500 Japanese monks walking across a hardwood floor

Afternoon all! I hope that you stayed warm and dry over this past dismal weekend, if you’re in the UK , and that if you’re elsewhere that the weather was a bit nicer for you. For me, there was nothing for it but to hole up and wait it out. I can cope with the cold, and with the rain, but I didn’t fancy getting blown away over the weekend! That said, it was all very restful and lovely.

I had a bit of a stressful week last week, and the cold weather and everything was getting me down a bit. On Thursday I met my dear Louise for nachos and a chat at lunchtime, and after discussing Ditto Fabrics at lunch, I decided to treat myself to some Michael Miller Eiffel tower fabric when I got back to my desk. The afternoon was further saved by a lovely and inspiring meeting with my manager, and by Nic surprising me by meeting me at the office when the work day was over. It was so nice to break my routine slightly – instead of rushing for the train as I normally would, Nic and I went to pick a few things up in Ikea and took our time about getting home.

I was working from home on Friday and, while I got through my to-do list, my fabric arrived from Ditto and it went straight into the washing machine. By the time I had finished for the day, it had been washed and dried and was ready to sew!

 Rain forced me to abandon plans to see my friend Lucy, so instead I sat myself down at the sewing machine and powered through another Colette Patterns Chantilly dress. Well, I didn’t sew it all on Friday afternoon – I did some on Saturday and some on Sunday as well, but it was a very enjoyable sewing session indeed. I’ll write it up as soon as I’ve worn it and photographed it, but it’s a beauty even if I do say so myself! After a week where I was feeling stressed and a bit low, the restorative nature of making really perked me up and made me feel like myself again. So, today being payday, I put in another Ditto order!

Lots of my fellow bloggers have signed up for Zoe’s Me Made May 2012. I always enjoy these me-made months because I love seeing how folks incorporate their handmade bits into their actual, you know, lives. I’m not a consistent enough seamstress to have built up a wardrobe that can sustain a whole month so I’ve sat these challenges out in the past, but I have been thinking about it. You can customise the pledge, you see, and there’s really nothing to say that I can’t do it my own way. So I’m in, in my own way! Here’s my pledge:

'I, Roisin, of It can’t be from Dolly Clackett… She gave me an Easter Egg! sign up as a participant of Me-Made-May '12. I endeavour to wear at least two handmade garments per week for the duration of May 2012. In addition, I pledge to have sewn at least two more garments by the end of May 2012"

This feels manageable and realistic to me, as well as being challenging. I wanted to add in the bit about sewing two more garments because I want to make sure I remember to sew even when life is stressing me out because it makes me feel better. May is going to be a busy month for me for lots of reasons, but I will have time to sew, and I’ll certainly have time to rock some me-made items! Even without the two new dresses I plan to sew, I have enough to get through the month with no repeats, I think. I’m looking forward to joining in!

So, along with all of the sewing, the weekend was really really lovely. Nic and I had plans to see The Avengers with our friends A and H on Saturday afternoon, and then to go for dinner afterwards. The weather was frightful, but I thought I’d ignore it and wear a pretty dress anyway. I did wear a slip for warmth, though.

Stop Staring Sailor Dress and Irregular Choice No Place Like Home Heels 

Sailor dress of dreams! I love Stop Staring dresses, and I bought this one on ebay and then the weather turned horrible so it hasn’t had a proper outing yet. It’s marvellously impractical to wear; every time I put my coat on I had to get Nic to help me tuck the collar in.

But still, I feel fabulous in this. I put tights on for sitting in the cinema later, though. I always get so cold in the cinema!

I was unsure of what to expect of the film because I haven’t seen any of those other Marvel films. Not even Iron Man, isn’t that lame?! Also we were seeing it in 3D, and I am so sceptical of 3D. All reservations aside, I really enjoyed it – and despite having derided The Hulk that morning to Nic (“He’s basically like a less realistic Woof, isn’t he?”) I think I liked him best of all in the film. Mark Ruffalo was pretty great. After the film we went to Kayal for dinner and basically had to be rolled home, which was excellent.

