Not such a relaxing weekend!

Well it's been a long weekend here in the UK and today is the last day, but I've had more time off that most, but I haven't been relaxing, far from it!!!!

I had transformed the tip and junk room that was my dining room into exactly what I want a beautiful, fully useful dining room and even though I swore and injured myself, and ached like hell, I wallpapered for the first time, hated every minute of that, I sawed and mitred corners for the edge of the floor, I painted, and did I mention I ached?

Here's the big reveal, just like on all those DIY shows....

See a previous post for what this room looked like before it's quite a transformation!

As you can see it's red and grey to fit in with my dinette set, but I was so nervous about the grey, which actually I picked up from the curtains cos the curtains matched the dinette and it's hard to take a dinette into the DIY shop to colour match ;o) However I'm really really happy with the grey I think it really works but I was aware it could have gone horribly wrong, it's a funny old colour grey....

Here are some of the close up details, below is my sideboard, with some of my favourite bits on, a coffee set which we were given for our wedding (20 years ago this year eeek!), a painting by my lovely husband, and a lamp given to us by friends in San Diego.

I had been looking for curtains to go in this room for ages, something that matched the colours and design of our dinette and I was super lucky some months ago when I found these, I think they match pretty much perfectly!

The only thing which isn't done yet is the light fitting, see below, given to us by some lovely friends, sadly it needs rewiring so that will have to wait for another day, but it's going to look amazing once that is up and it's all finished!

As if that's not enough I had another super lucky find this week! I have been looking for a cabinet to put my record player on and stereo in FOREVER, well ok maybe a year or so, I just couldn't find something that would fit in with our other stuff but be just right for what I need and be small enough to fit in the corner, but big enough to do the job, you can see why it's been a problem, oh and affordable too!!!!

Well I went out to lunch on Tuesday, and spotted a second hand furniture store down a side street not far from my work which I have never seen before but apparently has been there for about 5 months. I thought oh well I'll have a look, and there it was the ideal bit of furniture, it's not terribly exciting as a piece of furniture but I can't tell you how excited I was! So last night, I set it all up and after all the work I've done, I got drunk and danced around the living room for most of the evening!!

The first picture is of it is next to my record cabinet, fab eh?

And there she is, I need to tidy the cables, but I was slightly intoxicated when I set it all up and though it best to do that when sober ha ha!

I could now do with a loooooong weekend to recover, instead today I will rest, relax, sleep, eat, not get dressed and generally recover, who needs a gym, just decorate!!!

Hope you like it and hope you all has a fabulous break over Easter

Appreciate what you have!

As a vintage collector/user of all manner of things, clothes, shoes, furniture, you name it, if it's my era and I love it, I'll be coveting it! But the problem with being a lover of these things is that despite the fact that I do try to sell things on I no longer use, I have a lot of stuff I have, live with every day but just don't appreciate.

I'm sure many of you recognise this situation, I'm sure most people who love vintage stuff suffer from this particular malady! So I was just thinking this morning, after spending the morning trawling ebay and 'watching' a load more stuff, that I really should appreciate what I have too.

Here are just a small selection of my particular favourites!

My beloved cocktail bar which has seen lots of moves, lots of different locations but I'll never part with it!

A new addition to our family, I actually got 2 of these, non-matching sadly, but super cheap for the price they normally go for and both gorgeous!

 These is my most favourite lamp, we bought it in a store in LA, we saw it, loved it but it was a little out of our normal spending range, we left it drove away and then turned round, went back and bought it. But then we had to ship it, we packed it really well to ship home to ourselves, it arrived and it was broken in two, we were so sad, but had it restored - more money! - and now it sits pride of place!

I love these little book ends!

 ooooh I really love this, my bargain of the century I think! A gold glitter bar stool, really comfy really heavy duty, just gorgeous, how much did I buy it for? £15, yep lucky eh? And that was only last year!

Another bargainous find and gorgeous, my lovely 50s coffee table.

This little lady has been with me for years, she sits on my bedside cabinet and makes me smile a lot.

I was lucky enough to buy this as a whole set many many moons ago and really do appreciate having it.

I LOVE my g plan sideboard, converted to TV cabinet! It was in very worn condition when I bought it, but again I got it at an amazing price and just treated it with love. A more stylish TV/entertainment cabinet you couldn't wish for!

 So why am I constantly searching for new things when I have so much to appreciate!

I guess it's the nature of collecting and loving these items.

