I had a lovely weekend filled with cocktails, dancing, hangover breakfast at Cafe 37 (best ever) and planning my playlist for the My Mad Fat Diary inspired 90s party I'm having in a few weeks time. I wore a lovely new French Connection dress on the weekend but I completely forgot to take a snap so you get me in some less interesting workwear instead sorry!

I also picked up my new glasses this weekend and after after the initial shock of wearing them again after five years of avoiding them, I think I quite like them. I picked up two pairs for £125 at Specsavers which is pretty good value. I can't buy mine online because I have a pretty weird prescription and I really didn't enjoy forking out that much money on such boring items. I moaned to my mum '£125 is half a Vivienne Westwood dress, four nights out, a weekend away!!' all true but I suppose my eyesight is very important and I wont be buying anymore for at least two years.

Cheltenham Ladies Day is famous for the dress code of women sporting fancy hats and dresses so picking something to wear for the day can be a little daunting.

The event takes place on the 13th of March this year and we all know that the British weather can be rather unpredictable at that time of year so you need to strike the balance between standing out so you win one of the fashion awards and staying warm and dry.

Many women go for extremely dressy hats and matching outfits, think WAG gone mad but the best dressed are often understated.  What you wear really depends on what you’ll be getting involved in. If you're more interested in spending the day at Cheltenham watching the races and placing some bets then you could chose classy outfits with tweed or a smart suit, covered with warm fur coats if you don’t want to catch a cold on the day or spend the whole day shivering.

Ladbrokes have asked me to put a little outfit together for a day at the races and this is my selection:



I've gone for nice Spring like pastels, a modest fascinator (don't want to walk around with weird modern art type sculpture stuck on my head) a bag big enough for you purse, phone and make up and patent shoes. If you're walking around on grass all day you wont want super high heels that will get stuck in the ground and you can also wipe the mud off patent.

Have you ever been for a day at the races? What would you wear?



*collaborative post

I had such an amazing time at Bestival last year so I decided to take the plunge and book tickets to go again in September. My friends and I only paying £7 a week rather than all the money upfront so I don't need to worry about  my student friends not being able to afford to come because we can all spread the cost, there is a big group of us going and even though it's months away I'm already excited and have started to make preparations. Me, too keen? Never!

Every year on Sunday the festival has a fancy dress theme, last year was wildlife but this year the theme is H.M.S Bestival and I can't wait to get stuck in putting my outfit together.

This outfit was supposed to look a little Edie Sedgwick but I'm not too sure. It has a 60s vibe but I feel like something is missing, maybe a beehive? This coat has been reduced even more in the sale now so if you're an XS you can snap it up for a bargain. I was worried that I wouldn't get much wear from a coat with a print but I've worn this pretty much every day since I bought it. It definitely makes me feel a bit rock and roll.

My recent monochrome outfit post got me a little inspired to seek out what else the high street has on offer this Spring in black and white. There was so much to chose from and this is also a trend you could recreate with things you already because we all have a black skirt or pair of jeans we would team up with a white blouse so no need to blow the budget on this one.
 


My first monochrome pick is a bargain dress from boohoo.com, it's only £20 and I've got a feeling this will be making it's way to my house on payday and worn on a night out with a splash of red lippy providing the only colour in my outfit. The blouse is super pretty and girly and I found it on City Goddess a wholesale site I've not come across before. The t-shirt is from one of my all time favourite brands, Orphan's Arms which you can get via ASOS, most of their t-shirts come in black and white so it's a great place to pick up an unusual top to fit in with this trend.



I love these cool Nike hi tops from JD Sports, you can get them in all sorts of colours but these black and white ones are pretty slick. Really tempted by the purple ones too but think I'm a bit old to pull them off, what do you think?
Accessories are a cheap way of getting involved in a trend, the phone case if from Topshop and the bag is a total bargain at £8 from Peacocks.

I would love to see any of your outfit posts rocking this trend so leave me some links. Hoping to have a lazy Sunday reading blogs.

I've had a rather busy but very lovely week so far which I've spent with all my favourite people. Not even the hangover from hell yesterday could put me in a bad mood. This is what I wore to work on Tuesday, I forgot all about this dress and it felt quite girly and Spring like. It also makes a nice change for me not to be wearing all black.

Valentines Day. I'm not a fan and I can't escape it. You get bombarded with images of cupid, loved-up couples and it makes me feel a little nauseous. I don't mean to be a party pooper but I find it all really annoying. Despite my feelings on Valentines Day I'm going to try and embrace it as well as I can for a singleton and this year I'm going to Take My Breath Away: Valentines karaoke with some of my best friends and I'm going to get really dressed up and have some fun. I'm even going to try and not roll my eyes when I see couples holding hands.

Here is my little selection of Valentines things to treat yourself to (even if you're a committed spinster like me):


I've actually bought this dress, yes another plain jersey dress from Topshop BUT they are are so easy to wear and go with everything so I'm allowed ok? I will be wearing this to karaoke on Thursday with anything red or pink that I can find in my wardrobe for an over the top Valentines look.

I love this O.P.I polish and I'm going to hit Boots and Superdrug tonight to look for a dupe to save a little money.

I'm loving Next homeware at the moment and this heart shaped light is on the way to my house ready to be hung over my bed. I already have fairy lights in my room but I don't think you can ever really have too many fairy lights.

How cute are these Agatha Ruiz de la Prada shoes? Court shoes are the perfect height for a mid week night out and the heart stitching is pretty fun too

It's been another very busy week for me, I spent the first half in Paris, took my mum shopping, had an imporptu wild night out (payed for it for the next three days, too old for that now) and I'm now enjoying a relatively calm weekend only popping out for a meal with colleagues tonight. I need a really good lie in...

Apparently monochrome is a big trend this season, I didn't know this while I was chosing this outfit but let's all pretend I did and I'm 'bang on trend' ;) I love all of these items together and I think this is going to become a favourite outfit for work and the weekend. I own a few t-shirts from Orphan's Arms now and I love the literary and historical prints that they have. I'm always checking their site for new stock and I snapped this t-shirt up as soon as it went into the sale.


I picked up this necklace whilst shopping with my mum in the week, cute isn't it? It was from the RI budget range where you can pick up earrings for about £2. They had loads of adorable key, heart and cross things in the range so I'm popping back next week to stock up.

I've been away a lot recently and want to catch up on some blog reading so please send me some links to post you have loved recently, feeling a little out of the loop.

I posted earlier in the week about my day in Disneyland but I also spent some time in the very lovely Marias district. Le Marais is a pretty cool area of Paris known for its concentrated presence of gays, Jews and fashionable young people.  There is so much going on there from museums, parks, restaurants and lovely second hand shops that you could easily spend a whole weekend here.

The shops are open on Sunday but don't open until around 11am on weekdays so it's best to arrive in the afternoon if you want to soak up some atmosphere. I did a walking tour of the area which you can find here. It was great, easy to follow and lasts for about 2.5 hours but if you're stopping for lunch and window shopping you could drag it out all day.












St.Paul-St.-Louis Church, the Church is one of the oldest examples of Jesuit architecture in Paris.

Have you ever been to this area? I hoping to go again in the summer so would love any tips about the best places to eat and shop although all the felafel and cakes looked amazing.

If you follow me on twitter/instagram you will have already been bombarded with Paris related photos but I'm going to show you some more because Camille took some amazing photos of our trip to Disneyland and it would be shame not to share them with you. I really wish I could capture things like she does but I'm the least artistic person ever... If you're reading this, 'Hi Camille! I love these photos'