Rule Britannia

I've been a bit quiet of late - mostly because I've been wearing the same things over and over and also because I've been feeling a bit of a mess. However, in an attempt to cheer myself up, I decided to get in the mood for the Jubliee with this Red, White & Blue maxi dress. It has detachable straps so can be worn bandeau stylee - which is probably not that appropriate for work. I don't need the girls popping out to play.

I think next time I wear this dress, it'll be with a red cardigan, but I toned it down a bit today with navy.

 Excuse the even crapper than normal photos - I appear to have the shakes!

 Jersey striped maxi dress (20) - Peacocks

Navy Cardigan (XL) - Gap

Navy Jewelled Sandals - My Sister 

Coral Reef

Oh sunshine, where have you been all of my life? Any excuse to get out the maxi skirts and dresses and I am happy.

I fell in love with this skirt - mostly the colour of it and the fact it looked really easy to wear. Plus it was a bargain, so I was sucked in.

The plan was to wear it with white, but could I, for the life of me, find a white top this morning? I'm not sure the black really works, but the skirt is still very summery and I'm sure it'll feature a fair bit if this sun thing we've got going on, hangs about.




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Coral Jersey Maxi Skirt (22) - Matalan (similar)

Black Vest (18) - Dorothy Perkins

Black Cardie (18) - Matalan

Leopard Sandals - Dorothy Perkins

Necklace - Fairytale Fashion

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Pretty Flamingo

Thanks all for your comments on the disco leggings, they are staying in my possession and will make an appearance at some point, although possibly not until the end of July on my aforementioned hen do. Matt thought I looked like I was wearing tin foil, so it's good to hear some more sensible views :)

Also, as you may have noticed, I've kind of given up a bit on the bloggers challenge. I find it really hard to post every day. Photo's I can cope with, like the Instagram challenges (I'm @linzerello if you are on Instagram), but writing a daily post has just been a tad hard to keep up with as work has been crazy busy of late. I am not good at giving up on things, so there may still be the odd post on it at some point!

So - onto a new dress. I fully blame Louise for this one :) When she posted it on her blog, it was love at first sight and given Dotty P's had a 25% off code, who was I to argue?

I am not sure the size is quite right on me as the top is a little loose around the arms, but I am sure I can get that fixed fairly easily. The dress itself is amazing, it's a good length and the skirt is gorgeously full. If I had any weddings to attend this year, this dress would be a definite contender.

 Swishy

Dress (20) - Dorothy Perkins

Naby Leggings (XL) - Store 21

Navy Cardigan (XL) - Gap

Peep Toe flats - H&M (similar)

Can I wear these?

I know these are really bad photos, but I just can't make my mind up. I love these leggings and I want them for my hen do, but, can I get away with them? My plan is to wear them with a long black vest (like the picture perhaps) and a peep toe heel. Maybe a slouchy blazer too.

My hen do is in York and since I don't get dressed up very often, this seems like the perfect excuse. I'm a Northerner and find that down South, people just don't dress up as much I used to for a night out!

I know you can't really see much from this photo, but you get a bit of an idea. I wouldn't be wearing the red shoes and I'd hopefully be less of a mess...
So, Ladies,  Yay or Nay?
x

Lipsticks and Moustaches

Today's bloggers challenge was "your brightest lipstick". I spent ages trying to find the perfect red lipstick for a pasty, blue eyed blonde.

Eventually, I settled on "Lady Bug" from Mac. I love this colour. I think  it works pretty well with my colouring but I do find red lipstick very high maintenance. It get's everywhere, you definitely need a lip liner and constant reapplication.

Moustache Necklace - FairyTale Fashion (i.e. my sister)

Red and White Stripey top (20) - Tesco

Moustache & Eye Ring - Topshop (similar)

Lipstick - Lady Bug by Mac

Oooh and check out my moustaches.

Something you wear when it's sunny

Day 17 of the bloggers challenge - something you wear when its sunny. This one I can do.

Sun, I think I remember what that is. We have it sometimes in the UK, but usually we need to escape this little Island in search of it. There are 2 things I can't live without on the rare occasion we see the sun.

1 - Havaianas. I'm a flip flop snob, no other flip flop will do. So comfy and so many different styles. I may need more.




2 - Sunglasses. I've 2 pairs of Ray Bans, which I love, but I'm after some more funky ones this summer too (is funky a really naff word??) I can't bear squinting. It's bad for wrinkles.




My niece bought me these. I actually love them :)




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Bloggers challenge 15 &16

I'm struggling with some of these posts, but I am stubborn and I hate to give up on something once I've started so I've been wracking my brains for inspiration.

Day 15 - Nail varnish collection

Well for starters, I never paint my finger nails. On the odd occasion that I do, it looks like my 4 year niece has been let loose with the varnish and it pretty much always chips within about an hour of wearing it. At the very most, I use a clear varnish on my fingers.

I do however, paint my toenails. Especially in the summer. I don't like the look of toenails when they aren't painted (I totally hate feet) so I always make sure my nails have some sort of varnish on them. My current colour of choice is red.

 All my pots are kept in a vanity box under the sink. I seem to have a lot more than I thought!

 Barry M has to be my favourite, cheap and cheerful and loads of colours to choose from.

I'm considering a shellac manicure/ pedicure before my wedding. Anyone got any experience of these?

Day 16 - Something customised.

I didn't think I was going to be able to answer this one. My sewing skills amount to just about being able to sew a button on. However, it doesn't say customised by me, does it? So this is all done by my sister. She is quite clever.

