Just the teeniest tiniest reminder for you all that I have moved to Blogger. Please delete this as your feed address or link address and replace it with http://earthvs.blogspot.com. It’s the same ol’ me over there, with all my outfit posts and various wishlists and travel photos and hair lusts and everything, really. Please come and join me over there!

xoxo

After months and months of debating, I’ve finally dug up my little roots here at WordPress and upped sticks to Blogger! You can now catch me blogging my little heart out at http://earthvs.blogspot.com!

And please make sure that you change your feeds – my FeedBurner and my Bloglovin’ are updated with my new address, but you will need to change your own feed readers yourself if that’s what you use to read blogs. You can add my blog to your feed reader by just adding this web address (http://earthvs.blogspot.com). Or, even handier, you can now add me to your Google Friend Connect, which is somewhere in my sidebar on my Blogger blog. PLEASE DO! I don’t want to be a Billy-no-mates with -350 followers!

See you over there :D

This Topshop dress, well, I found it on eBay well over a year ago. I was more than chuffed when I spotted it going at £4.50 with only an hour left – and hardly any views with NO bids. It added to the fact that I’d seen this dress in Topshop not long before and absolutely fell in love with it; however, the hefty £45 price tag meant I had to kiss goodbye to my pretty floral frock. Until that lucky eBay day. Two days later, the dress was in my hands and for once, I felt like a true bargainista.

[Dress; Topshop, via eBay | Shoes; Primark | Hat; Peacocks | Watch; present]

I have no difficulty when it comes to styling this dress. For starters, it’s pretty much a summer only piece. Secondly, it’s so full of detail and pattern that it barely needs any dressing up at all – or so I believe, anyway. Just a simple pair of wedges, heels or flats, and you’re done. The best part is, you can really girlie it up – as I’ve done with the white heels here – or completely contradict it with lace-up boots or studded sandals and both will suit it just fine. I kept it simple with my festival hat and felt really, really pretty!

I curled my hair today, something I only do once in a blue moon. My hair is naturally curly anyway but more of an untame, I-will-do-as-I-please curl that just looks more wonky than anything, and is mainly frizz. Curling my hair with proper curling tongs takes forever because my hair is so damn thick. I swear it’s stopped growing downwards and is now just growing outwards.

And – I’m sorry for the lack of a World Cup outfit on Friday! I did wear England colours, I assure you, in the form of a white tank top and some skinny red jeans. But I was so knackered when I got home from work, all me, Phil and our mate Phil could muster up the energy to do was buy some pizza and beer from the supermarket and vegetate on the sofa, pretty much. The game was so disappointing. I’m dreading Wednesday, our final group match. We’re going to have to pull a major miracle to stay in the tournament – and by the way they’ve been playing the last two matches, it ain’t happening. Oh well, come on England, I say! I guess. Thankfully, I’m at work so I won’t have to know the result until somebody is able to sugarcoat it for me. God, I hope Wayne Rooney doesn’t read this!

Image credits; 1 | 2 | 3

Only three words spring to mind – give, me, and it. Oh how I’ve yearned for punchy orange hair for years. I feel like I could wear anything with it (well, except maybe orange) and my hair would just ping! out. Sadly, I can’t seem to locate any sort of actual permanent orange dye in the UK – yes, adorning the shelves of Boots and Superdrug are all sorts of reds in abundance, and even a couple of auburny-sort-of gingers perched in between, yet not a single ode to the fiery orange. It’s the bitter full stop after weeks and months and years of itches and inclinations to finally just do it, now I’m totally ready! Yet it just seems I may never live my orange dream. Oh, sigh.

What is the most favourite colour you have ever dyed your hair?

Greetings! Usually I can’t begin a welcome with that saying without adding either ‘…and salutations’ (of Heathers fame. 1980s Christian Slater *swoon*) or ‘…from Sh*tsville’ (of my beloved Wildhearts fame; what a tune). Today I am doing my damnedest to leave it at a short and sweet greetings. This is just the tip of the iceberg on how I sometimes really don’t know how to start blog posts at all. But it got your attention, right? (I hope.)

