Hypocrisy - spending update, indoor cats and a dress reveal

Hello lovelies

Well, my no spend week is almost over and aside from buying some wine - which was very much needed but I won't go into that - I seem to have made it!  I am paid at midnight tonight.

So - I've decided I'm going to attempt some sort of budgeting over December, while I don't usually go any more crazy over the festive season than usual, it would be good to keep an eye.  I'm therefore implementing an envelope system.  I am taking all the cash I need out of the bank in one go, allocating it to various envelopes (cats, going out, cleaner, groceries, Christmas) and will try to stick to these amounts, or under, over the month.  It ain't going to be easy but better to try and fail than not even try, eh?

Most of my allocated Christmas cash is going to be spent tomorrow, on the cats.  Over the past couple of months my two indoor cats, previously soft, cuddly, calm creatures, have becoming increasing whiny. Marlon (the big blue) meows constantly from around 6 in the morning.  He doesn't WANT anything, apart from me to get up.  Once I'm up, he just ignores me.  Little b@$^A£d!  Gene, the small one, likes to sit in the hallway yowling at the front door but seem to have no desire to actually go out.  He just miaows at it.  For hours. 

I adore both my boys and they are, by and large, good natured creatures - I just can't take the noise.  they aren't ill, they are still putting away food like nobodies business and are very perky.  I think they must just be bored, and I can't blame them.  As such I am finally getting them a cat tree.  The one I have wanted for a couple of years is finally on sale at half price.  Half price is still £60 but this is £60 spent on my sleep (i.e. sanity).  With a combination of this, a laser pen for easy playing and a Valerian toy I'm hoping they will chill a bit. 

I'm also finally going to attempt to leash train them.  I can quite see myself, decked out in my vintage regalia, visiting the local hostelry with two cats on leads.


Anyway - the real reason I popped in today was to show you my new baby.  My Christmas present to myself.

Feast your peepers:

Oh yeah.  Sexy innit?  Could there be anything better than a full length emerald green velvet dress with a matching turban?  I don't think so.  And heavens, she fits like a glove.

Thank you to the lovely Kellie at Via's Vintage on Etsy for answering my many questions.  It really was a dream of a transaction and its a dream of a dress.

I've paired her with some stunning and scandalously cheap repro shoes (dance shoes) I picked up on eBay from Freed (used to be Equity).  They aren't quite like these but almost.

I shall go to the ball, I shall.  Whether I have a prince to take me, well, we shall see.  ;-)

Shame about the shoes

OK - so this is a slightly different blog post to the one I was intending to do tonight for a couple of reasons, firstly I decided to do an outfit post instead and secondly, I can't find my darn camera so am stuck using iPhone pics which won't do for the other piece I wanted to write.  Meh, where is that camera?

Anyhoo - I had one of those days where it all goes together. My hair worked out. My makeup looked good as my skin seems to finally be settling down following the change of seasons and I wore a new outfit.  All in all I felt good about myself today.

I set my hair in a similar fashion to the "Glamorous Casual" setting in the post just previous.  This time however I used one finger pin curls on a dry set with a couple of wave clamps in the front.  It worked really well, though as usual the wave didn't really take.

Look at my massive mouth - I look like a cartoon fish.  Heh.

Outfit wise, I had a burst of organisation last night and have laid out my outfits for the entire week.  Today was a jumper I knit from the "Two Hour Sweater" pattern as detailed in good ole Livejournal (I never did get that site but it is full of useful info).

This was my first real knitting project and I foolishly used some genuine vintage 50's wool to make it up.  It turned out OK.  I just wish I'd know about only joining at the ends of rows when making this up.

I really like the patterns at the sleeves and neck and the wide ribbing.

Anyway, I put it with a vintage 40's black crepe 'A' line skirt (its a cat fur magnet this thing, but lovely) and a wide belt and pinned one of my favourite reverse carved lucite brooches on it.  I think the whole thing worked well.  It could have used a hat but I was going to work and that's just too much, even for my workplace.

It was really good to go out wearing something I'd made.  I got a lot of compliments on it, despite its somewhat primitive appearance.  It has inspire me to sew the rest of my knits together so I can wear them out too, instead of them just slowly building up in the craft cupboard.


The only low point of the outfit was that I had to wear silver ballet flats with it as I have no comfortably, non-vintage buy vintage style black shoes.  I am hunting for something with a low-mid heel, that can work with 40's outfits, that is comfy enough to wear for long periods and that doesn't cost of GBP 50.  If you have any ideas please, point me in their direction!

Toodlepip.

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