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Tuesday, 30 April 2013

Double Take - Mother Edition

When the lovely people at Marisota sent me this dress to review: (post here):


They actually sent me two! I asked what to do with the extra dress, and we came up with the idea of a Double Trouble post, with me and my Mam. My Mam saw me in this dress and immediately voiced how it was "Her colours" and how she wanted to have the dress. This way, we both got what we wanted!

This morning, I styled it with a grey blazer:


My Mam styled the same dress, in the same size, like this:


Adding a purple cardigan for warmth, and because, she said, it matches the colours perfectly:


You can't argue with that!

If I'm honest, I'd have liked to see my Mam in the 18, rather than the 20, but I know she would not have felt as comfortable in that, as she did in this size:


On me, the peplum highlights the waist, covers my VBO (visible belly outline), and fits well over my bust and waist. On my Mam, there is a lot of loose material, but I know that this is how she feels most comfortable. 

Come the summer, I know she will forget the leggings, and instead show off her great bare legs, as at 5'7, she is shorter than me, so it sits just below the knee. 

She loves the print, and the fit of the dress, without it being too daring and although I think a size smaller would suit her better, I have to admit it looks cracking on both of us!

Thank you Marisota, for giving my Mam the chance to offer her opinions on this dress - and now we have to check to make sure we're not wearing the same dress whenever we meet up :)!

Much love my lovelies, 

K x

Wednesday, 24 April 2013

Confidence booster?

After my long break from the main office (roughly 6 months), I returned a virtually changed person. I was confident, stylish and happy. I still am. But since my return, there has been a definite shift in how I'm treated by my colleagues. 

In the past, I was frumpy and fat. Now, I'm more fabulous and fat!

I get compliments (mostly from the girls in the office), which was UNHEARD of prior "the break".

But then, there are the men. Whereas in the past I was part of the furniture, having been here coming up 5 years, now there is a undertone to their comments. It's like they've suddenly noticed me, and now they're trying to make up for lost time. Either that, or in the past I never considered that these comments were directed to me. 

It's things like lingering looks, the smutty comments, and "Your dress wins the best dress today" / "I see you're wearing red lipstick today sweetheart".  You know, the usual patronising, sexist comments. 

One of my good friends in the office though, further complicated my return to the office by asking that I didn't message him, talk to him, or smile at him, until he got over his 'crush'. Wait. Is it MY fault? What have I done to warrant this attention / these comments? Nothing. In a nutshell.

I don't dress provocatively at work (not that it should matter); I can only think that this is down to my confidence. But their comments, their 'banter' is not helping my confidence levels, and while I do call them out on any comments which make me feel uncomfortable, it is only since I've returned to the fold. 

I am not in any way saying this to 'brag' or 'boast' about the comments and the attention. This is me trying to make sense of the change, and also how I feel about it. In my self, I don't want to go back to being the frumpy lass in the corner, but neither do I want to be the objectified Joan Holloway of the office. 

If I was to say this outloud, I'd probably be told to be grateful for the attention, or thankful that they think I warrant the comments. But that is still not okay.

I'll let you know how this develops. Although any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Much love, 

K x


Monday, 22 April 2013

Shruggate response

This last week has been a little odd on various levels. Like today, and getting asked to boost social media for the company we work for. Like last week, when I spotted someone doing something unethical, and called them up on it. 

I was also challenged on my use of shrugs.


These photos have all been taken in the past week or so. It is April. It's rather cold up here in the North East, and working in an office with heating / aircon issues, I never know what to expect. 

I wear these shrugs as a permanent piece of clothing through the day, and often throw a boyfriend cardigan on top of it. 

When I was heading out to the DIY event, it was in a warehouse, by a river, where again I didn't know how my temperature was going to settle! I opted for no coat, but this shrug as the next best thing:


Now, Claire mentioned that she thought it added bulk to me. Whether it does or not, I don't really care. I'm not out to make myself look smaller - what would the point be in that?

Also, I'm arm proud, and more than happy to bare my arms, I just don't want to be freezing when I do it!

My shrugs are all from ExciteClothing in a variety of colours:


But my heart really belongs to the humble cardigan:



My favourite at the moment are those from Little Miss Delicious, and I'm waiting on this to arrive in Navy:


So you see, whether I wear shrugs or cardigans, or go bare armed, it's for a reason. And that reason is my own. 

