is.)
Parties are tiring for me- not in the "urgh this is so last season way..." I do absolutely enjoy going out and talking to people, in fact I can safely say talking and rooting out intelligent and highly interesting people is the most fun I can have on a night out. Ive no problem approaching strangers, and I don't care about age or gender or appearance, in fact I find myself drawn uncontrollably to the "different" whether they are the transvestite sat at the end of a crowded bar, or an old man sitting on a train platform, I find myself desiring to learn something, probe their different minds. After a large social gathering though I am most likely to retreat, turn off my phone for a few days and retire into my own head to sieve through it all and ingest.
Don't misunderstand me- I like conversation, however I'm more likely to get animated and involved in a conversation about history or politics or art than I am about Robert Patterison's girlfriend cheating!
Are you an introvert? Chances are if you have reached the bottom of this article - either you or someone you know well probably is as this has struck a chord with you - take the test and see for yourself?
Its hard to avoid the phrase "it" something-or-other these days with the rapid progression of everything being at our literal fingertips and instantly downloadable/purchasable/doable; so it stands to perfect reason that with every day that dawns so does something new in the sphere of "it" d'jour!
I first recall the phrase (personally) back in the 90's with the dawn of the It-Girl. It was the likes of Tara P-T and Tamara Beckwith, Sophie Anderton and Kate Moss. It was when gossip and fashion exploded into our consciousness and suddenly we had the birth of the SUPER-model.
Little has in fact changed, it changes often, but little. And for that I'm both grateful and a bit disappointed. Imprinted now forever more into my brain is the very consciousness of looking for the next IT-Thing. Whether its the latest it-bag I'm craving, the latest fad-trend-fleeting-fashion 'look', hairstyle, gadget and even address; all move in the ever orbiting circles of whats in and whats not.
I've found over the last 5 years (post-motherhood) my passion-for-fashion has both grown phenominally and also my ability to have the occassion or time to wear it dwindled dramatically. Cruel that!
To pull in what I think is currently flying out under the radar that really needs some better IT status.
Isaac Reina and Steve Mono- bags and leather goods. We are by our droves falling under the entrancement of the par-down look. The sublimity in pure and perfect design. With the unveiling of the super-rich on reality television, I think few people with IQ's over room temperature aspire to replicate the Made In Chelsea look; consisting of the obligatory Speedy 35 Louis Vuitton, Uggs, Mid-Blonde mid-length blowdry, complete with coral toanails, superb high shine french manicure, and try-hard dressed down chic. In the words of said characters- #EPICFAIL!
Isaac Reina. A Hermes graduate focus' in on the passion for highest quality and simplest design. Vegetable tanning left in the most neutral and natural dyes, hand stitching and practical application for the use intended (this I think is key!), does deliver something that once held in your hand, feels like pure silk and not leather, and the zips, pockets and "user interface" are impeccable and poetic.These bags are so subtle they practically SCREAM I'm AWESOME! The word pattina will spring to mind once you hold one. You'll just know you'll still be carrying it in 20 years. Fact!
I know that sounds a bit much from a handbag, but you'll have to take my word for it, given their almost impossibility to find in any great range or quantity. Therefore this makes them IDEAL to become the next IT-bags.
Now for Steve Mono, spanish designer, who until very recently worked entirely on men's leather goods. With the turn of fashion towards the androgonous look and the coverting of the word "boyfriend" in front of all basic clothing and accessories to make them trendy; the boyfriend-jeans, the boyfriend-blazer, the boyfriend-jumper.... ah don't make me go on: Stands to reason that before much of a turn we will be looking to emulate more of their wardrobe designs. Steve Mono creates a perfect synergy between the mens and womens collection to inject the bare minimum of colour and glamour to make the womens line fly, and yet retain the straight angularity of the mens functional design that makes it SO sexy. These SHOULD be under the arm of every clever woman who doesn't own a Speedy 35!
Hard not to pull in a british designer given the Team GB craze that is sweeping our nation. Ive always championed British design, however I wasn't aware until recently just how British Mulberry still was. I assumed given its placement on the arms of the euro-wealth, it was a label that must have sold its soul. I was apologetically wrong. It still makes each and every piece by hand - here in the UK. Well thats a HUGE thumbs up from me. Each bag taking roughly 19 hours to complete and is seen through to completion by ONE skilled craftsman. Bravo!
The Del Ray hasnt seen the stratospheric desire the Alexa bag saw, but I think thats what makes it all the more special. Its NOT hanging off the arm of every little daft 6th former who asked for one from daddy to channel their inner-chung, and instead drips neatly off the arms of the smarter and more subtle of its followers.
This again makes it a clear contender for IT-bag status.
So who are the girls that dictate our dilection towards these little snippets of unadultered spending and wanten desire to fit-in? I've mentioned who I think most of us (over 16) try NOT to emulate, with the rise and rise of TOWIE and the likes of Amy Childs, Made In Chelsea and the Caggie Dunlops- turns out many of us believe we turn to the underdog. The non-conformer to point our way. EVERYONE turns to the underdog or non-conformer. By defintion this makes them the exact opposite. (Don't you love fashion and its contraditions!)
We followed the likes of Sienna Miller, then it was the quirky skinny kid off teenage breakfast tv, Alexa Chung, now its The Blogger. HA! As if every single blogger gave them an all access pass to being creative and directional. Their little trends outstrip popularity because they spread slow, originating from towns and families well outside our usual fashion hemisphere. Thats why we find them so "cool". Its the twitterati generation railroading our fashion!
Yep! And they all think they look so unique! Excellent job girls... You managed to pull off looking like a hapless farmers daughter with expert unison!
You've seen it - you know it, you may not know you know it but you do. The magazines in fact only replicate looks once they become recognised, not the other way around. The messy top-bun of hair. The festival look of the unkempt and possibly even slightly smelly- the skinny jeans, the boyfriend jumper, the boyfriend t-shirt, the geeky specs... and the weird coloured nail-polish. All typified by supper-blogger Bip Ling!
Who ironically hasn't got a single original thing about her look, or style.... again the contradictions pile up.
So, we know that the emerging it-girls are less seen falling out of nightclubs and doing the walk of shame down sloane street anymore, but they usually come in the forms of popstrels and DJ's. Lana Del Ray, Molly King, Peaches Geldoff and odd looking actresses that the public relate to their hit and miss wardrobe such as Keira Knightly and Kristen Stewart. And so thats how an It-Girls born. Couple her aversion to looking clean and smart with a few REALLY overpriced accessories and a good-looking boyfriend (thats the actual kind not the jean/jumper kind) and you have the making of her. At no other time would a sane person consider these championing looks...
I have written about weight, health and size before on this blog; I'm not going to lie, I'm a little bit ashamed of our growing size as a nation, especially among young women and children. But I was genuinely shocked and tearful watching programmes like The Naked Truth with Gok Wan, covering teenage body issues. It was terrifying to watch the young teenage girls with such disgraceful warped views of what their bodies should look like in their quest to attain (and this horrible word) - thInspiration.
It would seem that Inspiration and Inspiring women have been diluted down to this... Size!
As a young woman who follows fashion and celebrity covered magazines, who-wears-what and what everybody looks like in a bikini, it does make me sad that magazines churn out the ridculous column inches of "Kim Kardashians Bum Implants..." why can't they use their marketing and advertising coverage for positive use?
J.K. Rowling
Shouldn't we be idolising a different type of woman?
I thought about how I would tackle this issue with my own daughter as she grew up. Already she has begun talking about the recognisable faces on tv, from X-Facter's Tulisa to the new Princess Catherine. What female figures can we seek out and really encourage our young teenage girls to aspire to?
The more I thought about this the more I wanted to put together a positive list of women to rival the Angelinas, Kardashians, Britneys, and Hiltons
It would seem that the thinner you are the more column inches you get - and the fatter you are the more negatively sliced and diced you can be by the media... So where is the happy medium?
Brains?
mmm... these two girls unfortunately capture a very worrying likeness to many young women!
The focus needs to just shift, completely and utterly away from weight, size and physical attributes to achievements, acomplishments and life goals. Instead of all the magazines having "Spring Diet" splashed across the front covers, we need to be teaching our young women how to sharpen their financial accumen, their business minds and entreprenaurial sides; feature articles on strong successful women, those that have helped, saved or created legacies, battled the sexism race and won, achieved greatness in the boardrooms and the kitchens.... NOT on the scales!
I don't care a JOT if Pauline Quirk or Fern Brittain have had a gastric band, I DO care about banks that are speacialising in mortagages for single women, or DIY tips on how to do basic household maintenence in order to eliminate me hiring in handymen. I AM interested in being educated on worldly forward thinking and environmental issues affecting ours and the next generation. Tell me these things? Not if Cameron Diaz has had facial fillers!!! Do YOU know what Deep Ecology means???
Look it up- fill your head with the things that matter!
I googled "Inspirational Young women".... There were a rather dry musing of luke warm hits but nothing really punchy...
I googled "thinspiration" and I was taken instantly to the largest growing online community for what is commonly referred to as the Pro-Ana movement or for the less-well-versed among us, the Pro-Anorectic (not anorexic but means EXACTLY the same thing)... Pretty Thin.com
It certainly is pretty thin on real issues I'll say that much!!
I was shocked as I scolled through the pages of women desperate to starve themselves for "the thigh gap" and covering their fertile minds with images that would surely leave their bodies INFERTILE if they continue to starve and starve....
Up until about 3 years ago, one of my ambitions was to reach the 35 under 35 list... Have you heard of it? Have our sixth formers? Do the young women of tomorrow only aspire to "be famous" and marry footballers? I really hope not...
"The 35 Under 35"; we should be talking about these women with your daughters.
I found it very hard to put together any kind of list that would speak to teenage girls and encourage them to think outside of fake tan, fake eyelashes and fake personas. I too was openly affected by anorexia around me at ballet school. I have witnessed it first hand with friends, but I don't think parents, carers and teachers are really setting the examples they used to.
Business women of the year- there are many awards and more added each year that are specifically for the accolade of women in their fields of business. I really like this. A growing number of small but notable forums and communities are out there for women. Everywoman.com is one, there are others, but they only seem to appeal to women, not girls.
BUT... There are few projects that specifically address girls as school-girls, by the age of 14 or 15 their characters are well-developed and their minds nubile and impressionable, if many of these girls were inspired to become successful and supported to follow their own paths in life instead of those of girls wearing short dresses and falling out of nightclubs having risen to "fame" on a stupid realtiy tv show, then we would see a surge in female entrepreneurs, female professionals, sexy scientists and gorgeous graduates. Where are they?
We need to be telling our young women this when they are doing their GCSE's to give them direction, focus, drive and something to aspire to achieve....
Its been quite a considerable time since my last post on this blog - but, I hasten to explain, have been writing elsewhere on alternative topics and sites and some of my own personal work; So - you may ask - what the devil have you been writing and where is it? "We want to see it...?!"
Its not that simple- I'm currently endevouring to become a published, produced and successful writer, in one particular field. I do have many other skills but I have learnt with (some) age that you must pick a committment and stick with it... Mine is films. Feature length films. (I know its a far cry from a little blog but hey...) Anyway, so with much guts and not much glory (yet) I have been rabitting away on writing three full feature length films.
I've also been testing out some of my other skills, short stories, or to be more precise -
short erotic stories...
Now this is going to be a real experiment; for the last few months I have been posting short erotic 'extracts' or musings online, under a false name on an erotic website. Many of the people who have read it have contacted me by direct email saying how much they have enjoyed it and can't wait for the next installment, so I thought I'd test my subject matter here... With the ordinary good folk and see how it goes down.
First thing in my mind is - Judgement! How will people judge me on fictional work of a particularily kinky nature? Hmmmm.... well - I don't know. Thats where you the reader come in. All comments will be published immediately and I will not screen them before publishing. So threads and trackbacks are very welcome to open up the floor to you and your opinions.
I look forward to any contributions you take the time to make and I hope you enjoy the words...
Everything about traditional holidays conjures up sexy playtime for me... The decadence, the opulence the warm, the cheer, the dark winter nights, the whistling winds, brandy sauce, even warm mince pies and cherry-rich christmas pudding
- My mind runs riot with all the sexual encouragement.... Cold snow, naughty Santa outfits, ice, fire; even the unwrapping of gifts in excited anticipation....
It's like that perfect grin you get when you take off the blindfold.
Warm mulled wine, softening your senses, taking away your inhibitions, smell of chocolate and spice lingering on the skin, every single bit is full of forbidden glowing smiles- the most playful and naughtiest of elves can take a blistering over the knee spanking from Santa....
Even as I write this, that childish excitement I used to have about Christmas morning is certainly still alive and bubbling up, but this time, I want my stockings... Dripping! I want to be held up in front if the fire and toasted like a marshmallow, as he spanks my cheeky ass pink with a huge candy cane!
I want him to stuff woolly socks in my mouth and tape them there with sparkly Christmas tape, hold my christmas bunches as he gets kinky with his naughty fairy. I want him to pour molten chocolate over his delicious Popsicle,
and demand that his naughty fairy clean it all up with my mouth....
The list goes on- dripping candles, tinsel bondage, red hot pokers sitting in the bottom of the fire just crying out for a tiny little skin for a memorable Christmas branding (Christmas eve maybe....) string my naked body up outside his door like an ornament, suspended in the freezing cold snow by Christmas lights....
Dear Father Christmas- I've been a VERY NAUGHTY GIRL.
I have been piecing together this little blog for exactly a year now, and unsurprisingly I have gleaned a HUGE amount of pictures in research and the odd thought process I go through when putting together each post. But I don't always use all the pictures I gather, so I thought today I have a visual dump of these wonderful images, in no correlative order, they are all in someway connected to one the published posts, and a few with discarded posts that never made the cut. Seems a shame to waste them.
In browsing through them all, (and my apologies if I repeat a few that are already published, they are my favourites) I realised that if I had to demonstrate my character and personality in pictures and a visual representation alone, THIS is exactly what it would look like.
So here goes, as many of you who read this will know I have a thing about titling all my pictures. Many Thanks to ALL the different sources that these have come from- long may you all continue entertaining our eyes with your creative images. I wish I could credit you all individually.
"Tally-Ho"
This is ACTUALLY called a tally-ho chair. Probably part of the reason why I love it. Its a piece of erotic furniture, and probably encapsulates my darker sexual side quite expertly... I love eroticism. I like erotic art and photography a great deal, I believe we should always seek ways to thrill ourselves, even if its just a picture on a wall that gives us a cheeky thought for a few seconds. Excellent!
This is probably how I picture myself...
My post; Symbols throughout time - is by far the most popular- I've NO idea why, but for all of those who loved browsing the images I put together when deciding on body art, here are the ones that haven't yet made it onto my skin, but might...
These are both maori drawings, the second is simply divine - excellent clavical tattoo I think.
These are the base ideas for my own - underneath.
Had to have my own handwriting after I read a graphology book - (the pyschology of handwriting )
I can't tell you what it means, its a secret!
A special thanks to Cosmic Slop for this little anecdote. Gotta make you smile!
"Peeping Tom"
Is that not the sexiest thing you've ever seen? Plain, simple and real.
"Sail away with me"
This was taken in St Tropez- got to say, I think I belong back there, along with my delusions of grandure. Hunky men with expensive boats, doesn't get any better...
The perfect heart is always going to look a little dark and have sharp bits and broken bits - no?
This is the next addition when I man up enough to take the plunge...
These are just brilliant - I just love the historical content.
Both of these have very strong overtones, but one means war and the other wisdom.
And lastly.... I took this little slice of punk art. I LOVE it. Everything about it, every detail, every singular speck of it is gritty and quirky and slightly out of focus. All words that descibe me perfectly!
Tomorrow post will be a selection of my best photographs so far, taken by me... Enjoy!
I thought a few days before I wrote this post about the social ramification, after much deliberation I decided to try and walk the fine line between frowned upon and wrong. (Its a fairly uncomfortable place for most, but I find myself there none-the-less frequently!)
