August and another show night

Hello and how are you? We're all well thanks. Here's a shot of me from last night's reception party at the gallery with artists Flynn O'Reilly (left) and Ramie Leahy at the end of a busy evening. The time just flew by as we welcomed guests from both Tresco and Bryher to join us for wine and canapes and to chat to the artists about their work (see the show in full, here).

Ramie uses this quaint mode of transport to carry his art supplies and paintings as well as get him about when he's on the island. He has become a regular sight during the summertime over the past couple years.

You may remember this lace jumpsuit (by Darling, London) from last year. I bought it from TK Maxx and this year found these new shoes from there too. See the funky heel in the next shot.

The brand is Xti TENTATIONS. The heels are decorated in tiny sparkling jewels of black, silver and bronze and the main part of the shoe is in sparkly silver. The block heel makes for a comfy and stable height which is just what I needed at the end of a long working day.

My jewellery is a mish mash of old, gifted and preloved pieces along with my pink elasticated belt. 

Show number four of six had me recycling a party outfit which wasn't really what I had planned. The slightly overcast weather forced me to change my mind at the last minute from a chiffon beaded number that I'd done some last minute adjusting to in readiness for the party but hey, I can always wear it next time, eh? I also have a vintage two piece in silk which I've been saving for a special event so you will see that before the exhibition period is over too.

And finally, here's the line-up of lovelies from last night. My thanks go to (l to r) Ruth, Max, Polly and Tash for all the front of house and behind the scenes work that ensured another successful evening. Four down and two to go and they're still smiling.Thanks ladies!

Until next time, take care!

Anna x

Flower power!

I should have put out a sunglasses alert for this one! This is my new flower power jacket, a real throwback to the fashion of my teens (that's the 70's in case you couldn't guess). I came across it in TK Maxx earlier this summer and have been itching to have the opportunity to wear it. The recent downturn in the weather provided the perfect silver lining to these storm clouds giving me a chance to add a pop or two of citrus brights to the jazziest of jackets.

Here's the brand ...

... and here's the price. Not too shabby eh?

The observant amongst you will notice that I decided to flip my bag around letting you see the simple, featureless nature of the back - clever of me, don't you think? And done on purpose, of course.

The smock jacket is canvas, fully lined and adorned with these crazy vinyl flowers on the orange trim. It took only a heartbeat for me to decide to try it on and less than a minute to decide to buy it - the look is flower power, flamboyant and completely over the top, therefore is an utter joy to me. 

I added John Lennon retro sunnies (from River Island), a wide orange and gold bangle, one plastic ring and another oversized one, plus that natty little straw bag (all preloved) to continue with the hippy chick theme. No-one could ever accuse me of taking myself seriously could they?

The cute sweater is by Tu, picked up in the summer sale last year and perfect to wear with this jacket with its double trumpet sleeves. And the trousers are preloved, by Zara and seen recently on the blog after a trip to London (see here) and that's where I found this hand carved wooden necklace too.

These River Island sandals are retro pieces too being many, many years old; too many for me to remember. The rubber soles are great shock absorbers and the angle of the platform is not too steep to be uncomfortable - they're all day wonders these ones!

Sunshine and showers pretty much sums up the weather of the day. I have a day off tomorrow and had been hoping to have an end of day picnic when Steve finishes work so I'll be keeping my fingers crossed that the fresh weather front blows though by late afternoon. All being well, I can share a new off-island adventure with you on next time as Steve and I visit a different uninhabited island for the first time. We've suddenly decided that we really ought to visit as many of these smaller islands as we can, just because we can, and I'll be capturing as much of this on camera as possible. I do hope that you're having a good week wherever you are. Seemingly we in the UK are about to have another burst of that summer heatwave again, but this weekend I'll be thinking of my lovely friend Bo who lives in Portugal and is being promised temperatures of 48 degrees! She left the UK with her son and husband nearly 10 years ago, looking for a milder climate, but really - 48 degrees? That's blooming ridiculous!

Until next time, take care!

Anna x

Not Square With Gingham - our Style Not Age challenge

Hello and welcome! Thanks for joining me today as I gather together my Style Not Age friends who between us are presenting "Not Square With Gingham". It was Hilda's choice this month, and one that had me scratching my head a bit as I wondered what to wear. I really only have three gingham pieces, one of which I've already featured on our monthly style challenge (here). With no shopping trip in sight and a clampdown on spending this month due to far too many expenses with out little motor boat, I had to give up on my idea of eBay solving my problem. Anyway, as you can see I've gone all bright and colourful (oh what a surprise!) wearing this floral gingham top that came from a charity shop last year, but more on this later.