I hope you don't think I'm attacking anyone with this, simply explaining where I get the shrugs / cardigans from, and hopefully, explaining things a little.

Much love my lovelies, 

K x


Monday, 15 April 2013

Friday On My Mind

After a blumming amazing week at work, I was looking forward to a night in with a curry and my Sky+. Ah HA! Not to be - I was lucky enough to have plans to head to a DIY BYOB venue in Newcastle called Heart Attack and Vine:





I've said before, and I'll stress it again, I'm not a muso journalist. Buttttt Hannah Darcy, radge Queen, was on form with her angry acoustic guitar clashing with her beautiful vocals. Tissue Culture, who describe themselves as shouty stroppy bairns, use some great shouty guitar noise dark, alongside some beautiful melodic light. 

The band we were all there to see though, was the 'Dead Grotty' EP launch for Retriever:


Retriever were a 3 piece and a drum machine, who have developed into a 4 piece, no drum machine. 

Thanks to Hannah D'Arcy for the picture

I danced and bopped and just made a bit of a fool of myself really!

There was a whole thing about being on a date by accident - but that didn't stop me giving the bands the love they deserved - I think Hannah might have got a little bit more than anyone deserved, but never mind!

Now, you're going to a DIY venue, and really don't know what to expect... so you wear something that is an assault to the visual senses, don't you!


This is the cartoon / 80s print dress from Sorrento Plus. I LOVE that this print is so intense, I've not really looked that closely at it yet. It's like a magic eye picture that look at from the corner of your eye!


And this was me back from the night out - a little skull as a gig ticket - perfect!

The sweetheart neckline, the skater skirt, and the print, made this dress a perfect new addition to my wardrobe:


And with a Friday night like that one, I'll be sure to be heading back to Heart Attack and Vine - and BYOB also includes soft drinks - for the record ;)

Much love my lovelies, 

K x

Friday, 12 April 2013

Marisota Edit

When the lovely people at Marisota asked me to chose an item from the site to review, I was torn between two items:



I had a suspicion that the prom dress would be a great fit and would suit my style of preferred office wear. But, having just taken part in the #psbloggerschat, which that week had been trends. There were a lot of tweets in praise of the peplum and so I went for the Edit Print Peplum dress.

 I was so excited when it arrived, my instagram feed was bombarded with images:


The print immediately got a LOT of love and compliments - before I'd even tried it on!

When I did eventually try it on:


It was met with mixed reviews. I was unsure of the fit, wanting to try it with a different bra and to actually put some tights on! The main thought was that the peplum got lost in the print - that if it had been a contrasting block colour, it would have popped out a little bit more. Some thought if the neckline was a little different, it might look better. 

I wasn't willing to give up on it that easily:


See, tights and a better bra seemed to have made all the difference!


I went for the size 20, and found the fit perfect. The dress is a mix of 95% polyester and 5% elastane, which made the dress stretch without losing shape or print.


The skirt sits like a tube skirt, with no annoying riding up when walking (a massive pet peeve of mine!), and the peplum moves nicely when stomping around the office! 

If it wasn't for the peplum, this dress would make a mighty fine bodycon, so for anyone wanting to try bodycon, but a little self conscious, give this peplum a try for a bit of a taster!

The length is just about knee length on my 5'10 frame - although when sitting down, I did have to pull the skirt over my knees, but with the stretch in the material this wasn't a problem.

I swanned around the office effortlessly in this dress. I didn't have to worry about the belt slipping, or showing too much cleavage. I didn't have to readjust or fidget.

I was complimented a number of times on the vibrant print, on the cut of the dress and the usual backhanded compliment of 'you look slimmer' was rolled out once or twice but that is for a discussion another time.

I did try the dress with a belt, just for laughs and giggles:


And yes, you can see what I think about this from the look on my face! Worth a try though :)

Much love my lovelies, 

K x

This item was sent to me to review, but my words & views are my own

Monday, 8 April 2013

The Magnificent 7th does Monochrome


The Magnificent 7th is a new fashion challenge, which will be posting on the 7th of each month (hence our name!), and the aim of the challenge is to create an outfit to fit a theme or a topic, ONLY using clothes & accessories from our wardrobes, and yes that does mean digging deep into the depths and finding those long lost clothes! Hopefully one of us won't end up in Narnia, but you never know with a bloggers wardrobe!