On Sunday we holed up in the flat to listen to the wind rattle the windowframes. I sewed, Nic read comics and listened to jazz and we watched lots of episodes of the first season of Law and Order, which Nic had brought home for us. Early on, that show was great, and I confess to being really tickled by how explicitly the title sequence spells out the show’s concept. Like, in case the title left you somehow unsure of what the show was about, it’s spelled out for you in the title sequence. My love for the music of Mike Post increased by about 300% as well – there’s no slacking off with Post, you can’t say the man doesn’t work hard. According to the Law and Order Wikipedia page, the chung chung sound that indicates a scene change was  “an amalgamation of nearly a dozen sounds, including an actual gavel, a jail door slamming, and five hundred Japanese monks walking across a hardwood floor.” WELL PLAYED, POST. Nice work.

So that’s about it for the weekend. I have another busy work week ahead but a lovely long weekend to look forward to, some sewing, and some wearing of me-mades! See you soon for the first installment, and my new dress!

To the Regiment - I wish I was there!

Oooh it's rainy and horrible today, isn't it? I can't grumble about the rain because we need it, but this cold wind - I do NOT enjoy! I do have a few cheering things to think about though, and the weekend is nearly here with lots of fun things planned.

This week has been good blog-wise because I've been the recipient of two blog awards! So now I'm going to share the love and share some links.

Chris from Sycamore Stitches very sweetly nominated me for the Liebster - which goes to blogs with fewer than 200 followers. I'm meant to nominate 5 others and while I'm not sure how many followers each of these have, these are all fab blogs you should definitely check out!

Rehanon's blog Miss Demeanour is On The Make was brought to my attention by So, Zo and it's capital F Fabulous. Rehanon has some brilliant makes under her belt for one so new to sewing, and her turn of phrase is brilliant too. Follow her on Twitter (@mink_deville) for some major lols too - this is a woman who was busting moves to Prince so hard that she broke her shoe. That's dedication to funk right there.

(just to break this up with pictures, I'm adding in some rando phone photos from the last few weeks, mmkay?)

 Nick and Nora - a wee detail of Clackett Towers

Jill from The Sewalongs commented on one of my posts about Florida to recommend I visit The White Wolf Cafe, where she used to work. So I'll always be grateful for that recommendation, because that place was brilliant. She has some gorgeous makes on her blog, and I can't wait to see what she does with all that beautiful fabric she picked up in Cape Town.

Emma of Ol Green Eyes has the most beautiful photographs on her blog. I am seriously in envy of her perfect Irish rose looks, and I love how thoughtful each of her blog posts are. 

 

Nic and I visited a graveyard in Winter Park and it was full of these creepy weeping angel things

Cat of Tea and Feathers mixes up style posts with really thoughtful writing. She knits and sews, she has some fabulous birds, and she's always good value on Twitter as well (@koshkajean)

How cool is Joanne of Stitch and Witter? More than once this lady has made me totally re-evaulate my initial thoughts on a pattern - her amazing Colette Violets have had me swooning every single time.

Gillian of Crafting a Rainbow nominated me for a Versatile Blogger award. 

I was particularly touched that she said she liked the fact that I talked about my sewing disasters, too! Sometimes I worry that if you've come to my blog for a sewing blog you'll be disappointed, and if you come for any other reason sewing talk will be boring to you, so it was nice to hear that the ragbag approach I take appeals to some. I'm to tell you 7 facts about myself, but before I do that here are a few more Versatile Bloggers that rock my Google Reader....

Roobeedoo - I avidly read everything Roobeedoo writes, but I'm often a bit too shy to comment! Sorry, Roo! She's one of those bloggers who can make me really laugh out loud. I admire her style and her near-perpetual motion, and I love love love her knitting projects even though I am quite a crap knitter myself. 

 Hornsea Heirloom teapot in Autumn Brown. After looking for one of these for years in this colour, I found one last week in a charity shop for £2.50!

I had the absolute pleasure of meeting Handmade Jane at the Bombshell meetup in October and we got on like a house on fire. Many of you will know who she is anyway because she's such a star, but I couldn't not give her a shout-out here. 

