Autumn is coming

Autumn is coming by prawnnnnn featuring a loose sweater

Autumn - or Fall, I love that name - is my second favourite season, after Winter, just because it is so homely and warming, and is a relaxing period after the so-called 'excitement' of Summer (which I never seem to experience). I love the crisp, dewy mornings and the cheek-reddening winds, the piles of crunchy leaves and the hearty meals.
Plus, Autumn means going back to school with my friends, and I often see it as the start of a new year, rather than January 1st, as it is when everything recycles in my life, and has done for the past 13 years.

I'm actually quite excited to go back to school this time, and probably for the first time ever, as it will be a hard and busy year, that ends with the choice of going to University (which I still remain undecided on), doing a further course at a college, or going into the working world for real, whether that be in an apprenticeship or a full-time job. I just know that I'm going to have to make massive decisions and massive steps (and be MATURE), and I want to get started as soon as possible, as it's going to be so freaking scary!!
I'm sort of starting to feel old enough for all this; is this me growing up?

 Anyway, what could enpower you to get cracking more than a lovely, cosy outfit to wear? I always think of Autumn colours as mustards and plums, as well as the obvious oranges, reds, yellows and browns, so this is my very obvious take on the style.
For me, no matter what 'trends' are in at this period, I always wear the same stuff, warm-coloured jumpers, jeans, and heavy shoes. It's just a no-fail solution to being cosy and rosy!

Anyway, thank you for reading, let us know what you are going to get up to in the Autumn months in a comment. We're going to see Bowling For Soup!!! How exciting.

If you wanna be the Spice Girls

Last night me, Hannah and three of our friends went to the sixth form Halloween party dressed up as the Spice Girls. You may have read about our plans for this venture in Halloween #3 and Leopard Print Loathing, but I think that it's nice for you to see the finished product.

We all got ready at Baby Spice's house, to a soundtrack of the Spice Girls Greatest Hits album, and had great fun creating a faux bob for Posh, drawing on liquid eyeliner tattoos for Sporty and applying layers of bronzer to Scary.

The party had a lax fancy dress code, so when we arrived we were concerned that no-one else had dressed up, however as the night progressed plenty of people showed up in costume: a kilted Scotsmen, a group of surgeons, Cupid and Snow White, amongst others. The winner of the fancy dress costume was a guy dressed up in a giant inflatable willy costume, which probably tells you all you need to know about the class and tone of the party.

The guy at the bar knew exactly who I was dressed up as, which is the most important thing for me when it comes to fancy dress - there is nothing more awkward than talking to someone at a fancy dress party and having them ask you who you're supposed to be. I was also happy because my costume wasn't very slutty - it may have been short, but it wasn't up my arse and my boobs were nowhere near out.

With my first Halloween party of 2012 over, I can now really look forward to the second one on Tuesday.

Oh, and Spookbook is back! You can check out the entries so far and submit your own here.
Happy Halloween!

Who wants to sleep in a city that never wakes up?

Bowler hat - £9.99 - H&M 

Dress - £30 - Dorothy Perkins

This is the outfit that I wore to go Halloween-costume shopping with Hannah (of Doubleyou fame) - the details of which you can read about here. Us girls are going as The Spice Girls for the sixth form Halloween party, Hannah is Scary and I will not insult your intelligence by telling you which one I am going as.

I bought this dress back in the summer, and the only other time I've worn it was to Alex's 18th birthday party (I have to admit that I did feel a tad overdressed, as I wore heels and curled my hair, but as his relatively long-term girlfriend I had to make an effort since his entire family was going to be there) and I've been wanting to wear it since, so I took the opportunity to wear it again on our little town trip. 

I really like the dress, mostly because of the skirt - I love how floaty it is and when I spin around it sticks out, which is, in my opinion, the mark of a nice and girly dress. I'm by no means the girliest person in the world (girly-girls can sometimes do my head in) it's just nice to wear a pretty dress now and then, don't you think? I also like pretty much anything with a collar, and some of you might remember a post I did on quirky prints, so there's three of my boxes ticked with this one item! 

Dorothy Perkins is most definitely overlooked when it comes to affordable fashion.

Leopard print loathing

Today was a day well spent.

Me and Holly travelled to our local town in search of the perfect Scary Spice costume, resulting in a lot of leopard print and little happiness.

First stop was the shop that doesn't know it's fancy dress - Primark.

Don't get me wrong, they have some really lovely clothes, most of my wardrobe consists of them, but when it's bad, it's really bad.

After searching through the extensive 'horrible animal print section', as it is now named, we found some leopard trousers (yes trousers) and a black sequinned bandeau. Very scary.

At the changing rooms mild embarrassment struck when the girl doing her shift there was in fact from our very own school, our very own year and our very own classes. We ensured her that these were for Halloween purposes, but she still looked partially horrified.

In the changing rooms, I hung up the ghastly garments and with a deep sigh, put them on.
They were horrific.
The bandeau looked like something out of a tribute act - but not for the Spice Girls - and the trousers were just, well, they were leopard print trousers weren't they.

After Primark, naturally the next point of call is the charity shops. We are blessed with around ten of these treasures, and they did not let us down today, with an array of disgusting leopard prints, we were overjoyed.

Unfortunately (and worryingly), the sizes were around 14 and above, except for one little gem. A top/skirt/hankerchief in the most god awful print you will ever see or hear about.

On our way down towards H&M (the second cheapest high street store in town) we witnessed a very peculiar sight. Stood outside H&M was a roughly nine-year-old boy eating a sandwich. He was not an extraordinary boy in any way, but what caught our eye was the quite frankly massive marrow that was so naturally slung over his shoulder. I can only assume that it was a regular occurrence for him, as he did not look at all self-conscious as he stood on the highstreet on a Saturday afternoon, monching on his sandwich and holding his marrow.

Inside H&M itself we were once again on a mission for a disgusting leopard print, and we were not let down. There was a wide range of leopard print bottoms for us to choose from, however some of them were in legging form and if you're wearing a grotty print you can't also wear leggings as trousers can you? There can only be so many broken fashion rules in one outfit, even at Halloween.

"It looks the most like it could be an outfit, rather than something from a dressing up box"

"I look like I should be in a nativity"

Just incase you couldn't already tell, we aren't really sold on it.