Dreamcoat

Coming back home from sunny, blue-skied Bruges on Saturday the 8th of November was a bit of a let-down, particularly since I was plagued by that pesky cold I told you about a couple of posts ago.

Having said our goodbyes to Veronique after breakfast, we were expecting to get home well before midday.  However, as extensive roadworks were taking place in the north of Antwerp that weekend, our Satnav decided to make a detour via Brussels, making our journey just that little bit longer.

I wasted no time in getting our stuff unpacked while Jos went food shopping in the afternoon, but then I started feeling unwell, a tickle in my throat announcing the fact that I was coming down with a cold.

I thought I'd escaped the worst when I felt reasonably well upon getting up on Sunday. 

It was mostly overcast with the odd sunny spell and highs of around 14°C. Still, I didn't leave the house all day, catching up with blogland and gearing myself for the ordeal of going back to work on Monday. 

As for my outfit, I opted for a comfy skirt and blouse combo, with both the grey and red tartan circle skirt and the King Louie blouse supplied by the gods of the charity shops.

I enhanced the tiny pops of red in my skirt and blouse with a wine coloured beaded necklace and elasticated belt with massive white metal buckle (both charity shopped). I was wearing not one but two brooches that day. The plastic cat brooch got the company of a red-hearted white metal one which I used to tame the collar of my blouse.  

By mid-afternoon it became clear that I spoke too soon. My scratchy throat might have done a runner, I was now suffering from an alternately blocked and leaking nose, lots of sneezing, watery eyes and an annoying and persistent little cough. Not fun at all. 

There was nothing for it but to join Bess on the sofa. 

It was a wrench getting out of bed at an ungodly hour again on Monday, particularly as the day promised to be a mind-numbingly gloomy one. Courtesy of my cold, I was feeling a bit zombie-ish but otherwise ok. As usual, there was lots to catch up on at the office, but I'd managed to get through most of it by the end of the day. 

Which was a good thing as Tuesday was the 11th of November, Armistice Day, which is a public holiday here in Belgium.

Again, it was dark and gloomy and, although the day's highs of 10°C weren't too bad at all, again I didn't leave the house all day. 

My cold was still very much present, but there's no rest for the wicked, as I actually had things to do.

But first things first: I was wearing a burnt orange polyester dress, closing with a zip at the front. The zip pull is missing, but I can't be bothered to replace the zip, especially as it's still in good working order. Replacing the zip pull is out of the question as well, as there's hardly anything left to attach it to. But then I had the brainwave of using a single, orphan earring instead.

The dress's print has bottle green in it, so I piled on the green accessories. 

Just before we were off to Bruges, I was contacted by Patricia, a lovely lady who lives in our village, is into vintage and always buys lots of stuff from my flea market stall. She'd asked if she could come around for a rummage some time and we'd agreed on Friday the 14th; Making use of my day off, I spent it going through my flea market boxes and wardrobe(s), selecting some items I was ready to let go.

More about that later ...

Meanwhile, it was back to work on Wednesday, which was a rare sunny day with a balmy 16°C temperature. As my cold, which had taken a backseat on Tuesday, was back with a vengeance, I went to pick up some cold relief medicines during my lunch break, stopping for a rummage at Think Twice on my way back to the office.

Obviously, there was no way I could leave this gorgeous orange handbag behind!

Although there are no less than five Think Twice (or T2 as they are commonly known) shops in Antwerp, I do not visit them all on a regular basis. Most of my purchases are made in the two shops which are only a couple of minutes' walk from the office. 

A slightly longer walk takes me to the shop in Antwerp's vibrant Kammenstraat which offers a refreshing alternative to mainstream shopping with its array of independent boutiques. In spite of the gloom and impending rain, this is where I was headed during Thursday's lunch break.

My self-imposed coat ban proved to be futile when I came face to face with this stunner of a coat. Nevertheless, I hummed and hawed before deciding on its purchase as it's got a couple of issues. When I finally took it to the check-out, I ended up chatting to the shop assistants. It was at that point that my beloved sage green beret, which I'd taken off in the fitting rooms, must have fallen out of my bag. I only realized I'd lost it when I was going home that night, but I had no idea where. Fast forward to three weeks later, when I visited the shop again and was stopped and asked whether the beret was mine. They'd kept it for me all that time and I couldn't have been happier to have been reunited with it. The girls were duly rewarded with chocolates!