I have two children at the moment; my daughter started school in September and my son goes to nursery a couple of days each week. Nothing unusual... I am what most would consider a "stay at home" mummy. I work from home, for myself, so its assumed I'm a glorified housewife. Safe to say there is nothing glorious about this roll, it is neither glamorous, boring, measured or quiet. I do NOT find I have lots of 'spare time' as many people may assume and I certainly do not attend the gym each day and have my nails and hair done once a week either. In fact it's like working 12 hour shifts 24 hours a day!!
To those who do not look after children ALL the time, like carers, grandparents childminders etc, your children (my children) may well seem like little angels. And I'm lucky enough to know that when they are with other people or school they DO behave themselves moderately well, (better than most, not as well as all). But, and here it comes, (eyebrows and judgemental looks at the ready) I shout at my children....
Yes - I do. Ok so now we have it out in the open, lets discuss... I am an educated women, who does not come from a council estate, or wear tracksuits and shop at Iceland, but.... I do shout. I find myself exasperated to the point of exhausted at times, especially with the 4 year old. In the month since she started school we have not had ONE morning where she has been able to lay her hand on her school shoes. Not the end of the world... once or twice but at 8:10 when the tears start flooding because I am getting the baby changed and dressed and she refuses to look for her own shoes, I loose my temper.
Quickly I interject your judgements, I put them in the same place EVERY evening, the cupboard by the front door... Every evening. And EVERY morning she runs around the house crying its the end of the world she can't find them. Every morning. Every morning I say , "Go and look in the cupboard..." She goes... and then bursts into hysterical tears immediately.... WAILING
"I CAN'T FIND THEM....!!!!!"
Mummy-dearest can be patient. I believe myself to have a modest amount of ordinary patience, I'm no saint, but anyone who does something repetitive, just makes me snap! Adults alike, surely the human brain has the ability to learn from common mistakes...?????
Even at the age of 4!
So invariably by 8:15, I fly down the stairs, enraged and incensed by the repetition of the same world-ending disaster as the day before and the day before that and the day before that and the day before that and the day before that and the day before that.... and you get the picture!
Yesterday I was violently halted in my fit of despair at the 4 year old (who just can't SEE school shoes it would seem), by my husband who has decided to work from home. He has always left by this time on a normal day, but he is OUTRAGED by the scene he hears unfolding in the hallway... 4 year old having a melt down and mummy BARKING from upstairs in a mad tone of voice....
"THEY ARE IN THE CUPBOARD... FOR GODS SAKE! I'M SO S-I-C-K OF THIS...EVERY MORNING, WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOUR EYES... YOUR SCHOOL SHOES ARE RIGHT THERE! STOP CRYING!!!!!!"
In hindsight mad-mummy probably does sound ridiculously scary, but the husband begins an equally tyrannical rant upon me... as the adult who should know better, the stay-at-home-mommy, who should NEVEr shout, never loose her temper, never smack, never ignore, never..... blah blah blah.
Are there ANY mothers who are like this? Well it would seem that there ARE.
I met one. I met a mother who SAYS she has NEVER raised her voice to her 4 year old son, she has NEVER chastised or reprimanded, she has NEVER ignored or not put him first, she has NEVER not listened, supported and helped her son every single day of his life.... Impressive you think? It goes on... She SAYS, she has never made him do anything he didn't WANT to do and she would NEVER EVER EVER smack or even tap her son- EVER.
I thought this was either really interesting, really amazing or really embarrassing- either way, it made me look like an idiot... Until I found out, that her little cherub son was a little DEVIL.
A demoniacal, precocious, stunted, terror of EPIC proportions. Hmmm, begs some questions now... Having met dear-little-X, I was horrified by his social and emotional understanding of behaviour and consequences. And despite the fact she had supposedly NEVER shouted at him, this is all dear-little-X did - SHOUT. Scream. Kick. Punch. Fight. Upset. Bully. Demand. Terrorise. Disrupt. Disobey.
And after I met dear-little-X, all I thought was "dear-little-X needs a good smacked bottom!"
Yep - I'd have pulled down his pants and smacked his little bottom and let him cry about it! And no I do NOT believe myself to be a child-beater in any way, but I don't think "the naughty step" would work on this little demon!
Barking mad mummies aren't as barking mad it would seem after all, but I don't think anyone is prepared to accept that getting into trouble, being shouted at and given the occasional smack on the bottom IS good for children- are they?
My husband and I have fallen out over this, he too believes children are "angels" and its only parents who are badly behaved, and that if my children f***-up, then its only me to blame. Hence the screaming 4 year old in the hallway is a direct RESULT of my bad shouting...?
There is probably some truth in this, but I'd rather I shouted and my 4 year old screamed than have a dear-little-monster on my hands...
DISCLAIMER: I do not in ANY way endorse child abuse, in any way shape of form, this is merely a small snapshot of an incident, and NO children were in any way harmed in the writing of this posr
If you are anything like me and my girlfriends we all had a huge swoon on us when Maroon 5 hit the music scene in a major way with their album songs about Jane. Adam Levine. Healthy to start a blog post about what you REALLy intend it to be about. I'm no music buff, I know what I like and I'm not afraid to admit it. Rarely does a new song pop onto the radio and actually grab me by the neck and make me start swinging my dressing gown around my head in front of the children at 6.30am.
But yes I do occasionally!
Moves Like Jagger - there seems a fairly divided subject on the new one. Personally I can't get enough of it. Maybe that has something to do with my slight crush on the lead singer... and who got a load of his mostly topless video on You Tube... such obsequious use of male torso!
I'm not complaining! Check these out...
Its hard not to find it a BIT attractive if you have red blood flowing through your veins, but obviously the tattoo's are a personal taste. Here's some more, just for kicks girls, (and boys, I'm not judgemental)
Yes it is ROCK-TASTIC this pose isn't, and you really can see the Jagger emerging...
I really could add an awful ot more of these, as I trawled the internet looking for them. I've added the rest of the pictures to the BOYS BOYS BOYS album. Take a look.
And if you HAVEN't seen the great little video, short and simple as the concept and execution, turn on your speakers and have a swoon.
"Embarrassed mother of two, signing off from her school girl crush confession."
I had to begin today with this. If this doesn't stir up some feelings of whistfulness in you, check your pulse. I could never however actually LIVE in a house like these. To me it echoes a very large hotel room. Stark and a little bit generic, but the architecture and design is fablous.
The reason I've called this post Caucus race and Groundhog day is because thats how I feel most mornings; I shall pick up the same toys, from the same random places around the house, I shall load the washing machine again with food covered clothes and wet towels, make the same beds and empty the same bins. In fact it could feel like I never actually did it yesterday. The mess would indicate I never did. The same dishes yesterday will need washing today and the same cups half full of milk will need emptying.
I can think of few other jobs than that of a mother and wife that are as thankless on monotony!
So some mornings to break the cycle, I take a look around some of these houses. I wonder, "who lives in a house like this?" I feel hopeful that they don't have children! Or it puts me to shame!!!
Here are just a few more rooms, beautiful houses across the globe, that, must surely be devoid of children!
called the Praying Monk, in Paridise Valley, Arizona. (LOVING the address!)
Some stark housekeeping.
Any mother looks at this and the FIRST thing she will think is,
"ooo, what about that water edge, looks unsafe!"
Ladies - only in our dreams are we going to have such sleek lines and uncluttered surfaces!
All of these pictures were taken from this website; its full of dreamy inspiring design, art and fashion, worth at least half an hour of your time with your 11am coffee!
I think I have more chance of waking up tomorrow and looking like this....!
I love the look of naturally curly hair! My sweet friend, Katie, told me about rag rolling. It's a quick and simple way to get natural looking curls without using a curling iron! I asked her to share her method here on A Beautiful Mess because I knew you'd be itching to learn like I was! Enjoy...
When I was younger, (17) my boyfriends father owned an antique warehouse; I used to love many a stroll around it on a Sunday afternoon after lunch. I'd hanker after all sorts of curiosities. I've always been a skip-rat; one mans rubbish is another mans treasure! So true with me!
More often than not, of course I couldn't afford anything in there at 17, but I did fall in love with one item. It was love at first sight... I couldn't stop staring at it. People have been known to say antiques have "spoken" to them. They feel a connection with them. I've often wondered if this is about our past lives, do we brush by a piece of another life? Its certainly an eerie feeling...
An art deco lamp 'spoke' to me. Solid Silver with four huge pink glass globes the size of melons. I desperately wanted to take it home with me. I felt it belonged to me! (I sound like a kleptomaniac!) But it was hundreds of pounds and I could barely make my rent each month!
The next day, my lovely boyfriend came to my home, in the back of his car, he had the lamp... I was so happy. It was probably one of the first things he had given me. It wasn't your usual young love gift, a CD, a bottle of perfume, a MIXTAPE! This was something I really really wanted. This was the start of something for him too, he went on to buy me lots of collectibles, but this was very special to me.
That was over a decade ago, and I'm still shocked that it has survived 8 house moves and 2 toddlers... But it has. My husband will not even touch it. I have told cleaners in the past not to touch it, the children know its not a toy, and I've carefully lived alongside it, in awe of it, ever since.
Today, my little son, who's 1, ruined all that. We call him crashbangwhallop!!!!
He just LIKES breaking things and making them crash... My lamp came off the worse for this little phase hes going through, and... I cried. I actually cried. (I'm not a cryer!)
DO NOT BE FOOLED BY APPEARANCES!
HE IS A HIGHLY SKILLED DEMOLITION EXPERT!
It made me think about what I really love in my home. If you're anything like me, people give you things, pass 'stuff' onto to you, buy you things, "lend" you things for your home.... (Mother-in-laws are the WORST!).... And eventually you end up with a house full of nothing that matches AND little you've actually chosen yourself! I hate seeing waste, so I end up saying to myself,
"...it'll do for now, shame to waste it. Recycle blah blah...."
The items I LOVE, that I've purchased are mostly second hand, I'm not a huge fan of BRAND new furniture, its so soul-less!!! But my lately-departed lamp was top of my list. An orange eames chair from the 1960's is also another dearly loved piece, with its original covering. A few other little victorian occasional chairs from an auction AND all my pictures. My art...
I love my Helmut Newton,
My Edward Hopper and my old, French, black and white photographs.
The only piece of new furniture I have that I love is a rather unique dressing table on stilts with closing cupboard doors that is completely mirrored inside.
I'm still trying to rationalise my loss from this morning and keep telling myself, this is just stuff. I couldn't actually SAVE it in a fire, of course I'd grab my kids first, and probably a box or two of photographs.
I've heard some crazy things people would save in a fire, their phones?! their laptops?! Alright I have to admit, yes I probably would grab some of my shoes and a handbag or two- what can I say?!
But I'm surprised how happy I am to let go of almost everything but a couple of things, and my CLOTHES. I'm shocked at how sentimental I feel about my clothes. I see my collection having begun amassing at around the age of 15, (and back then Daddy dearest was wealthy and generous! It was a short phase!) I can't believe now that at just 15 I could easily blow a £1000 on two pairs of shoes! My father made it worse by being a firm believer in having the matching bag/shoes/belt/coat/jewellary and lipstick...
No wonder I had a BAD shopping habit by 18!
So the clothes that I have collected over the last 15 years are just priceless to me. I like to store everything perfectly. I "retire" my shoes, before they reach anywhere near outworn, I take them to get re-soled, re-heeled, then I sit and clean them, repair any tiny scuffs and scrapes, wrap them back up in their original boxes and tissue and they go into the loft; retired for a quite life of reliving their wild years with other, fellow party shoes of a 'certain' age!
You think I'm joking? I sometimes think that my clothes are human and my shoes have a SOUL!
I'm off now to begin calling specialist glass workers, and blowers to try and replace the broken lamps... sob sob....
What is it that defines us as women? There are many things that shouldn't define us as women- but do! Our bodies, our faces, our clothes, our fertility, even our choice of mate (or none for that matter!)
But these things shouldn't so what DOES? I'm postulating these big conceptual questions as if I am now going to enlighten the reader with answers, like a Guru of femininity.... sorry...
A woman can say more in a sigh than a man can say in a sermon.
We have throughout time fought for our rights, to choose; to choose who we have sex with, (if anyone) to choose where we work, and what to wear, what jobs we have, and how much we should be paid to do them. We have fought for our rights of equality (slightly hastily and I think this has come back to bite us in the bum at times...). We have fought for our rights to choose to have a family and our rights on how we give birth, or not at all. We have been at the forefront of challenging perceptions of "the norm". Social norms. Historical norms. Classical and modernistic norms. Women have pioneered a mini-career out of being challenging. To both other women, the opposite sex and society as a whole.
Does this make us just argumentative pains-in-the-ass? Or just highly enlightened human beings put on this earth to drive society and culture forward into places it may feel uncomfortable, pushing until it becomes acceptable?
Despite studying history, I'm sad to say I recall not all that much. But I'd love to hear from the people who read this of the men they know of throughout history that have changed conceptual everyday practices without the driving force of women in their midst of the decision.
One that springs to mind is the largest british religion. The Church of England. Created because.... Our [then] current King (was a bit of a loose bastard) wanted divorce. Why? Because of women. He loved them (and loathed them once married!) but essentially the creation of our most common religious denomination among Christians in England has been borne from his desire for women.
Literature and film seem to owe a huge amount to women as a whole. Love stories seem to be the driving force behind so many. Whether loss of love, or the finding of it. Or even the shunning of it and the outright cold shoulder towards it.
But what defines me then? I wouldn't class myself as a feminist, on the sole basis that I still do expect a man to pay for dinner, buy me a drink, maybe even flowers, tell me I'm right (more often than I am) and seduce me. So I don't think I could go on a march for equal rights really!
If women didn't exist, all the money in the world would have no meaning.
That said, work ethics are a sticking subject, pay grades, promotions, maternity leave(!), and so forth.... they will be a never ending source of debate so long as we are a democratic country.
Definable me. I think I could hazard a guess as to what the average women feels defines her, (this is a tricky line to tread...) Freedom, choice and independance. The freedom to choose, yes or no and not be in any way threatened by voicing your opinion and for youropinion to be respected. Choice follows on logically from freedon. The choice to not be berated or persecuted for our individuality, the way we may look, dress, work or live. And Independance.... now for many a married women, this is an even MORE sticky point. What defines independance if we CHOOSE to get married. Should we be allowed to walk out the front door and not say where we are going or when we are coming back? Or do we lose this "independance" we got as an adult? I'm not sure on this one. Should we have the independance to work the hours we like, in the job we want, without being looked at with slanty eyes by our fellow women, if we are married and with or without children. Judegment ladies.
No woman will ever be satisfied because no man will ever have a chocolate penis that shoots out money.
Judgement among our single sex is shocking. We judge our own sex more than the opposite sex judge us! Thats silly!
Stigmas still remain even after we have fought for our rights to do things like NOT have babies and be career women, or even return to work 6 weeks later because we miss it. Its true you know you've all done it, judged someone; a woman you know.We are more alike than we remember....
The basic Female body comes with the following accessories: garter belt, panti-girdle, crinoline, camisole, bustle, brassiere, stomacher, chemise, virgin zone, spike heels, nose ring, veil, kid gloves, fishnet stockings, fichu, bandeau, Merry Widow, weepers, chokers, barrettes, bangles, beads, lorgnette, feather boa, basic black, compact, Lycra stretch one-piece with modesty panel, designer peignoir, flannel nightie, lace teddy, bed, head. ~Margaret Atwood
Having money in my pocket, food on my plate and a roof over my head, all provided for by me, I feel thats what defines us right now as women. Even if we are stay at home housewives with children, we still facilitate the ability for a fellow earner to go to work whilst we provide the childcare for them to do so....
I love this little poem. I'm sure you've all seen in. But whoever wrote it (suspectedly Maya Angelou) , deserves an award from all woman-kind....
