My favourite section has to be ‘Yuletime’ – http://www.nineteenseventythree.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=314_319 – love the Baubles and Sprouts cards!

It’s the new Paperchase owl range coming this Autumn, as designed by Jilly P who did the original owl range that I was so obsessed with. Can’t wait to get a few of these bits – the mug looks fab!

Alain Grée Animals

My boss came into work a couple of months with a parcel decorated with stickers of illustrations by Alain Grée. My eye was drawn to them instantly and a Google search threw up all manner of cuteness.

Alain Grée is a french illustrator and author and published over 300 books mostly in the 1960s and 70s. His work was recently licenced in Japan – Print & Pattern did a post about this in 2008: http://printpattern.blogspot.co.uk/2008/09/illustration-alain-gree.html.

You can buy lots of things via his website: http://www.alaingree.com/en/products.htm.

(As an aside, his characters really remind me of the Topsy and Tim books I had when I was little e.g. http://1.bp.blogspot.com/–JOj0Np2VcE/Trbx28wBBII/AAAAAAAABjo/lzwE1X945os/s1600/topsytim.jpg. I wish I had kept all of them, unfortunately the snails and slugs in the garden shed ate the books along with my back catalogue of early 90’s NME, Melody Maker and Select magazines.)

(Also in the title it is meant to be Alain Grée with the accent but the stupid font I’m using pretends eacutes don’t exist!)

Me and Chris

Chris and I got married on the 5th May 2012! It was a fab day followed by an amazing honeymoon in Thailand. Now we’ve been back a couple of weeks it all seems like a lifetime ago, but last week we got the photos back from the photographer so I thought it would be a good time to do a post.

Coming out of the registry office

Us and our families

Neither of us wanted a big, traditional style wedding so we opted for a registry office service for close family only followed by a party straight after the service for family and friends. The service was at 12pm in Milldam House in Old Portsmouth and the party was from 12.30pm until 6pm at the Kings Street Tavern in Southsea (http://www.thekingstreettavern.co.uk), which is a gorgeous old fashioned pub run by Chris’s friend Sam. Luckily Sam closed the pub all afternoon for us as he is normally open on Saturday lunchtimes, this meant all our friends could turn up and get settled in prior to us turning up.

King Street Tavern in Southsea

I wore a beautiful Orla Kiely ‘Big Bird’ dress, Monsoon angora shrug and John Lewis navy suede heels and Chris wore a heritage slim fit brown Top Man suit and vintage brown Churcher shoes. We had bespoke wedding rings made by Atelier in Ryde, Isle of Wight (http://www.atelierjewellers.co.uk) in silver with a bark effect and ‘Sarah & Chris 05.05.12′ engraved on the inside of the rings. Harriet from Atelier was really fab and managed to know and create exactly what we wanted, so I was really excited to finally be able to wear the ring! I also wore some silver hoop earrings that my Mum bought me, and my Judy Reeves necklace made by my friend Elin (http://www.elinhorgan.com). I also had my hair put into a partial beehive by Lauren at Hair Ott in Portsmouth (http://www.hairott.co.uk), which I loved and want to have done again very soon!

We wanted the day to be as relaxed and enjoyable as possible, without the stress and fuss associated with a traditional style wedding, so there was no dress code, food-wise we asked for canapes and Bucks Fizz at the start of the party followed by an ‘afternoon tea’ style buffet and cupcakes in lieu of a big wedding cake (I was being a bit selfish here really as I have a gluten free diet so having cupcakes was easier as I could then have my own one!), and stuck some money behind the bar to get everyone on their merry way. We still had cake toppers though as on Etsy I found a seller called Kathy who works under the name ‘Knottingwood’ (http://www.etsy.com/shop/knottingwood) who custom makes peg dolls to look like the bride and groom (and extended family if you wish!) and did a fab job in making very accurate peg doll versions of me, Chris and Judy. I’ve now put them on display in the wall unit in our living room.

Knottingwood peg dolls

The canapes were gorgeous mini roast beef & horseradish yorkshire puddings, smoked salmon and crème fraiche blinis and chocolate dipped strawberries, olives, breadsticks, crisps and dips and there were little bags of sweets laid out on the bar for the kids. The buffet was also great – we had sandwiches, quiche, salads, a cheese and a meat platter, crisps, dips etc. Sam and his team at the King Street Tavern did a fantastic job of making sure everyone was well provided for. I didn’t actually eat that much of the food as by the mid-afternoon all the stress of sorting everything out in the run up to the wedding suddenly hit me and I had to go and sit on the sofa in the back garden for a while with a diet coke and crisps to relax and get some energy back! Meanwhile Chris managed to carry on drinking and eating, lucky him!

In the back garden of the King Street Tavern

We didn’t have wedding flowers, instead I bought loads of orange, yellow and white roses from the market in Portsmouth and purple, red, pink and white anemones from a local greengrocer. The day before the wedding me and my Mum ran down to the pub when it was closed mid-afternoon and stuck them all in lots of different size vases that I had bought from Ikea (we spent about 20 minutes cutting the stems and sticking approx. 40 bunches of flowers in the vases), and asked the pub staff to arrange them as they saw fit. On the day they looked fantastic and really enhanced the old fashioned splendour of the pub, I was really pleased that something we’d spent so little time and money on ended up looking so good!