Louise of The Princess Prudence Diaries is the epitome of Versatile Blogging - she sews, she collects, she photographs,she runs BeBopaLouLou Vintage, and she can eat nachos like nobody's business. 

What I wore to work yesterday - before all this rain, of course

It makes my day when Megan of The Fashionable Bureaucrat posts. For one thing, she is Canadian, and I love all things Canadian. For another, her shoe collection is nothing short of fabulous, and for yet another, she has this dress. 

I love Arlene of Dress Junkie, she's an absolute doll. She's another one whose photos are amazing. As well as gorgeous style shots and beauty reviews she blogs about her life and she's inspiring and riotously funny to boot.

Lauren LLADYBIRD - I have a confession to make. I totally have a blogger crush on you. Lauren is funny, talented and awesome. She sews cracking dresses and, having only just learned to knit, is sporting the most adorable hand-knitted cardigan. I'm in awe of her energy, and her blog posts make me snort with laughter every single time.

I don't have time to list all of the bloggers I love but I do have a blogroll on the right, should the fancy ever take you!

Okay, now seven things about me....

I have a terrible memory for some things, but an amazing memory for the lyrics of TV theme tunes. Lyrics in general, but for some reason TV theme tune ones stick the most. My favourites (if you're interested)are New Tricks, Pugwall's Summer, James Bond Junior and The Wire. I also like to make up lyrics to those that don't have lyrics like The X Files and Fringe. So, yeah.

 I'm not going to lie. I still love Pugwall's Summer

I'd like a dressmakers dummy because I know that they're totally practical and everything, but the idea of having a headless, limbless torso on a stand in my house makes me feel really uncomfortable. I might feel differently if I lived in a bigger place and could put it somewhere that wasn't either my living room or my bedroom but yeah - they do freak me out a bit.

Perhaps related to the last point - and I might have raised this before on here - but I find serial killers really interesting. Less so now than when I was younger, but when I was a teenager I was constantly reading books about people like Peter Sutcliffe and Fred West. My mum and my grandma are the same, so I blame them a wee bit. When I was at home over Christmas and I was reading a boring book, my mum gave me a book to read about Fred West instead. FESTIVE.

 Look Janet, there's Robbo

I have a really stupid sense of humour. Like, it's not at all sophisticated. Nic and I nicknamed a character in a TV programme Robbo for no reason, and now every time he comes on screen all it takes is for one of us to say Robbo and the other one dissolves into tears of mirth. Yeah, I laugh at smart comedy too but fart jokes get me every time. I love grafitti as well - the worse and stupider it is, the more it will make me laugh:

 My shitty journey to work on Cross Country trains

 Gifs absolutely slay me, particularly this one:

Seeing tender father-daughter moments on the TV make me properly weep. I'm very close to both of my parents, and this always makes me feel homesick. So, Denise going into labour in The Royle Family? PASS THE TISSUES (although my dad is nothing like Jim Royle) Melanie joking around with Ken in Early Doors?TISSUES PLEASE.

Related to the stupid sense of humour point above, I can very easily waste hours by watching funny videos relating to Star Trek: The Next Generation on youtube. I'm not a Trekkie, not really - I love The Next Generation but have no interest in the show outside of that, but show me a video that someone has made compiling all of the times when Worf has been denied, and you'll see someone gasping for breath because they are laughing that hard. Ditto evil Picard playing his flute.

And that's only six because I can't think of any more, and there's a glass of wine waiting for me. Thanks again, Gillian and Chris!

She used to like it when they had them feet at the beginning, soon as they stopped that she lost interest.

Happy Monday, everyone! I'm not long home from work, and I'm all cosy with a mug of coffee. Today is the first day in weeks that I've been home at a normal time. It's the first day in weeks that I haven't been in an all-day meeting, so it felt almost like a treat to be able to sit at my desk and get through all of the delightful admin that had been piling up in my absence. Well, almost a treat, you know.

Because of work being so busy it's been all quiet round these parts. I had to work in London on Friday and was home late, and on Saturday was up for a quiet day. Nic and I took the bus over to Kenilworth to have a poke around the charity shops (nothing much of interest there) and coffee and a cake with SJ in Sweet As. The sun was shining and I was in the mood to flounce, so out came the crinoline and a wee dress that had arrived in the post from Pin Up Parade earlier in the week:

Bettie Page Cheers dress and double t-bar shoes from Topshop

I just love the fabric this dress is made from. I have a weakness for novelty prints, and this has lots of stylised cocktail glasses on it:

The dress was in the sale, and paid for almost entirely out of paypal funds so it feels a bit like a freebie (although, obviously it isn't, like.) I had to buy a size bigger than I normally would because that's all that was left, so when it arrived I took it in all over and took the hem up by about 2 inches. It's still a teeny bit big in the bodice, but a bit of ease in a summer dress is no bad thing. I wore this out to the pub on Saturday night, and of course I was drinking cocktails! I was a little bit put out, though, when there was a whole hen party in dressed in a similar style - they were dressed in fancy dress pretty much how I was actually dressed. Sigh. Oh well!

Due to the numerous cocktails, I spent all of yesterday recovering. I didn't think I'd had that much to drink but I suppose cocktails are deceptive, so yesterday was a bit of a trial. It has to be done sometimes, though! I do have a few wee outfit shots from the past few weeks that I've been meaning to share and I'll never get around to it if I don't do it now, sorry to stuff them all into one post!

31st March - River Island dress, Primark platforms and Nica bag

Another crinoline shot! I saw that Annebeth of The Styling Dutchman had put a crinoline under one of her River Island prom dresses, so I gave it a go too. My Paris print one is in fairly heavy rotation so I got out a more spring-y one. I'm not sure what's going on with my hair and makeup here - I look a bit more done than usual! I wore this out to dinner and to test-drive these shoes from Primark:

Aren't they pretty?! They were also suprisingly comfortable for platforms...

Sunday 1st April - Sewaholic Lonsdale dress, Melissa Amazonas sandals and Ness Ebony bag

I wore this to the pub for Sunday drinks with friends, before it got really cold again. I love this dress so much and it inspired me to get my arse in gear to make my second one!

Saturday 7th April - Laura Lees for Topshop dress, star print tights from Topshop and Irregular Choice Serpintime heels

This is one of my favourite dresses EVER. I don't wear it that often because it's quite old now and I'll be so gutted when it gives out. I have so many happy memories associated with it. It's covered in embroidery like this:

There's also a skull and cross-bones on there somewhere. I used to wear this when I was a teacher and my kids were absolutely fascinated by the embroidery.

That's your lot for now - apologies for the bombardment! Now, I'm off for an exciting evening of ironing, chippy tea (yum) and Scott and Bailey. Have a lovely evening, my darlings!

More successful sewing: Sewaholic Lonsdale dress

Ever since I sewed my first Sewaholic Lonsdale dress last year, I've been meaning to make another one. I wear my Lonsdale dress loads - it's really comfortable and so cute, so I thought it was high time to add another one to my wardrobe.

The fabric suggestions recommend not using stripes or plaids, presumably because matching them might be a more complicated proposition for cutting on the crosswise grain. I don't know. I do know that, as far as a a casual summer dress goes, my concern about fabric matching is minimal, and gingham = spring (even if the weather hasn't caught up with that yet) so gingham it was.

I picked up some poly gingham from my local fabric store for £4.99 a metre, which is cheap enough and while the quality isn't perfect, it's grand and it washed nicely. My only irritation was that I couldn't get it to press into crisp folds, but the upside of that is minimal wrinkling! So that's a win, really. Construction-wise, the Lonsdale comes together really nicely. This would be such a fun and satisfying project for a beginner because Tasia's instructions are so clear and the techniques are very intuitive. I particularly like her method of finishing the waistband inside the bodice and I have gone on to use it in other projects, most recently my Colette Hazel dress.

