And life goes on

I've been hunkering down in a world hushed by snow, digesting my sadness in bite-sized chunks. And I'm doing surprisingly well, really, all things considered.  Day by day the pain is losing its jagged edges. I've just passed a whole day without shedding a single tear, although it still doesn't take much to choke me up. 

We're trying to establish new routines to replace the old ones which involved our beloved fur-baby, but we keep seeing her out of the corner of our eyes, and I can often hear her phantom-snoring behind me while I'm typing away. We find ourselves rattling around Dove Cottage's rooms, where her absence echoes and bounces off the walls.

Lagging behind with my blog means that she was still very much with us in the days I am writing about in this post and it's weird to think how blissfully unaware we were of what was to come. 

Picking up where I left off, let's start with what I was wearing on Friday the 22nd of January.

The temperature, which had climbed into the low double figures in the preceding days, had taken a bit of a dive, but at 7°C it was still slightly too warm for this vintage wool-blend dress. With its vibrant watercolour print, its abundance of pinks joined by steel blue, sage green, yellow and red, it was love at first sight at a charity shop many years ago.

It came with a self fabric belt with a transluscent pink plastic buckle but, as you're probably used to by now, I preferred wearing it with a contrasting belt from my stash, from which I picked this moss green suede one. More green appears in the turban hat my brooch lady is proudly wearing.

Shades of purple were added too, a darker hue for my necklace and a lighter, lavender one for my cardigan. To the latter, I pinned two floral hair clips in lieu of a brooch.

After our usual weekday fruit & yoghurt breakfast, Jos was off to the newsagents for our and our elderly neighbour's daily paper. Meanwhile, I repaired the ripped lining of a pocket in one of my Winter coats as well as a small snag in my Nordic style cardigan.

Then the lure of the charity shops proved once again too strong, so we drove down to the big three-floored one in Duffel, where we went our separate ways.

The clothing department had apparently just been restocked and the rails were bulging with stuff so it will not come as a surprise that I didn't leave empty handed.

One of the first things that caught my eye was the flower patterned cross-body bag, which I was delighted to discover was made from cork (top right and bottom left). 

I also found the tiny and slightly tacky souvenir brooch from Holland, containing all the usual suspects: a typical Dutch clog with a windmill design, filled with a miniature bunch of tulips!

The blouse, with its William Morris style pattern, is by Barbour, a fact I only discovered back at home. Although its label had been removed, I found the name proudly displayed on its buttons!

But that, obviously, wasn't all. The next day, Saturday, I dressed up in all the rest of Friday's finds.

The amazing pair of palazzo trousers was hiding among the skirts. In addition it was put into the rail's XL segment by mistake and it was only because of its sprinkling of flowers that I pulled it out. Further investigation determined that not only was it completely lined, it had pockets too! No brainer!

A bright green light-weight jumper was lacking in my wardrobe, so that came home as well. As did the slubbed long-line cardigan with its mix of colours, the black woven belt with its round two-tone buckle, and the chunky red necklace! 

The day's weather went from bad to worse as the day progressed. It had been grey all morning and by early afternoon it started to rain, the dampness making it feel much chillier than the 5°C indicated by the thermometer.

Dusting the treasure filled Tomado shelving unit in our bedroom, I took down the Art Nouveau style family tree photo frames, which had been standing empty ever since I found them at a flea market back in January 2017. When I showed it on the blog all of four years ago, I mentioned that it would soon be filled with old family photos. The champion of procrastination, I am!

On the very top, my great-grandmother Aloysia, whom I never met since she died in 1946. She is a bit of a mystery and we believe that she may have been at least half Dutch. 

The row below her has my maternal grandmother Bertha, whom I once honoured with a post of her own. Next to her, her husband Alphonse. They both passed away in the 1970s. 

Finally, on the bottom row, are my Mum, Alice and my Dad, another Alphonse, Fons or Fonny for short. Both are not longer with us either, as they passed away with 15 years between them, my Mum in August 2001 and my Dad in the same month in 2016. 

There, much better, isn't it? The rest of the shelving unit's contents might be the subject of a future post. A show-and-tell, so to speak, does make you look at things with fresh eyes and appreciate them all over again.

With no let-up in the rain, I settled myself on the couch and continued reading the book I'd just started. A recent charity shop find, I was enticed by the Maggie O' Farrell reference but, although it was a good read, it didn't reach Maggie's heights at all. Initially, there were traces of  Lynne Reid Banks' The L-Shaped Room too, but seeing that the latter is one of my favourite books, it once again did not quite live up to expectations.