Hilda wears gingham check fitted trousers by Puno Roma and a classic Zara shirt. Why oh why, does that half tuck look stylish on her and yet half undone on me? Hilda's feature can be seen in full on her blog Over The HIlda.

Emma from Style Splash wears a summery pink and white gingham skirt and tee shirt both from Zara. (Have these ladies both been cashing in on the Zara sale site I wonder?) Her sleek and stylish summer shoes are from River Island. Do pop over to see more from Emma on her blog too.

Jacqui has given us a double dose of gingham with these crops and matching brolly, but she's also added some pattern play by way of this sleeveless duster in summer florals - fab! Last minute photos brought about this weather-led shoot which turned out both cute and playful for her. See Jacqui's post on Mummabstylish.

My photos were weather-led too as I panicked at my last minute attempt to find somewhere out of the high winds and between showers to capture my gingham offering. Steve kindly did the honours in his lunchtime. If he had zoomed into the sea in the distance you'd have seen the white horses driving over the tops of the waves. Heavy showers for the past few days has brought inches of welcome rain to the UK which is long overdue as you can see by the parched grassland of Jimmy Cox's field. (Jimmy Cox is long dead, so we weren't in danger of being chased off!)

I pushed the boat out by adding these pop art courts by Chockers to my jolly vintage skirt by Jaeger. They cost £8.50 in St Michael's Hospice charity shop in Harrogate in the spring.

My gingham top is by F&F at Tesco's but was sourced in a charity shop last year. I like the feature of the split sleeve which was a great compromise for me when off-the-shoulder tops ruled the roost, but weren't my thing. The addition of flowers and greenery to the gingham appealed to my need to break with convention. 

Today's jewellery is all preloved apart from my favourite gold chain necklace which was a gift from Sasha. This pretty pink cuff is a recent and welcome addition to my stash.

My other go-to accessory has to be this pink stretch belt which I found on eBay a couple of years ago. At £5 the cost per wear must have dropped down into the pennies by now as I seem to wear this belt at least once a week - it's turned into a signature piece of mine - not the most stylish, classy or expensive, but certainly useful!

The final flourish to my outfit was my black net petticoat, adding fun and fullness to the skirt. The simple act of adding a net underskirt instantly adds a sense of occasion to any ensemble - a favourite trick of mine.

Thank goodness that there was no-one about to see this windswept scenario as they were out for a woodlands walk - what would they have thought?

Thanks for joining me today on this last post of July. I can't quite believe that August is upon us! The summer is rushing past me with so many things left behind in the rush and tear of life; no link-ups as I'm too time challenged; far too infrequent exchanges with blogging friends; not enough miles clocked up ready for my big sea swim challenge - oh dear, I must try harder. On the plus side, I'm drawing on my mindfulness training from earlier this year (see here) and remembering to take a moment which has been a life saver. The "musts" and "shoulds" and "have tos" are being dropped in favour of power naps, picnics and revelling in the outdoors life. Counting my blessings is a great way of grounding myself and stopping the runaway train of thoughts that can sometimes drive me to exhaustion. Summer on these beautiful islands is in itself a huge blessing and one not to be overlooked. On that note, I shall leave you, my lovely readers and wish you well. Downtime is just what the doctor ordered methinks!

Until next time, take care!

Anna x

Show time once again!

Hellooooo! How are you? I may be a day or two late, but here they are, the dream team from our most recent exhibition opening night and don't these young ladies look fabulous? From left to right, Tash, Polly and Hannah did a wonderful job as well as sparkling amidst the heat of the evening on Tuesday when we opened the show for Stuart Kettle, Maggie O'Brien and David Thomas (see the paintings in full here). We sold a few pieces on the opening night and sales are continuing fine thank you.

My frock for the evening is an chiffon number (preloved) by LK Bennett which almost broke the bank at £15. Joking apart, it was in immaculate condition and fits like a dream. This lightweight fabric was perfect for the hot summer evening when we were almost becalmed at New Grimsby with not much of a breeze circulating around the building despite doors and skylights being open.

The finer details of the dress can be seen here where the pleating creates a gentle empire line and a deep v neck with a tiny modesty band behind. The lining is polyester which swishes nicely as you move. This cobalt blue isn't a colour I wear a lot of, and certainly not what I would wear in the winter when my Scottish pallor wouldn't be enhanced by this tone at all, but with a light tan I can just about get away with it.

