More turquoise and red

This little skirt was a lovely find. I don't think I will ever part with it, it makes me feel very pretty...and kind of like I have my red kettle and Henrietta peck and the lambs with me the whole day when I wear it!!! (see last post)

It is an original 50s skirt with a little cardigan I bought in H&M. As you can see I have started with a blonde stripe in my hair, too. I wanted to get to a beautiful platinum blonde...but there was no chance of that (more later!!)

Turquoise and red

I have been collecting kitchenalia for a long time now, I have been far more adventurous in my kitchen than anywhere else in my home or in my wardrobe, certainly. Yet my kitchen says more about my personality than anywhere else.

It is painted magnolia and has standard cream cupboards and white tiles (we live in a new build) but I also have shabby chic style painted pine dresser and shelves which are packed full of my charity shop and ebay finds. I have a biscuit tin just like one my mother used to have, I have some pyrex crockery, some cake plates, sylvac, some very pretty 50s lambs that my mum gave me (I sourced an extra one because she gave me four but I had my littlest child, Leon and we became a family of five). Here are some pictures:

Home made curtains, bell dangling from the window was fro mthe Christmas Market in Manchester a few years ago

The mobile I made with the children, striped teapot, my son's first wellington boots,my painted pine shelves...

A wire heart holding all our invitations, thank you cards, take away menus etc

Stripey 'hello' duck form Martin Mere Wetlands park

chickens

home made glass jar vases

plate stand with buns

little lambs

'Henrietta Peck'

My lovely red kettle

Battered biscuit tin

This load of old tat that is in my kitchen says a lot about my life with my family and our personalities. I decided to inject a little of this into my wardrobe for a more fun (if slightly un-coordinating) look!

NEXT!!!!

The next thing I bought was this:

Esbelt waist cincher

It is really too good to be true!!!

It was this blog that made me go ahead and purchase it and it does EXACTLY what it says on the tin. I am size 12 ish... but no matter how skinny I get, my belly still hangs over my jeans. That's having three kids for you...my boobs can also be tucked into the waist-band of said jeans but thats a whole other story...

It is made of rubber with cotton lining that goes next to your skin and has two sets of hooks and eyes (like on your bra) up the front. It is designed to go from under your bra, where your underwire is and sits just on my hips. I started off with size M and it was pretty tight. After two weeks however, I was ordering size S because it was on the tightest fitting and it was loose.

I am happy with my size S. I did get so that I was comfortable in it and went for an XS but I think at my size if I wanted to go any smaller I would need a boned corset, the Esbelt wasn't strong enough to create the shape I wanted.

The Esbelt makes me 27/28" waist which is just lovely with a pretty high waisted skirt or the Stop Staring dress I posted in my last post. Another thing is that when I have been wearing my Esbelt for a few days I start to keep my shape which meant that last summer I wore it every day and when I wore my swimming costume I actually felt that (without it) I had a better shape than before.

Winter came though, and I put on a few pounds and stopped wearing it...it is back out of hibernation now though as I prepare for my more summery outfits :)

Baby steps

So the first thing I bought was this dress:

which was great...although I still haven't worn it out of the house since we don't go anywhere that calls for sexy-vixen evening dresses! It is a 'Stop Staring' dress and I do feel very sexy in it.

Hardly ball pool-wear...

Hello!

This is my first blog about me, as opposed to my many blogs about Mummy Bridge and my family, this is about Melanie Bridge!

About a year ago I decided I was really fed up with how I looked. My kids are growing, my youngest is now 3 and I felt like I was disappearing. Fast. Under layers of supermarket clothes and (when I could afford it) Fatface and Boden layers.

Here are some 'before' pictures :)

ok, so in my pyjamas on xmas day, taken by my 5 year old...not the best picture ever...

I do have the excuse of pregnancy for the rather large striped t-shirt...

preggers again

who says you can't look great in a paper hat?

yum. school run anorak on bonfire night with my very beautiful son

Matalan t-shirt with Tesco cardi.

I love this pic, it was a great day.

 

ok,so boring right?

I didn't look horrendous, I looked like I could do with a bit of touche eclat (!) but also I didn't feel that my clothes reflected my personality. I am a curvy girl, 38/30/40 but I felt like I was starting to disappear.

This blog is about my er kind of reinvention(s) there's more than one, because I am still finding my style. Also I am making HUGE mistakes!! Like when I decided to go blonde! (more of that later)

I am of the right age to be a 'yummy mummy' but I home educate so you won't see me in the school yard. I was saddled with student debts and just dressed in whatever was on sale in Sainsbury's for years, until we started to be able to afford for me to dress how I wanted to. I went through the phase of wearing fat face, Gap jeans and Pandora jewellery, dressing like the crowd or the herd or whatever you want to call it, but after the first few months of feeling like part of the 'gang' I started to feel like I was no longer expressing myself as different, unique or creative person.

I then watched 'Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang' with the children. In it the very beautiful Maggie Gyllenhaal dresses in the most charming repro 40s clothes you will ever see! They are not true vintage in style as the costume designer embellished her outfits in quite an eclectic way but it got me thinking that maybe I needed to shed my 'Gap cocoon' and see if there was any shape-wear out there which might help me squeeze into something a little sexier and any clothing out there to squeeze into which might make me feel on the outside like I do on the inside.

I am finding that it takes balls to change your style because you have to risk looking like an idiot when it goes wrong and you have to risk being laughed at even when you think you look great.