Ta-dah! Tuesday - come and link up!

Hello! Hope you all had a good bank holiday weekend. I've been absent from the blogging world for a week - but I have been busy, so hopefully you'll forgive me. I've just had a great weekend in the Suffolk countryside with friends, I've been trying out more jewellery ideas, organising an upcoming giveaway, and collating all the swap information. Incidentally I'm closing the swap in two days, so if you still want to get involved, sign up NOW. 

Anyway, I've been making earrings again - using feathers this time; don't try this in the lounge unless you want your carpet to look like fantastic Mr Fox has paid a visit to the chicken shed - and wondered what the rest of you have been up to. Have you made or done something new? Finally completed a project you've been working on for ages, or at last tracked down that elusive item on your thrift list? Have you bought something you love, taken an incredible photograph or just got your kitchen how you envisaged it when you moved in 12 years ago ? Maybe you have just hauled 13 bags of clothes to the charity shop and are sitting stunned in front of a newly spacious wardrobe? Whatever your 'ta-dah!' moment is - short post or detailed how-to -  I'd like to see! Fabulous outfit posts count too of course.

Anyway, here's my latest earring attempts - as promised!

Boho feather earring - love these graphic spots

[its partner somehow ended up in my coffee and is less photogenic, I may have to make another]

'I laugh in the face of superstition' peacock earrings

I had a pair of these years ago with added beads on each frondy bit.

[I'm not sure the world's brightest feathers require extra bling]

Link up - what have I missed?

Lakota x

PS. Like sweeties? This post was mostly written while eating rhubarb and custards. Yum.

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Frog Princess update: Her Magnificent Body!

Just a quick post, but I had to share this. I got such great feedback on my Frog Princess post - some of the comments really made me laugh and there were obviously a few of you wincing in recognition. Anyway, if you're currently suffering the critical eye of your offspring, read this and remember that occasionally they make up for it. Boy 1 (age 7) had started writing this in his 'topic book' as I was writing the post, but today I got to see it completed. The subject is 'I am thankful for...' and all idiosyncratic spelling and phrasing is his own!

"I am thankful for my beautiful mother because she always makes my dinner. She also engcoureges me to do things I'm to scared to do. She made me and brought me to earth in her special way*. Only using her magnificent body"

I fear that 'only using my magnificent body!' may become my catch phase of choice whenever I'm asked how I've done something - worthy of a slogan t-shirt don't you think?

I googled and discovered that I share this accolade with a collection by an American poet, Christina Hendricks and former Spice Girl Mel B, although Boy1 hadn't chosen any of these to illustrate his pronouncement. Instead it was accompanied by a picture of me looking like I'd fallen asleep in the tropics following a chemical peel; apparently there wasn't a light pink pencil. Sadly I can't reproduce it here as his book needs to stay in class. But thank-you sweetheart, I appreciate it. And it's spag-bol for dinner tonight.

Lakota x

*He was made and 'brought to earth' in the usual way. We're not from Krypton or anything.

40 before 40 (36 before 36 wasn't as catchy)

Thirty-five is a very attractive age. London society is full of women of the very highest birth who have, of their own free choice, remained thirty-five for years

Oscar Wilde: The Importance of being Earnest

I am 35. Really. This is a non-exhaustive list of stuff I'd like to get done, or do again. Preferably before I hit 40, but it's mainly just a list I can refer to when I think "what shall we go this Summer?" or "what could we do this weekend?". I'll add to it as I think of things - if this seems too easy, and I'm actually ticking things off, I may progress it to the Day Zero project


1.Visit New York and San Francisco

2. Own a piano again (and play it!)

3. Make some money from my writing

4. Ride a sled pulled by huskies. Also want to stay in an ice hotel

5. Stay at Hotel Pelirocco in Brighton

6. Holiday in a gypsy caravan

7. Crochet a blanket. I may need to give myself longer than 5 years. (I can have it on my lap in the nursing home)

8. Go to a massive antiques fair

9. Actually meet some of my favourite bloggers

10. Take the kids to a festival

11. Proper British beach holiday in Devon or Cornwall (Mr FHCS is mooting Pembrokeshire too)

12. Go to the circus

13. Go to an auction

14. Do tourist things in London I don't do because I live here. eg, Tower of London, Thames boat ride
 Also take the boys to the ones I have done - London Eye, Monument

15. See the Northern Lights

16. Go to Marrakesh and get lost in a souk

17. Find make-up which doesn't bring me out in spots if worn for more than two days in a row

18. Be able to do something with my hair other than than putting it in a ponytail.

19. Learn to make proper jewellery - earrings for example.

20. Take archery lessons

21. See 'The Woman in Black' at the theatre

22. Be familiar with all the London museums (am shamefully bad at regular visiting)

23. Go on more weekends away, some with kids, some just as a couple. (Whitby, Hebden Bridge)

24. Finally have conquered the sewing machine - get lessons?

25. Stop being rubbish about long drives / motorway driving in the car

26. Own a cat (sorry, allergic brother in law)

27. Have moved house. Somewhere I really love.

28.  Go to the dogs (as in greyhound racing, not rack and ruin)

29. Get to Portobello market again. Early. Perhaps I should combine this with a hotel stay.

30. Colombia Road Flower market

31. Have a go on a potter's wheel.

32. Either relearn my appalling French (I have an A level in this language? Really?) or ditch it and learn Spanish instead.

33. Own a cocktail cabinet and make cocktails of an evening to the strains of the gramophone. Wearing a fabulous vintage frock and waving a cigarette holder around. (And have morphed into someone living in 1929, apparently. Who smokes. Hmm)

34. Have my fortune told by various methods and see whether any similarities occur.

35. Go ghost hunting

36. Be proficient at a card game other than 'Shithead'. Sorry, but that's what it's called. And I am the mistress. (Abby, if you're reading, you still owe me your first born child).

37. Keep up with music - do not become person who only recognises songs because they've been in a Building Society advert.

38. Buy fewer boots, and more actual clothes. Preferably ones which I love.

39. Replace my second hand Mulberry shoulder bag (which is ancient and used for gigs etc, and will probably have reached a sad demise in the next 5 years) with a healthier model befitting a grown-up. And do not sit it in a puddle of beer.

40. Make sure we all own bikes, and go on wholesome rides through the country in style of Centre Parcs family.