Inside my Lonsdale

The only alteration I made to the pattern was to shorten the straps and to sew them down at the back. This is purely for practicality because I love the bow detail on the pattern and on my first Lonsdale, because it's so pretty. However, it does make getting dressed a two-man job. You need someone to tie the bow. I mean, it's physically possible to tie it yourself, but if you do that it looks like you tied it yourself. Also, it's killer on the arms. Trust me, I've done it. I'm a fussy so and so too, so every time I've worn it poor old Nic has had to retie it two or three times (at the very least) before it met my approval. In addition, in our climate being able to wear a cardigan is pretty important. I'd sew the bow again, but this time I decided to give it a swerve:

Stitched-down straps, and the top of my hand-picked zipper

I'm going to stop teasing you now and show the whole dress. I sewed this up on the rainy Saturday of the Easter weekend but it was just too cold to wear it straightaway. The sun peeped its head out for a few hours on Sunday past so I grabbed the opportunity to wear it and ran with it:

Worn with Charlotte Russe Madison wedges... I couldn't resist the double gingham. Look into your heart and tell me you would have been stronger. I KNEW IT.

Now, as I said above, I didn't bother to try to match the gingham up, so it doesn't match. I think it looks good all the same, though, so I don't care. The only thing that bothers me ever so slightly about this version is that the gingham behaved differently enough to the cotton I worked with last time that the bodice fits slightly differently, hence the wrinkle between my bust and my waist. That being said, some ease in that area is no bad thing and it came in very handy after the enormous dinner I had on Sunday night with Nic, Lysy and The Scientist. So, there's that.

I did take some photos of how the dress looks with a cardigan but the wind was messing with my hair, so my derp face is too distracting in them. You'll just have to imagine it. So here's a picture of the back view instead:

I didn't think it was possible to have a derp back, but apparently it is! The straps are good though, yes? But I probably need to take some length off the bodice if I make this again in a similar fabric. As I said above, the extra ease comes in handy and most of the time in this crappy weather I'm likely to be wearing a cardigan over this.

As the bodice is self lined, this dress has only a few seams that need to be finished. I opted to finish them in my favourite way, by turning and stitching them:

It's quick and easy and neat, and you can read some advice on how to do this in Tasia's post here, if you like.

I sewed this up in one rainy Saturday afternoon. No messing around, no stress. This is another happy dress. I see Tasia has a few new patterns in the pipeline, I'm really looking forward to seeing what she comes up with next.

One last photo and then I'm off. I need to be drinking a wee glass of wine and watching some Made in Chelsea. This long-ass-week is taking it out of me, but lookit how happy and gingham-y I was on Sunday:

 Oh yeah, like you wouldn't do the same damn thing?!

Successful sewing: The Cod Afrique Hazel dress

So, hands up folks. Who among you (sewing) people did a little squeal of joy when Sarai from Colette Patterns announced their SS12 range would soon be available? And then did a big squeal of joy when you saw how adorable they were? YES I DID TOO. I immediately fell in love with both of the dresses, Lily and Hazel. The timing was fortuitous because, having seen So Zo's fabulous African cotton dress, I'd been inspired to dig out the beautiful African cotton that had been languishing in my stash since 2010.

According to the selvedge, the designer/design is Veritable Top Finale, but I can't find anything useful on the internet about it. I bought this from Dreyfus in the Marche St Pierre in Paris when Nic and I were there on holiday in June 2010. I was drawn to the table of waxed cotton when I saw all of these beautiful African ladies in beautiful clothes shopping there, and Nic spotted this print. It was very cheap - I think about two euros a metre, but when I got it home I wasn't sure what to do with it. I think I also misremembered it - in my head it was really heavily waxed, Barbour jacket style, but of course it's nothing like that at all!

I bought and downloaded the Hazel pattern on Thursday morning and, as Nic was away from Thursday to Saturday I knew I'd have a clear run at sewing this without being antisocial. While my fabric was washing on Thursday night I assembled the pattern. I drank rather too much wine on Friday night to think about sewing so I sat down to this on Saturday morning. It was all done bar the shouting, so to speak, when Nic got back at 5 o'clock, and I'd gone out for a dander in town partway through the day. This pattern is so sweet and easy to sew from, and the African cotton is a delight to sew with as well. It doesn't get all creased, but it does hold a fold really well. It's quite crisp, so probably wouldn't work with a more drapey style pattern, but it was perfect for this. The only main adjustment I made to the pattern was to line the bodice, rather than fart around with facings:

This decision was partly because, as I said, I don't like farting around with facings. Also, I was a tiny little bit concerned that the bodice might be a bit see-through because the base colour is white. It isn't see-through, but I'm glad I lined the bodice anyway because it meant that the gathering at the waist seam was all neatly tucked away behind the lining. I lined this using a cotton pillowcase I'd dyed turquoise a while back so everything required from this pattern was already in my stash - win! The only other, tiny change I made was to cut the skirt pieces to the length for the largest size because I wanted this to sit on my knee.