I’ve dreamt up this outfit for a while. Before I put the clothes on my body, it kept striking me how both major parts of the outfit – the shirt and the dress – are at the moment huge trends in the UK. Would I look like every other girl on the British high street? Well, when I was finally wearing the outfit today, I looked in the mirror and felt a teensy bit unique. I even took it to Croydon high street and didn’t see a single person who dressed remotely like me. I’ll admit, this isn’t difficult in Croydon where most people opt for crazy neon bright legwarmers and tutus or jeans falling down past their pants, but don’t cloud my little achievement. I felt hip, for once.

[Dress, Shirt & Shoes; Primark | Hairband; H&M | Ring; Topshop]

I’m a bit of a Primark walking advertisement today, it seems! Don’t knock it, though. I’d never deny myself the glory of Primark. I can’t believe I used to have such a love-hate relationship with that place – and sometimes still do. When I was 16/17, I wouldn’t even go in there because I thought it was just “Mum stuff”. When I was 18, however, it suddenly got cool? Either that, or I realised what I was missing. It really exploded when the LiveJournal communities – think Facebook groups and pages, but oldskool – for both Primark and the whole UK High Street were set up (The High Street is still going and was set up, in part, by Blair; have that for some cool information). Likeminded British girls posted up photos of things that they’d bought and the interest spiralled onwards and upwards from there. Let me tell you one thing – I probably wouldn’t be blogging here at this little space of mine if it wasn’t for LiveJournal and communities like The High Street – it was my first foray into expressing my favourite fashion fixes. Seriously, check out these two pages if you want a giggle – and please note that this is January 2006 we’re looking at, here! (Ooh, also, I still have that leather jacket and those silver flats in the second post, :D) It was how I got to know and admire lovely ladies like Blair and Bee and Helen and Katie. A year before I even gave a damn about what I was wearing, I sat at my ancient computer at 6:01 PM waiting for the very slow dial-up to do it’s that. The connection was probably only 56kps and it just made the internet so irritating and boring. Who knew how much it would eventually impact my life in so many little ways?

currently listening to;
les savy fav – the year before the year 2000

01. Grab your pasta. My favourite is linguine, but spaghetti would easily suffice.

02. Push it down into some boiling water with olive oil until it warps like a record in the sun.

03. Assemble your other ingredients. Any herbs will do but my personal preferred combination is parsley, tarragon and garlic pepper. I’m too chicken to experiment!

04. Pray to the kitchen messiah. We’ve all got one. Mine happens to be a pink plastic bag from Lazy Oaf.

05. Try not to leave the fridge open like yours truly, the airhead, here.

06. Do the cool, beat happening, bust-a-movin’ bang-bang tune on the side of the saucepan. Don’t be afraid to make a racket, you’re doing your thang. Note: never before captured on photo, this is what real noise looks like.

07. The taste test! There’s actually no point to this. You will always know it’s not soft enough before you’ve put it in your mouth but by now you’re so hungry, you have to have a strand just to fuel you to the end. You’re nearly there!

08. Turn your pasta into a simply pleasurable masterpiece. Toss your herbs with olive oil (or, if you’re having a naughty moment like me, Utterly Butterly) and be proud of your five-minute meal like it’s the most bellisimo thing you have ever created.

09. Okay, close the naffing fridge already.

10. Saving the best part ’til last: make a fort in your bedroom. Eat your delightful dish laying on your belly under your bedcovers, in front of America’s Next Top Model on your laptop. Who cares if this is bad for you? You’re happy, fed – and now totally ready for bed.

Share with me! What is your favourite I-could-make-this-with-my-eyes-closed five minute meal?

This is a rehash of an outfit I wear quite often. I love black and white stripes with red highlights; I find it really poppy and the red stands out so much, and it doesn’t quite work with any other colour. When I can’t really be bothered to piece together a proper outfit but I actually want to make an effort, this is what I come to. I have enough red tanks, vests and bandeaus to keep this going for about a week. Plus the tunic is super comfortable. It’s actually from River Island – a place I umm and ahh over a lot. You see, I do actually love their items from afar, but when I get up close, there’s always some tacky embroidery or words in garish print that really, really put me off. I bought this well over a year ago and searched for it high and low before I found it – the last in my size – by chance in the store in Canterbury. Only now have I noticed the teeniest tiniest highlighter yellow phrase emblazoned on one of the pockets but it’s too small to notice. Thank God.