Sunday rolled along and brought bright Winter sunshine with her. The thermometer was still stuck at 5°C but didn't feel quite as chilly with the sun's rays warming, if not our bodies, then certainly the cockles of our hearts.

My own internal thermostat, cranked on high as a result of the menopause, has lately cooled down enough for me to start wearing jumpers again.  I'd originally consigned this King Louie cardigan to the flea market boxes as I'd mistakenly washed it at too high a temperature, but I took it out again and it turned out to be fine once I'd stretched it by putting my arms through its sleeves.  It's a bit shorter than before, but I think I can live with that. 

I pinned a pearly brooch at my neck, and wore a necklace of blue and green beads, some of them wearing jumpers of their own! They tie in with the colours in the floral pattern of my vintage skirt, which was an old Think Twice find. To create a more elongated silhouette, I added a sea-green belt at my waist. 

The sun streaming in through our front door's glas panel and fanlight brought Spring vibes to Dove Cottage's dining room. I'd just put on a fresh tablecloth, a vintage one I found at Think Twice in October 2016. Just look at that happiness inducing print of Summer flowers on a deep blue background! 

I went a bit mad with my camera and snapped some odds and ends and hidden corners in Dove Cottage's dining room and hallway. The glass lampshade hanging in the latter is a family heirloom from Jos's childhood home.

The small cabinet with its glass door and side panels was a charity shop find, and the treasures residing inside also deserve a closer look in a future post.

Here's our dining room again, taken from the other side. The doorway to the right leads to our kitchen. In front of the window, which offers a view into the passageway leading beside the kitchen, you can catch a glimpse of Phoebe's scratching post. She was an avid post scratcher and demolished several of them during her lifetime. It's been relegated to the basement for the time being. 

More details, from top left: a vintage spice cabinet hanging, perhaps incongruously, in our hallway, a Christmas ornament featuring a glass deer which we keep out all year, a green glass vanity set bought at a car boot sale in Cardigan, and a doily-an-button wall hanging, a handmade gift from my lovely friend Lynn.

By the time I'd finished taking photos, all traces of sunshine had gone, leaving the usual dismal grey January day in its wake.

I spent the rest of the day reading and rummaging, starting a bag of charity shop donations. I even went through my flea market boxes, adding some non-vintage items to the bag. But as usual, those boxes proved to be a danger zone, as these two dresses went straight back into my wardrobe. Oh well, in my defence, I have already worn the one on the right in the meantime.

I'll leave you now in the usual way, urging you to stay safe, sane and fabulous! I can't believe it has been almost a years since this has become our standard way of parting ...

Bumbling along

Although I'm feeling much better by now and the tears have dried up for the time being, my mood is still a bit all over the place. I'm fidgety and unable to settle to anything, and I'm feeling as if I've been just bumbling along lately.  Sometimes, hours seem to have passed and whole mornings wasted away without having done very much at all. The strange thing is, I can think of a million and one things to do, but I simply can't seem to get started.

My non-working days get kick-started by our usual fruit and yoghurt breakfast, which is then followed by one of my greatest pleasures: choosing my outfit for the day! But lately even that seems to take longer than usual. I'm endlessly dithering over what to wear and when that is finally decided, choosing my accessories often involves a lot of trial and error until I'm happy with the result. This eternal indecisiveness really does my head in.

No doubts about this dress, though. A Think Twice sales bargain back in  March 2019, in a mix of solid green and white on green chevrons, it instantly caught my eye when I opened the wardrobe doors on Friday before last. Wearing my favourite colour always makes thing better!

There was also no doubt that I would be wearing red with it, so I started by replacing the dress's matching belt with a red vinyl one with a large plastic buckle.  I think I tried about five red beaded necklaces, though, until I finally decided on this one. 

The floral brooch, which includes Edelweiss and Gentian, is vintage and was a flea market find.

On my wrist, a red plastic bangle and chunky green bracelet, a charity shop find and a rare retail buy respectively. 

The red suede shoes are Tamaris and were charity shopped as well.

The weather that day was another mix of clouds, patches of sunshine and the odd shower. 

We were on our way to the garden centre when we passed the charity shop on the outskirts of our village. As the car park seemed relatively empty, we decided to go for it, so we donned our masks, grabbed a sanitized cart and tentatively walked inside.