My wedding bouquet - made from buttons. I lost half of my finger ends threading these buggers onto wire. My sister did the creative part, I love how it has turned out.

Wellies - I got these made for the Rewind Festival last year. They are great because they are wide and fit over my fat calves - plus my sister made them look pretty. 

Converse. She is doing me a wedding pair too.Got to love a bit of bling!

stripey tube

I've been putting off wearing this skirt for a while as I didn't think I had any tights, but I discovered these in the depths of my drawer this morning. I remember now why I don't wear them, they are proper granny tights and all bunched around my ankles. Somewhat annoying, I can tell you.

I hadn't intended on wearing the red shoes, but I felt miserable when I got up and red always makes me cheerful. Everything else is just kept simple to let the skirt do the talking. I'm still very conscious about my massive thighs, hence the long cardie, but I may work up to wearing it without one day.... 

Thunder thighs R Us.

Black/ White striped midi skirt (20) - Dorothy Perkins

Black oversized vest (18) - ASOS

Midi Boyfriend Cardigan (20) - Simply Be

Tights - ?

Shoes - New Look

The weekend

My Dorothy Perkins order arrived last week (I really am not buying any more clothes after this!) so I got to wear my latest bird print dress at the weekend after seeing in on Louise and falling in love.  I was away on Saturday with a couple of girlfriends at a Spa hotel, so I wore the dress for dinner.

I really love the style of it and it's so incredibly comfortable to wear. I just wore mine with leggings and some new sandals that haven't had an outing due to incredibly crap weather. Excuse the gormless look on my face, we'd already had 3 bottles of wine by this point....

 Nice hotel carpet

Bird Print Dress (20) - Dorothy Perkins

Leggings - Evans

Shoes - Zara

Yesterday when I came home, me and Matt headed out to meet a couple of friends for lunch. It was a lovely day (shame it didn't last) so I got to wear another pair of sandals that have been hiding away and again from a Dorothy Perkins order. I think I have an addiction. 

Once again, excuse the proper gormless look on my face. It was sunny and my sunglasses were in the house.... 

Purple Skinny Jeans (22) - New Look Inspire

Slub Diamond Shape Tunic (20) - Dorothy Perkins

Zebra Print Sandals - Dorothy Perkins

Jersey Cardigan (18) - Matalan

Bloggers challenge 12, 13 & 14

Ok seriously, I am getting so far behind on this challenge and catching up with comments. Apologies for that, I think I have managed to respond to all comments now - thanks to everyone who takes the time to comment, it really does mean a lot.

So - I may end up skipping some of these challenge posts as I am struggling for ideas! Forgive this picture heavy post, if I don't cover the past few days, I will completely forget.

12 - The outfit you've had the best times in.

This is really hard for me, I don't tend to wear an outfit loads as I am obsessed with buying clothes. However, this dress saw me through most of last summer, our holidays to France (where we got engaged) and Vegas so it has to be up there. It's nothing massively special, but it's a really nice dress to wear and can be dressed up or down. Oooh and look, I was also wearing it when I met Matt Goss....

I actually don't have any full length photos of me wearing it - but it's exactly the same as this one, just black:

Jersey Maxi dress - ASOS Curve

Belt - Ebay

13 - Your lazy day at home with style

To be honest - when I am at home, I am mostly in my PJ bottoms. The rare occasion we have people come round, I'd wear a jersey dress and leggings as I want to be comfy, but when I see friends, I usually travel to them as they all have kids and I don't so more often than not, you'll find me at home in my M&S Jersey PJ bottoms and a vest or my hareem pants. A bit like this (we were travelling to France, hence I wanted to be comfy!)

This would be my lazy day out kind of style... 

14 - The item hardest to hunt down.

This has to be my wedding dress. I don't have it yet, but I had an idea in my mind of exactly what I wanted so I am having something similar made. I tried on a lot of white satin, got very disheartened, but eventually (I hope) settled on a dress that is exactly what I want. 

Obviously I don't want to give too much away just yet, but these 2 dresses were my inspiration. Watch this space.... 

Bloggers challenge 11

11 - Spring essential

I'm fairly sure we've completely bypassed Spring this year. Unless it's all about the rain.

There were a few things that sprung to mind for this one. First off my trusty parka which I tend to wear whenever it's not quite warm enough to go without but too warm for a coat.

Seen here and here.

But then I realised, pretty much every post you see me in, I'm sporting a cardigan. Call me an old granny, but I can't do without.

I've loads of them, black, grey, navy, red, purple & white, plus patterned, long and short. I honestly don't feel fully dressed without one. A cardigan can totally change the appearance of an outfit, how very versatile?


Striped, cream with sheer back, purple, red, hearts, leopard, lace back, coral, extra long boyfriend...

I must own about 10 black cardigans alone. Obsessed, much?

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Bloggers challenge - Day 10

Day 10 - Cute tights

Now, I don't own any tights. I have a bit of a hate relationship with them as I'm yet to find a pair that stays up. I always end up with the gusset somewhere around my knees and that's never a good look. It's only recently that I've started to embrace dresses and they are pretty much always worn with leggings.

So, I've started to research decent tights - any tips on good plus size tights that stay where they should, then I am all ears! Given we're unlikely to see any form of Summer here in the UK, I might need to invest.

Here are a few I quite like the look of:

Union Jack Print - M&S

Made in Britain - M&S

Red & White Stripes - We Love Colours

Star printed tights - Pamela Mann

Purple - Pamela Mann