"A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .... enough money within her control to move out and rent a place of her own even if she never wants to or needs to... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .... something perfect to wear if the employer or date of her dreams wants to see her in an hour... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ... a youth she's content to leave behind.... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .... a past juicy enough that she's looking forward to retelling it in her old age.... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ..... a set of screwdrivers, a cordless drill, and a black lace bra... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .... one friend who always makes her laugh... and one who lets her cry... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .... a good piece of furniture not previously owned by anyone else in her family... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .... eight matching plates, wine glasses with stems, and a recipe for a meal that will make her guests feel honored... A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .... a feeling of control over her destiny... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... how to fall in love without losing herself.. EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... HOW TO QUIT A JOB, BREAK UP WITH A LOVER, AND CONFRONT A FRIEND WITHOUT RUINING THE FRIENDSHIP... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... when to try harder... and WHEN TO WALK AWAY... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... that she can't change the length of her calves, the width of her hips, or the nature of her parents.. EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... that her childhood may not have been perfect...but it's over... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... what she would and wouldn't do for love or more... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... how to live alone... even if she doesn't like it... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... whom she can trust, whom she can't, and why she shouldn't take it personally... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... where to go... be it to her best friend's kitchen table... or a charming inn in the woods... when her soul needs soothing... EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW... what she can and can't accomplish in a day... a month...and a year..."
3 Easy words. One HUGE concept. Indefinable. Indescribable. Epic. Biblical. Never-ending. Challenging. Completing. Soul defining. World changing. World ending. Tiny. Infinite. Lost. Found....
If a picture can tell a thousand words, then I could think of a thousand pictures that still couldn't capture it. But, in the true sense of any creative.... If you can think it, if you can dream it, then you can see it and you can feel it...
I like the words I Love you. And these are a small selection of mine (and some of my sisters) epic pictures of "I Love You"
I love my little sister. We fight. A lot. Probably because we love each other. We can be very similar, and VERY different. But we do share a passion for pretty things. Sounds ambiguous... its not...
I never even knew she had a little collection of pretty pictures, EXACTLY like Tally's Tags. That's what they are. The same thing. Pictures we have found, taken, collected, gleaned and pinched from anywhere we have seen them. Surprisingly though, when you think how many billions and billions of images there are in the world that could be created, we have somehow got a significant amount of the same ones... Bizarre? Coincidence? Or because we love pretty things?
That said, I don't share her obvious talent for photography. I have promised I will not divulge her name or whereabouts as she embarks upon creating a name for herself as an "artiste!" at the moment, somewhere in the cool depths of Europe... (can you hear the jealousy in my voice?!) But I will share with you the things I love.... about her... via her pretty pictures...
I like giving pictures titles, I'm a wordy person, so excuse the titles I have added myself....
Blow my mind
Paris Girl
Get me!
its just words...
Ooh la la
Poof
Oh Rosie
One Day
Flut Slat
Tomorrows post is similar, and its one I've been piecing together for awhile so is an amalgamation of our pretty things, called....."I Love You!"
This is my first post in roughly six months and it seems poignant to track where I've reached in that 6 months. I often say,
"If we lose track of who we were, we never really know who we are."
I know I stopped writing for a reason, but I'm glad to say, painful as it was, (painful enough to forget) that I now feel past that hurdle and ready to share again. Looking back though is an important part of planning your route forward, and finally after a year (almost to the day) life has turned right around. On a personal level last year, in honesty, was probably my most disastrous yet. In all 28 of them, I was sucked out by a rip-tide of bad decisions and even worse disaster recovery.
But it would seem that so much can happen in six short little months. I've almost lost count of how many people I know are having or have had babies, I have already had four wedding invitations for this summer and despite being in logistical chaos (redecorating) I'm surprisingly laid back about it.
Its amazing how every person we pass in the street, sit next to on the bus or behind in the line at starbucks has something that has probably hurt them today. Has had someone who did something bad to them, and probably did something bad to someone else too, however insignificant or unknown it might have been. We can't all be perfect, ever. Those who think they are, stop reading this right now!
I've mentioned this site before, but it never fails to make me smile, and remind me of the struggle, pain and love we all feel every second of every day...
Is it age? Acceptance of domestication? Resignation?! Those who have known me the longest have said they have seen marked differences in my attitudes, and my appearance of overall levels of happiness. Should I tell them I have regular valium?! Is that a bad thing at all?
Still seems our moods, our true feelings and our inner most thoughts are not widely acceptable everyday conversation. Its no easy conversation telling a close friend or even a work colleague that you're struggling with "stuff". I still can't work out why. And I still don't have any answers for a relative or friend on the receiving end either.
All I can say is, "This too shall pass" I don't know where it goes or comes from, and I don't know when or if it will come back, but as a resounding and regular sufferer of anxiety, panic, stress and depression.... 6 months can feel like a whole lifetime away.
Its all seems pretty ordinary now, my little routine with the children, my day to day life, but at the weekends it all turns on its head. I tend to think a large part of this slightly stressful U-turn is down to the fact my husband comes home at the weekends. Having been in London for the week, in his sparsely decorated flat he shares with his recently separated mate, I often feel like I have a teenager returning from university each weekend.
My quiet little house, that is clean and tidy is suddenly descended upon with a HUGE bag of dirty washing, rucksacks cascading with unopened post and within roughly thirty minutes the fridge is empty and the place smells like a boys locker-room! How? How do they do that????
I used to take a basket and walk from the front door following my husband through the hall, the kitchen and into the lounge, collecting each random item he discards along the way until he reaches the sofa. This will include (and not be limited to) blackberry, phone, tobacco, lighters (plural), iPod, earphones,rizla, filters, collarbones, cuff links, tie, socks, shoes, coat, scarf, laptop, rucksack, watch, wallet, receipts, used tissues, business cards, more lighters (!), loose change, keys, more keys, taxi receipts, glasses, glasses case, post-it notes and other odd bits of gadgetry I don't understand, and then the random stuff I can neither contextualize nor fathom for instance a tube of pritstick glue?!
All these items come out of pockets and off of his person like he was Inspector Gadget getting undressed! I can only liken it to if a woman got home each evening and then proceeded to take all of the things out of her handbag and leave them all at various points around the house!
The children are invariably excited to see him and so loud noise and lots of shouting takes place from about 7pm. Then the normally peaceful and quick ritual of bedtimes is turned on its head. Baths take twice as long, washing hair erupts into screaming and brushing teeth becomes a tantrum. Stories go on forever and eventually come 9pm my normally silent house returns to its somewhat semi state of quiet with Top Gear playing in the background, Sport on in the kitchen and the blackberry buzzing away on top of the piano.
Restoring the balance does not happen until midday Monday,hepled by having recently gone through the minefield that is hiring a cleaner. (You may laugh. There are some strange people out there!!!) My husband seems to have slightly missed the point of the hiring exercise. Now that I am working much more and want to spend my free time with the children and doing less housework, I thought this made sense. My husband sees this as not needing to lift a single finger, "cos the cleaner can do it!" hhmmm not quite the point, but I think this is just a venus/mars discrepancy of opinion...
I know many mothers who deal completely and utterly with the children 24/7. Even those who have live in partners/fathers. Personally I like this. I think dealing with your children, being responsible for their meals, clothes, washing, activities, school reports, homework etc etc is good when undertaken by one parent. I find it very, very difficult to try and do it alongside someone on a part-time basis who wants to be completely involved at the weekends, but very understandably so.
Has equality gone a bit too far? I think its good when women do mothering jobs, with maternal instincts to match and men should do "man" jobs, fix stuff, car stuff, heavy duty stuff, not- (as mine likes to do) have a go at doing the washing, to disaterous consequences. This morning I open the tumble dryer and find my cashmere jumpsuit (dry-clean only) and one particularily non-colourfast blue jumper and all my childrens clothes inky blue... Brilliant!
Do all mothers find it easier to just parent alone? I mean the day to day stuff, the routine things, getting dressed, making lunchboxes, load of washing, quick flit with the hoover, sort out mid morning bottle and nap, do chores, pick up from school, veto TV watching and playroom tidying. When two of us are home, this stuff just becomes impossible, its like two people doing one persons job.
This weekend was a pretty standard one, shopping to be done, errands to run, 4 year old birthday party, bit of gardening, see the neighbours, DIY stuff, just the usual. And yet come today I feel like I've been on a rollarcoaster for the last 48 hours. I often think to myself, I wonder what people do at weekends who don't have children???? I can't remember????!
I've begun my new fitness regime pretty slowly, but in the right direction... Drying out! My first whole week without alcohol since I was pregnant I think! Not a drop. And it pains me to say it, I really can feel the difference.
This week I've already been out walking three evenings with the children. Which is a sharp turn for me given my fitness level. Even just a glass of wine each evening as so many of us mums do, can really make you feel sluggish, I know it has done me.
I've also stuck to my guns about the greenhouse too and successfully planted up most of it with vegetables and salad. My "green-fingers" have yet to really yield their true calling to mother nature, but here's hoping to a very "green" summer.
I've also started my one months trial at the tiny little local gym. (I'm not good with commitment.) Its cheap and cheerful, it has a pool and the personal trainer looks alarming like (a very buff version) of the spawn of Winona Ryder and Angelina Jolie.
Unnervingly sweet and I'm sure super off-putting if I was male, but very motivating if you are a woman! I've got my sights set on being able to go three afternoons a week and at least once at the weekends.
That's the nitty gritty licked, what about the rest of it? Ok so now its for the smokes. No one ever got fit and healthy smoking. And despite being able to kick the habit without even a sniff of regret or difficulty during both my pregnancies, I somehow seem to come back to it. The first time I held out until my daughter was one, the last time, I purchased my first pack as soon as I stopped breastfeeding. Why?! I clearly can't have been craving it after 12 months! So really I have a good track record for stopping, just not from sticking to it... main problem, I enjoy it. Yep. Never going to be able to stop anything you really enjoy unless you stop enjoying it. I have to find a way to not like it. But I have a strange feeling even if I do keep to it, I'll be that old, wrinkly, eccentric grandmother who just likes to stand outside with the young people smoking saying, "Just blow it in my direction!" I fear I may always just love it. Its the rebel in me.
So with the smoking and physical underway, now for the really new stuff, the holistic approach. The mental revamp, the diet, the nutrition, the routine, the sleep, the meditation etc. I say ETC because I don't quite yet know what I'm getting myself in for.
Again I think I need to start simple, so I've been shaving a bit each night off of the time I continually go to bed, which always seems to be after 1 am. No wonder I'm not a good morning person. So far its going well but I've read it can take anything from 21 days to a month to adjust and benefit from a new sleep pattern. Hopefully by the end of the month I shall be in bed by 10.30pm each evening and rising at 6am pretty well spirited.
Personal fitness DVD's and so on? It is certainly a celebrity cash-cow, but does it really work? I'm not overweight or over forty. So what sort of thing do I need to go for? I've plumped for the New York City Ballet workout actually. And I wish I could say this was for scientific reasons, but its not. Two deciding factors were;
a) I know ballet, I did NYC masterclasses back in London
b) its what Sarah Jessica Parker does to stay in shape. Well that swung it for me!
No Nell or Davini for me, I'm going slightly more unconventional. Given that Ballet is the basis for almost all current physical training aside from sport I guess its ok.
I have yet to sign up for a course of pilates/yoga, and given my slightly rural location I doubt I'm going to find any Bikram Yoga anywhere near. But what about all the other really faddy fitness crazes?Power plates, GI diets and so on? I've not a clue yet, but over the next twelve weeks I shall be investigating. Everyone has positive and negative things to say on all of it. But in the words of a very good comic on buying a car,
"Has it got a cup holder and will it make girls touch my cock?"
I don' know half of enough about how/why these things work, all I want to know is will I look like Elle Macphearson and be greener than David Rothschild?!
I'm off on our first family jollies, and against all my better judgement I am actually thinking about what I will look like in a bikini. I do like the idea of being super-fit, super healthy and this should realistically be easily achievable if it weren't for two things; two NORMAL things, Ok maybe three things then;
1. I'm not a celebrity, I'm not famous and therefore am not likely to be photographed in a bikini!
2. I have two children. (I could explain the drawbacks on ones health, but I shall shorten the list to merely, I drink, I smoke, I am short of time, and have set schedules to work around, to list but a few)
3. I do not have pots of cash to splash on faddy/diety/detox/health/antioxidant/macrobiotic/mircobiotic/ something-biotic-organic food!
SO.... here's the thing, I read fitness magazines, I gaze longingly over the sculpted bodies of female athletes and dancers, and feel a twinge of envy towards people who have really nice gym memberships.
I used to LOVE the gym when I lived in London, I could easily absorb a whole Saturday in there before going out for the night, and would train four or five times a week after work. I like pushing my body, and I'm convinced I could get more out of it, here is the only drawback - I'm don't have much "won't" power.
The thought of me giving things up is fleeting, coffee, nicotine, alcohol, refined sugar, processed foods, non-organic vegetables, complex carbohydrates, and so on is well... Rough. I can completely understand how stars do it, they are being paid to.
Finding time for regular Yoga, advanced Pilate's, juice drinks and careful body management seems to evade me, but, I'm sure this is because I'm not trying hard enough.
Having spent quite sometime looking at holistic approaches to wellness management, I am certain that is does have to be a complete lifestyle overhaul. To include, diet, sleep patterns, nutrition monitoring, fitness planning, time management as well as mental exercise, meditation and mental evaluation. It all sounds very idealistic, but the more I research it, and have been for a few months, the more I am interested.
Its well documented that certain celebrities have abnormal lifestyle habits when it comes to their health and body image. Elle Macpherson, (AKA The BODY, and yes I have seen it naked and in person), is INDEED very very incredible, (I worked in a luxury fashion store helping customers with their fittings before you think that's weird!) But her dedication to it is also very admirable and inspirational. She doesn't drink, she strictly controls her eating habits, for health and nutrition rather than weight loss and dieting, and approaches her health from a mental as well as physical point of view.
Wellness Clinics and centres are sprining up all over the place, dedicated to getting the individual back on track from unhealthy urban stressful lifestyles and return them to a natural, holistic, calm and controled way of life promoting harmony within our lifes.
This particular one is of a lot of interest to me, given its extensive programme of teachers, courses and workshops. They certainly are open minded and all about finding harmony. Despite some of the prices being out of my price range, I can see how many women can find these types of centres hugely beneficial in teaching and educating how to look after out bodies really well.
As it going to be quite some time before I'll be able to afford the idyllic retreats of the Spa's in the far east and tranquil exotic islands, I still believe that they do have something to teach us about looking after ourselves. I think its incredibly hard taking such initiative, but if I give myself roughly three months to see how much I can accomplish in this time, (ie until british summer begins) then I'm being fair to myself and giving myself the time to re-educate my body, see if I actually have any muscle memory left, and can I find budget busting ways to be nutritional and healthy?
Each Friday I'm going to review my efforts, laid bare and truthful. For the rest of this week I shall be putting the finishing touches to my research and fitness programme and I shall be planting up my greenhouse too, because I think the only way I can afford to eat as much fresh organic stuff as I can is to grow it. So lets see...
I love browsing endless pictures of beautiful homes. I am certainly a homey person, and I take great solace in my home, now my social life came to an abrupt pause with children! But decorating with children around is an interior nightmare. Yes Ikea make it look effortlessly simple and practicality prevails page after page of their family-shot catalogue, but my house doesn't ever seem to look like these pictures.
So given that I had my children so early in life, I'm determined to make sure that when they get a little older I will have my house decorated in the most impractical colours of white, with carefully styled ornaments that normally would be knocked over or broken. I will have strategically placed coffee table books that won't get little buttery finger marks on them.
I will have glasses that don't come from T.K. Maxx!
I will have improper artwork, and adult books, I will have a glitterball in my bathroom - why? Because I've always wanted one! I will not have a large box of bath toys at the end of my bath, but expensive scented candles, a wine cooler and a sound system that is NOT tamper-proof and cheap!
I will have every single piece of my cutterly matching, wihtout drawers of bright-coloured plastic spoons. I will have white rugs! Yes- white. I will have a table that is not felt-tip friendly, and chairs that cannot be stood on to bake fairy-cakes!
I will have glass cake stands in my kitchen, with cake IN them. I will have small antique dishes for tapas in the summer, and not plastic ones from ASDA. I will have white linen napkins for dinner parties, that don't have blackcurrant stains on them, and I will have little grass reed room infusers that my son won't try and eat.
This may sound like I don't like my children, but I DO. I just dislike finding felt-pens without the tops on seeping into the sofa.
Its not much to ask- but as I look around my desk, there is a naked barbie in my pen pot, all my post-it notes have been stuck on my wall, and "someone" has drawn on the front cover of my yet unread copy of BAZAAR. Its a far cry from the home I thought I'd have before I was thirty, but right now I wouldn't change it for anything. A fridge covered in indecipherable drawings stuck on with barbie magnets.
I woke up this morning feeling pretty darn rubbish (with fabulous PMT to boot), and having taken myself in hand over the weekend following a good cry on Friday, realised even the longest of journeys doesn't start with "the first step", its starts with my being dressed to even take that first step! Get the clothes and shoes right and THEN you can take that first step....
Having moved to the country from London, the first thing that went into immediate hibernation was a vast quantity of my wardrobe, and almost my entire shoe collection. Given that I'd worn heels every single day of my life this was a big adjustment. Being a dancer and then working in an office, I had grown accustomed to a type of uniform depending on my day. Until moving here this barely ever included jeans, tracksuits, flat boots and wellies!
I miss fashion! I miss getting ready in the mornings for work, and I miss dressing the part- (whatever that part may be), but I also realised that without that uniform to hide behind, I felt hideously naked! Re-adjusting my wardrobe to fit in with my new life, my new roles and my new friends has been one of the hardest things about moving for me and becoming a mother. And when practicality is supposed to reign, (breastfeeding and mud), I know now that the one thing I should not have let go of was my style.
The odd occasions when I do dress how I like and want to, I certainly get comments and in honesty I am never quite sure whether this is a bad thing or a good thing. In a small place where land rovers and farms are the norm, even in the height of summer a short play-suit is NOT "de rigour" for the school pick-up. Despite it being perfectly acceptable to do the school run in leather trousers and chanel knee high boots in Chelsea; Chelsea it isn't!
The line between fitting in and being true to yourself to me has been very lost over the last couple of years, and only now as I approach (gloomily) near 30, do I seem to feel that my wardrobe does define me, and not the other way around.
Granted smarter is better with a bump, but.... not frump!
Going for a dinner party outside London invariably means Boden, and not Bottega Veneta, and walks means Barbour and dogs and not Balenciaga and Kings Road, but what if you aren't a Boden-Barbour sort of person all the time? Should we fake it? I am a better person in in a shirt than I am in a fleece!
BALENCIAGA BODEN
I'm certainly finding out that this year, unlike last year, is the year for change for me, and funnily enough its not a change forwards, its going to be all about a change back. Back to my own comfort zone, of Phillip Lim and vintage Lacroix, tea-dresses, shirts and silk.
I've found new passions for fashion over the last few years, indulging more and more in ebay and online shopping given my location, and as heels just AREN'T possible, I've swapped high altitude heels for high-end expensive underwear and statement jewellery. These have become my latest things, along with handbags and coats, things that I CAN wear to nip to the shops in with jeans and not feel like I've completely lost touch with who I am, and not be frowned at either.
Its a fine balance with fashion between not wanting to stand out and not wanting to look like you've made an effort but I often get the feeling with any moms, new or old, TOO much personal attention to your attire gives the impression you may have somehow neglected your young, and could have been spending better more conscientious time sterilising bottles and keeping a better home. Its as if we DON'T look stressed out and slightly out of time to do our make-up at 8am, then we must be doing something wrong.
I certainly feel that many mums look to each other for approval, and nothing is less approved of in my opinion than being a little bit selfish. After a long chat with H on the phone on Friday, she assured me, in only the way an OLD friend can,
"Babe- you tried, you FAILED! I knew you would, but maybe it was a good lesson to learn, you can't always fit in everywhere with everyone, and just because something looks ideal to you, doesn't mean its always right for you, be yourself. REALLY be YOURSELF. In the last 4 years you don't even look like YOU.... don't try and be someone else, you're time will come..."
Wise words to a sobbing 27 year old...
Its always been a favourite track of mine, "Vienna Waits For You" given the type of character I am, I want it ALL, NOW, and I can't wait... So whats truer than just slowing down and not trying to be the best, not trying to get to the end as quick as possible and concentrating on who we are NOW.
"Slow down, you're doing fine, you can't be everything you want to be before your time, you're gonna burn out before you even get half way through, when will you realise; Vienna waits for you..."
So bravery came through for me this morning, and the voice of change stepped into my wardrobe, on went black tights, (yes tights!) on went a black knitted (designer) dress and the skinny cinch-waist belt, on went black biker-look boots, and on went the mascara, (all before 8am) and you know what, I feel good... Now all that remains is if I can keep the bargain with myself, to be ME! every day, no matter how scary that may seem... Its a long cry from my comfy tracksuit bottoms and uggs but its putting my best foot forward to start that first step, and I AM going to take it easy...
I feel my luck has suddenly turned. Some things we inevitably lose, possessions I mean, and although some are more carefree than others, I am a sore loser. I love my things, in a sentimental way, not materialistic...
Each item that I keep, I keep for deep, meaningful reasons. Until four years ago, I had worn a ring, not an expensive one, in fact pretty darn cheap, but it held huge significance, I had worn it for over 12 years, without taking if off more than a few times for special reasons, (like my wedding ceremony, and a few dance exams).
I cried for two whole weeks when I lost it. 2 weeks! (That's longer than I've cried over losing a pet!)
This may sound a little silly, even I stuggled to explain it, most evenings my husband would come home and say, you're not STILL crying and looking for it are you?!
I turned our house into a wrecking yard, cushions, sofas, bins, washing machine, sinks, shower, even the floorboards came up.... (well I didn't know they were tongue and groove!!!!) and then I eventually gave up and lost hope - I lie, I hoped that someday someone would find it, maybe years and years later and treasure it as a lost thing...
I felt like I'd never be able to replace it, I'd have been less sad if my whole wardrobe had caught on fire - including all my handbags and shoes...
I retraced and retraced my steps, again and again, and without sounding COMPLETELY crackers still thought about it often... The last few days my mind has been full of other things I've lost; people. Friendships, relationships, family and in my 'normal' way of dealing with things I busy myself with cleaning. Mainly rearranging my furniture in every room, re-organising every draw, I've even colour coded and folded my knickers.... (yes I have had a LOT on my mind).
This isn't unusual for me, I do take something to ease the anxiety from time to time, usually wine works, but sometimes it just makes it worse, rescue remedy, Kalms and then if all else fails and I start vacuuming the dog I know its time for a valium.
Highly strung? Much? Me? There have been times when I have severly questioned some kind of bipolar disorder, periods of mania interspersed with depression, but my depression is never suicidal, and my mania is actually BLOODY productive. Right now my house looks 'styled' and cleaned to within an inch, I've even hired a cleaner who thought I was utterly, utterly bonkers when she came to look round, "this house is stupendously clean and tidy..." I kindly had to explain it would pass soon, in a few weeks or so, and it would be back to looking its normal lived in slightly dusty/cobwebby self... She must have thought I was more than a few sandwiches short of a picnic!
So... My intense mania this time paid off so handsomely I could cry; on deciding to remove some curtains to vaccum them, spot clean them and dust the rail (I know what you're thinking...) I was rehanging them when... Pop out fell something onto the floor, I thought it was a curtain hook, to my pleasant surprise, the ring. I got it the day I auditioned for dance school, (I got in) and I still remember the look on my mum's face when she gave it to me in the car afterwards.
Now I'm hoping my mania will continue long enough to build some emotional bridges with some lost friends, because now, getting this back after such a long time means that even the things you are absolutely CERTAIN are gone and lost forever and ever, might just be tucked away in a little quiet corner waiting for the right moment to rediscovered.... You might need to look really really hard, but its there...
Its been exactly one month since I lost my phone and due to the extremely unhelpful people who I take my mobile phone insurance out with contesting the authenticity of my phone, I am STILL without one.
I am an iPhone addict, I love everything about it, and being often feel it keeps me in the loop of normal society and the broad strokes of every day life. The first few days, (I lost it New Years Eve) I was too hung over to care too much. By the end of the first week, I thought I should begin the ball rolling assuming it would be a simple phone call, and they would pop me a new one in the post... HA! How wrong I was.
Micheal, (I pictured him thin, gangly, stale and pale, with cheap clothes and slightly greasy hair, and most likely only had sex twice) instructed me that he frankly hedidn't believe I had done everything in my capability to not lose it, and therefore was going to deny my claim! His tone was unbelieveably snotty... Probably aggravated by my pressing questions to him such as,
"Is that a computer generated response given certain data, or is that just your personal opinion?"
Curt response back to this being, "Madam, it was New Years Eve, you were drunk, you lost your bag, and you're now trying to make us pay for your stupidity..."
Now, I'm not saying he was entirely wrong with his assumptions, but I was still angered, and also highly surprised by this as a retort from a call-centre worker, and some kid assessing my conduct and therefore my "eligibility" to have a new phone. Who was he?
Sure it was New Years Eve, SO? Does that mean that all crimes committed on New Years Eve are the victims fault, for being out? All accidents that occured not worth investigating because, "Most probably you were all just drunk?" I think not.
I didn't lose my handbag, I still have my handbag and its contents, I somehow lost my wedding ring and my mobile phone... and NO, I can't remember how exactly...
So, I try a different route with my new enemy, Micheal, to explain how "eligibility" is calculated? After several attempts of trying to remember every bit of my reading "Getting to Yes" and various other business negotiation books, Micheal-the-miserable says I need to PROVE to him I'm someone to be trusted.
Again - flabbergasted.... My this point I'm CERTAIN he is not reading the autopromt on his computer and is officially a Rogue Trader, but he also informs me I cannot be put through to anyone else, his manager is conveniently unavailable for the rest of the day, and if I terminate the call in order to ring back, he will mark me down as an anti-social customer and they will not process any claim! HHHMMMMMmmmmmmmm. Temper testing stuff....
Why do I always get the arsey ones???
So, plan C, flirting! After exactly 2.4 seconds I conclude Micheal-the-miserable is Gay!
Plan D! So I turn on my heels with this conversation and think, dirty. The hustle is on....
Micheal-the-miserable is certain he won't give me a new iPhone, and I am DAMN sure I pay mobile phone insurance for a reason and I'll be damned if I'm shelling out £500+ for a new iPhone!
"What would change your mind, dear Micheal?"
"The Police report...."
Hmmmm how does one "find" a police report, a crime reference number and find a suitable officer to help me with my (very insignificant) plan?
Police National Database, enquiries number - Yorkshire. Pot-luck would have it I get a lovely old chap on the phone who wants to try and help me, I don't lie, but try and gently explain my predicament. Phonecalls, numbers and conversations ensue, before finally a friendly chap at Birmingham Police station says he can in fact vouch for the authenticity of the claim... OK! I say...
I call back Micheal-the-miserable, and to my delight and pleasure he is duty bound to accept the fax from the nice police officer saying he does in fact have a police record on his system of a report of the said phone with said IME number and therefore... the claim can proceed.
NO. Micheal-the-miserable tells me that as this has taken me two whole days to gather the information and confirm the claim details, I am now outside their specified time-limit to make a claim! ARRRRGGGHHHH. Stay calm. Stay calm.
Round 2. He begins with a staunch, "its DOES state this very clearly, in the terms and conditions of your policy and therefore I cannot help you".... My face contorts while I try and stiffle the urge to just blow a raspberry at him down the phone... Its is very tempting! But I resist. Desperatly wanting my phone...
After much coaxing, sweet-talking, and keen persuasion, Micheal-the-miserable gives in to my final push of a personal complaint.... Turns out he has already had two, and a third would mean something with HR... Bingo!
So... I am now finally a month later after FAR too much time spent on the phone to an 084... number and completely out of rescue remedy, and Kalms, just about going to get a new phone.
Lesson learnt... Hmmmm not really. Only that I STILL hate people in call centres and insurance, and mobile phone insurance is pointless! That and don't get drunk and lose your phone!!! Clearly I'm an idiot!
I'm off to get my first tattoo today, its more of a tester tattoo, given that I actually want a few, but thought I should check I'm good with it. Be a bit of a bummer if I start something I can't finish! I guess I am a little old to be getting a first tattoo, from what I gather you either get your first one before you are 25 or you never get one at all!
I have searched and searched and waded through tons of designs and images in order to find a collection of ones I absolutely LOVE. Given the things that excite me and the things that appeal to me, its of no surprise that words and symbols of meaningful things are full of hope, imagination, dreams, defiance and endless romance.
I don't think many people could disagree that this photo is really made better by the tattoos.
Its become pretty fashionable among the runway models, and I must say ALL of these tattoos I would love to have, as I think they are just wonderful.
This one is lush; "Tonight the world is mine"
This is one I am seriously considering, its meaning is one of "being in love"
I have decided to get this little delicate symbol which holds a variety of meanings of birth, motherhood and maternity.
She is personal favourite of mine, a bit cool!
This symbol I like a lot, but I decided in the end I wouldn't like it as a tattoo, it means Faith, Hope, Love. Something about its art is quite aggressive and fierce though I feel, which is juxtaposed to the very meaning in my opinion.
This one is ccertainly something similar, but far more earthy in feel and beauty, with its meaning being Love, Wisdom, Truth. This is definately one I may consider in the future, but not right now.
The matching wrist symbols of love are divine, and did consider something exactly the same, one word of love for each of my children, but given that I do want more children, I have, for now, decided against this.
Despite its popularity as a tattoo, I am still very very keen on this "Om" symbol. Its meaning of life, harmony, transendance and the giving of life is wonderful. Where to place it is not yet decided, but it is a definant addition to my decision of body art.
Some of you may be able to read this, for those who can't its english translation is to do with true love. Its direct translation is actually "true love does not break", but its cultural translation is "true love is never ending". I personally love the top script, all three lines say exactly the same thing in different types of script.
I love keys! I think they can be great objects of beauty, they seem to hold such promise symbolising the opening of new doors, new dreams, new paths, they capture all I feel about fabulous secrets, challenge, unlocking potential and so much more. I have yet to find the exact key and design I would like as a tattoo, but intend to have it inked onto my ribs over my heart. It will be small and most probably covered by most bras, but I would like it to remind me that only I hold the key to my own heart, my own life and my own potential.
This is my name in Hebrew. And not just because it looks cooler - but my name is a hebrew name, a very typical hebrew name, and I like it. As a child, not being Jewish and it being an unusual name it certainly marked me out as different, it has always been a conversation starter, and has led me to make many friends, its certainly made me who I am. I think a name can have HUGE meaning to someone, and can be ultimately defining. You would certainly make a rather spunky lawyer if you were called Star! And I was very aware of this when naming my own children. Which brings me to todays tattoo...
I tend to believe in things such as reincarnation, life being about souls and cycles, and when my daughter arrived she distinctly had the instant feeling of being an old and wise soul, so I chose Ivy. Its sybolic meaning of truth, strength, determination and prosperity seemed well suited to her, and so... this tiny little symbol of just a few lines will mean everything to me and to her. I'm off, if this stings like hell I may rethink all the others!
This morning I received yet another great little forward. I'd love to know the statistics of viral spam, and just how many people do forward these RE: IMPORTANT FOR ALL WOMAN stuff.
I hate to sound like a party pooper, as we as a nation love a good shock-value story to chit chat over in our coffee breaks, but some are now so old its mad.
This mornings FWD: PETROL prices - BOYCOTT BP/ESSO (in favour of purchasing at Asda, Sainsburys, Tesco and Morrisons.
I believe in the concept of the voices rising together to stick it to the big man, but am I alone in wondering where these supermarkets purchase their petrol from?? Failing it being quite so straightforward, I'm guessing that they don't have their own riggs and probably purchase crude oil at the daily/hourly/minutely price per barrel? I could be wrong- but stuff like this is always the first thing I think when I read these things.
I find the older generation is far more willing to jump on the extreme bandwagon of mad virals, I have received some utterly downright CRAZY forwards from my mother-in-law, I seriously don't know where she finds them?! Yet she seems to then fill up at least 400+ inboxs with them when she does!! My father has recently discovered this phenomenon, his seem to be much more politically motivated. He seems to find the army/intelligence/conspiracy theory stuff. Which some of it, as the ex-girlfriend of one such Army chap, I could honestly vouch for its complete fictitious nature!
