Well, hello there!

Wow, it’s been a while. *Blows dust and baby drool off the computer keyboard*. I hope you’re still out there somewhere. I’m sitting here, home alone while husband is away at a wrap party and Elliot is snoring gently in the bedroom. Trying to kickstart my brain and string together a few sentences, or maybe just a few words that can sum up the last five months.

Basically I’ve been dedicating all my (many!) waking hours to keeping this little fella happy:

This has meant: a helluva lot of breastfeeding, internet shopping, incontrollable chocolate & ice cream cravings, diaper changes en masse, 3 x mastitis, tears of joy and despair, tantrums (mainly mine), 1 x tongue-tie diagnosis, 1 x tongue-tie release, sleepless nights, walks in the park, baby smiles & laughter, caffeine binges, hair-loss and yo-yo’ing hormones.

Add to that a love greater than anything I could ever have imagined, and you might understand why this blog has been a teeny tiny bit neglected.

In the meantime I’ve been keeping up with all the blogs I normally read, and recently I’ve missed my own and been thinking about what to do with it. There won’t be any more “dressing the bump”s. But I guess I could do some “dressing the blob”. Or not.

What I do have is a few second-hand finds I could show you…and who knows, the whole thing might just turn a bit more personal and baby-friendly.

Anyways, it’s nice to be back. Stay tuned.

Elliot August Bassett

…was born the day before yesterday, June 27th at 10.00 am. He’s weighs just above 3 kilos and is absolutely amazing. I was induced 2 1/2 weeks early due to obstetric cholestasis which I was diagnosed with 5 weeks ago (hence the blog silence).

The birth itself was a really good experience….god how I love epidurals….and we couldn’t be happier.

Blogging may stay sporadic for a while as Elliot enjoys being constantly glued to my nipples :-)

A gift: Snygg leather jewellery

Hello there. I’m back after a little blogging break…and ahhhh it was nice.

Instead of an outfit post (let’s face it, I’m looking more and more like a tent) I’ll show you a lovely birthday gift I got from a friend in Denmark.

This silver ring with a leather flower is made by Danish designer Vicki Zoé Ziska, the woman behind the brand Snygg. She specialises in leather jewellery and I already own two pairs of her earrings in gold and green,  a bit like these.

This ring is the perfect match for my fat pregnancy-swollen fingers (can’t wear my wedding band at the moment) as the silver ring is expandable. And it adds a bit of oomph to an otherwise boring outfit.

Read more about the designer and check out her jewellery at snygg.dk

Dressing the bump – rainbow summer dress

I bought this rainbow cotton dress many years ago in one of my favourite second-hand shops in Copenhagen. It cost around 8 pounds.

I love the bold and bright colours as you can’t help but feeling cheerful when you wear it, and it’s perfect for hot and humid summer days where you need a bit of ventilation under your skirt.

I remember thinking that someday this would make a great maternity dress, as it can accommodate even the biggest of bumps, so the other day I decided to give it a try.

I’m wearing it with a ribbon tied around it, to make sure that I wouldn’t be mistaken for a ginormous tent

Blog award

The other day I  received this blog award from my lovely fellow blogger Karoline-med-K. Thank you!

This also means I have to answer a few questions, so here goes:

Why did you start blogging?
I began reading blogs 3 1/2 years ago when we first moved to London. Mainly about other expats’ experiences moving to a new country plus a few fashion blogs. A while later I was sitting insanely bored behind a desk in a big office building and I decided to start my own.

I love reading very personal blogs, but decided that that was not for me, so instead I focus on recommending stuff that I like and showing you my second-hand finds.

Which blogs do you follow?
You can see links to some of my favourite ones in the right sidebar. In the beginning I was really into style & fashion blogs, but most of them bore me now. Three favourites would be: Teaching Cancer to Cry, where multi-talented Ezra from New York  writes beautifully about how he is making cancer cry (plus he shares some  yummy recipes).

American-born ph.d. student/writer/feminist Anglofille, because it’s highly intelligent, honest and opinionated, and it was one of the first blogs I started following.

Lastly, the only style blog left in my reader: Skylark and Son, where an Australian mama in her thirties shows us her amazing op-shop (charity shop) finds. She is very funny and her son is beyond cute.

Favourite make-up brand?
I don’t really have one. But I’ve been using Lancôme mascaras for the last 20 years and still love them. If I had the money I would buy loads of Chanel, as I love the packaging. And I would buy the entire range from Australian skin care brand Aesop.

Favourite clothes brand?
Yohji Yamamoto, H&M and second-hand finds.

“Must have” make-up products?
Rimmel Glam’eyes liquid black eyeliner,  Estée Lauder double-wear concealer, Clinique transparency blended powder, cream blusher (preferable this one from DuWop).

And this to wash it all off with.

Favourite colour?
Black (yes, I know it’s not a colour). 

Perfume?
Chanel no 5 (pure perfume thankyouverymuch).  Throughout this pregnancy I’ve been wearing Costume National’s Scent instead, so that I don’t risk getting sick and tired of no 5.

Favourite movie(s)?
Hmmmmm…..I cried and cried when I watched The Hours. Finding Neverland and Brokeback Mountain are great too. Moon. And of course Dirty Dancing!

Which country would you like to visit and why?
Australia. It’s just one of these countries you have to experience. Plus I know they make great coffee. And I would love to go on another road trip in the States.

What are you looking forward to in the near-future?
Meeting my baby boy in July.

Now I think I’m supposed to pass this on to 5 other bloggers, but I just became overwhelmed with fatigue, so will head for the sofa and watch The Goonies instead :-)

Matryoshka dolls

When I was 6 years old and in kindergarten I was deeply fascinated by this set of Russian matryoshka dolls (also called nesting dolls or babushka dolls). I could spend hours peeling off the outer “doll layers” until I got to the amazingly tiny baby one in the middle.

I’ve never owned any of these myself, until a while ago, when I spotted a set of these in a local bric-à-brac shop. They cost £1, so although they looked nothing like the classic ones from my childhood I had to buy them.  They’ve been cheering up our mantelpiece ever since.

And then when I read a post on Liberty London Girl’s blog about how she had bought one of the more traditional sets while in Moscow for around £8, I decided it was time to invest in the “real thing”.

Luckily for me Sam has a very nice Russian friend & colleague, who was just about to go to Moscow on holiday. And this is what he came back with:

The perfect set, which instantly takes me back to kindergarten.

I excitedly pulled them apart to see who was nesting in the middle: and yay, there it was, the teeny weeny little baby. How cute (sorry pregnancy hormones taking over here).

The dolls make great gifts for kids too (over 3-years-old though because of the small bits). If a trip to Moscow isn’t on the horizon you can buy cheap ones online at for example Amazon or Play.com.

Or if you’re a real aficionado you can visit matryoshkastore.com, which is 100% dedicated to nesting dolls in all shapes and genres. Here’s something for everyone, from cats to Little Red Riding Hood matryoshkas.

The sensible tan leather sandals

I haven’t worn high heels since the beginning of the pregnancy. It’s not comfortable, definitely not healthy and it just feels wrong to totter around in stilettos .

So I’ve been on the hunt for a pair of very simple leather sandals in a decent quality, that can replace my beloved jelly shoes,  and live on my feet for the rest of the summer.

And yesterday I found the right pair.

These Silas sandals from Office are both cheap and comfy. And they have that perfect durable rubber sole which guarantees a long shoe life and steady feet, even on the most slippery of surfaces.

They cost £58 and come in navy blue too. Buy them here.