Prints Charming, our Style Not Age challenge for December

Hello again and welcome to the last Style Not Age challenge of 2025! Emma's idea for this month's theme is Prints Charming, one that was easy for me to pluck from my wardrobe thank goodness, especially with all that's going on at this time of year. 

This fabulous two piece is from the Iris Apfel and H&M collection from a few years ago. Emma sat tight and waited for it to appear at a reduced price on Vinted - clever girl! Catch up with Emma on her blog Style Splash. 

Leopard is Jacqui's signature print of the moment. The coat is from George at Asda worn with cream jeans and black sweater topped with yet more leopard print in her scarf. See more from Jacqui over on her blog. 

Hilda's chosen tiger print in the form of these wide legged jeans from M&S for this month's challenge paired with a tiger motif tee shirt. Read her back story on Over the Hilda. 

My outfit is all old, shopped from my closet and yet still fulfills the brief. The red duster coat was an amazing charity shop bargain yonks ago costing a mere £3. I featured it in December 2020 when life was oh-so-different as we were emerging from lockdown. See the feature here if you missed it. (Golly didn't I look young then, slim too?!!!!)

The trousers are from Vinted and blouse is a vintage piece. 

The tartan boots are decidedly old, bought from M&S, but goodness knows when.

I hope you're enjoying the windswept look from this set of photos. I bribed my dear friend Fiona to help me with a mega dose of blog photos (as yet to be aired) - a large schooner of sherry and some of my homemade fudge kept her onside as we traipsed outside repeatedly with more wind and less sunshine for each outfit. 

I'm such a big fan of all things ornate: this Chinese jacket with hand-sewn embroidery is a real joy, a valued item in my clothes collection. Increasingly I'm moving lots of pieces on now, realising that the large volume of clothes aren't serving me well. Moreover, many are too small now - a truth I find hard to admit, but know that I must in order to cull the excess I've gathered over the years - these are only jamming up the works, stopping me from seeing what I can actually wear rather than hope to wear. My daughter came up with a wonderful solution to the decluttering problem. Sasha now lives on the mainland and is time-rich as opposed to me being time-poor. Ironic really when you consider that I live in paradise and she in Manchester. Anyway, I now send her a box of clothes about once a month and she uploads them onto Vinted to sell and after a certain length of time, if not sold, she redirects them to her local charity shop so that she's not bogged down by them forever. The money she makes is going towards her deposit for a flat. Win/win!

None of the accessories are new either. Rings are pre-loved and sunglasses are by Quay Australia. 

Apologies if you're a regular reader and have been noticing my lack of posts of late. If I show you why, you might understand...

For the past month it's been like a veritable fudge factory in my house. Juggling work and fudge production has been a real challenge and yes, probably some form of madness, but I do sincerely love the joy of giving and in particular giving my homemade fudge to family and friends. If yours hasn't arrived then sorry, you didn't make it onto the list...

My next post will be a mega feature of all of my festive outfits, some worn, some still waiting for their Cinderella moment, but all are blog-ready for your delectation. I have a few days off coming up around the New Year when I'll be dedicating some time to pulling a blog together for you. Apologies for the neglect, but I do appreciate you dropping by and also for your lovely comments. I hope you've found some time to rest and relax over the Christmas period and wish you every happiness for 2026!

Wishing you a very Happy New Year! 

Anna x

And fur coats too!

Hurrah for the joys of dressing up big time! Oh what fun I'm having playing around with lots of fur and sparkly things this month. As ever, I really don't have many going out options, partly because of living on this tiny, but beautiful, island, but mostly because I don't drink alcohol and therefore pub life isn't really my thing. So this was me, on a lovely sunny Sunday afternoon, all dressed up and nowhere to go.

I have maybe half a dozen fur coats, but this is my current favourite. It was from River Island quite a few years ago and I still get excited at the prospect of wearing it. The length somehow adds to the sense of luxury plus it has that reassuring weightiness to it - what a fab fur it is!

The coffee and cream palate is decidedly conservative for me so I thought the best way to ramp things up was by adding as many extra bells and whistles as possible. The satin combat trousers are by Zara purchased from a Truro charity shop recently. They're two sizes too big, but never to be put off by such small matters, I simply added the cow print belt (from Vinted) to tie in with the coat and cinched the waist in as tight as possible.

Next up is the cream blouse with these fabulous frilled arms. These obviously need to be flashed about to gain the full effect. The blouse is from TK Maxx. The pony skin boots again in cow print were a Vinted buy some time ago and work perfectly with the overall look.

The rings are preloved and the sunglasses are by Radley London. 

