Hello Autumn!

Up until a few days ago parts of the UK was enjoying an Indian summer and most afternoons last week you'd have found me in my bikini reading in the sunshine. It all went downhill at the weekend when temperatures plummeted and we awoke to the first frosts of the season. 

As most of my clothes are worn all year round, it doesn't take me long get my wardrobe ready for the cooler months. Here's the double wardrobe where I store my coats, jackets and maxis. The shelf contains bags and the leopard bag on the bottom holds my sandals. My belts, gloves and scarves are stuffed in the two baskets below my Afghan coat. 

Here's my boot collection. 

I store my blouses, waistcoats and skirts in the other double wardrobe. There's my hats and a few more bags on the top shelf. Stashed below are a couple more pairs of boots and my baskets. The suitcases on top of the wardrobe are stuffed with my sundresses, flimsier frocks and festival gear.

The top three dressing table drawers contain underwear, socks & tights and workout gear. My shorts, bikinis and Summery tops are in the bottom one.

I treated myself to a new clothes rail to hang my midi dresses and moved our 1960s chair out of the bedroom so I could squeeze it into the corner. 

Despite it being bitterly cold I had to wear my new dress to hit the town on Saturday night - a 1970s printed cotton maxi I bought from the Air Ambulance (or the Ambo) charity shop on Friday. It was made in England for Shelana, a long-defunct British boutique label, and is in pristine condition, I don't think it's ever been worn. An absolute bargain at £5! 

I bought these earrings from a boutique in Santorini - they were handmade on the island using stainless steel and lava, I love them! When you're travelling with only a handful of dresses a new pair of earrings makes your ultra light packing feel fresh and exciting.  

On Sunday we went for our usual morning charity shop run - dropping off a bag of books and coming home with a few more. I'd not worn this vintage 1970s Kate Beaver maxi dress for months. Handprinted in her studio in Dorset they're extremely rare and command £££s online. This cost me 99p from a charity shop about ten years ago! Whenever it features on my blog I get messages from people pleading with me to sell it - sorry but this baby ain't going nowhere!  

These amazing boots were a measly £3 from the clearance chazza in the Spring, the wooden pendant was my Mum's in the 1970s and the 1960s Italian-made hand-rolled acetate scarf was a recent charity shop find. As one of the volunteers told me when I took it to the till with my £1 coin, that print couldn't be more you.

On Monday I had a couple of appointments at Walsall Manor, one for a field test and a follow-up visit with the ophthalmologist, all's good with my glaucoma and I don't need to go back for another twelve months. Everyone at the hospital was in raptures over my outfit, a vintage wool housecoat (a gift from friends, G'n'T) , my charity shopped Aldo fedora (now in its 7th year) and the Art Nouveau belt from the clearance chazza.

This very early Anokhi jacket was snaffled for less than £20 from Ebay during the height of the Summer. Someone's taken it in - my body double, I think - it fits me perfectly! The tiny vintage atomiser pendant was bought at Womad from my friend Caroline at Pilgrims Fairtrade (website HERE) 

It's the calm before the storm, by all accounts we've got some shocking weather forecast for tomorrow. I wore this All About Aud sale dress with my vintage Phool quilted jacket and secondhand Toast cowboy boots for this morning's swim (well, to walk down to the baths, I wear a swimsuit in the water!)

This Accessorize hat complete with feathered band was a clearance charity shop buy a couple of days before we went to End of the Road. A girl can never have too many hats. 

I've not shared a Lidl £1.50 Waste Not box for ages, here's last week's! 

Normally I'll type an ingredient into Google for recipe suggestions but I snaffled this book from a charity shop a few weeks ago and it's absolutely brilliant. Not that you have to be vegan to enjoy it - I'm a  vegetarian and Jon's an omnivore. Based on the premise that people already have flour, oil, salt and black pepper in their cupboards, all the recipes are, like the cover suggests, made using five ingredients and in the case of the delicious beer bread pictured below, often less. Interested? Second hand copies are readily available on Abebooks. 

We loved the parsnip & chickpea tagine 

And the carrot cake porridge is a game changer..

 The cauliflower cheese soup is really tasty

The Santorini tomato fritters are as good as any that we enjoyed on our travels...

The vegan sausage and bean casserole with colcannon mash was perfect for last night's freezing temperatures.

And the olive oil & lemon shortbread is a revelation.

And I'm not on commission, honest! 

I'll leave you with William. We keep warning him not to wander too far just in case somebody's tempted to steal him for a Hallowe'en prop. He looks really chunky but he's the same weight as he's been for months according to my Wii Fit, it must be his Winter coat!

See you soon.