Snake print jacketThere is a lot of animal print going on this winter which I quite like. This snake print jacket was one of the items from a benefit sale, held by Nikki of Midlifechic with items from her wardrobe. So it is second-hand, but I bet she only wore it once. I combined it with a blue top and trousers (the latter from the Max Mara outlet in Turin). The red patent leather pumps are a couple of years old (never been outside, only in the office).

Loes and I went to Buitenplaats Plantage in Vogelenzang, a small, wealthy village. It was before the lock-down but we were already careful to maintain distance. I have been to this restaurant twice before. The first time with Anja (Curly Traveller) and Sylvia of 40+Style and I called the post Battle of the jeans. The second time with Anja and Misja (misjab) when we photographed my jeans jacket.

Below: Inside the restaurant.

Buitenplaats Plantage Vogelenzang

Below: We decided to take the photos with the light through the windows behind Loes. Here I am in front of the big fireplace.

Snake print jacket

Snake print jacket

It was time for lunch. They serve organic, biological and sustainable food. Delicious.

Below: Loes with pretty earrings. Her eyes are so beautiful.

Loes

Below: Another take on the jacket. This time with a grey suede legging, grey turtleneck top and golden boots. We went outside for this. The blossom in the back is gorgeous.

Snake print jacket

Below: Because this grey top is rather tight over the stomach, I sewed a fastening on the jacket so I could close it.

Snake print jacket

Below: Close-up of the fastening. It closes with a clasp and a grommet. It was in my sewing box for years. The only catch is that the jacket is a bit too tight to fasten, so it rides up a bit when you sit down.

Snake print jacket

Below: Close-up of bag and boots.

golden bag and golden boots

Below: There are pigs on the premises. Kids love them.

Buitenplaats Plantage Vogelenzang

Below: I loved how they scratched their backs on the trees.

Buitenplaats Plantage Vogelenzang

Below: Walking towards the fields with flowers and the picnic table. I still slouch…

Snake print jacket

Below: It was rather windy at this spot, but what a sight.

Snake print jacket

Below: Spring is definitely on its way.

Buitenplaats Plantage Vogelenzang

Below: As we left, Loes took a photo of my kimono coat, which you have seen a couple of times before. Checking my hair. (I never knew whether that great big label on the back is a designer thing or just the label which you should remove before wearing.)

Kimono shaped coat

Below: I did some research and found out that the label on the jacket is the name of the brand: Sans Culotte, Sans Papiers. It means “without breeches, without papers”. In France the “sans culotte” were popular people during the French Revolution in 1789. They wore long striped trousers instead of short trousers with stockings as the nobility and middle class did. The brand wants to provoke. Now do I remove that label or not?

Kimono jacket label

Below: With sleeves like that, you need long gloves (found them in Paris when I was there with Susan of Une femme d’un certain âge).

Kimono shaped coat

What happened in my life this week

Monday: well… what do you do when you stay in all the time (due to Corona)? I thought I would be bored but I haven’t got enough time. Facetimed with my friend Marjolein and with Susan from Une femme d’un certain âge. That was fun. Plus the sun came out and it was really pleasantly warm in our garden. So I sat there and was absolutely zen. Here I am with no make-up on:

sun bathing no make-up

Cycled for half an hour (gosh there was a lot of wind) to get some exercise and picked up 2 pairs of jeans to try from the shop kpa.haarlem in town. We very carefully kept our distance. Karlijn, the shop owner, put the paper bag outside and stepped back into the shop. I picked up the bag with my leather gloves on. Unfortunately the jeans didn’t look as good on me as they did on her as I don’t have hips. See the difference below:

Karlijn of kpa.haarlem

trying jeans on

Tuesday: it is ever so nice, not having to get up in the morning on the sound of the alarm bell. You just get up when you wake up. Heaven. I cycled back into town to return the jeans and picked up a meringue with whipped cream on my way home. Here I am on my stretcher in the garden enjoying life while the world is on fire.

sun bathing

Wednesday: I make a point of wearing high heeled shoes every other day. My muscles have to remember that this is what I demand of them. I put on my peep-toe shoes with socks in it. Not really my thing but sometimes you have to try new things. First photo below is with black skinnies and the second photo is with my boyfriend jeans. I have to replace my boyfriend jeans as they look tired. And they always were sooo good.

socks in peep-toe shoes with skinnies

socks in peep-toe shoes with boyfriend jeans

Below: close-up of the socks.

socks in peeptoe shoes

Then the doorbell rang and it was Kitty with a bunch of yellow tulips. As the flower business relies heavily on export, they have been hit hard and are practically giving away the flowers. Kitty picked up many and was distributing them among her friends. So nice.

tulips

Wednesday: again on my stretcher in the sunshine in the afternoon while Ron was painting the shed. He wants the garden to look good in case it has to serve as background for my blog photos. I would have met my friend Yvonne for lunch but that of course fell through. Apart from being my friend she also supplies magnesium to me and she dropped that off accompanied with another bunch of tulips (same story as with Kitty).

Tulips

I already had a bunch of flowers from the week before, so my living room looks really good.

bouquet of flowers

What else did I do that Wednesday? I had two Facetime conversations with friends. In the afternoon Ron bought fresh fish and delivered a portion of it to friends who are really chained to the house (left it at their front door). We decided to have dinner together; that is to say: we both had dinner while we saw each other on the iPad through Facetime. Globalization has gotten us into this virus mess but it has brought us nice things too.

Thursday was lovely. This was the day I was supposed to get my fare-well party, which of course, was cancelled. My colleagues were very creative though. I will tell you all about it next week as I haven’t got much content for next week. Sunbathing in the garden again even though it was getting a little less warm. Because our help came to the house, I joined Ron at his allotment in the morning to avoid contact. At eleven o’clock I met Kitty in a street behind our house for a photo shoot. She kept her distance and we only talked with 2 metres between us. Facetimed with a friend in South Africa. It was such a busy day.

Friday: only had one Facetime call with Yvonne of Funky Forty in Switzerland. We met at the 30-40 Blogger Meet in London. That was really nice (both the meeting and the Facetime call). Not a good day to sunbath as the wind had turned and it was less warm in the garden. Cooked dinner which was highly appreciated by my husband who cooks most of the time.

Never thought I would be this busy being retired AND housebound. I will try and slow down from now on AND start doing more exercises and cycling “tours”.

Greetje

No Fear of Fashion

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