Not Going To See The Queen

On last night's local news they said the Queen would be visiting Nottingham this morning.... I asked the 13 year-old if he wanted me to spring him out of school for the day so we could go and watch her *doing some waving* on the town hall balcony, and, like, see her in the flesh. He didn't. It felt odd to imagine myself going, sans children, so I didn't either.

And, on the subject of the recent Jubilee, ignoring the Gary Barlow-Paul McCartney fiasco, this is what we did. Yes, we had some cakes! And I *might have watched the odd bit of tv coverage too*.....

Note, they are NOT cup-cakes!

And I am going to frame this fabulous retro, jubilee-edition cereal packaging.

Because I LOVES  the typography and colours.

And the boys both think it's an excellent idea too.... win-win :)

Some Old Royals...

A mini-version of what I was planning in this post:
http://trashsparkle.blogspot.com/2012/01/i-think-im-becoming-philaterer-stamp.html

I Think I'm Becoming A Philater...Er... Stamp Collector!

Image from http://www.bfdc.co.uk


This wasn't going to be my First Post (boom boom!) of The Year, but then The Divine Helga reminded me of my growing Crush on Old Royalty in her post about coming over all Queen Victoria-esque: http://helgavontrollop.blogspot.com/2012/01/feels-like-touch-of-victoria.html




What with the Diamond Jubilee coming up this year there are going to be some yummy stamps being issued by the Royal Mail. Such as this kind of thing.







Image from https://www.myroyalmail.com

There were also these 2007 60th Wedding Anniversary stamps -

a bit of Couture Excellence in black and white:

Image from http://www.bfdc.co.uk

Just before Christmas I picked up a book on more of the Old Lovelies. Its full of splendid pictures of the Victorian and Edwardian ancestors. What with being too busy eating mince pies I haven't scanned it yet, but I'm planning a Bit Of A Feature on the landing wall using images from the book and some of these stamps.


It will all be joining this Jamie Reid poster:





And possibly this photo. I once kidded an impressionable young man these were my grandparents:


(Image by Patrick Lichfield)


.... which reminds me; must decide where we're going this summer!


Image from http://habituallychic.blogspot.com/2011/02/governor-of-bahamas.html.

HabituallyChic's blog has tons of fabulous Duke and Duchess of Windsor photographs. I'm going grab a coffee and sit and sigh over them all now....

I've Painted Me Happy

Seeing all the lovely nail polish on blogs is rubbing off on me - last night I sat here and did a nail every time I clicked on a new post. This is proving indestructible and has so far withstood shopping, coins, zips, moving furniture, fiddling with the digital camera, opening packs of jam tarts... what more could a girl ask for?  Electric Punk, maxiflex collection 2000. 

On Thursday evening I was watching a programme about Spitalfields and the 1970s rescue squad who started moving into derelict Georgian houses there - Dan Cruickshank et al. Suddenly I was overcome with the urge to start painting this sideboard:

I never saw the end of the programme, and have been applying coats of paint ever since. It was brown, and I've umm'd and ahh'd for 2 years about painting it, so it was hardly spur-of-the-moment. Wonder why Dan Cruickshank had that effect? I'm going to sand the feet to rough them up a bit, and the top is going to get the sticky-back-plastic treatment.

The kitchen is starting to come together now - I've worked out I'm going for the less is more look (the less decorating I do, the more it remains unfinished) and so only a handful of the vintage bits are going back into it. Blue and white mostly. Like this car boot find: