Anna's Island Style: Missguided jacket

Hurrah - it's only 14 sleeps 'til Christmas!

So, here we have as promised my Christmas styling of the Scottish icon that is the kilt. I bought mine in a charity shop for only £5 and have been mulling over how to style it up for ages. Can you make a kilt funky was my question and hopefully I've answered that with an emphatic Yes!

The addition of the big, bouffant petticoat goes a long way to reinventing the staid image of the kilt, as does the mighty powers of pattern play by way of paisley and leopard print. The red lurex tights pick up the red within the woollen plaid and also connect tonally with the metallic jacket. All in all, it's a wild rendition and I know, not one for the faint hearted!

Piece by piece the outfit reads like this: metallic biker jacket by Missguided, bought from TK Maxx some years ago: paisley print shirt by Lands' End, second hand: kilt by The Tartan Shoppe, second hand: black petticoat from eBay: red lurex tights are charity shopped: leopard print pony skin courts by BCBGeneration from TK Maxx.

Nothing new jewellery-wise - the rose gold necklace was a boutique purchase when I was in St Andrews a couple of years ago: the big jewelled ring is pre-loved and the other ring was a find in a street market in Cape Town.

I'll be back again on Monday with another dose of sparkle and style for your Christmas inspiration. In the meantime, have fun with your preparations and last minute shopping. My shopping has been totally online this year and thank goodness, the mail is still coming through at this end of the country.

Anna x

Hey Poll! Look this way, over here girl!

Pint sized, cute as a button and worth her weight in gold, here she is, the blog photographer without whom my life would be a shambles. (Yes, we know I have other back-up, but let the girl have her moment in the spotlight eh?) Not only does she take great shots, but her banter enlivens me and always makes me laugh; if there's a blog or Instagram photo of me laughing my socks off then invariably that's down to this humorous young lady.

She's currently away on holiday playing the part of rent-a-bridesmaid to two of her old school friends and in her absence I've been reminded of just how much she supports me in her primary role as Gallery Assistant. As she gads about on the mainland, eating out, meeting up friends and maybe partaking in a little retail therapy, I can sing her praise and post some shots of her too without her censoring. Polly is an absolute gem; hard working and reliable, a skilled trouble shooter with all of my computer problems, sharp as a knife - a graduate in Forensic Science no less, and has better customer skills than I could rival with the best smile ever to greet our customers day in, day out. She embraces island life, revels in her job and hopefully a little local love interest may well keep her here long term too. Anyway, thanks Polly for all that you do, and have a lovely break!

And here I am responding to the veritable ray of sunshine who feeds me jokes and compliments. So let's talk outfits now, shall we? Or more to the point, this totally over-the-top jacket. This biker jacket in a bronze/red metallic finish is about three sizes too small for me (yes, it's actually a size 4!) and was a recent find in (small drum roll please) TK Maxx! Not only that, but it cost me £9.99. The brand is Missguided which is more a Polly brand than mine (targeting the 16-35 market allegedly), but by finding it in TK Maxx it becomes a bit of a free for all. I love to see other mature women rifle amongst the racks labelled MOD BOX - we know there's all sorts of treasures to be found there. I had every intention of keeping the jacket for a party, but, and my friend Sheila will understand this, the very newness of it begged a quick outing. What if I had kept it for months, and then discovered that it pinched or squeezed or just didn't deliver the wow factor I had envisaged?

Well, rest assured that all is well, wow factor duly delivered. And now I want you all to forget that you've seen this as I may well have to wear it to my next birthday bash. "Rocking the 60's" is one idea for the theme so far, but as it's not until January I have plenty time to improve on that.

Cue lots of gregarious flouncing about in response to the quip of the moment. Polly brings out the show-off in me. Strike that. I bring out the show-off in me. I'm human Marmite - love me or hate me, you just can't ignore me.