Surely we have some kind of duty to our friends and colleagues to spam responsibly?
Here is some of the best of the worst ones... one I fell for HOOK LINE AND SINKER... to embarrassing consequences, (I learnt my lesson!)
1. Colonel Sanders of KFC left, in his will, a bequest of millions to the KKK!!! FALSE. (My dad loved this one!)
2. An UNnamed British house wife penns a perfect political/religious polemic to a newspaper, full of wonderful quips about, "I'll care if... " . FALSE. It was in fact written in its entirety by a journalist and sent out as a wonderful hoax spam.
3. Mars Hoax - (I fell foul of this one, suckered in by the relevance of the date to me personally, and so all my level headed common sense disappeared and I planned a party to coincide with this - HA! I looked like such a PLONKER!!!!)
4. Plastic water bottles causing cancer.... (I think this one was particularly attributed to Sheryl Crow and breast cancer) - Turned out some bonkers student suggested it in a thesis, and although the said thesis was never reviewed, published or thought to have any evidence, a journalist got wind of it, and hey presto!!
5. Supermarket check out, rebuke to an Iraqi cashier -
One of my sons serves in the military. He is still stateside, here in California. He called me yesterday to let me know how warm and welcoming people were to him, and his troops, everywhere he goes, telling me how people shake their hands, and thank them for being willing to serve, and fight, for not only our own freedoms but so that others may have them also.
But he also told me about an incident in the grocery store he stopped at yesterday, on his way home from the base. He said that ahead of several people in front of him stood a woman dressed in a burkha.
He said when she got to the cashier she loudly remarked about the U.S. flag lapel pin the cashier wore on her smock. The cashier reached up and touched the pin, and said proudly," Yes, I always wear it and probably always will."
The woman in the burkha then asked the cashier when she was going to stop bombing her countrymen, explaining that she was Iraqi. A gentleman standing behind my son stepped forward, putting his arm around my son's shoulders, and nodding towards my son, said in a calm and gentle voice to the Iraqi woman: "Lady, hundreds of thousands of men and women like this young man have fought and died so that YOU could stand here, in MY country and accuse a check-out cashier of bombing YOUR countrymen.. It is my belief that had you been this outspoken in YOUR own country, we wouldn't need to be there today. But, hey, if you have now learned how to speak out so loudly and clearly, I'll gladly buy you a ticket and pay your way back to Iraq so you can straighten out the mess in YOUR country that you are obviously here in MY country to avoid."
Everyone within hearing distance cheered!
IF YOU AGREE____ Pass this on to all your proud American friends.
I actually thought to myself when I looked this one up, surely with the delight that is camera phones and YouTube this would have surfaced almost instantly if true... yet alas, it was most likely a well thought out reply, while someone sat drinking a cup of tea in their living room...
So...Whats the point here? Well, as so rightly pointed out, the maths of these super hoaxes are incredible, millions, hundreds of millions, billions of people spam these things around each day. How about someone creating something ethical, moral, and charitably motivated, if every person who sent a forward donated £1.00 to a water/child charity, well millions would be raised in days.
Personally I don't even know how to create something like this, with an easy PAYPAL click button for each person to just tick before forwarding, but it MUST be possible.... So why not share THIS article with your friends today, and I HOPE it reaches someones email box that knows just how to do this and in a few weeks time I receive the first GOOD spam email! Its worth a try...
Good Luck spammers.... (My suggestions would be Save The Children, NSPCC, Water Aid, Oxfam or similar)
My husband struggles and oppresses his upbringing sometimes but more often than not I believe he fails and speaks out and up in volumes about how he wishes our house was more like his mothers andI was too more like his mother.
He had to eat his toast over the sink as a little boy (for fear of crumbs!!!)
I hate insanely tidy houses, and I think anyone who has a PERFECT house is one of two things, bored stiff and lacking any imagination, OR has a very good cleaner! The rest of us, I'm certain like things to neat, tidy, clean but not obsessively so. Especially if you have children! I do not have plastic covers on my sofas,
and I do not have an endless amount of beige in my house.
I allow shoes in the house, (we live in the country and there are no carpets downstairs) and I have a dog, who is occasionally allowed on the furniture. I have a slight tendency to be anal about "everything has a home", (its the Virgo in me), but hey I don't loose sleep if the dishwasher isn't unloaded and the kitchen floor bleached each night before bed.
I teach in my house, for private lessons, so I tend to make sure its rigidly tidy for lessons. Understandably. I have nik-naks and trinket stuff, pictures and bits and bobs everywhere, I DON'T have a glass display cabinet full of tea services, cut crystal and Royal Dalton Figurines though!!!
For four years of marriage I have battled against this with my husband as everything about someone whose house resembles eerily closely Hyacinth Bucket's and whose life has been lived in absolute fear of germs, pets, mess, untidiness and general OCD neurotiscisms seems to scream the opposite of me, but today I snapped. He woke up complaining. Before even the lights had been turned on, that he had woken up late and it was somehow MY fault!
I greet his miserable face downstairs shortly afterwards, hoping the brief interlude would have sorted him out, only to be met with, "This house is like living in squalor!"
I felt this statement was just way too far, and completely ridiculous!
Enough was enough, I downed-tools and went on strike, I made my point more than clear throughout the rest of the day by not lifting a finger, pointing out regularly that certain chores needed doing. Washing, washing and more washing, bathrooms to be cleaned, beds to be changed, toys to be cleared away, lunches to be made, dinners to be made, bottles to be washed, lounge to be vacuumed, the list went on and on and on and I completely stuck to it. What I used I left were it landed, and what the kids got out I left. Muddy wellies, wet coats; you name it I left it.
Now at 7pm the house looks like an utter bombsite. The toys are still in the bath, wet towels are scattering the children's floor and no less than 4 piles of washing litter the floor in the kitchen. There are a stack of dishes on the side in the kitchen to rival an industrial kitchen, and there are wet play clothes and muddy footprints trailing the downstairs of the house. The dinner is still on the kitchen table and unsurprisingly every light in the house is on, every door is open and all the curtains remain un-drawn.
Its killing me! I always tidy the lounge before sitting down in the evening to do my work, and I can't bear it being covered in mess and toys, but this time I'm sticking to my guns. Its like playing a huge game of chicken!
Because I earn a tiny weeny little percentage of what my husband earns, from being a dance and drama teacher and hopeful writer, he sees this pittance earnings as irrelevant, and therefore my work is also irrelevant and as he sees it offers little to no contribution to the household on any significant scale it is therefore a waste of my time- ergo the whole house suffers (in his opinion) because I work. I hasten to add, we have no cleaner, no nanny, no gardener and all this falls to me to fit in around my work and juggling the two little children. As his mother stayed home every day and spent every single day scrubbing the bath until she could see her face in it, he assumes that so should I.
This picture does not get me excited!!!!
I am a very houseproud person, and I like my house looking lovely, I spend almost every minute of my time in it, trying to keep on top of it all, and also ensure he has a dinner on the table the minute he walks in the door. But - today - it was not enough. And so today this rather risky strategy of mexican stand-offs began.
I will for sure be tearing my hair out by tomorrow evening when the children have no clean clothes and there is nothing in the fridge, but I am hoping (but not holding my breath) that he will realise just how much I do, as well as working each evening.
I am however looking forward very much to having a huge amount of time to play with the children and work on my scripts...
I'm no designer, interior or otherwise, although I dabbled a little with being a stylist, it seemed like an awful lot of work for not enough money, and I was too used to the money to switch careers by that point. But somedays when things are quiet in the house, the children are sitting quietly, I find playing with moodboards awfully calming. There is something dreamy about creating an image, that you could picture yourself in, each one is always dependant on the mood you are in that day and it does drift you off into a little bit of daydream. I'm not saying I have tons of time on my hands, but its a nice fifteen minute downtime.
Mydeco.com created by the dot.com brain behind lastminute.com , Brent Hobberman, put together mydeco.com giving everyone the creative power to become their very own interior designer, decorater and stylist. They have options to decorate a photo of your own rooms, a 3D graphics options, click and drag, the toold are great, and although its not CAD, its certainly the next best thing if you're planning to redecoarte a room.
Since we bought a bit of a drafty old manor house, (I mean we bought a part of it) that had been badly decorated (by blind people I can only assume given the craftsmanship of the work), we have been very slowly doing it up room by room...
I think its easy to get lost in Ikea, John Lewis lookbook and Heals... but there is nothing more rubbish than just looking at a picture a stylist has put together and saying "I want that".... So get creative, have a play and see where your moodboard takes you....
I seriously want this fireplace in our living room.... although I think finances may dictate otherwise!
I think I its safe to say that unless you are completely comfortable with the way you look and how you feel life is going to progress for you positively, you'll not be thrilled about aging. I'm not. I'm already considering Botox, fillers, needles, injections, peels, lasers, you name it, if I had the money I WOULD do it.
Now I'm not saying that the cheaper the option the more I'd indulge, and I'm not advocating getting anyone but the very best person there is to do it, despite how tempting it may seem. I've been asking for Botox for my birthday and Christmas for the last two years... (It has yet to transpire - HUSBAND!)
I am an avid reader of any kind of medical/beauty/skin reviewers, I find Tatlers supplement guides to be excellent. Tatlers Cosmetic Surgery guide is extremely comprehensive. I'd rather pay twice as much for Botox by a national/worldwide acclaimed specialist with countless procedures under his belt and a six month waiting list than get it done for 'discount' price at my local salon by a young girl who hasn't got any A'levels!
I'm not into doing reviews, per-se, and I certainly do not get sent any products to review and write about, but... I purchased something yesterday against all my better judgement, with the thought, "well for £7.00 it can't hurt to try?"
I put it on before getting in the car, and after an hour of sitting in traffic, (for fun) decided to check the results, I can honestly say I was wonder-struck! First thing I did, reach for the Google button on my phone and look this stuff up. It was either going to make my face melt and give me skin cancer or it was just plain awesome!
Turns out - problem number one - the website address branded on the packaging does not exist! (Alarm bells)
So I google the trademark instead- more results- no less alarming - (I'll let you know when my face starts melting)
There are mixed reviews about what is in fact just the active ingredient, I have by this time given up trying to find more about the actual maker, but the active ingredient throws up tons.
SYN-Ake.
Turns out there are quite a number of products containing this "replica snake venom peptide" that mimics Botox, without the invasive needle.
I worked in Harrods in the beauty halls for long enough to test every single decent product it housed. Natura Bisse had, at the time, released a brand new product to the market claiming very simialr things, this was in 2005, called Inhibit. Around six months later a double strength Inhibit was released, claiming, (you guessed it) twice the speed with better results.
I tried this product, repeatedly, given that I was supposed to be selling it, to much disappointment. I saw absolutely no difference whatsoever, despite only having the finest of lines and wrinkles to fill at the time.
But, now, five years on, smoking and drinking, children, marriage and a large mortgage have deepened these lines considerably! I use Aveda, given that I now need something a tad stronger than my old faithful - Origins.
I tried Balance Active Formula, Wrinkle Freeze Serum- I can honestly say it did EXACTLY what it said on the tin.
"The frequency of muscle contractions, causing lines is reduced by 36% after 1 minute"
"By 82% after 2 hours"
"52% wrinkle reduction after 4 weeks and 24% reduction on crows feet after 4 weeks"
After 2 hours, I could not frown!
I kid you not. I raised my eyebrows, heavily reduced muscle contraction and MUCH less lines.
I was astounded, so upon returning home, thought I must research immediately.
I think its safe to say that I cannot advocate the use of something I do not clearly comprehend, but this review was fairly good, along with the rest of the website;
But- I could not find anywhere but eBay and T.J.Hughes that sold the actual product that I bought, suggesting, strongly, the company went into liquidation and sold off excess stock.
I will certainly be purchasing a cream with this SYN-Ake ingredient in it in the future, and deal with my melting face later!
Its that dreaded annual trip to the land of the expensive tat! Toys 'R Us. Having put both children in nursery I convinced the husband on his day of 'working from home' to do a quick whizz round the toy store to do all the children's Christmas presents. He looks at me with dread, reaching sneakily for his crying wallet and shaking his head, I say, "Its time...."
It means two things, he wanders around both bewildered and glued to his blackberry, and I attack the store with gusto as the trolley piles higher and higher. We both know that by the time we reach the checkout we will just be throwing any old tat in the trolley regardless of price given that we have lost the will to live.
A very spotty kid will approach you at your lowest point, trying to sell you a store/credit card, and he will look despondently at you when you mumble an impolite "No!"
The pink isles are just sickening, and the toy cars/ships/trucks all do look EXACTLY the same, as does every single bit of sparkly, fluffy, shiny, plastic doll in there. All the doll babies look like the brides of Chucky.
The "educational" toys seem so outdated, if I presented my four year old with one she would look at it with utter disappointment, being used to playing with Daddy's iPod.
In fact I don't think the grey pixelated screens are any better than the Nintedo's I had twenty years ago!
I find the whole experience to be just infuriating, as I keep thinking "£45.00" for three plastic Peppa Pig figures, just because they have crowns and swords??? £72.00 for a talking Woody???"
Its disgusting- really!
When I was a child there was one extremely wealthy girl in my class at school, although it was common knowledge who here parents were, she was dressed as shabbily as those from the poorest homes, their toys were meagre, and their home, although he size of a stately home, furnished and decorated as it was in the 40's, and always freezing!!!!
It wasn't until much later in life when our paths crossed again, through friends, and siblings, I'd also found out their Christmas' were not spent at home, but away in third world countries, doing missionary and aid work. The three children along with mum and dad, would spend Christmas day digging wells, building huts and schools and tending to sick children. They were told as they grew older why; the fortune they were to inherit and be entrusted with, the business and empire they were to head would ruin them if they had no value for money. And so, it was that they lived a fulfilling but simple childhood and despite the obvious taunts, and occasionally bullying cruel children do to each other, this strengthened their resolve yet further, and they became worldly, wise, balanced and rounded adults unphased by wealth, money and shunned extravagance.
Would I really be all that cruel if I gave my daughter an orange and a lump of coal?!
I can always tell when someone my husband doesn't know is on the phone, his voice becomes all worker/banker-ish... bit curt. I could not decipher from the one end of the conversation I could hear, what on earth was going on or who could possibly be on the other end, despite my best frantic mouthing gestures of "who's on the phone!"
I became concerned when I heard, "when is that?.... Oh Christmas eve...... right, well I'll have to talk to my wife..." (and here comes the real killer bit- deserved of an immediate dead-arm thump), "But I'm certain she would be VERY happy to help!"
I'm close to manic by the time he gets off the phone,"WELL??????"
He's laughing his holy socks off, unable to speak through the titillation...
I should point out quickly, we live in a tiny village, controlled very much my 'The Parish Elders', also known as the Parish Council.
They are a meddling bunch of old people with FAR too much time on their hands and who believe anyone that didn't witness the War is an ungrateful, indolent, self-indulgent plague upon their beautiful rural way of life. It has over the years been affected more and more by 'commuter-belt' syndrome, and become home to many people who weren't born and raised in the village. Much to the distaste of The Elders.
I joke often it bears close resemblance to the town from the film Hot Fuzz, " Its all for the greater good..."
It is fiercely frowned upon, therefore, if us young new-blood, do not join in with community activities. You're either IN or OUT. And as many have found out the hard way, (me included) if you do something to annoy one of these Elders, they can make life a real misery for you when you least expect it.
(these are real ones in the local pub.... pleasant looking aren't they?!)
So... when the fits of explosive hysterics subside, my husband informs me that we have been 'selected' to play Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus in the crib service for the whole village on Christmas eve.... O H M Y G O D. Literally.
My second thought, after excruciating anger/embarrassment is, "What about our older daughter?"
Sure we have the baby boy to fit the bill, but he happens to have an older sister, almost four, who would be mighty miffed to be left out of the festivities, given the little performing-attention-seeker she is.
Of course, in all small villages there is always a slight stray from the original plan, and they assured him she can be included as the less-known older sister.
(this is not us, but nice to know this sister clearly exists!)
I have, religiously, been to every one of these little Christmas gatherings since we moved here, and am always moved by the sheer comedy of how seriously The Elders take it. They even have a real Donkey, among other wildlife, IN the church, the Centurions (!) on the door hand out Quality Street to the children and EVERYONE attends.