My cute little nephew Flynn with my Auntie and cousins

It was a great afternoon and lots of our family and friends said that they had a lovely time as it was so relaxed and fun, just like going down the pub but with all your family and friends – such a strange but amazing feeling to know and love everyone there! Also it was really lovely to have our dog Judy be able to come to the wedding. She had a great time playing with all the kids and getting loads of scraps off the buffet.

Judy Reeves in her special wedding neckerchief

The next day my Dad drove us to Heathrow for our overnight flight to Bangkok. Neither of us had been to the Far East before so were very excited, I was still feeling a bit rank from the day before but thankfully managed to make myself feel better before getting on the plane. We were really lucky to get seats at the back of the plane where there are only two seats in the row, and were really close to all the snacks / bar so it was most enjoyable… it definitely didn’t feel like a 11 1/2 hour flight! We had four days at the Shangri-La hotel in Bangkok (http://www.shangri-la.com/bangkok/shangrila) which is on the Chao Phraya River and is stunning. The staff are so nice and accommodating, and after dinner on the first night we returned to the room and found a card and a chocolate sculpture waiting for us as a gift from the hotel to celebrate our honeymoon. How lovely! After Bangkok we spent 7 nights at the Hyatt Regency in Hua Hin (http://huahin.regency.hyatt.com/hyatt/hotels-huahin-regency/) which was like paradise, it was right on a huge golden sandy beach and set in the most lush grounds with hundreds of birds and a frog chorus at midnight!

Unfortunately now we have come back down to earth with a big bump, I need to get myself back on the sewing and web projects, lots to do (including a huge backlog of posts for this blog about all my finds over the past 10 months!) and so little time…

Totally gutted. I’ve been going to that car boot every summer Sunday since I started coming down (and eventually moved down) to Southsea in 2006 and between me and Chris (and other friends) we have found some real gems amongst the stalls. Where else am I going to find funny middle aged ladies selling large concentrations of 1970’s / 1980’s Snoopy memorabilia? No other car boot I’ve been to has ever been quite as good or fruitful.

Spoiling the playing field? Such a load of old rubbish Not once have I ever seen it in a state. I reckon Portsmouth City Council have got a hand in this.

EDIT 07/07/12: There is a campaign to reinstate the car boot… sadly it doesn’t seem to have had much effect though: http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/business/local-business/campaign-to-save-popular-car-boot-sales-at-southsea-seafront-1-3705417.

Hornsea Sunflower pot

I think this has to be one of my best charity shop finds ever, as normally when I buy anything Hornsea it’s from Ebay or collectors websites. I went into the Hospice shop in Ryde at lunchtime today and it was sitting on a shelving unit as part of the collection of retro bits they were in the middle of putting together for the mod / scooter thing going on this weekend (it had literally just gone on the shelf and didn’t even have a price on it!). I was drawn to it because I thought it was pretty and looked very Orla Kiely-ish. I was expecting it to be quite new as there is a lot of stuff in a similar style being made at the moment, but then I saw the Hornsea stamp and thought ‘wow’, and obviously then headed straight for the cash desk. I hadn’t seen one like it before so was unsure of the age, thinking it could be early 1970’s, but after spending about 10 minutes searching around on Google whilst eating my lunch, I found some other sites with photos / information about it. It’s from the ‘Sunflower’ range of the same pots in 5 different colour ways, and was made in 1965 (see here: http://retroselect.com/Hornsea/Hornsea%203.htm and http://eastgatenhornsea.com/display_item.php?451). I’m still feeling very chuffed about finding it, I think it will be for decoration only as it’s quite fragile and has a bit of crazing so don’t want to ruin it.

Arthur Woods pot with wooden lid

At the same car boot as the Snoopy finds, I found this Arthur Woods pot to add to the collection. It’s got a wooden lid and looks like it has never been used. It was only £1 so I was quite chuffed.

Snoopy storage jars

Snoopy Goodies

Snoopy juice jug and glass

Snoopy pie dish

Snoopy hot air balloon mirror

Snoopy mugs

My favourite is the juice jug. Most of it I got off a lady who has a whole room in her house devoted to Snoopy / Charlie Brown memorabilia, but was having to downsize so was selling the bits she didn’t want. I left behind some egg cups, which I’m regretting now but nevermind.

Greasy fingerprints

Better but with some wallys in the reflection

The last time I bought something off US Ebay it all ended in tears (I bought a QChord, it cost lots of $$$, it blew up in my face when I put some batteries in it and then I proceeded to have an email row with the redneck seller over the course of a week, but I did end up getting my money back hooray!) so I was slightly nervous at the prospect of a mirror staying in one piece on it’s way over, but when it arrived it was wrapped up so well and was in great condition so I was very happy. I’m not sure where to put it yet and it’s very heavy so some planning is required.