I'm pleased to say that I've nearly wrapped all of my Christmas presents already and am about to start writing my Christmas cards. Coming up this weekend is the first stint of fudge making for my far-flung relatives. Somehow I've not managed to amass the fancy fudge boxes that I like to use for this sweetest of gifts so I'll just have to get creative with what I can find. Wish me luck with that. 

And that pretty much winds things up this week. I do hope to fabricate an excuse to wear some party clothes soon - I missed our island staff party at the weekend as I was a bit under the weather so that's one opportunity dashed! But never mind, as my husband often has remarked, I'll get dressed up for the opening of an envelope so I'll be turning up here next week in another fancy outfit (as opposed to fancy dress!).

Sending you my warmest festive greetings and wishing you successful shopping in the final run-up to Christmas!

Anna x

December - the month of sparkles!

And so begins the season of sparkles! Needless to say I'm in my element this month for at last I have a legitimate reason to dial up my dressing up. I'm wearing a cosy roll neck fairisle sweater that I recently bought from the F&F range at Tesco's. It was the only one on display which, for some reason, made it seem like a real find. 

I'm not normally keen on black and white but the sweater is so perfect for this time of year I couldn't resist it. It has silver beading on the front that lifts it out of the ordinary too. 

I've paired the sweater with these rather fabulous silver jeans, a charity shop find in Truro recently - the brand is Pull&Bear - and they're brand new, without a scuff or mark on them. 

The mock crock effect boots are a recent purchase too from Deichman in Truro. I used to have a pair very similar to these and do wonder sometimes what on earth happened to them. Anyway, when I saw these I thought they might work well with some of the winter looks that I have planned...

My photography is a bit blurry this week. I had to take my own photos which wasn't helped by the blustery and cloudy weather. I've tweaked the photos but they could be better I'm afraid.

My textured cow print bag was the perfect accessory for the silver and black outfit. It's big enough for all of my photography essentails - mini tripod stand, phone, hairbrush and lipstick (although the look was definitely more windswept than anything else!).

The jacket is quite old now, but the brand is Zara and has a rating just like a duvet - it's ultra cosy and has this massive hood for rainy days too.

I do love this casual look for these silver jeans - what do you think? I'm sure I'll find another bit of styling for these over the next month, if I can only hit on a better day for the photoshoot!

                                                                    Anna x

Belt Up, our Style Not Age Challenge for November

Yes, it's that time of the month again! Here we all are rising to this month's challenge where Jacqui has prompted us to Belt Up! My outfit is one that I gathered together in September and yet never managed to showcase on the blog for various reasons so here it is now in all its technicolour glory! But as always, let me share the outfits from my fashionable friends first...

This month's feature is pretty much a story of two halves where Hilda and Jacqui are also touting an autumn vibe along with their belts whereas myself and Emma are pushing the boat out colourwise! Read Hilda's backstory here on Over the Hilda blog.

Rich chocolate hues work perfectly with Jacqui's tan leather belt in her seasonal look. Find out what she's been up to this week in her latest blog post at Mummabstylish. 

Emma's really delivering the wow factor this month with her fabulous two-tone jacket and golden accessories. This outfit shows she's ready for the party season right now! Catch up with all of her latest news on her blog, Style Splash. 

My colourful offering is all pre-loved, so excuse me for feeling a bit smug. The jeans, belt and cardigan were finds from Truro charity shops when I was passing through in September. The linen shirt is very old and the Dr Marten boots were from Vinted. I totally understand it this isn't your kind of thing as it truly is a Marmite outfit - obviously I love it, but it's okay if you don't.

The cardigan had been lovingly hand knitted which obviously adds even more appeal for me as I truly appreciate the time and effort it would have taken to creat this colourfest of a cardi. 

The boots are hopefully going to add cheer to my winter dressing as well as being comfortable. I do love a clumpy boot and these do have big heavy soles hinting at longevity too.

I was so excited to discover these hand painted jeans in the rack of a charity shop during one of my browsing sessions. The are many sizes too big for me, but I went straight away to the local haberdashery and bought some wide elastic to add to the inside of the waistband. Between the elastic and the jazzy yellow belt I managed to pull the waist in sufficiently to carry off this baggy legged look. 

Nothing new with my accessories here. My sunglasses are old from Radley London and rings are both old too. 

Many thanks for joining us for this month's style challenge. It's a wonderfully diverse spread of outfits that we're sharing with you again. Maybe you'll find some inspiration here?

Looking forward to seeing you again!

Anna x

Ode to Claudia

For those of you who have just returned from outer space or have some other paltry excuse for not being in the know, the series of Celebrity Traitors has just finished and many of us are in mourning for the loss of our new found best friends, myself included. More importantly, however, is the lack of style inspiration from the icon that is Claudia Winkleman aided by her stylist Sinead Mc Keefry. The above is my favourite outfit of the entire series which energised me to delve deep into my wardrobe...