So I challenge you to look around you today and appreciate the things you already have!

Saturday round up!

Well I have many things to report about today and it's only 3pm, lordy!

First up I wanted to take part in MaryDeluxe to list your top 5 vintage finds, I saw Leigh Ann from Voodoo Stitches took part and I thought mmmm how should I do this? There are top 5, top 5 bargainous and recent, top 5 vintage clothes, top 5 vintage shoes, you see my point?!! So I thought I'd start with my top 5 latest bargainous finds, these are not my all time favourites but it's proof that you can collect fabulous vintage things without forking out a fortune so here goes

1. My new and expanding collection of stag design glasses  - Total cost for all about £20, that's 6 sherry glasses,  6 shot glasses, 6 liquer glasses and 6 tumblers!

2. Some fabulous 1950s fabric I bought before Christmas, there is nearly 6 yards, plenty for a dress and bolero, including postage from the USA it cost me the princely sum of about £9!

3. Oriental chalkware couple, 99p from ebay!

4. Cocktail tray £2 from charity shop!

5. Red confetti lucite earrings from ebay 99p

We're all saying how expensive vintage stuff is getting these days but there are still bargains to be had out there and even on ebay, you just have to keep your eyes peeled!

So that's me started

I've had a stupidly busy week, I'm doing a lot of different things at the moment to make ends meet, but one of my favourite part time jobs which I started this week is working for Miss L Fire shoes. I'm only doing a few hours a week for them and mostly from home, but I will be popping up there occasionally and I did so this week. I have to say being surrounded by fabulous shoes is awfully distracting when you're trying to have a serious meeting, thankfully Lynsey, Sammi, Dami and Francesca all understand the distraction of shoes!!

Again I saw all the new releases coming up for Autumn/Winter, I promise as soon as I can I'll give you a preview, but meantime, my favourite shoe from the Spring/Summer collection, I will have these shoes, do you think I may be tempted to spend all my wages on shoes ha ha!

Also if you're interested I have an amazing 1930s kitchen cupboard I just put on ebay, if I had room I'd keep it but we don't. It's so stylish and sturdy I really do wish I could keep it, still I do hope it finds a good home!

It's stunningly warm in the UK at the moment and has been for the last few days, it's a pure joy, sadly I choose this time to treat my lawn for moss, actually that's not true I'm killing the moss to sew seed to make a lawn! I really am not exaggerating, so I can't sit in the garden as you're not allowed to walk on it whilst it takes effect, ah well! I'll post photos when I finally get going on the garden, it's been sorely neglected since we moved in and it wasn't good when we did so I have a lot of work to do this summer eeek!

Nothing else to report, hoping to get going on some sewing this weekend if I get chance but I'm rather snoozy at the moment so unlikely to get any done today!

Don't you just hate it when....

You break something you've had forever, especially as it's survived 50 or 60 years already and then you're the one who breaks it?

Well we lost something yesterday, it was no ones fault, it's so windy here in the UK, my husband opened the door the wind blew it and totally blew over our cat vase ornament off the ledge near the door :o(

It was smashed to smithereens so not a hope in hell of fixing it. I looked all over my computer to find a pic I'd taken of it cos it looked great next to the curtains I made in the hallway but couldn't find one anywhere. There is one on ebay for sale so this is what it looked like, sad!

We won't replace it, especially as this one is up for £79, crazy money!

Anyway I feel a teeny bit better today - at last - apart from being awake half the night coughing, but still don't feel quite so much of a zombie today. I thought I would do something useful. I wanted to sew all the cushions for the living room, I'm ashamed to say I made the curtains 2 years ago!! Anyway I got 4 done, then I was just too knackered to finish another couple, I guess I'm not 100% yet, but I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out!

Here are the cushions on the sofa near the matching footstool that I recovered the other week.

And a close up

Sewing the bobble trim on made it a little more complicated but I like it!

Here is the cushion on one of our wooden chairs, near the matching curtains

I'll finish the other 2 in the week, won't take much doing.

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Talented guy!

I said I'd let you know when the very talented guy I know who sells repro chalkware was selling on ebay again, well he's selling now! There's quite a few on there, some have already gone, sorry for being tardy, however he told me he's releasing a lot of new models so keep an eye out for what he's releasing in the future.

