Wardrobe organising

So according to the brainy statisticians, we only wear 20 percent of our wardrobes 80 percentof the time. No way, I thought, I have got rid of the clothes I don’t like so don’t wear and all I’m left with are items that I love and wear all the time.  So to be organised, I catalogued my clothes, so that I can see exactly what I have and hence resist the urge to keep acquiring new things. In the midst of doing that, also thought I’d highlight the things I live in all the time and what a shock!!!!!. I have over 100 items of clothing yet I only ever really wear about 20 of them all the time. Wowsers!!! So those pesky statisticians were right and I really need to stop buying clothes. Well I have stopped but the items highlighted in yellow are those that I covet to finalise my perfect wardrobe. If I had done this little exercise prior to finalising the 30before30 list, I would have included ‘wear all clothes in wardrobe all the time’, but given that I didn’t, just gonna have to do it without it being part of the challenge. This is no way going to evolve into a style ‘look what I wear everyday’ blog, so I won’t be taking pictures, but I will endeavour to be more adventurous with my clothes and wear them more often cos I do have a pretty amazers set of clothes. It’s just that I never seem to have anywhere nice enough to wear my ‘nice clothes’ to, but just going to have to start finding places. I will also start tallying each time I wear an item and see if we can get more blues and I’m able to disprove the statisticians.

Items in blue are those I wear all the time, green are those I haven’t worn yet and yellow are items I want to acquire.

DRESSES
Cos black high neck mini	Mango black sequinned mini	Vintage Biba long green
Pied a Terre purple knee length	Les Petites orange silk button	Banana Republic black wrap
Whistles purple deep neck	Whistles burgundy pleated	Whistles orange rope neck
Green print  midi	Kenema & co green skater	M&S vintage denim
American Apparel blue t-shirt	Whistles white summer	Cos cream back button
Whistles red print knee length	Whistles navy gold buttoned	Whistles blue cowl neck
Cos mustard double buttoned wool	Vintage 20s silk cream floral print	Sisley green tie summer
Topshop striped blue boob tube	Cos grey midi	Vintage cream print
Spaghetti strap black short	Spaghetti strap any colour silk midi	Silk print mini
SKIRTS
Whistles cream silk onion shaped	Mango black silk knee length	Banana Republic black silk mini
Vintage green midi	Escada black velvet pencil	Whistles black A-line
Vintage purple button knee length	Whistles denim tie midi	Midi sequinned
Whistles blue stripey mini	Cos mustard puffball	New Look black maxi
Glastonbury red print skirt	Budapest brown flared	Nadine gift tribal summer
	Indian silk x2	Uniqlo grey knee chiffon
SHORTS
Whistles black silk knee length	Cos black mini	Jaeger black mini
Whistles tweed high-waisted	Uniqlo grey summer	J-Crew nautical mini
Diesel denim	Gap denim	Topshop cut off dungaress
TROUSERS
Whistles grey ankle zip	Whistles black high-waisted	Whistles navy harems
Whistles maroon silk harems	Whistles blue summer	Whistles tan high-waisted
JEANS
Gap boyfriends	Zara cropped	French Connection bootcut
Uniqlo flared	Whistles skinnies	Blue skinnies
French connection straight leg
TOPS
Zara men’s white shirt	Gap striped fitted shirt	Chambray denim shirt
H&M white linen shirt	H&M blue linen shirt	Whistles grey silk blouse
Pied a terre cream silk blouse	Whistles black round neck	Whistles peach cropped top
J-Crew stripey	J-Crew grey sweatshirt	Topshop green scalloped
T-SHIRTS
Whistles white marl	J-Crew grey	American Apparel white
AITF white logo	Cos green	Kooples white
VESTS
Gap light blue	Topshop navy	Zara orange
Zara green	AITF black	AITF white
Forever 21 white long vest	Zara black waistcoat	Lurex camisole
KNITWEAR
Bennetton mustard cardie	Zara grey knitted oversized cardie	Whistles grey jumper
Perfect navy jumper
SHOES
Clarks tan brogues	Clarkes black low heeled 20s	Black ankle lace-ups
Carvela black round-toed	Carvela burgundy shoe boots	Aldos black heeled
Dune black winter zip-ups	Camper orange heeled sandals	Flat summer sandals
Thin strapped sandals	Low-heeled summer sandals	Green Converse
JACKETS
Zara black boyfriend blazer	Zara black gold buttoned jacket	Next grey fitted blazer
Whistles dbl-breasted wool jacket	Fitted black blazer	Whistles cream mac
Gap denim jacket	Oasis zip-up leather	Gap zip-up leather
Boyfit khaki jacket
COATS
M&S belted camel coat	Zara black puffer	Gap grey double breasted
M&S heritage double breasted	Burberry khaki long trench	Vintage fur

Once upon a FREEZING day in Spitafields

                    

Been meeting up with my mentee more regularly, we skated at Somerset House day after boxing day, were suppossed to go to the National Gallery, but changed her mind at the last minute claiming (despite having expressed an interest in art and seeing art work) that it would be too boring. TEEN-A-GERS!!!!! So on what felt like to coldest day of the year so far, we bussed it to Spitafields from Archway and spent the day wandering around. Was ok, best outcome of the day was being able to swap my Whistles mac (yes I wore a mac on the coldest day of the winter) which had a small pocket malfunction to a brand new one. RESULT. Spitafields cool, but too full of trendy wendies and kinda less a less charming Greenwich market, but it can be ticked off the 30 places to visit list.