Second really sticky point, we live OPPOSITE the church. Directly opposite. I can hear the hymns on a Sunday morning, and can see the pews from my daughters bedroom window. So HOW can we say, politely, NO!
I just know there will be rehearsals, meetings and costume discussions, held in the articly cold minute little church. It truly is every episode of Vicar of Dibly you can imagine all rolled into one big nightmare! Mine!
I used to be a suit-dressing, power heeled, cocktail drinker, living in London, attending Fashion Week shows, not Nativity Carol Services. What did I do to deserve this?
My husband casually asked me recently, one evening whilst watching a film, "...ever regret getting married so young?"
I was just 23 when we married, 22 when we met and before I was 24, had my first baby. My response, was not quite the natural one of , "Of course not darling, I love you, its the best decision I ever made..." No... it came out slightly differently, I said,
" I wish I'd slept with more Rockstars and Models first!"
Ha! I have to admit I did go through a short lived phase of just adoring male models, in all the flashy nightclubs, wearing the dappa suits and elegantly poised like Caligula! But... in a very short few weeks after a handful of said model conquests, it turns out, they are boring as hell, and as lively as your Gran in bed, down to the fact they are so in love with themselves they don't even try!
Rockstars on the other hand... Whole different ball-game; by this point in the conversation my husband was both mildy surprised and also not, at the same time, as he says often, "Nothing about you shocks me anymore!"
"Now- Rockstars, musicians", (I went on to say) "have talent, passion and are usually albeit egotistical, rarely actually that handsome, so deep down they still feel they need to 'work for it' a little."
My husband laughed,
"seriously? you wish you had slept with more Rockstars? How, pray tell, would you have managed this?"
I was on a roll by now, away with my imagination and back to being 21 in my head, the rubbish out of my mouth was completely disconnected with my logical brain... "I'd have been a die hard fan - you've not really lived until you've been a groupie! I mean look at the 70's...."
I wish I had been a teenager in the 70's SO badly it hurts, the whole ethos of it would have suited me down to the ground, Free Love, Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll baby YE! Hmmm in another life....
Anyway, so the conversation progressed, "how about Rockstars now?"
Good question, didn't take much time to put together my all time top 5, but as I pointed out to him politely, I'd have liked to have done more than 5! He hung and shook his head in slow amazement...
1. Dave Grohl - Foo Fighters..... Well bend me over, slap my ass and colour me happy... Hell yes!
2. (I know hes dead!) Kurt Cobain... What a crazy ass dude - rock out with your cock out!
3. Adam Levine - he can sing! And that voice makes you want to take his clothes off and do bad, bad things!
4. Andre 3000... (Now I'm personally not into black men, nothing racist, they just don't usually do it for me), BUT, having met him when I was working as a dancer at one of the MTV awards, he was so utterly charming, I so coulda,woulda,shoulda....
5. Nickleback... I'm a sucker for long hair, I once dated a guy cos he had the most amazing long hair - YES he was a model too, but he was very dark brooding and a talented actor as well, but come on, this guys tunes ROCK- you know he would be wanting an orgy with a group of bunny girls from the playboy mansion! Ubba Ubba!
I could go on... but my husband quietly stopped me, before I got too carried away... He is quite used to this sort of outburst of enthusiasm.
I try not to discuss sex with anyone, as I have found, over the years, we are all very very different, and what turns one on, shocks another, so I tend to learn to keep my bedroom antics to myself. But I do truly believe we have in us all, a latent sex goddess, waiting for worship/retribution/kink, I just wish more women would let it out.
Now being in a "committed" relationship with two small children, sex is often the last thing on my mind, so I have reverted to learning and educating myself in the hope of reigniting a new kind of passion... (other than hot men and handcuffs) - Tantric...
Check a few out for yourselves, I've been to the odd one or two, they are fun, approachable and totally enjoyable!
I have to say- I DID NOT write this particulary lovely little bit of blurb below- BUT I really wanted to share it it with you. I've entitled it "sweet cougar", as I feel I'm a bit too old to be wanting a "boy" but I still feel 21 when I do see those beautiful, handsome, divine creations of GOD... BOYS! So I thought as most of the county is covered in snow, this could melt any heart....
I want a boy who will move the hair away from my eyes, and then kiss me. Who will hold my hand in line at the mall and make all the girls jealous. A boy who thinks I'm b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l. A boy who will sing to me at random moments. Who lets me sleep on his chest.
I want a guy who will tell his mother I have beautiful eyes, a guy who will bring me orange juice when I'm sick, who writes songs about me because he doesn't know any other way to tell me how he feels.
I want a boy who is more goofy than romantic, but knows the right things to say at the right times.
I want a boy who will call me 3 times a day if he went away. A boy who will apologize for calling too much, and no matter how many times I tell him its okay, he'd still do it. A boy who will let me gossip to him and just smile and agree with everything I say. A boy who will throw stuffed animals at me when I acted dumb and then jump on me and kiss me a million times.
I want a boy who will write me notes in class, and give me flowers every once in a while for no real reason at all. Who will bet kisses on who could beat who on at game. Who makes fun of me just to make me laugh. A boy who will surprise me with 25 cent ring and we could have contest of how far we can spit our gum. Who will take me to the park, put his hands around my waist and give me big bear hugs all the time. A boy who will kiss my neck, just to have a reason to tell me how much he loves my new perfume.
I want a boy who, at night, who will dance in his pajamas with me. A boy who will take pictures in photo booths with me, someone who will never turn down a trip to the lake and who will play tag on the beach with me. Who will tell all his friends about me and smile when he does it. A boy who could sit with me on the kitchen floor and eat sandwiches. Who will make out with me in the pouring rain and will tell me when he doesn't think something looks good.
I want a boy who would try to teach me how to play the guitar, even if we just end up laughing at each other.
I want a boy who will run his fingers through my hair, share his lollipops with me, and get along with all of my friends. Someone who would never be afraid to say I love you in front of his friends and someone who would argue with me about silly things just to make up.
I want a boy who will take me to Target to just make fun of some of the stuff there. Someone who will kiss me at midnight on New Years and who will make funny faces at me when I'm on the phone.
I want a boy who will count stars with me and be friends with my family.
I want a boy who will stay home with me on a Friday night just to help me make dinner and watch movies together under the same blanket. Someone who will squirt water guns at me in the house after I've got him soaked. A boy who will tell me I'm b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l but not too often.
I want a boy who looks me the eye and tell me something serious, that was also funny and make me promise not to laugh. A boy who could make me laugh like no one else can.
I want a boy who will hold me closer than normal when I'm sick, and would play with my hair.
But mostly I want a boy who is my best friend and will always be there for me.
I think often and hard, morbidly true, that if someone was to walk into my bedroom or house and I was not there, what would they make of me? I think your reading defines your thinking. And I often think carefully about the books that grace my bedside table and bedroom.
As a girl, I dreamt of having a library and now, at my (limited) grand age, I love that I do... Sounds pretentious, but I have a great love of books. Right down to the fact that my greatest sexual fantasy is of having sex in a library! In my fantasy, I am thrown up against the shelves of a huge, grand library, in the philosophy section, and the smell of the old dust, the leather, the paper, the words of all the great peoples thoughts supporting my body, seems somehow just intoxicating
... anyway... I shall explain this in more detail later- but... back to MY library.
My purchases are sporadic, but never singular. I found a bookshop (and a bookseller) that was so... 'meaty'..., it was how every perfect bookshop would look in my dreams; books covering every inch of floor and wall space, the smell, the history, and the Yoda of all things written at its helm.
I went in there in there researching my script, I get most of my inspiration from actually reading other works, and I went in there with specific stimulation material requisites; "Historical scandalous sex stories. Not love! Sex, scandal, history and the more bizarre the better!"
This wrinkled Oracle of all things published, looked at me blankly, I thought she might throw me out for such a request. As it turned out she was merely cataloguing in her head, her response was quick, I immediately sensed that she may not repeat this answer if I missed it and asked again.
It was beautiful,
"Up the back stairs, not the ones on the left, the ones behind the door, at the very back, 2nd floor, go one, two, three, four, five rows across, (walk to the left side of the balcony), then, bend down, one, two, three shelves down, about fifteen, sixteen books across, there about eight books there, mainly of French origin, translations, that should do you. BUT... if not your thing, come back down here and I've got some British stuff, but, in honesty, the british ones are crude, the French ones are voluptuous... I'd try there first. You want aristocratic affairs. That's where the kinky stuff happened... orgies and the like, the real seedy oddities... Shout if you get lost..."
I was so blown away by the fact this woman knew the exact location of a few books in such a specific genre, that I got the expressed feeling she had already read everything, EVERY one of the 10,000 books in that store, that I could barely utter a response other than, "Thanks...."
As it turns out not only was she SPOT on... But she joined me a few minutes later, like a stealth bomber, to say,
"I think, looking at you, you want these ones..."
What does that even MEAN????
She handed me four books. And I'll admit, I was so bowled over by everything she uttered, as she seemed like the font of printed knowledge. I said, "Yes, I'll take them all"
She was right.
Not only was she right, she gave me one book that to date is one of my favourite things I've ever read. I read it with such succulent relish that I could have inhaled it. What made it even more perfect was, given that it was a very old text, (now I am a SUCKER for this) inside was not only a penned note, but a personally written poem, To... and From... but also dated and signed.
It was self written poetry. I was holding in my hand, the most unique soul baring thing any man can leave after death, his word. It gets better, this was one mans word, written in 1947, from Mike, to Tony.
It made it quiet possibly the most romantic thing I'd ever seen. One gay mans love poetry for another, at a time of such closeted, forbidden love of such a kind, that it made it even more erotic.
This fabulous bookmark had also been left inside, I've never heard this poem, but I love it!
I shall for all of your pleasure, release this mans love, for the very first time onto the world;
To Tony, Love Mike, 15 Sept 1947
I give you all that I possess,
My eyes, my lips, my hair
But in my heart, I save my soul
For one who is not there.
You are my friend, I love you, will
And know your goodness and your kind
But O’ dear God, where is my love?
For him I cannot find.
You loving me, gentle kiss and joy
And moments of stolen pleasure
And know my secrets and hold my hand
And say you’ll leave me never
But where is the wildness and the pain
The hurt words and the sorrow
The laughter and the stars that shine
In eyes that know no ’morrow.
Where is the hand that stroked my hair?
And told me stories old and time
And loved me with a lovers passion
Sweet garlands of loves spring dew.
N.B When researching this article I found out I am not alone on this fetish for books, a "biblophile" I believe is the term. And I found this site- I'm not going to lie, I actually got more turned on than if I had been looked at a naked David Gandy standing at the end of my own bed... Sad but true... Check this out!
Its that time of year when we all want to glam ourselves up, don the high heels and look our best. Invariably indulging in a few too many Ports, and glasses of wine, buoyed by the perfectly acceptable line, "Its Christmas; Ye, I'll have one more!"
Women are awfully and commonly full of the bravado when armed with a stiff drink and a pair of expensive shoes, we feel on top of the world, and it seems we let our good sense leave the building and naughty things happen... The office party; that once a year opportunity to tell the handsome quiet chap in accounts you've had a crush on him since he started, or to tell your recently divorced boss you think his wife must have been mad to leave him... We also run into past loves and conquests, as bizarrely the cold weather and the mulled wine draws us out of our homes.
Christmas cheer seems to get us in a spin, I know it has done me in the past. In fact a few years ago at a huge Christmas party, I made some bad mistakes and by Christmas day thought my marriage might be well and truly over... All over mistletoe, wine and Christmas Spirit! tut tut tut....
So why do we do it? Why does Christmas make us go a little bit bonkers? We overspend, we over-shop, we over indulge, we fall out with family and generally become a more irrational and silly version of ourselves for about a month!
Look at Love Actually, Briget Jones; whole films about the crazy stuff people do at Christmas. And although deeply funny, romantic and charming, somehow only totally believable because its Christmas time. No other time of the year would we throw such caution to the wind and behave with such reckless abandonment.
I've received inappropriate texts and emails on Christmas day, and in the past sent a few too- surely Christmas day can't be the only day of the year when its acceptable to tell someone how you feel, without consequences?!
Christmas eve, before I was married, used to be the biggest "hook up" night of the year, anything goes... You see all your old school crushes in your local pub when everyone returns home to their family homes for the Christmas holidays, and before you know it, you're snogging your sexy Physics teacher from senior school in the pub car-park! (Yes I did!)
So, whats the answer, should we let this holiday roll by, full of bad judgement, tipsy kisses, and hefty credit card bills, leading to that well known thing called a January Hangover? Mmmm, yes!
But, from past experience, here's a few things I wish I HAD said at Christmas when the mulled wine short-circuited my brain in those all too predictable and awfully awkward situations that only ever arise at Christmas time;
When you bumped into an ex, or any other past romantic attachment;
1. Oh hi!... Er ... Sorry Harry isn't it?
2. You never did renew that gym membership then?
3. This is Bjorn, my tantric sex instructor (when standing next to any hot man!)
4. Don't worry about your hairline, some women see baldness as a sign of virility.
5. I'm really busy right now, can I ignore you some other time.
When they try and get you into bed, "cos its Christmas"
1. Him: Is this seat empty?
You: Yes, and this one will be as well if you sit there.
2. Him: Your place or mine?
You: Both! You're going to your place, I'm going to mine!
3: Him: Hey come on, its Christmas, we're both here for the same reason...
You: Yep! To pick up chicks!
4. Him: I can tell you want me...
You: You're right- I want you to go away!
When you see the ex with someone new...
1. Its great that "little problem" didn't stop you finding someone new.
2. I'm so impressed by people who do work in the community.
3. I LOVE that 'obvious roots' look.
4. Its so brave continuing the trailer-trash look out of season
5. Why so fed up? You haven't slept with him already have you?
6. Those trousers look great on you- don't you think boot-cut is so flattering when you're pear-shaped?
7. Oh sweet- you've got matching moustaches.
8. Gosh- whens it due?
Don't let the Christmas cheer get the better of you, despite what all the films tell us, that someone will come crashing into our life like the best Christmas present of all time, and sweep us off our feet- your boss is not that person! And neither is the boy who used to sit on the back of your school bus. Wear the worst Christmas jumper, your biggest pants and protect yourself from becoming your own worst enemy!
I'm ashamed to say, I have taken a bit of a fancy towards my new Doctor. So much so I was almost relieved when he said he would be leaving at the end of this week, returning to his old practice, (many miles away). So why then did he feel the need to hastily tag onto the end of that sentence, but "I'll be back when the new surgery is built - permanently, I'll be moving here..."
Oh dear! I though to myself with a wry smile. I can safely say I've never been to the doctors so many times in any four month period as I have in the last four months. I should add that he is, (charm and looks aside) a very good GP! And has done wonders to get me appointments and treatments I've been flapping about over for years, but his good bedside manner has backfired a little...
For some years I've suffered with bouts of depression, and more recently panic attacks and anxiety. I find the whole thing so utterly embarrassing I can barely bring myself to tell friends, but Dr. X and his sweet nature seemed to have me spilling out my guts and life story within minutes. He kindly recommended some treatment for the problem, at a well known Psychiatric Hospital, to 'talk' to someone, given that any past attempts to kick the problem seem to have not been very effective.
I explained to him my apprehension towards such a seemingly drastic approach; I mean I'm not mad! (husband would thoroughly disagree) but he reassured me that it may help much more than any anti-depressants and medication. I think the whole thing was made worse by trying to have a serious conversation with someone whilst also trying not to flirt with them!
Sensing my reluctance, Dr. X made the appointments on my behalf, and went so far as calling me at home to keep the pressure on to go the appointments. (I'm a stubborn bugger!)
Well, once there, it looks exactly as you may picture a psychiatric hospital, white and clinical, spooky and eerily quiet.
Everyone smiles, so broadly at you, I can only assume it's incase you're a paranoid suicidal, and there is an overwhelming sense of calm throughout the freakishly long corridors. It felt almost empty.