Claudia and I are at opposite ends of the goth colour spectrum obviously, but I was very pleased with my very own style version of goth chic. Steve and I came across this field of beautiful pink nerines which acted as the perfect backdrop for my palest of pale offering.

The short cream fur jacket with gold bejewelled brooch was a birthday present (in January) from Sandra, my eldest sister. She too lives on an island, but at the other end of the UK in the far north of Scotland on mainland Orkney and had espied this in the window of a local charity shop, immediately thinking of me. I'm delighted to finally have the opportunity to wear it, especially for this showcase event.

My cream waterfall skirt was a Vinted buy last year and has been featured on the blog previously - see that here. I love the ultra feminine style and do wish I could justify wearing it more often. 

In true Claudia style I'm wearing long frilled sleeves in the form of this vintage frilly blouse from many years ago, but which has proven to be real asset to my wardrobe. 

The cream platform boots are very old indeed, from ASOS many years ago. And talking of boots, I've spent far too long over the past couple of weekends trying to hunt down a box of winter boots that I had clevery hidden in the loft in our shed. I was becoming more and more frustrated at myself and how this 'putting things away somewhere safe' often results in these treasure hunts. 

The main reason for this treasure hunt was to find my tartan boots as I hope to somehow find/sew a black net skirt as per Claudia's which I'd wear with said boots over the Christmas season. Having stated this now, I do worry that I'm hexing myself. I've tracked down the designer of her fabulous net confection and can't find it on the website, but lesser ones are retailing at £695 - way out of my budget!

So these are my thoughts from a very quiet Tresco. My antics when dressed up like this are surely a source of amusement to those who might catch a glimpse of me, but hey, what do I care?

Wishing you a great week ahead! Many thanks for visiting and hurrah for you if you're kind enough to interact by way of leaving me a comment - it's much appreciated.

                                                                                        Anna x

Isobel coat from the Lighthouse

Hi there! How are you? Today I want to share my new Isobel coat, gifted to me by the Lighthouse Clothing Company. Sunday was a windy but bright and sunny day - that kind of fierce wind that blows right through you - so I decided to take a walk out onto the headland of Tresco to give my new winter coat a proper testing. I'm delighted to say that it was toasty warm and windproof, aside from the promise of it being waterproof and breathable.

I chose this coat not just for the lovely colour (Sea Kelp, find it here), but for the length which is ideal for my height (5ft 5in). Anything longer would be below knee length; not good for striding out with a bit of rock climbing to boot.

When my son and I left home it was raining, just a light drizzle, but enough to trick me into thinking I didn't need my (bright blue) sunglasses. Stupid of me really as I could have popped them into the very spacious pocket. Anyway, after walking half a mile or so, the clouds cleared, rain stopped and we were bathed in the late afternoon sunshine. Much squinting on my part followed as Jamie did the best he could as photographer-of-the-day in the whipping wind.

As you'll see the coat isn't just fully padded but also has a cosy fluffy lining which extends into the hood as well - such a bonus for a weatherproof jacket. I love that extra feature!

The coat also has a drawstring waist in case you want to be even more snug. 

As for the rest of my outfit, well there's nothing new here at all. The turquoise chunky knit jumper and matching boots were both from Vinted in the past year so you'll probably have seen them on the blog before. The fab green jeans are by Twiggy from M&S, another Vinted buy from this year. I recently found the long beaded necklace in a charity shop in Truro though and I'm pleased to say that the smattering of small turquoise beads ties it in perfectly with today's look and I added a blue plastic ring, another charity shop find, to finish things off.

My other news is that Gallery Tresco has now closed for the winter and I'm already deep in winter works mode. The island may seem to have shut down, but behind the scenes all of the permanent staff have lots to do over the next few months to get ready for the 2026 season. My final week of trading was very healthy meaning I still have lots of paintings to pack up ready for shipping to the mainland. Thereafter I'll be tackling my (dreaded) annual stocktake as well as clearing the decks ready for a new carpet to be laid. Before Iong I'll be searching for the boxes of decorations to prepare for our Christmas opening...

One final bit of news is that my husband has recently celebrated 50 years of working for Tresco Estate, or rather Tresco Island as it is now known. He's also just turned 68 and assures me that he's not ready to hang up his workboots yet. Steve's one of those lucky guys who loves his job and is in no rush to take up the call of armchair and slippers. We're very proud of all that he's achieved in his lifetime - if you ever visit Tresco you'll see his legacy at every turn as most of the young woodlands have been planted by him. Well done Steve, you're a living legend!

                                                                        Anna x