Even though all shops here in Belgium have re-opened on 18 May, this was our very first visit to a charity shop since before lockdown, as we'd decided to wait until the first rush to the shops was over.

This particular shop which, as most charity shops here in Belgium, is a lot larger than the average UK charity shop by way of comparison, was an oasis of calm. Being back there felt strange and familiar at the same time, and Jos aptly remarked it was a bit like being on a school trip.

While Jos bought a coffee from the vending machine in the cafeteria, I browsed the well-stocked clothing aisles, quickly finding a cherry print dress from retro label Zoë Loveborn, and a funky print long-sleeved River Woods top.

We'd already added the set of Miss Marple DVD's to our cart after we'd just walked in and I grabbed the three-strand necklace form the jewellery display on our way to the checkout.

As everything went smoothly, it was a positive experience overall. So much so that in the meantime we have visited two other shops which we considered spacious enough to be safe.

We continued to the garden centre, where we bought another batch of bread mix and a box of copper tape to safeguard our precious patio plants against the onslaught of slugs. I was very good, as only one plant came home with me: Agastache 'Apricot Sprite'. It's got the tiniest of orange flowers and apricot scented leaves.

As we were treated to a rare patch of sunshine, we had another mid-afternoon snack of homemade scones with jam and cream, which we enjoyed at our little table in the courtyard.

Taking advantage of the lull between showers, I did some well-needed deadheading and tidying up, finding a pair of Siamese twinned Osteospermums and the first flower in our ancient Clematis viticella 'Etoile Violette'.

Saturday's weather couldn't have be more despressive if it tried. Grey, rainy and windy, and with a temperature drop of several degrees, a return to long sleeves was the order of the day.

I rescued this vintage skirt from a box of unsold flea market items back in April and, funnily enough, I wore a similarly coloured blouse with it back then, only with short sleeves. There really is no rhyme nor reason to the seasons!

The flower infused blouse I wore with it on Saturday is Esprit by way of a charity shop. Both the belt and wooden beads were charity shopped as well, while the brooch was yet again a flea market find.

After lunch, we went into garden to put copper tape on some of the worst affected pots. I removed the sorry remains of the Petunias from the Echinacea pot and replaced them with a pink small-flowered Pelargonium we bought the other week.

Meanwhile, Jos did some pruning and trimming, which included removing some of the wild shoots from our Spirea shrub, so that we can now see the table of plants next to the bench from our kitchen window. However, soon it started raining again which put an end to our gardening plans.

Fully intending to do some dusting, I traipsed upstairs, making a start with the desks in our spare room. Apart from a thorough clean, they needed some clearing and reorganization of the accumulated clutter.

I'm writing my blog posts from our main laptop, which we've acquired just before lockdown. This is the one with the blue spotty cover fashioned from a vintage tablecloth. It is sitting on our main desk, which also has our scanner/printer as well as an old-fashioned desk lamp. Our old laptop, which I'm still using to upload my photographs, is sitting on a desktop custom made by my late Dad, fitting neatly between the main desk and the bookcase, which is off-screen on the right. The funky fabric is hiding an unsightly fuse box.

On the top left and bottom right are toddler photographs of me and Jos, while our homemade mouse mat has a collage of family photographs from both sides.

The tin on the bottom left used to belong to my Mum and has been roped in to house USB sticks.

In fact, there's a whole battery of boxes and tins providing storage for a multitude of items.

All were charity shop or flea market finds, except for the one on the top right, which was a gift from Tania, one of our favourite flea market sellers.

This tin, which came with a tiny key, holds a selection of family photographs ready to be scanned. It might look a bit worse for wear, but aren't those decorations delightful?

Sunday's weather was a complete repeat of Saturday's. 

My journal says I did some deadheading in the drizzle, washed my hair, removed the residue of the orange nail polish from my toenails in readiness for a new colour which didn't happen, and caught up with the world of blogging.

To lift the overall dullness of the day, I opted for this pink Diolen delight, with a print of yellow and orange green-leaved flowers.

For my accessories, I couldn't choose between these colours, so I decided to use them all: yellow for my belt, orange for my ring and flower corsage and green for my beaded necklace.

Sandals have been banished to the back of the shoe cupboard for now, and I'm once again embracing ankle boots. In this weather, I have been known to wear nylons, but decided to be brave and go bare-legged that day.

But whatever the weather, the garden remains a true sensory delight, and a sight for sore eyes, even if it can only be enjoyed from our kitchen window!

Here's to hoping for sunnier days to come, in every sense of the word.