SHABBY CHIC BARN WEDDING

I thought I'd share the flowers from the wedding I attended on Sunday. Unfortunately I didn't find out who the florist was, but I thought they were perfect for the shabby chic style wedding.

Bouquet: Blue Eryngium, White Spray Rose, White Lisianthus, White Double Freesia, Pink Bouvardia, Purple Veronica, Green Astrantia, Alchemilla Mollis

Garland: Million Star Baby's Breath, Queen Anne's Lace, White Avalanche Roses, Soft Ruscus, Ivy and Eucalyptus

Centrepieces: Blue Eryngium, Million Star Baby's Breath, White Stocks, White Spray Roses, White Avalanche Roses, Purple Veronica, Pink Bouvardia, Green Astrantia, Alchemilla Mollis

REME VINTAGE JACKET

Yesterday I spent a lovely day in Hampshire at a wedding. We were incredibly lucky with the weather and spent an afternoon drinking Champagne in the beautiful gardens at Bury Court (http://www.burycourtbarn.com/). I've had my vintage military jacket for about 3 years now but still didn't know what part of the army it was from. Thankfully some of the other guests filled me in. Apparently it's a REME (Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers) uniform. 

 I had a quick look at the records and there appears to be two Symes in REME during the 1940s. I can't quite believe the uniform is that old but you never know. They were definitely built to last!

The best part of my outfit for me though was how much fun it was spinning in THAT skirt during the ceilidh in the evening :D I am now permanently attached to it for the rest of summer and I will be twirling everywhere instead of walking.

Outfit:

Jacket: Vintage
Top: H&M
Skirt: H&M
Shoes: Fiona McGuinness
Necklace: Charity Shop

TILES TILES TILES

About a year ago I started a tile collection. Here's a selection of what I have so far. I think I have a subliminal thing for the colour brown. So fashionable! The first was a gift from family, the second a gift from the other half and the last my own purchase. I use them as coasters mainly. I did have the idea to use a mish mash of lots of different tiles as a back splash in the kitchen, but then I found my emerald green 20s tiles (Lucky Finds) so that idea took a back seat. Maybe in the next house? It'd be lovely to group them together somewhere and by then I might actually have enough to do a whole kitchen :)

Having a collection of lovely things actually makes me really happy. Each object ends up having a particular memory or story attached to it in your head. It's like keeping a diary. I am blatantly going to spend the rest of the day ebaying tiles and broken clocks, though where's the memory in that? Maybe I should just wait until they pop up unexpectedly.

Happy Collecting!

LUSTREWARE

When I was about 16 I found this lovely lusterware tea set in an antiques place in Horncastle, Lincolnshire.  If you are ever up that way there are loads of very good and reasonable antiques shops and the town itself is lovely too. 

Lusterware is a type of pottery that has a metallic sheen. The wedding ring cushion I got off ebay for a few pounds and the little Bakelite picture frame was from an antiques place on Pershore Road in Birmingham.

I only have one other little bit of lustreware in the house, although I want more. The fireplace in our dining room is tiled and the central decoration includes tiny little lustreware tiles. The fireplace has to be my favourite thing in the whole house.

SOFT AND ROMANTIC VINTAGE WEDDING

The wedding held at Shrawley church has been and gone ( Shrawley Church Weddings Post) and I feel a little bereft. I have a couple of other weddings coming up and have redirected my attention and efforts to those, but I will miss this one. The main focus flowers for this wedding were baby's breathand amnesia rose, and the theme was a sophisticated 'shabby chic'. 

My absolute favourite flower in the wedding were the stunning peonies (Duchesse de Nemours) which were softly ruffled and a beautiful ivory. Peonies are really big on the wedding scene at the moment. A bouquet of just peonies on their own can look just stunning and I'd choose that over a bouquet of roses any day. Another popular wedding theme is coral, especially when paired with mint, and coral peonies are a great choice. Check out this pinterest board for inspiration: Peonies!

