In which I say long live the queen

So this outfit was actually very much inspired by this post from Ali of  the Drawing Mannequin. I had this Peter Pan collar shirt I bought a while ago and hadn't actually got round to wearing it yet. Her outfit earlier in the week really inspired me. I had meant to be far more similar - yellow socks and black shoes and everything - so um, now perhaps it is only like hers in the same top. However, it was the idea of sticking with monochrome and then adding one bit of colour I went with. In this case turquoise, my favourite colour. I am also wearing the floral crown I wore for my wedding. I like re-using a little bit of that day in my normal outfits. I actually wore these shoes for the barn dance too. What I need to find is a dress with which to re-wear the petticoat!

The inspiration

Oh and I have a computer game that I absolutely have to recommend. If you don't normally like computer games, or you love them, if you like strategy games or manga, if you like really good stories or if you want great female characters in games, or any or all of the above, this game is for you! It's called Long Live the Queen.  The premise is, you are a newly appointed queen in the lead up to your coronation. You will face many challenges so you have to go to classes to learn to prepare for them. the classes range from Archery to Court Manners, Military strategy to Meditation, even Poison and Lumen (magic use). Every weekend an event will happen and you have to deal with it using your new found skills. But you spent all your time on dancing and not poison? Bam, dead. There are many ways to die, all in adorable manga illustrations. I only got to coronation after the fourth game, but there are so many new ways to die I can unlock... Oh and if it wasn't hard enough how well you do in different classes is affected by your mood. You need to balance your mood to match what you want to train in. And watch the story unfold. Also it's made by indie gamers and is really cheap. And I wasn't even paid to write this! Plus, if you get it maybe we can talk strategy together... ;)

Oops. Here is an example of failing at skills. This one hasn't led to my death yet...

After that brief intermission for gaming love, back to the outfit pictures. I do apologise for the awful background. We actually walked all the way to the nice park to take pictures, but when we got there found that the on switch on the camera had been knocked. It had run out of battery on the way there! Having to go all the way back to then charge it up I couldn't be bothered to go anywhere else, so these are just taken in the back yard. Apologies.

 Outfit details
Top: New Look
Skirt: Random independent shop in Edinburgh
Floral headband: Handmade
Shoes; H&M kids

In which I am pretending it is spring

This was one of those photo sessions where I was utterly freezing as we took the pictures. In between shots I was yelling at Andy 'Are we done now!?' because it was like ice out there. But you know it was necessary for sharing my tomboy look. Andy inspired this outfit when he commented that this hat was only on the blog once and he said "but you wear it nearly every day!" This little pink bowler is my way of turning a jeans and lazy day outfit into something cool. When I just can't be bothered I go for the hat and it makes everything cheery. So now it sounds like I laze around every day! Not quite, but I do like to put it on when I get home from work. When you are tired or have had a bad day the same effect as the lazy day applies - you can't be unhappy in a bright pink bowler.

I took this at the weekend just on the way back from a little shopping trip - that was both sad and successful.

We kind of bought-out Blockbuster. It's a film rental store that we have used loads since moving here. We both love films and like to try all sorts of things from rental places - even though Blockbuster had a rubbish selection. The firm have just gone under and were selling off all their stock. Maybe indeed because they don't even stock classics like Leon. All dvds were £2 each so we got about 11... It was an amazing haul - getting a Studio Ghibli film for £2 feels like such a win! Except that we will never borrow a film again. The staff there were under a serious shadow of depression at the store closure so our 'yay' cheerfulness at getting so much good stuff for so little was also a bit awkward. And now I guess we'll join Netflix or something.

 

Other thing that always makes me happy: my rainbow umbrella

Shiny, shiny glitter peter pan collar

Outfit details 
Hat: Camden market

Shorts: Got from my friend
Waistcoat: Matalan
Tights: H&M
Shoes: Asos
Shirt: Charity shop
Necklace: Gift from my Dad

In which I have made a sparkly peter pan collar

 I put this outfit together pretty much entirely inspired by the below photo of Vicki of The Magpie Girl. I love the matching colours and the pockets and pretty much everything about it! I remembered that I actually had a pinafore dress (or two) but I had started to think I look too childish in them and shoved them to the back of the closet. However now I am just embracing the childish look and going all out girly.

This outfit is made up of handmade and thrifted items. The top and dress are both from charity shops. My mum made the hair bow and I made my peter pan collar on Friday evening. It's made from a lovely sparkly black felt - and I have more of the same in a snowy white felt and black with big silver stars on it! I think it would go pretty well with my galaxy dress next time I wear it. I learnt how to make it from a tutorial on Runwaydiy.com and it is really easy to follow. However I need some fashion advice before going further and make many more.. I wore this all day but it kept getting bunched up or moved to the side. It would not stay in place at all! I know other people must have detachable collars - I see them in blogs and in the shops. So what do you do to keep a collar in place? Should I weight it somehow? Advice would be really appreciated.

The sun was right in my eyes so there are just a bazillion pictures of me squinting. Sorry guys!

Outfit inspiration from The Magpie Girl

I am so pleased with my handmade collar and the pink bows going on from the back!

Sparkles and buttons cannot be beaten. Really pleased with how simple and easy it was to do. If I can fix the movement problem I shall make several.

This is the walled cathedral garden that makes me think of the Secret Garden. We had picnics here last summer, but now it is rather dead looking. Usually this is all flowers.

There is a lovely jewellery shop I go to everytime I go to Edinburgh and all my bangles are from there. Although they are not always on this blog I usually wear a couple of bangles a day. I have so many I have a whole collection at my parents house and another pile at mine! These were 2 more I got last weekend. Plus turquoise nails!