Yours truly, feeling very nervous, reverted to my witty self, with forehead-slapping consequences; an exercise class, full of some slightly questionable looking characters, attempting to move rhythmically to a Boyzone song,
"whats going on in there?" I ask, to break the silence of the long walk to her office,
"Daily exercise helps the patients..."
"They look like a real bunch of nutters! God I'd want to KILL myself if I had to do starjumps to boyzone...."
(DOH! springs to mind)
It gets worse. We reach my seemingly lovely and approachable, (albeit freakishly tall for a woman) psychiatrists office, and its everything I had hoped it wouldn't be... Empty. No fine leather couch,
No wooden slatted blinds, chesterfield furniture and all the trappings of a scene from Analyze That; instead its empty all except for two NHS looking plastic covered "armchairs", and once again my mouth gets the better of my brain,
" Hmm, that looks comfy, is it plastic incase the crazies wet themselves; wipe clean?!"
Oh I know.... its terrible, even I was shaking my head at myself by now...
So the 'session' begins, in the uncomfortable office with the plastic chairs, the freakishly tall woman and the loudest ticking clock I've ever heard.
At some point during this 'discussion' we somehow seem to begin talking about sex. Why do all psychiatrists want to know about your childhood and your sex life? I explain its been a little 'flat', she tells me 'thats normal' when you have a lot on your mind, going on to ask me if I do still in fact 'get aroused' , I politely ask her to rephrase the question, for clarity, she replies,
"Do you find people- your husband, strangers, people on tv, attractive?"
You can guess who popped into my head- Dr. X... "My Doctor!"
I reply without even thinking, and go on to waffle a little about all sorts of round about reasons, now all the while I'm wittering on about things I'm sure don't matter, tall woman is jotting down notes at an alarming rate.
At the end of the session she tells me, its routine practice to just pass on the initial assessment notes to the GP so that they can be made aware of any further or ongoing treatment and medication if required, I agree, sign the form to release the information and think its Doctor/Patient confidentiality, right? No problem them knowing what I've said to the tall woman... Glaring mistake was I didn't say my Doctors name to her.
Two days later, I need a repeat prescription, I make an appointment with Dr. X, as usual, I perhaps put some slightly tighter jeans on, and a dash of lip-gloss... and go to my appointment.
Dr. X looks very surprised to see me. I'm perplexed. He explains he had the psychiatrist's letter this morning, (very efficient tall woman) and she addressed it to the surgery, rather than a specific Doctor, and having dealt with it all himself, felt he should read it.. and he has just read it...
He takes a minute to look at me, I look puzzled, he continues looking at me, and then- BOOM! the penny drops.... I'm humiliated beyond belief and turn the colour of a tomatoe. I mumble the need for a prescription, not wanting to make any eye contact whatsoever. But Dr. X is a consummate professional, he brings up this sticky matter....
"So I've read the session report, I'm glad it went well, it would seem that your problems are indeed anxiety, and stress related, with regards to your sexual dysfunction, I was unaware your medication was causing side-affects....."
"hmmmmm, its not really a problem Doctor, I'm fine...." (Again the colour of a tomatoe)
"Well, its nice to see you still haven't lost the urge, I'm sure everything will return to normal once your course of medication has finished....."
Oh well this time I wanted to just throw myself on the floor and convulse in shame and embarrassment, I managed a very forced polite smile and tried to keep my eyebrows still.
It's at this point after an awkwardly long pause while he refills the printer paper, and sorts out the computer to print up my prescription he feels the need to volunteer the information he is leaving at the end of the week.
On my way out, I think to myself, if he is leaving at the end of the week, then I should definitely make an appointment on Friday afternoon to say,
"Doctor, I think I felt a lump in my breast, could you take a look....?"
Please tell ten friends to tell ten today! The Breast Cancer site is having trouble getting enough people to click on their site daily to meet their quota of donating at least one free mammogram a day to an underprivileged woman. It takes less than a minute to go to their site and click on 'donating a mammogram' for free (pink window in the middle).
This doesn't cost you a thing. Their corporate sponsors/advertisers use the number of daily visits to donate mammogram in exchange for advertising.
Here's the web site! Pass it along to people you know.
I was hesitant about this post, as I know people are going to leave negative comments, but... After a thirty minute conversation with a friend this morning it would seem this really is something women think about ALL the time. Their weight and their size! Its well documented in every single magazine, every single news article, headlines, documentaries, reality tv shows, posters, books, clubs, programmes, classes, it goes on and on and on.
This multi-billion pound industry certainly isn't fading away, but it would seem that we have literally become OBSESSED with our weight! This seems to be a relatively new thing, possibly pushed into the forefront following the "heroin chic"supermodels of the early 90's.
This is not a good look on anyone- I don't care what you say Lagerfeld!
WHO thought this was a smart move?!
The emergence of a new strain of women... Its easy to see that women can be divided into four body types- controversial- but true;
THIN (very small boobs, slim hips and little body fat anywhere)
FANTASY (porn style looks, augmented breasts, injected bottom and surgically enhanced)
HEALTHY (a low BMI, weight proportionate to their frame and fit)
FAT (everything has lost context, waist, boobs, bottom)
Wheres the middle ground?! What happened to advocating health?
Where are the normal looking women? I like the Dove campaigns,
and I like that curvy women are beginning to grace our magazine stands and our advertising campaigns, but it still seems to be the hottest topic of discussion among most women of all ages.
I agree to a certain degree with "The Gok affect" that we should embrace our bodies, but I don't agree that it should be at any size!
Fetish lover of the curvier woman or not- this is NOT healthy!
Shouldn't weight really be about health?
Genetics and natural selection are making this battle we seem to be having with our bodies worse and worse. As more and more families make mistakes with their children's eating, health and exercise, this problem becomes deeper and deeper entrenched.
Unfortunately eating healthy food is more expensive than eating the cheap junk food. Fact. And now with even more and more of us feeling the pinch, cuts, recession, higher VAT coming, losing child benefits, we are all going to feel this every time we go to the supermarket.
The answer cannot be to just give in and buy the frozen lasagna and the value bumper bag of chicken nuggets?!
We are constantly being told that life is for 'living', for 'enjoying', for 'indulging in'. Yet we are also feeling the tug between, the "I deserve it!" chocolate bar and the "oh its just a a pudding" and the "I must look like a celebrity/supermodel/hollywood actress".
This is the wrong attitude. We need to start being accountable for ourselves, (personally I think anything that is self induced i.e. lung cancer from smoking and heart disease from being overweight should not be treated on the NHS! But that is just my opinion...)
Ladies- This is well, frankly- disgusting! Its another form of self harming!
I teach dancing to children and I am still amazed at how unfit many of them are who start with me. And I don't think we can blame the school entirely. They blame the govenment for lack of funding, and the government blames us for spending too much. Children imitate their parental figures, grandparents, aunts, uncles, neighbours, children look to us for the guidence. If we don't teach a child how to grow a pot of tomatoes on a windowsill in their bedroom, how can we expect them to understand what its all about?
Health education is more important than weight. You may be a healthy size 14, or a healthy size 8. There is no way you are your optimal best and fighting fit at a size 24. And we should stop telling people to "be happy whatever their size!" No! Get fit!
I've had two babies and although I am still under thirty, I am now fitter and healthier than I was at 21. Lifestyle dictates that many of us have to sit for long periods at a desk, this isn't helping us. But it doesn't tell us to go home eat a bag of crisps, a huge dinner, and then snack on a chistmas tin of roses for the rest of the evening whilst drinking a bottle of red wine!
Two things and two things only make you lose weight. FACT! Eating less than you are eating already, and doing a lot more excercise than you are doing already. And thats it. (I'm not factoring into this medical problems that cause weight gain)
Here is a list of turn-around diet techniques. This is not taken from a diet plan, this is just from my experiences and education as a dancer.
Water! Our bodies are designed to store fat for survival. We store more if we are dehydrated. You need to OVER hydrate to trick you body into releasing its fat stores. It senses it does not need them and so they begin depleating if we stay hydrated continually. 2 litres per day is optimum. For LOOSING weight 3 litres. PER DAY. Fill up a large botle if neccessary and put it in your kitchen or on your desk. Say to yourself, "I must drink that before..." a certain time. It will feel a HUGE effort to begin with. But the difference after 2 weeks will be that you will be hydrated. Continue.
Lecithin - taken regularily it prohibits the fat in your food from being absorbed into the blood stream. It has other health benefits too. Take a read...
Pure Hoodia is an appetite suppressant. It was used by Aborigines on walkabout in the bush when they knew they may not be able to eat for days at a time. Taken regularily it controls fady hunger. I am not advocating starving!
Virgin fish oil and virgin coconut oil are both excellent for slimming, beauty, cooking and much more. Why not swap out your olive oil and salad dressing for this?
Kick start your system like rebooting a computer. Fast during the day, and eat a light meal before 6pm. Do not eat after 6pm. Your body needs time to use that food energy before you sleep.Do this for 3 days. By the third day you will feel less hungry and more energised as your body automatically starts drawing on its fat stores.
Mummies- breast feeding is best. No two ways about it. You put on weight during your pregnancy to ensure you have enough energy when the baby is born to feed them. Breast feeding burns an enormous amount of calories. Thousands and thousands. Your baby needs those calories. If you eat very sensibly immediately after the birth your body will know to let go of those calories and fat stores as long as you remain hydrated with water.
On a personal note, I do know it can seem like the most impossible and painful thing in the world. It was for me. Both times! Bleeding, lacerated, aching, sore and hellish for 6 weeks... A difficult baby could be sign of other things, you are not failing if you can't do it. I went on a breastfeeding course at the birthing centre in London; I learnt a little but it wasn't realistic! It was far too airy-fairy and whimsical. Get help if you are stuggling. Coaches, Midwives, other moms, its HARD WORK. Check your baby isn't tongue-tied, and try a cranial osteopath who specialises in new babies, (being dragged out by your neck and head can put a few things out of place!)
Sugar is bad for you. FACT. Stop eating it. A treat should be just that. Something occasional, something rare and something extrordinary. Will power, or "won't" power as my friend calls it, is saying I "won't" do that. I won't eat biscuits. You don't need to eat them. You may want to, but you don't need to.
Drinking and smoking- goes without saying, its not good for you. (I do both!) But if you are going to drink and smoke, make an even bigger effort with your diet and excercise to balance it out a little.
Running and walking is cheap. Gym memberships are not. Find a buddy to do it with if you lack the motivation (and it is frightfully unmotivating when you can see your own breath and its dark and its raining at 7am!) But do it anyway. The mental hurdle you will have crossed with yourself to push on will set you up with a positive attitude for the rest of the day. And then... tomorrow... do it again. Walk to work if you can. I lived in London and never walked to work. Through sheer laziness. It took me longer to catch the tube I found out one day when there was a tube strike! Fail!
Its no good buying cheap fixes, faddy diet books, expensive gym memberships and watching Gok! Want to look good in a dress and high heels? Then get healthy, get fit and you WON'T die trying. Super-knickers, fat busting nonesense that sells you something? Rubbish! A book won't make you thinner or healthier by just reading it. Educate yourself and change your lifestyle! (do NOT read THIS book!)
This book cover looks ridiculous! No normal woman would wish to look like this unless she was a professional athlete! Don't be silly!!!
Before I had my first baby I was a rather plump 10st. I'm not tall and it did not suit me. I felt uncomfortable in my skin. I had a large chest and a very round bottom... I felt slow. I was also on the pill... I have no way of proving what the definate causes were of being on the pill, but I do know after a year off of it while I had my baby and breastfed, when going back on it I had a surge of strange side effects. I went through the roof with PMT-like mood swings, I felt angry, I felt sad and my appetite soared. I stopped taking it after three eventful weeks. I had gained 8lbs! Having since spoken to a few other mums on this odd fact, they too all conveyed exactly the same things had happened to them. I'm not saying stop taking it unless you have another failsafe method of contraception. Look into other options though. Or just take a break for a few months and see if you feel any difference?
Now I am a very slim 8.4 stone. And my body feels in good shape. My husband comments daily on the fact I look "thin" but I have more energy, I am not sluggish. My BMI is very healthy, and for my frame and genetic shape this is my natural weight. (Its just almost 2st lighter than when my husband met me!) I have different body issues now, having had two children; saggy skin, stretch marks and my boobs are definately at least 3 inches lower and have lost all of their "stuffing"! But those things are badges of honor for carrying a child. They are your war medals as a mother and I wouldn't trade them in for my big boobs and my plump bottom again. I just turn the lights off! At least I know I'm healthy.
As you may have gathered from my previous posts, I like a little nostalgia and vintage. Whether its jewellery, fashion or furniture, I like a little history. There is something deeply moving in some aspects of vintage. My engagement ring is vintage, and I love that fact it has a story, it feels like it has a persona, a life before it was mine and I feel this about many antique things.
My great aunt was the person that started all this for me, I remember as a child visiting her house, it was like walking into a museum. She was so chic, and so elegant, and the house always smelt of rich tobacco. Everything about it was vintage. From the moment I walked through the door it was like walking into the past. She was a huge lover of fashion, maintaining that she would rather leave a wardrobe of fine clothes than a wealth in the bank. And that’s exactly what she did...
As my mother and I cleared out her endless wardrobes and attic trunks after she had gone I was utterly enthralled with the sheer quantity of items. There were whole shoe boxes of lipsticks, another for powder compacts, another for earrings, more and more for all kinds of accessories. There was a whole box full of silk scarves, another for belts, gloves, hats, stockings, it was just never ending!
There was a lifetime of shopping and indulging her passion for fashion. I’m happy to say that I still own, use and have kept many of these items, some I will never use, and some are now treasured antiques. I certainly did not know they would become antiques when I was aged twelve and just fascinated by the smell of the velvet jackets and the pristinely kept stockings. Ever since then I have ‘collected’ clothes and accessories. My attic is my own treasure trove now, and my husband despairs’ every time he goes up there. I do not like to throw anything away and now as I reach the first cycle of fashion (10 years) I’m starting to appreciate this a whole lot more.
I now have things that were fashionable ten years ago, that I have kept and kept, and now they are back in again. The sheepskin bomber jacket, the healed brogues, the leather cloche hat and so on. I have a large amount of things that were my grandmothers, my mothers, and even my father’s first wife’s!
The key to keeping things worthwhile is keeping them immaculate. With my shoes, I ‘retire’ them before they are worn out, I get them regularly re-heeled, and re-soled, I clean them gently with warm water and a sponge, I keep the toes stuffed and I make sure they are wiped after each wear. I rotate my handbags regularly and store them in their dust bags with newspaper stuffing. I repair the really old stuff as often as possible, stitching, straps, buckles, buttons; I try and maintain things as well as I possibly can.
I’ve been known to go online to Goggle, “stitching antique leather” and purchasing old tools online in order to reupholster an old footstool authentically. Sound mad? I suppose I have a little bit of a passion for it, but learning to do these things for yourself makes looking for vintage and purchasing much more enjoyable knowing that you can look at things that are in less than perfect condition and restore them yourself.
Only keep things you love. Take no notice of what is fashionable right now, learn to look past the fashion, and see the true beauty in things. Whether it is an old chair, a tainted mirror, a shabby handbag or a quirky looking jewellery box.
Personally mixing vintage with new makes things look more unique, giving your wardrobe a touch of personality and stops you from looking like a sheep following the fashion magazines and the high street looks. Trust your instinct and even if that Thierry Mugler dress from 1993 might look very dated now, give it another 10 years and it will be a prize purchase that you will wear again with pride.
Whatever your style, few of us are completely unique, so look back through history, whether its decor, fashion, beauty, handbags or hairstyles, there will be someone who has done it beautifully before that will inspire you to find your own take on it.
When I moved out to the country I knew no one where we were moving to, and nothing about the area whatsoever. I had lived in London for five years, and still had the same girlfriends I'd had since school. I still do. Although I knew I was going to have to make new friends.
Being a really young mummy is hard in this respect, as you will undoubtedly notice many girls are leaving family and babies until much later in life. I can safely say that none of the women where I live are less than ten years older than me, despite having children the same age as my own.
