Thanks to a recent Birthday I’ve done an awful lot of reflection recently on the last 35 years. I’ve reflected on love, life and all things adult lately, and I’m pretty sure you’re bored to hell of it. So I thought, in celebration of something a little more fun, I’d reflect on something else – my style. I actually wrote this post a couple of years back, but it’s still one of my favourites today, so I thought I’d share it again to give you guys a little insight into how my love of fashion began…. and also give you a giggle, you probably need it after all that heavy life stuff I’ve been posting lately!

Let’s face it, I was a very odd looking child. With an AWFUL haircut. Turns out though, I have always been incredibly stylish! You stop by this blog and flick through my terrible, blurry outfit shots and think ‘Gosh, this lady must have spent HOURS putting together these startlingly similar combinations of tea dresses with ankle boots or 50’s style frocks and skirts….’ don’t you? Mais, non! It is actually not a hard learnt and complex skill, wearing pretty much the same things over and over, it’s actually just genetic. Something I was lucky enough to be born with, and now you’re lucky enough to have me share it with you – talk about a win win situation!

As you can see from this very early pic, my outfits were created through a very selective process known as ‘Wearing Whatever Your Older Sibling No Longer Fits Into….’ I learnt an important lesson here – never be afraid of hand me downs. If you were a child of the 70s and 80s you too probably remember the anticipation as your Mum brought the Winter or Summer clothes down from the attic and you frantically crossed your fingers, hoping that this would be the year you finally fit into the green velvet circle skirt of your sister’s. I’m still a faithful bargainista now, and have scored a few massive wins by seeking second hand alternatives in charity shops or from eBay. Who knows, keep an open mind and you too could find yourself the proud owner of some delightful brown corduroy dungarees too?! (I never did fit into that green skirt, BTW, and I’m still sore about it now…)

Now, some people will tell you you should avoid looking too matchy-matchy, it’s just not considered ‘fashionable’. Much better to throw together the most garish clashing prints you can find. The more like you’ve been dragged through a haberdashery backwards, the better, if you want to be a true style icon. Well I say piffle to that. I’m no stranger to ‘colour blocking’ and the like (yeah, I know some stuff) but I say if you want to wear the red shoes with the red bag and the red belt and the red lipstick, go for it. Here I am demonstrating this beautifully by wearing ALL THE PINK:

Yep, I was rocking coordinating leisure wear way before Paris hilton got into Juicy Couture doncha know. These days my tastes are a little more feminine, but I’m still not afraid to pull on an entirely monochromatic ensemble.

See, I told you I have always been a fan of a flouncy skirt! And with stripes and a matching cardigan – I would basically wear this exact outfit today.

As I would this one too, in fact I’m actually quite sad I don’t own this dress anymore. I wonder if this is where my recent obsession with Peter Pan collars has stemmed from? Also note, this appears to be where I first started to try my hand at perfecting the classic blogger outfit pose – look at me, nonchalantly pretending to admire the rhododendrons! These days I prefer a less cringey ‘look at the camera and smile’ approach, but I think I looked more ‘on point’ back then than I do now to be fair…

It wasn’t all fun times though, and sometimes tough lessons are learnt early on. Here we see me running into that dreaded situation when someone turns up in the same outfit as you! My advice in this situation would always be to hold your head high – why be embarrassed when you clearly both have exquisite taste? I think you can tell by the smirk on my face here that I didn’t feel threatened by Santa one tiny bit. I knew I was rocking the red with white trim just as good as him. It’s just as well I’m comfortable when this happens – it’s still a pretty regular occurrence these days. Yeah, thanks for that, Primark.

And finally – breton stripes with red footwear? Well, there is really no more that needs to be said, is there?

Stay tuned for the teen years!

Love,

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