And here it is! In honour of the African fabric, and of some of my lovely musician friends, I've named this my Cod Afrique Hazel dress. I'm really happy with the fit, and the finish of this dress. The last few finished objects I blogged about weren't finished to the best standard I can do, but that was fine because both of those - particularly my yellow vintage dress - were more about getting me enthusiastic about sewing again, and that worked. This lady, though, she really deserved to be made up with care! Pleasingly, even with me taking my time, this frock was really quick and easy to sew up. I'll definitely sew from this pattern again (and, probably, again and again and again!)

And yes, POCKETS! So obviously that makes the dress even more adorable. I loved the instructions for inserting the pockets, as well - so easy, and the pockets are the best I've ever done. Sarai is a drafting genius. I really like the placement of the straps, as well. If you look very closely you can see a tiny bit of my bra peeping out, but the placement covers bra straps really well. The other adorable detail is the sides of the bodice being cut on the bias:

This detail works really well with this fabric. I love how dramatic the print looks on the bias.

I really like the way the bodice seams come down to a point. It's sort of lost in this busy print, but I know it's there and that's all that matters.

I still have about a metre of this fabric left and I'm thinking it might look good as the top half of a Macaron, what do you think?

So, basically, Hazel is a sold-gold winner. So much so that I'm very seriously considering buying and downloading Lily. I have all sorts of ideas for both of these patterns, and I can see me wearing this version a lot in the summer. It's ever so comfortable. I'm really delighted to have found the perfect pattern for this beautiful fabric, and to have a dress so filled with happy memories from our holiday in Paris.

So, that's it for now but I will be back in the week with another finished sewing project. What can I say, I'm on fire at the moment! Happy rest of the weekend to you all, my dears.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and I proved it in 1973.

Yo YO. I've left it rather longer than I meant to, this blogging lark. Since the weather turned so cold and miserable, I wasn't that keen to go back over my holiday photos, I suppose! Also I have been having a majorly lazy Easter weekend - Nic and I had planned to go to the coast to visit his folks but for various reasons couldn't, so I have had a hectic schedule of lazing around to be getting on with.

So, yes. When I last wrote I was telling you about our stay in Thurston House. We were staying there on Friday night and Saturday night, and we woke up on Sunday morning feeling quite sad about the prospect of leaving. After another delicious breakfast, we decided to go back to Lake Lily Park to feed the turtles and to check out the farmers' market that happens there every Sunday. The market was lovely - there was a woman playing guitar and all of the stalls set up in the sunshine gave the whole thing a festival feeling:

Maitland Farmers' Market

It was just at the end of strawberry season, and these were absolutely delicious. Eating these in the sunshine is a very happy memory!

As we stood on the boardwalk feeding the turtles a family approached us, asking me to take a photo of them- the couple got engaged on the boardwalk and they were taking their baby daughter there for the first time! They repaid the favour by getting one of me and Nic, which I think is the only proper one of the two of us together on our holiday:

We stopped at one of the stalls and bought some cheesecake cupcakes (yes, you read that correctly) as a thankyou gift to Carole and Joe, before reluctantly heading back to Thurston House to check out. Joe very kindly took us back to Winter Park to the Best Western, and we spent the early part of the afternoon chilling out by the pool. Our room had been upgraded to a poolside room with a balcony for the final part of our stay, so after squealing a little bit at how lovely it was, we went back out into the sunshine to explore Winter Park Village. I did a little bit of shopping, and we went to our first proper American supermarket because we're cool like that.

 Trying on my new frock from White House Black Market...

Hanging on the balcony

Earlier in the day, I had slipped over and muddied my dress (messing about by the side of the lake) so, as I was getting changed anyway, Nic and I decided to get a wee bit dressed up and head into Winter Park to see what was happening on Sunday evening.