It was like starting at a new school. I was nervous and felt awkward. I still do sometimes. What are the rules of engagement when having to make new friends. I found them to be very alike to dating and new relationships. The same etiquette applies. You have to instigate the "chat-up". But naturally you gravitate towards someone you feel you may have something in common with, something that "attracts" you to them. Are they on your wave length? This was hard to tell to begin with, it was a minefield at nursery school, all these frantic mums, battling with little children, in a hurry on their way to the school run, in their mucking out gear from the fields, wellies and Barbour jackets. I stuck out like a sore thumb. I caught on quick.
I decided after a few months that the only way I was going to feel really comfortable meeting people was in my own home. I threw a party. Risky strategy considering I knew no one!!!!
I printed up some basic invites for a 'Girls Soiree', no strings attached and to bring a friend and a bottle and it was an open door policy. I dropped in an invite into every single house I could find within a reasonable distance of my own. I was terrified no one would come. How wrong I was...
Not only did many women come along, and bring their friends, but many left wanting to know when the next one was. I was fortunate enough to find someone who made really beautiful jewellery and so asked her to bring a few things along.
I was surprised, as many of the women there were, how many did not already know each other, despite living very close to one another. It would seem, we are all just a little nervous about reaching out.
People stayed, they chatted, quite a few exchanged phone numbers, it was like a singles party. Everyone felt relaxed at not having children and other halves around to monitor, and gradually possible friendships began to emerge.
By the end of the evening I definitely had a firm friend, we stayed up late, drinking and smoking and swapping life stories. Bliss!
But then what? Well then it reverts to etiquette. Thank you notes with telephone numbers, dinner invitations to introduce husbands, and setting dates for coffee. You want to impress, you want to find out, and you want to always put your best foot forward.
But what about long standing friendships. I recently upset a very old friend. A close friend whom I see very often. I brought up something long in the past, and put it out there like a gauntlet. (Needless to point out that this was after a few too many glasses of wine...)
Following day I felt worse than a row with my husband. There was a dark cloud of silence, and I was being an utter chicken about picking up the phone. Half because I knew whatever she said I would deserve, and half because I had no way of explaining where such a thing that had emerged from in my sub-conscious, which was daunting in itself. She sent me a couple of messages, and through nothing but terror, I just couldn't reply. Which I knew was only making it worse. But its exactly the same sort of feeling to when you've said "I want to finish!" in a fit of rage at your partner, which you may well almost mean at the time, but the next few hours and the next few days you know you may have a been a teeny little bit hasty and subsequently regret.
I found the situation I was in with my friend as tricky as some major hurdles in relationships with men. You're at a trying stage. Where in fact it may well be much easier to walk away and forget all about it, but part of strengthening any good relationship means building the bridges together, somewhere new. Its never easy to co-exist as human beings do, in such close proximity to one another and not upset each other when we roar.
I found out my friend was far easier though to deal with than my husband in the end, and a lot more forgiving too! But I still felt a certain sense of intrepidation upon finally answering her call, knowing all too well that I could not keep ignoring it!
She was mature about it, and actually invited that we went over the same conversation again, instead of sweep it under the carpet and forget it ever happened. This was like therapy!!!
Once addressed and resolved I did feel easier, it was clearly something that I had been harbouring for some time, and thankfully has now passed, with all good reason. I find taking leaps of faith very difficult in any relationships, whether friendly or romantic, despite never failing to be utterly surprised when they are both warmly received and positive, no matter what the subject matter.
I put as much stock into my female relationships as I do with my ones at home, with my husband and children. Most don't. But should we? Should we prioritise the women in our life, our friends with equal weighting to our boyfriends and husbands. Although men have sent me round the bend and to hell and back emotionally, no girlfriends have ever done that, and my girlfriends I have known longer than even my husband. I don't fight with them- well not normally, and live far more harmoniously with them than I do my other half. So really I should give them as much time, effort and priority as I do any male relationship I may have had.
Its a sore and sticking point to get dumped by a girlfriend for their guy, it happens, more infrequently now as i get older and the boyfriends become more stable and long term, but what part of our female heads thinks that our girlfriends deserve that.
They don't. Ever. And at my age I should know better! You know who is going to last longer if push comes to shove...
First time I heard this word I was unsure as to exactly what it meant- "GIRL CRUSH!"
When someone said it to me I was at a 1920's costume party and having only received the invite that same evening my costume was a bit more of a nod to the 1920's rather than the whole shebang as I'd have like it to have been. H was dating a film producer and he had brought a friend with him. We'll call her 'P', (for Perfect). So there I was with H and her utterly mad fling- (German and sex mad!) And P trots in. At first I thought, "well she certainly didn't get the invite tonight!".
Vintage tea-dress, seamed stockings, 20's heels, slash of bright red lipstick and the most perfect pin waved hair you've ever seen. She was demure, sweet, polite, slightly breathless from running out of the rain, apologetic for being a tiny bit late and well- lovely!
The evening was a blast, P spoke little, listened a lot, drank moderately and was extremely funny. After an hour or so our little clan had grown somewhat, and I noticed it was all men, in their braces and spats, hanging on to P's every word. They were literally tripping over their own tongues and were blown away with each batted eyelid she threw their way. I was taken aback at how someone could so effortlessly draw a crowd, especially at such a huge party. She was so breathy, quirky and simple, yet so elegant, sexy and charming all at the same time. I too was utterly entranced. I felt like I was at a party with a real life Holly Golightly!
H and I gave up trying to get in on the conversations in the end as no one was particularly interested in what we had to say, in fact I go so far as to say the only questions we were asked were, "How do you know her?", "Is she seeing anyone?", "What does she do?", "Where is she from?".
Which only made us look more blank and plain by replying- "Not a clue- only met her tonight."
To which they would turn on their heels and head back to P...
As H and I stood at the bar, sipping our gin from floral teacups on saucers, I found myself talking about P. H listened for a short while and then just said- "Girl Crush!"
She was right, this girl was amazing. Had I been less married and more liberal I'd have taken her home with me given half the chance!
Now I KNOW men do not feel this towards other men!
Having since spoken to my trusty girlfriends about this incident, they all looked at me frankly and agreed- "Hell yes! I get Girl Crushes all the time!"
I bet you must have had one too. That girl in the office that is never late, never un-composed, always perfectly turned out, make-up perfect, nails perfect, and looks as thought she may never ever have had a bad hair day in her entire life. Her clothes all look expensive and effortlessly fashionable, no one knows if she is married, single or even straight, in fact most of the time it would seem Girl Crushes happen on women we know the very least about. She may be that stunning mummy who manages to get her make-up on every morning, who trots around with her hunky husband and three exceptionally bright and funny children. Or she may even be just a brief moment with a stranger- I had one the other night in the wine store, beautiful girl, trendy gorgeous boyfriend, she was confident, funny, just finished work, had a quirky tattoo on her shoulder and just looked so confident in her own skin it was enthralling to watch.
Are we in fact just reflecting our own ambitions into these empty shells? Are they just what we could be, but are too afraid to do? We edit the holes in what we do know about them filling the details with things we WISH we had. The cool apartment, the perfect wardrobe, the cool friends, the popular parties, the most romantic boyfriend. The list goes on, whether you long for a classic beat up old sports car, or a top of the range Range Rover, if that seemingly perfect girl drives, you IMAGINE she has it. You give her all the things you want.
Later, after the party, H was pretty drunk, and mad boyfriend was battling to get her into a cab. I didn't want to leave just yet, so P kindly offered to - "...be my date..."
This girl didn't even know me, I had no clue who she was, yet somehow, I felt flattered. The same sort of flattery you get when a guy might say something similar. She went further- I was meant to be staying at H's and so if H went home I would either have to go later and have keys, or risk her not waking up to let me in- (probable!), so P said, "stay at mine!"
This picture sums it up quiet acurately... I'm the one on the right!
Urgh! I was actually starting to feel a bit giddy, intoxicated by the floral gin and the endless waves of perfect hair and her apparent excitement over having a pyjama party! My face must have been a picture- as H giggled and waved goodbye from over mad boyfriends shoulder.
She became even MORE perfect when I actually got around to talking to her. She did exactly what I had wanted to do for a career, she directed films. She was a year younger than me. (Always a kicker!) and she was madly in love with a male model whose name escapes me, but who I immediately knew who she was talking about when she told me what underwear he posed in! I felt sick. She lived with her "gorgeous" sister (!) self-deprecating to the core, that she was the "ugly one"... And worked far too hard to ever get any time off, so had spontaneously booked and recently returned from a Kite surfing holiday in Tarifa! At this point I thought I might as well have been in the company of the Dhali Lama. She was TOO COOL for words!
This isn't the first time this had happened to me, although the other times the girls have all ended up being new friends and I've since holidayed and grown close with most of them. Should we feel less threatened than we do, and more in awe of these women? Or are they in fact little different to you and I?
I guess its in our nature as women to assess another womans appearance if we take any pride in our own. I don't think we should measure ourselves up against them though. It turned out, (in the cab ride of confessions to some achingly cool after party in Hoxton), that P had felt she had failed at most things. Her boyfriend cheated on her all the time, her work paid very little and she had wanted to be something else entirely. In fact she confessed by the time we reached said cool party, that she had thought I was the successful amazing one. Now... Was this all part of the Holly Golightly perfect plan or not?! But as a married woman, living in the country with then one child, who did exactly what she loved and whose husband was faithful and worked hard, she had interpreted my party antics very differently to how me and H would. She thought I was too cool to make an effort with my costume, and just game for a laugh. She thought I didn't care what people thought of me. I was aloof with the admirers because I was happily married (ah bless!) and that in fact we both wanted to switch places.
Girl Crushes are moments in our lives, tiny snippets of what we think our lives might have looked like if we had made different decisions. Glimmers of alternatives and fleeting pockets of time to peer into the windows of our OWN hearts and work out what it is we really want, and take stock of what we really have. I'll bet you any money if you talk to one Girl Crush and get the conversation on a level playing field, they too will envy something you have. They may be smart, you may be artistic, they may have long perfect legs, you may have pert perfect boobs, they may have manicured nails, it may be because they have no friends to hang out with all day on a saturday so spend their time in a salon! You'd be pleasantly surprised at how many of us women envy what we don't have and disregard what we do.
The only thing P had which I didn't, was the good sense to see it!
The amount of gift guides, supplements, extra magazines, online offers, price match promises and budget busting deals in the run up to Christmas is overwhelming. I find it harder and harder to buy nice things for the nice people in my life, but I do like to do an awful lot of searching. Here is MY gift list. This year I'm on a penny pinching budget- self inflicted because I am going to New York two weeks before Christmas. And I want to spend my money there, on me! Shamelessly selfish, but I feel I deserve it.
My husband; likes clothes, loves trainers, works long hours in the city and has little free time to himself for anything.
I love this Barbour flask. He has just joined the local parish committee and I keep poking fun at him, that he'll turn grey and old and start complaining about the slight paint peeling on the village phonebox! In light of this admission to himself, that he is no longer the party animal and social playboy he was ten years ago, I thought a bit of a "grandad" gift might go down well. As long as he doesn't ask for a matching pipe and slippers.
I love old fashioned elegance. If you do smoke, (bad habit) this item is something you carry on your person and use maybe as much as your mobile phone... why do we carry little plastic bits of tat?! Why not browse eBay for some of these classics, try the flea markets, and antique stalls. I'm holding out for finding a really lovely vintage Celine gold one.
All of these cost less than £100. And many on eBay cost around £20.
I have a pet hate for celebrities who release perfumes. Having once-upon-a-time worked in the perfume halls of Harrods, I did actually learn a thing or two about scent, the ideas behind it, the things that inspire it, and what really goes into creating it.
One of the oldest perfume creators is Guerlain, and they have created some of the most famous scents of the last 100 years. Undoubtedly, Beyonce and Sarah-Jessica Parker, and Jordan do not have the 'noses' to do this... (well maybe Sarah-Jessica has THE nose, but I doubt its as powerful as Guerlains!).
Girls, don't be sucked into the fad smells and the cheap packaging of these 'latest craze' celebrity stinks. They can hardly even warrant the name perfume. Creed, Guerlain, Chanel, these are what you should be trying. Don't just try new, try the classics too. Have a look through this list
Your scent, as a woman can and will be the one thing that defines you when the lights are off and the clothes are lost- it can give you the greatest of confidence, dressed or undressed, choose it wisely. Think how much your favourite smells remind you of your fondest memories...
This is the ONLY place I could find mine to buy online. As it is world renown for being almost like gold-dust unless you visit the actual boutique in Paris. (Which I where I purchased this on the first day of my honeymoon)
I love the fact that every single time I wear it, I get an incredible amount of comments on it, from strangers mainly. Its beyond outstanding as fragrances go. It is one of four perfumes in their L'artisan range. This particular one is undoubtedly my signature scent, but at $240 a bottle... Its pretty extravagant! So- I found this online site- now, I cannot vouch for its authenticity, BUT... being the bargain hunter I am, I think for $15 its worth a try. I have ordered myself a spray vial of the above scent- and if its truly authentic, I'll be able to tell!!!! Its a pretty clever concept. If you have an unusual scent this is a real find.
Of course lovely girls like a little sparkle, but whats the real difference between the costume, the cheap, the fashion and the real ice?! Depends greatly on the budget, but I think some things look more cheap than others. And some high street stuff can also be very expensive. Obviously there is SO much out there, both in stores and online, here are my personal favourites;
Again I like a bit of vintage, and I like a bit of designer, combining these two searches on eBay or online searches produces some real finds, that are pieces that you will care for and look after, whilst making your outfits look that little better than average. Christian Lacroix is great and so is vintage dior.
Stocking fillers need not be boring, whilst still being traditional. Personally every girl likes a little luxury, and the little luxuries are sometimes the most enjoyable. Like nail polish, socks, underwear, hair clips and hair care products, stockings (persoanlly I think this a great 'stocking' filler!) Lipsticks, and glosses, lushious little pots of golden face serum, and if you're doing one for your mum or sister, why not throw in a little minuture bottle of chamapgne. Its so seemingly decedant but can't fail to raise a smile!
My perfect Christmas would look something like this:
'Barefoot for Barcelona' and 'Ski Teal' are my current crush colours- but check out their designer metallics range too.
I think its almost impossible to buy a girl a pair of flash, stilletoes, whether they are the best selling Kurt Geiger or top of the range Christian Louboutin, but what most girls would be greatful for on Christmas day are these; Not everyones taste, but hard to utterly dislike two such iconic footwear labels coming together; Jimmy Choo designs for Ugg in this fab new collection.
Ok- so these are PRICEY! But there are going to be some pretty fantastic immitation stuff coming out really quickly in the highstreets.
Hard to go wrong with something that is both very current season and something so traditional- cashmere socks. Wear them with your boots, your high heels and skirts and around the house in your pants! A snip at £8.00!
I'm not often hankering after something I've seen on a celebrity, so I was actually a little disappointed when I saw Danni Minnogue wearing these on Saturday nights X factor, as I had had my eye on them since the collection came out. Shane Leane first grabbed my attention, with his now classic, 'Hook my Heart' necklace, but these earrings are just beautiful.
The hawthorn collection is worth looking at too. With the gold rings starting at £85.00, I think its a fairly cool gift from someone special.
Fashion hits; personally I picked up all my big winter trends back in late Spring/ early summer, for this winter; the camel coat, the sherling jacket and the leather skirt. All were absolute knockout prices being items no one either wanted nor were they temperature relevant to the then time of year here in the UK. BUT... if you weren't smart enough to do this, then high street has caught up. (I got a gorgeous collarless tie-belt camel coat from Ghanarni Strok in sale for £15, my leather pencil skirt for £10 on ebay, and my sherling coat, my always-wanted-one since I worked for a luxury fashion designer on sloane street and my manager had one- the infamous JOSEPH waterfall sheepskin, again on ebay in June for £98.) Yes I'm now gloating!
If you didn't, these are of course the most wanted items for any fashionista, but fear not- now with good old Zara online and Asos fast on the designers heels you can pick up these items pretty sharpish.
Frankly for me Zara got this just right with their leather t-shirt. Unbelievable good value, and so cool it hurts. You will see me wearing this over my little charcoal polo neck in icy New York with my flat knee high riding boots this December- for certain!
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