Note this delicious floaty layer of chiffon - I fancy I didn't quite dance around enough to do it  justice however!

Here's a wee twirl for you.

Oh, and I can do this too!

These lime green satin sandals are by Steve Madden from TK Maxx and also cost £15. The kitten heel was a great height to wear after a long day at work, not too high, nor were the straps too snug either. I wish I'd had a some lime green accessories, but I got by as you can see below.

My oversized pearls (from Debenhams) you'll have seen before as well as the green amethyst bracelet which my dear hubby bought me in Morocco. The fab blue rings are charity shopped. I'm wearing my old favourite sunglasses from Quay.

The photo shoot was at the end of the evening when we were confident that things had gone well which I hope shows in our overall relaxed body language. It can be quite a stressful day, preparing the gallery for the evening's party as well as the conversation topic of the day being which outfit we will wear. So far this summer I've managed to choose mine well in advance and even stick to it rather than my usual last minute change of heart. I'm floundering a bit already about the upcoming one in August, so watch this space...

And finally, July on the Isles of Scilly has been nothing less than idyllic in the heatwave. Work days are peppered with end of the day picnics for Steve and I which makes for a welcome bit of downtime for us. We're off to another island tonight, but in the meantime I'll leave you with some picnic shots from the last couple of weeks.

Landing on the high tide at Samson, just a two minute boat trip from home. 

A quick hop from the boat into the little tender to take us ashore.

Picnic over, it's time to capture something for my Instagram feed - I gotta feature this amazing setting, surely! But first, a slight tweak here, a little adjustment there ...

What about placing another pop of colour here? This hat will do nicely!

Swatting a couple of flies away before I can settle down.

And this is it! The shadows created by the evening sun managed to make me look much more tanned than I really am, so no filters required. Tresco island lies in the backgroud with a sprinkling of yachts moored up in the channel.

This time last year I posted a bikini shot and said that I wasn't sure if at 60 I'd still be happy to wear one. Yay, I still am! 

Anna x

A pop of pink

Happy Sunday to you my dear readers and I hope your day is going well. The heatwave is being peppered by the odd rain shower which is no bad thing given the state of the burnt grassland and pastures here. I expect the rest of mainland UK is suffering the same, in fact I think I've heard of hosepipe bans in some areas too. Anyway here's a pop of pink to brighten your day if you need it.

This Ralph Lauren frock had a rrp of £260 marked down to £23 at TK Maxx which was too good a bargain to miss, don't you agree? I purchased it last month on my way back from my modelling trip as a little reward for the three days of hard work in temperatures of 31 degrees. I had intended for it to be an exhibition outfit, but when I tried it on the other morning I decided I'd rather get more wear out of it as a day dress and wow, what a fab day dress it is!

I was heading off to St Mary's for a meeting this morning and decided I'd need a jacket on the boat, opting for a faded denim one to make this a more casual outfit. This cute Levi's jacket is one I borrowed from my husband 40 years ago when I first met him and somehow I've never given it back to him. 

Silver seemed like a good choice for my accessories with these silver wedge sandals coming from a charity shop in Penryn a couple of months ago. They're a great height and the cork wedges mean they're not heavy either.

More preloved goodies are the rings and silver bangle. My pink and silver bangle was a gift a few years ago and the silver coloured chain is from the Melissa James jewellery collection which we stock at the gallery. That's of of the best perks of my job, that I see all the new jewellery as we unpack the range and therefore can buy mine before we even put it on display.

The dress is lined in pink satin and as you can see, it hangs perfectly. I'm thrilled with this purchase and can see it will be a firm favourite not just in the months ahead, but years to come too. Classic and stylish are made more fun by this brilliant fuchsia colour and honestly I felt a million dollars in this perky little number.

Before my meeting I had time for a ten minute breather sitting on Porthcressa beach which was looking pretty as a picture. These islands are just idyllic at this time of year, thanks to the best summer we've had in ages.

A tall ship was passing through the islands, looking very grand as it had moored up for the night in the calm Scilly waters.

I know that lots of you would swap your commute for one like this!

On my return to the island, I discovered the postman had delivered a bit of retail therapy for me. This Furla bag is one that I'd found on a recent online search. Well, since then it's sold out, but there's still a shocking pink across the body version here and it's on sale! Even this little bee on the handle thinks it's as sweet as honey. 

Until next time, have a great week!

Anna x