I can't resist sharing photos from my visit to my parents. I got up early to go to Edinburgh in the morning and this was the sunrise view from their house. I do miss hills and dales when I am back in London.

And just to go with the snow, this is my Lego Invisible Man I made the other morning. I have so much Lego to share at the moment there is going to be a big Lego post later!

In which I have a birthday wishlist

It's my birthday in a couple of weeks so I thought this would be a good excuse to indulge in some online window shopping. I thought I would go ahead and share some of the things I have been eying up of late.

1. Galaxy tights.
I know this trend has been around for a while, but it looks so much fun to pair with a black dress. It is also one of those things where they cost so much that I always find myself thinking of how much more stuff I could get for the same amount, but perfect indulgence for a birthday. Right? 

2. More Lego.
 I can't deny that Lego have some freaking awesome sets out right now. My favourites are the Lego Gandalf + Cart set or Wethertop from the Lord of the Rings series. Or Wolverine, Deadpool and the Helicoper set, or the massive Harley, Joker, Batman circus set from the Lego Heroes series. There is also a really cool looking lighthouse in the Creator series. I drool over all of these in the toy shop. 

3. My ears pierced 
I used to wear earrings every single day for years. I had them pierced at 16 and then about 2 years ago one day they started bleeding. After wearing earrings for 6 years they slowly healed up. One is completely gone and with some effort I can still get an earring in the left ear. Seems an odd birthday wish because it's a lack of a thing, a hole that I am wanting rather than a thing itself. :)

4. New shoes.
I would like a new pair of every day comfy shoes for just being out and about + a new pair of comfortable heels for going out out. When searching for shoes I found the pervading presence of creepers fascinating. There were so many that there were a few lace up brogue-like ones that I paused over and considered. It shows how effective trends can be. Creepers are not my style. Or they are the style I wore as a teenager. I like to wear brogues as my every day shoes or other cute lace-ups and yet for a moment I was nearly convinced that I like something I don't!

This is the one I was tempted by, but it doesn't beat the blue sude shoes below a bit.

Night Out shoe contenders:
From Irregular Choice

 

Every day shoes:

Blue Suede shoes from Clarks.
 Actually looked and touched these in the shop yesterday. They are so soft! However as I live in Britain I am a bit afraid of getting suede shoes as they can get ruined in the rain. I know people say avoid wearing them in the rain, but again -Britain- it can look like a sunny day and then chuck it down. Any advice on this as I do really like these shoes?

Churnky brogues 'Luigi Shark Tooth' from Office They look really comfy and long-lasting. 

 Kickers red ankle boots from Asos. Again, comfy but possibly won't go with quite as much stuff.

And that is enough shoes!

5. Peter pan collar.
qtpiworkshop on etsy has loads of beautiful collars that are seriously tempting. Like this one:

6. Something cute like this!
Heartless Amigurimi from AnaZoe.

After all that though I am honestly a massive fan of surprises so if you are someone who actually knows me don't think of these as demands. They are mere wishes. I am not going to pretend to be one of those people who claim not to like presents. Presents are fun, as materialistic as that may sound, but I do especially love the anticipation. I love getting a parcel and feeling all the bumps and trying to guess what it is. How can that not be fun?
What do you think?

In which there are photography problems, but more cake

Once again I have had a terrible lapse in blogging. I hope I can make it up to you through an outfit post, pictures of cake and a small amount of despising David Cameron.

I really thought there would be a longer gap between the times I put up pictures of cake. I would like to claim that I have been ridiculously busy saving the world from evil. Instead the only thing I have been busy with is conquering the world, on Civilisation IV.

I did have a mini holiday-type-thing to Yorkshire. It was mostly to look at wedding venues, but I did get to sample Wedding cake Prototype 2. Now I did have a problem with my camera, but both lots of photos I am going to show you. If you are good with cameras please help me here. These photos are wrong. The colour of the cake is wrong. I also took some photos of me in a green jumper, below, and the jumper is blue. I held my camera over the sleeve and altered all the settings I could, the exposure, the ISO, anything that could be altered. It continued to show the jumper as blue and the cake as grey – when it was green and bright purple I was trying to capture. Any tips? Should I just alter them post-photography with some software another time?

So –the cake. This time it was thick chocolate, very solid and rich. The little nodules on the top were marzipan, rather than cake and we agreed, a little too small. The icing was much thinner than the previous attempt, but did get very sticky. There may yet be more attempts before we are done!

These outfit photos make me despair a little. The sun was shining too brightly to capture the pattern on the skirt and, as noted above, the colours are wrong. As it is I feel you can get the gist of yesterday’s clothes, not the full understanding.

This jumper is actually green

Being silly

Cameo necklace. This is actually broken and I have to fix it with pliers nearly every time I wear it.

Socks with bows make me very happy

Oh and David Cameron? Well he announced that young people shouldn’t have housing benefit in a stunning display of callousness. I have read through his entire speech on the matter and cannot even understand his logic as he contradicts himself. I am so filled with rage at the way the Conservatives are ruining the lives of young people with astounding ageism and ignorance that I found myself unable to sleep the other night. I was lying awake in bed thinking of all the reasons it was a terrible idea. I fear the future of this country where so many people truly believe that the benefit system is somehow cosy, without understanding what it is like to live without dignity and have barely enough to feed yourself. I truly hope that this is a half-baked idea to appeal to conservative idiots. I hope David Cameron remembers that under 25s can vote.

Now that I have got my rage onto the internet, I will leave you with a lovely shot of a ruined abbey in Yorkshire.