If discipline does not come naturally, hand over the card

                                                      

Read an article on willpower recently and the conclusion is that to me it comes as naturally as a vegan craving beef tartare. I have no discipline or will power. If a chocolate cake is put in front of me, I WILL have at least two slices even though I know what sugar and simple carbs do to my blood sugar levels. The same with my shopping. It’s like there is a driving force that controls me and if I buy one thing, I somehow feel that buying 10 things is just as bad as buying the First thing, so I do. Anyway I send a shameful amount of money between December and January. So shameful that despite the full disclosure on blog, not going to disclose that one. If I am ever going to clear my credit card debts, I just need to know that they’re not there, so I handed them over to my mum when she gave me a loan, BUT….. I still have a debit card which means that I think I can reduce payments for a month and buy that Whistles dress or three.

Organised heaven

Chaos

Muji calm

My perfect bed

Feels I’ve had a constant stream of boxes being delivered at home in the last two months, my beautiful Roberts MP53 Radio, my photos, my candle-making material, my Folio books, my returned Roberts radio and on and on,  so my room has felt like a constant storage unit and I have felt totally ill at ease with such accumulated mess, but anyway got to sorting out and I’m pretty pleased with the ongoing progress. Not sure when I’ll feel happy enough to tick this one off the list, as it feels like a continuous process and that I’m FOREVER acquiring things as quickly as I get rid of stuff, but anyway no more as Nadine now has possession of my debit card and will only give me my food and £100 miscellaneous monthly allowance. Anyway these Muji storage boxes, THE. BEST. INVENTION. EVER.

Mama's got a brand new bag (or two)

My lush travel Zara bag

My smart everyday holdall

Oh universe, universe, you great conspirator you. So really wanted a bag that could hold whatever combination of shit I need it to hold (and gosh I’ve got a LOT of shit) right? Guess what Santa in the form of my unexpectedly stylish father brought me????? That’s right, a really nice stylish black handbag. Surely it ain’t a Mulberry, but looks as good as in my eyes. So that fits all of my everyday crap in it (books, water etc etc) and on a shopping expedition, post champagne afternoon tea with Nadine on Sunday, we wandered into Zara and eagle eyed shopper that she is, she spied a large leather look shopper and we decided it was the perfect travelling bag for me AND…. It was £39.99 so tick that one off the list baby. I love it when a plan comes together.

Photos and music drama

                  

Aboard a flight en route to Lima via Miami, listening to The Band on my iTunes- really been getting into my ‘white’ blues lately, so listening to lots of Dylan, Joni Mitchell, the Band and Janis Joplin. Gosh I should have been a child of Woodstock, as well as dancing with Josephine Baker in the 20s. Anyway I digress, what I mean to start with is the revelation of genius courtesy of Jessica Wilson, who has a very funny and resoundingly familiar blog detailing her dating experiences in London. In the middle of dinner at the Dorchester for Nadine’s 30^th birthday (where she was well and truly spooked by her surprise guests, as she had assumed she was having a romantic dinner with her man), Jess revealed that……..; she had written her blog entries but was just yet to post them. I mean utter genius. I always lament that I don’t have internet access to write posts for my blog, BUT, I do always have my laptop, so can do posts a la now on the plane and upload them when I have internet access. I’m sure this will revolutionise my blogging experience.

Anyway, great start to the year, thank goodness, everything seems to be going well. Very happy and content, though that could be the Merlot and high altitude talking, but seems a lot has been rammed into the last 17 days. I managed to find the most PERFECT yoga class (though having issues with my gym, who missold my membership on the basis I would get my capoeira lessons free and that hasn’t materialised itself – look out for ABW on Watchdog, LAFitness, if you don’t sort it out), worked my behind off at work and feeling pretty pleased, got a ton of new music, sooooo much more I can’t remember as I don’t do my daily gratitude list anymore. Anyway will stop this stream of consciousness and actually write about my 30before30 updates.

Soooo I spent the best part of two days over the Christmas holiday uploading 2000+ photos onto Boots for them to be printed. About 13 hours and £113 later, and two days for postage, I received a big box of photos, super excited as it’s all my lovely pics from 2007, but boy sorting through them is a byatch.