Trollied Dolly Pushing Daisies dress and Charlotte Russe Madison wedges

So, it turns out nothing was happening in Winter Park on Sunday evening! Well, apart from some fool busker wailing outside a restaurant on Park Avenue. Sigh. Still, it was lovely to have a walk in the dusk, and we decided to cut our losses and go back and watch the Mad Men season premiere in our hotel room. Well, after we had black bean burritos on our balcony - YUM!

Dusk in Florida 

I was happy to be able to watch Mad Men, especially as we don't have ordinary TV (far less Sky Atlantic) at home, so I knew it would be my only chance to watch it before it comes out on DVD, but watching it with constant ad breaks kind of wrecked my head!

Monday was our last full day in Florida and I was torn between wanting to do loads and wanting to just enjoy relaxing - particularly as I knew the flight home would be difficult. So laziness won out. Nic and I had a dip in the pool before breakfast and then spent most of the morning on the balcony reading:

 

My holiday reading matter...

The afternoon saw us ready for adventure so we decided to go to Orange Avenue to check out a comic shop and a vintage shop that Julian had recommended to us. This involved taking a bus and again, my nerdy side came out in full force because I was excited to see how public transport works in Orlando. I know, I am such a loser. Sadly, the comic shop was closed and the vintage shop was not all that, and the bus we got on to take us back broke down after about 100 yards. Still, it broke down outside the White Wolf Cafe and, as reader Jill used to work there, we decided to go in for a coffee. It was awesome, and went straight to the top of the list of places I definitely would go back to Orlando for:

We had just a light snack and some coffee, but it was a really enjoyable place just to while away some time. The owners buy and sell antiques and the bar is full of Tiffany glass. They have live jazz nights and, much like the Milk Bar we'd visited earlier in the week, the White Wolf had a really laid-back and bohemian vibe to it that I really enjoyed. If you're in the Orlando area I can recommend a visit - why not pick up some records in Rock and Roll Heaven across the road, then stop into the White Wolf Cafe to look them over.

We had only a short amount of time when we got back to get ready for dinner. Julian was taking us to Paxia in College Park for some Mexican food and tequila-based drinks. Paxia was very, very cool. The food was delicious - including the strange-sounding but amazing-tasting tortilla ice-cream we had for dessert. It was also two for one on Margaritas, so I had my first (two) of those. Julian took us for a little spin around after dinner, with the hope of catching another comic shop on late night opening (sadly it was closed) and I was genuinely really sad to say goodbye to him when he dropped us back at the hotel. He was an amazing host and I hope one day we can return the favour.

Our flight was in the afternoon on Tuesday so we had some time to have a leisurely breakfast and soak up our last Florida sunshine:

 Making the most of the lovely lake behind our hotel

Then, sadly, it was time to go to the airport. Seeing as we never made it to the Kennedy Space Centre, I had my photograph taken with a large plastic astronaut:

To balance things up, Nic had his photo taken with Spiderman:

 
I won't bore you with the details of our flight and return to Leamington except to say that JFK airport in New York is a shithole - we had a 2 hour layover there and at nine o'clock at night everywhere except the duty free (where I bought some Prada Amber perfume - yay!) and Dunkin Donuts was closed. AND DUNKIN DONUTS HAD RUN OUT OF DONUTS. So, whatever, New York. You can make it up to me later. I fell asleep on the plane to My Week With Marilyn - turns out it's the perfect film to doze off to, not because it's boring but because it's gentle - and before we knew it we'd landed in the sunshine in Heathrow. It cost us about a trillion pounds plus a kidney to get back up to Leamington and we were greeted at Leamington station by some shirtless guys (and I was all "put your shirts on, it's only, like 13 degrees, also PUT YOUR SHIRTS ON, YOU'RE IN PUBLIC", but in my head) and then to bed. Our lovely, sunny, wonderful American adventure was over. I can't wait to go back.

So, that's it about my Florida holiday. I've not been doing much since we got back, but I have taken a few wee outfit shots and I've even been doing some actual sewing.

I'm just waiting for some warmer weather to show this off. Until then, my loves.