I have several of his chalkware pieces, they are really lovely, well made and the best repros I've ever seen. Here are some that he has on ebay at the moment, I know he packages really well and ships all over the world so if you're in the US and want to bid don't worry! They can all be found here http://shop.ebay.co.uk/wigantamla/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p4340

I really want the next one for my bathroom!

Really how talented is he?! Thanks to Ray I had the courage to repair some of my own chalkware realising it was easier than I thought, which I was happy about as I had broken the base of one of my favourite lamps, now it looks like new!

If you want to check out some of the chalkware I've bought from him, click here for a previous post!

Loving what you have - part 3!

I haven't been blogging much lately as I'm a woman on mission! I've been building my business for so long I haven't had time for anything else and I have so many things that need doing or sorting in the house that I've finally decided to make a huge list and I'm setting myself a date goal to get things done by, pretty ambitious huh?

So please bear with me during the summer it's going to worthwhile, well for me anyway!

So this weekend we did something very boring but necessary, we painted our garden fences, boring huh? But boy it looks much better out there.

Today I went through my kitchen cupboards having a big old sort out getting rid of things we never use, and sorting through and photographing my dinner services of which there are 2 almost full sets. I LOVE them and wish I had somewhere to display them so I could see them more but back in the kitchen cupboards they have gone, well for now anyway! I'm sure I will discover all sorts over the coming weeks so I'll make sure I photograph as I go along!

First up is my Alfred Meakin Midnight Star Dinner Service, I can't believe I have so much of this, yet there is more to get, I got most of it cheap and in one go, I know, lucky me!

I LOVE the shape of the soup bowls!

Here's a close up of the teapot, love love love the star pattern!

Next up is my Alfred Meakin Stag Dinner service, it's in the rarer blue colour, you don't see this around as much as the red, so it's been hard to get additional items for it. We actually bought this as a whole set years ago at an antique centre.

Here's a close up of the design, again I love it!

Next up is a lovely desert set again from Alfred Meakin, can you see a theme here? Yes I love Meakin, sometimes I don't even know what I'm picking up is Alfred Meakin yet I look underneath and there is it. My mum even has a dinner service from the 50's which is not really my kind of thing but I've always kinda liked it, only last year did I look underneath so see who made it, you guessed it good old Alfred Meakin!!

Anyway we're not huge desert eaters so this doesn't often see the light of day but recently it's been english strawberry season, I sincerely believe English strawberries are the best in the world! Anyway strawberries and cream eaten out of this set just makes it extra special!

This is absolutely one of my favourite designs, here's a close up of a plate I have, it's the only plate I have of this design apart from the desert set above. I love the colours and the design!

The design is also called Bill and Ben, this makes me giggle, which will only make sense to British people of a certain age!

Next up, not Alfred Meakin - well I dunno it doesn't have a mark on the bottom but I don't think it is - are a set of 4 plates which I just can't bear to part with, I don't know why I keep them apart from that I love them!

Next up is something I had in my 'for sale on ebay box', I have no idea why, it's very cute!

And also came in VERY handy after painting the fences in the hot sun on Saturday, once we'd showered the muck off, drunk loads of water, we filled it up with Pimms, Lemonade and loads of fruit and ice, YUM!

How good did this taste after an exhausting day of hard work?! Yep you guessed it DAMNED GOOD!

Loving what you have - part 2!

My husband and I were talking this morning about a chair we used to have years ago, I have no idea what happened to it, we must have sold it, we have bought and then sold so much in the past 20+ years. Then it occurred to me that as someone who has been collecting mid century clothes, homewares and music for this long sometimes you forget what lovely things you already have, you are constantly searching for the next thing, believe me it's habit after all this time!

So I went around my home this afternoon and took pics of some of the things that go largely ignored but actually give me joy when I remember to look at them. I hope you like them too.

This Hula Honey sits on my bedside table, I love her. They have done so many of these recently in plastic but she's an original and made of some type of pottery, she's sadly got a couple of chips on her hair flower and at the end of her ukelele, but this just means she's been with me for a loooong time!

I also like the detail at the back with the little pineapple at the base!

This is one of those little ornaments that sits on a cabinet and you realise you haven't truly looked at it in years, it's rather cute isn't it, very 50s in colour and style, I have dragged him out and put him in a more prominent place!

These are the most fabulous drinks coasters in their own container. Again I forget I have these even though they are always there! Sad really cos they are lovely.

I have got loads more in the house that I know I don't appreciate enough - or in fact even notice! - but sometimes doing a post like this helps me to appreciate those little things I already have!