It's been a long time!

My 'me-made' Pussy Bow blouse!

And in my hummingbird fabric wrap skirt with Sam and Ruby on prom day

Mike recovering from eye surgery with a beer!

All dressed up for the Sapphire Ball!

Crikey! I'm not very good at this blogging malarky, am I? I think my last post was in February! Just as we were preparing for Spring. We are now preparing for Winter, though the sun is shining on this gorgeous October day, so it seems hard to imagine Winter at the moment.

So much has happened since my last post, but luckily no clothes or shoes shopping has occurred! Though it has been pretty damn hard at times I can tell you. To counter this, I have learnt to sew and have made a few bits and pieces to fill the (imaginery) void in my wardrobe. My favourite items are my lovely wrap skirt (Tilly & the Buttons pattern) and my pussy bow shirt (Sew Simple).

As I have mentioned before I think one of my triggers for shopping is when I am feeling low or stressed.

So let me tell you about our holiday to the beautiful island of Majorca. This was our first visit to the island and one we were very much looking forward to after the fun and games of GCSE's, and it wasn't even me sitting them! On day two of the holiday we thought we'd take a little trip to the market of Pollenca. We did make it to Pollenca - briefly! Within a couple of hours, we found ourselves in Los Espositos hospital in Palma as Mike's eye, we discovered had a tear in the retina. No problem, the Doctor opened up the whole eye department for him (on a Sunday) and lasered his eye, told him to rest and come back on Tuesday. On the Tuesday it was discovered that it wasn't just a tear, it was a detached retina and needed an urgent operation to save the sight in the eye. With the operation booked for the Thursday, all ideas of a relaxing holiday exploring the island disappeared as after the operation Mike had to sit face pointing down for 7-10 days whilst also recovering from the op.  Strangely my desire to go and buy some clothes began in earnest and I discovered there are some lovely shops in Majorca! But I stuck to my challenge and gave Mike a beer, with a straw!

Once back in Blighty we enjoyed the wonderful summer sunshine, counting down the days to GCSE result day! And what a day it was, our Sam did fantastically and made us very proud. He has since moved onto the Sixth form to study, Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Business! I wish I could say his maths skills came from me!

As part of my plans to raise lots of money for JDRF this year, myself and two other Type 1 Mums (Beckie and Becky) decided to organise a charity ball. The date, venue and name were quickly decided upon and we began some serious organising! The Sapphire Ball took place a couple of weeks ago at the Chester Grosvenor Hotel and was a huge success raising £7000 for JDRF! Everyone had a ball; eating, drinking, dancing and crossing their fingers in the hope of winning the beautiful Boodles sapphire (set into a ring or pendant) we had as the sparkling star prize! And guess what, I didn't buy a new frock! In fact I was my blog title: 'something old' my outfit,  'nothing new' obviously!!, 'something borrowed' the amazing 'Be Boodles' jewellery I borrowed for the evening and 'something blue' a sapphire ring borrowed from Sarah!

As I draw close to the end of my 'not buying clothes and shoes' challenge - only 44 days to go, I am currently 65 days into another challenge: To give up the booze! I have actually found this pretty easy and am really enjoying my new found sobriety. I will of course have a drink on my big birthday (not long to go now!) but it may be a few glasses of 'NoSecco' rather than Prosecco!

44 DAYS!!!! I am a planner by nature, so what was the URL for the Boden website again............

Kate xx

PS. For all those who didn't believe I could do this, there is still time to sponsor me in my challenge! Here is the link:
www.justgiving.com/fundraising/kate-mason50