Now, the observant amongst you will be looking at their calendars and thinking "but it is the 8th?" - yes, I am a day late in posting!

The theme this month is Monochrome. Something I thought I would be able to manage, given the past love of black. And actually, I really struggled!

My first outfit was one that immediately popped into mind. It is a dress my Mam gave me a month or so ago, mainly to use when singing with the choir (as we have to wear black & white). Perfect:

Dress - Donated, but originally from Sainsburys
Shrug - Excite Clothing
Belt - Charity shop
Tights - Gifted from Simply Be

Erm, no. 

I wore this to work on Tuesday, first day back after the Easter break, and with the purple tights, shrug and necklace, it failed at the Monochrome. Also, that belt really didn't work with it.

Oh well, live and learn. 

Wednesday saw me really get into the Monochrome though:



Skirt: Collectif

Same with the failed attempt, I waltzed into work rocking the Monochrome. A colleague even said that it looked bright and colourful, even though it wasn't! How perfect is that!

I added a grey jersey blazer, from ASDA last year:


And of course, when doing Monochrome - red lips are a MUST!

Much love my lovelies,

K x

Make sure you check out the other Magnificent 7th bloggers:


Thursday, 4 April 2013

Scarlett & Jo: Skater LOVE

There are times, when you see a dress, either in a store, online or on the back of some lovely people, and you just KNOW it was meant to be worn by you. The colour, the cut and the detail, all speak to you. 

It might sound silly, but that is what fashion does, it makes you realise that the right clothes are out there, and when you find them, you KNOW. 

And when I saw this Scarlett & Jo (an amazing collection for Evans) dress on Rosie at a blogging event, and later on Becky

If you saw this post, you'll have seen me trying this dress on in Evans in the Metro Centre. We just happened to be walking past it, and I wondered if they had this dress in stock, as I wanted to try it. When it slipped on easily over my head, I knew it was going home with me to my wardrobe!


I had a Diamond Wedding Anniversary party coming up, and wanted something a little bit different - and this fitted the bill perfectly. 

I wore it with my studded colour necklace from Simply Be, black tights, and Viva La Diva T Bar shoes in Navy.



This was on Good Friday, which had been a frantic day of painting - which is the clothes you see on the chair in the background. Oops!

The fit and the cut of the dress in the 22 was perfect on my 46"-41"-50" measurements. 

The dress is obviously, rather low cut, and I was hoping to maybe get to wear this to work at some point. So, the following morning, I tried it on with a cami underneath:



As you can see, this is now perfectly respectable and, frankly, adorable for wearing to any number of events - work, shopping, tea with my Grandma... :)

This dress was £40, but at the moment, Evans have a 24% offer on. Go grab yourself a BEAUTY of a dress!

Much love my lovelies, 

K x

Tuesday, 2 April 2013

Mr "Tee" Shirt...

As part of my shopping spree last weekend (more information on how it went, here), we ventured into Primark. 

Both Rachel and I wanted to have a gander at the homeware section, which meant venturing past the Menswear section. 

Now, you'd think after my success with this shirt, I'd be a little more inclined to give the menswear section a chance. This trip to Primark will certainly make this a little easier in the future!

We were sucked into looking at the tee shirts by their bright colours, bold logos and well, EVERYTHING!!

I managed to snap up 2 tees, which came to a grand sum of £10! WOW! It would have been £10 a tee if I'd got them from ASDA. £20 if I'd gone to Evans for them. 


I have to say that this is my favourite, a FUJI tee, which goes perfectly with my bright red Collectif skirt (for info on the black skirt, lookee here).

My other tee was this:


A wonderfully abstract printed tee WITH POCKET!

Just ideal to mix up my tee with skirt look a little! 

It goes without saying that I'll be paying attention a little bit more on the Menswear section in future!

What about you? Do you make a habit of checking the "dark side" of the shop for bargains?

Much love my lovelies, 

K xx