It was only when I got the coat home that I discovered a Bernat Klein tag inside. A bit of research revealed that Bernat Klein CBE (6 November 1922 – 17 April 2014) was a Serbian born textile designer and painter. Based in Scotland, Klein supplied textiles to haute couture designers in the 1960s and 1970s, and later sold his own clothing collections. Here's a link to the Bernat Klein Foundation if you would like to find out more. Please do not blame me if this makes you go down a rabbit hole like I did.

His obituary in The Scotsman was calling him the colour wizard of the Scottish textile industry who brought tweed to world's catwalks. 

And I've got one of his coats for less than € 30!  The photo doesn't really do it justice, but I'll show it to you properly once I've fixed the partly detached lining and slightly wonky hem.

Edit: I've added a close-up of its glorious tweed, taken when light conditions were better.

Anyway, after this short on and off working week, Friday the 14th of  November rolled along in no time.

It might have been gloomy and mizzly outside, I had no intention of leaving Dove Cottage's cozy confines anyway. I spent the morning compiling a rail of clothes, making sure to include some coats and jackets, as that is what Patricia was after in particular.

We chatted over cups of coffee while she was browsing and adding more and more items to her pile of likely candidates. After trying things on, she ended up buying two coats, three jackets, three dresses and some blouses!

My dress, with its glorious mix of abstract stripes on a burgundy background, is an old Think Twice find acquired pre-blog on a Friday afternoon shopping trip with my friend Inez. 

Although the stripes invite it to be accessorized with almost any colour you can think of, I often opt for turquoise, even if that colour doesn't actually appear in the dress's print. The flower embossed belt and the turquoise-rimmed floral brooch were charity shop and flea market finds respectively. The necklace, however, was a sales bargain from the high street last Summer.

Although at 16°C it was still unseasonably warm, it was a dismal and utterly wet day we woke up to on Saturday.

I spent the morning pottering around upstairs, folding away the unsold items in the flea market boxes which live in the built-up cupboard in our bedroom.

It was almost inevitable that one or two things ended up back in my wardrobe, case in point being the dress I wore that day. I know, what was I thinking?

My accessories were having a hard time competing with the dress's exuberant flower garden pattern. In the end, I opted for off-white in the form of a beaded necklace, vintage flower brooch and chunky plastic ring. 

We were itching to go for a rummage at the charity shops after lunch, but as Opnieuw & Co., our local chain of shops, were having a Christmas event which we wanted to avoid at all cost, we drove to the small charity shop in Reet instead. And no, I didn't find a single thing!

Back at home, we went to feed our neighbours' cats Bobby, Billie and Pip, as their personnel was off gallivanting around Paris.

This was followed with a cuddling session with our very own pampered little feline!

Yet another dismal day awaited us on Sunday, but as it looked set to remain dry, we were adamant to go for a much needed head-clearing walk. The temperature had halved over night, leaving us with highs of just 8°C, which were much more appropriate for the time of year.

Our walk took us to the park in the nearby town of Boom, which is only a 15-minute drive from home.

The earthy, musky-sweet scent of Autumn leaves greeted us once we stepped through the gates, and surely there's nothing like a good old crunch through a deep pile carpet of them to lift the spirits.

 

Apart from the odd dog walker, the utter greyness of the day must have kept people at home, so that it wasn't hard to imagine being somewhere far away from humanity, with only the trees in their Autumnal splendour and the resident waterfowl for company.

There's a brook running through the park, interspersed by one or two shallow waterfalls whose frothy cascades of water adds to the magical atmosphere of the park.

Much to our delight, when we got home it was still light enough for outfit photos without having to rely on harsh artificial light, which I'm sure is the bane of many of us at this time of year.

My dress, which is yet another old Think Twice find, is a thin yet deceptively warm one in a wool and polyester Trevira blend. Its dark green background is enhanced with swirls of orange and greyish green. A sage green long-sleeved t-shirt was layered underneath.

Again, I used a brooch (picked up from a flea market in Carmarthen, Wales) to tame its collar. Both my necklace and belt were charity shop finds.

There's nothing much to tell you about the working week that followed, apart from the fact that it remained gloomy and mizzly, with temperatures between 5 and 7°C.

There was the usual cappuccino catch-up with Inez on Tuesday, followed by a round of the rails at Think Twice, where I fell for this green and yellow tweed skirt.

Then, on Wednesday, I ran into an old friend I hadn't seen in person in at least 40 years. He'd moved to Spain many years ago and we lost touch. However, we subsequently reconnected on Facebook in 2009, which is why we instantly recognized each other when we were both walking along Antwerp's main shopping thoroughfare. 

I couldn't stop smiling for the rest of the day.

So, that's if for now. I'll try and squeeze in a final November update before Christmas. 

See you soon!