(Display tray for the buttonholes)

In the picture above you can see the beautiful peonies, baby blue Eucalyptus, white astilbe and Queen Anne's lace (Ammi Majus). Then below the finished table arrangements in all their glory!

Peony Duchesse de Nemours, Sweet Avalanche Rose, Amnesia Rose, Queen Anne's Lace, Pink Astilbe, Silver Brunia Balls, Gypsophila, Baby Blue Eucalyptus.

The flowers were displayed in cream enamelled jugs and set in oasis foam. I will be doing a tutorial for a baby's breath head garland soon so watch out for it!

BANK HOLIDAY BLUEBELL HUNTING

On the May Day bank holiday weekend we decided to take a walk in the Clent Hills. It was a stunning day for early may and now it's raining incessantly so I'm glad we did take advantage. We had heard talk of bluebells in the woods so made it our aim to find them.

Half an hour in and still no luck though we did find these lovely white flowers lining a path.

Annoyingly we spotted a patch of blue across the valley on the other side of the Clent Hills:

We thought these would be the only ones we'd see...

...AND THEN WE HIT THE JACKPOT!!!!!

Happy Hunting :)

FIVE A DAY CURRY

So apparently we now have to eat 7-10 portions of fruit and veg a day http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-26818377. This is lame because I didn't even manage five before so now I have to feel doubly guilty. This recipe is a good one to remedy the guilt. The original recipe is this: Coconut and Spinach with Lemon. As per usual I changed it quite a lot though. The general idea is the same but I added more veg and cheated on the spicing. 

RECIPE

Serves 2 with leftovers

Ingredients

• 1 onion, chopped roughly
• 2 tbsp curry paste (I used Patak's Rogan Josh)
• 1 courgette, sliced
• 3 medium tomatoes, chopped roughly 
• 4 closed cup mushrooms sliced
• Tin of chickpeas
• 250 ml coconut cream (or tin of coconut milk)
• 400g bag of spinach
• 2 x Sweet potatoes
• 2 tsp Olive oil
• Salt

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees celsius (180 fan). Pierce the skin of the sweet potatoes and rub with 1 tsp olive oil and salt. Place on a baking tray and bake in the oven for 45 minutes until soft.

2. Place the rest of the olive oil, onion and curry paste into a deep frying pan over a medium heat. Fry gently for 2 minutes making sure the onion doesn't brown.

3. Add the courgette and mushrooms to the frying pan and fry gently for a further 5 minutes. Then add the chickpeas, tomatoes and 250ml water before adding the coconut cream. Stir and break up the coconut cream gently until it has melted in. Leave this to simmer over a low heat for 20 minutes or until the courgette is soft.

4. Wilt in the spinach by one handful at a time and stirring gently. You should be able to incorporate all 400g if you're patient!

5. Serve the amazing veg concoction over the baked sweet potato. OMNOMNOMNOM.

TIPS AND TWEAKS

This was such a tasty meal and the only reason I used the veg I did was because they were in the fridge. You could use anything! Carrot and cauliflower would be awesome as they curry well. Odd bits of pepper or sweetcorn could be good too. I think just go for it with whatever you have. The essentials are pretty much just the chickpeas, spinach, curry paste and coconut cream. 

Happy Experimenting!

LATEST FINDS I

I thought I'd share my favourite finds for the house so far. First off my absolute favourite. This work bench was free! We were walking to the pub and someone had left it outside their house so we knocked and ask if we could have it. It is covered in saw marks and even has a clamp. Bit of a strange coffee table but it was FREE and has grown on me :)

Second were these beautiful 20s fireplace tiles. They are dirty and scratched but I got all 70 of them for £30 from my local reclamation yard. I could spend a day in that place. They will eventually be part of my new kitchen back splash.

Finally on a visit to my in-laws I found these two in a charity shop. The clock did originally work but has since stopped :( but I've decided to have a wall of non-working clocks on the stairs so I can buy broken old clocks to my heart's content. The scales are obviously for the kitchen, but just for show. I am very attached to my digital scales.

Finally I thought I'd share this...if I had the guts and the money it'd be in my bathroom right now.

Happy Hunting!