[Tunic - River Island | Vest - American Apparel | Shoes - ASOS | Flower - Primark | Belt - vintage]

(Hopefully, nobody noticed the slight American slip-up I had with my outfit! I assume everybody was too busy crucifying our goalkeeper to care.)

These two red accessories are what jazzed up my outfit. When I wore the clothes last night, all I could be bothered to muster up were my trusty black chain flats with my greatly-in-need-of-a-cut hair down. If I’d had more of a chance to think about this (tough when you’re awake at 7am, totally not even ready for a long day at work, let alone picking an outfit for the evening) then I would have loved to don these additions. I rarely do anything with my hair but after having this flower tied in a side ponytail, I’m really into the prospect of wearing my hair like this all summer.

How did everybody else enjoy the first England match of the World Cup? We went to our local pub which was jam packed to the rafters – four deep at the bar before kick-off – but with one of the best atmospheres ever. Every so often, somebody would sound a klaxon or blow their free trumpet from The Sun to the sound of the England tune – you know, that annoying dun-dun-dundundun one you can do with your car horn. Everybody absolutely raised the roof when Heskey was substituted for Crouch. Seems Crouchy is a little bit of a local hero around here, though who knows why. I do have a bit of a soft spot for him though. No, really.

Such a shame about goalkeeper Green’s butterfingers though. If he hadn’t have let go of the ball when it was fired at him, then the USA wouldn’t have drawn and we would have won. Although as everybody keeps saying, we drew in our first match in 1966 (the last – and only – year we’ve won) so it’s “still our year”. I was even feeling sorry for the poor bloke until I read that he’d made more errors leading to goals than any other player in the Premier League last season. Get him off!

Bet you never knew I was into football, huh? I’m into rugby more, really! I’m thinking of doing a ‘Things You Didn’t Know About Me’ post soon, since I don’t have much of an About Me section and I’ve gone quite a long while without really telling so much about myself. Not sure whether anybody would be interested though! But keep your eyes peeled if you are ;]

As traditional Sundays go, I’m off to complete mine with a big ol’ roast dinner. Catch you soon!

currently listening to;
les savy fav – raise buildings

I did get some enjoyment out of the weather, though. On Sunday, my little Surrey town had it’s own food festival, including lots of European market stalls for food, clothing and crafts. Plus a lot of informative stalls such as the local supermarkets’ approach on fair trade products. There was a lot of free stuff to try and test so I didn’t even need to buy much to eat, in the end. Quite convenient. My favourite stall was my local tapas place’s quick-fire attempt at getting in on the action. It was so cute though. You could tell that they felt left out and had just dragged a table and a chair from their restaurant and hauled out whatever they’d been cooking at the time – in this case, tortilla and paella. Mmmm! Later on, they came back with samples of serrano ham, and a shedload of churros. Plus buckets and buckets full of beer. They had the best prices in the market (£2 for a massive bowl of paella, when a couple of stalls up it was £3.50 for less, sweet) and were the friendliest people there. I love my little town!

[T-shirt - eBay | Skirt - some shop in Dubrovnik, Croatia | Shoes - Converse, via ASOS | Bag - New Look]

This is exactly how I want to dress all summer – for at least when it’s warm, anyway! Bare legs, flat shoes and sandals, t-shirts and vests, and my drawstring bag from New Look which I only bought a couple of months ago but has probably had more wear than bags I may have bought two years ago. It’s funny that when you find something you really love, you love it to death. I’m always feeling that I should have bought two of something sometimes.

After me and Phil trawled the market for a little while, we went and sat at a park (by park, I mean a patch of grass and some swings) just away from the action while we waited for a couple of friends. It started raining – hooray, England – and we drank paper cups of tea to pass the time. I incorporated so many of my favourite things into one day, I was so happy. The only thing downing me was that I had a stinking headache all day. Meh.

After a little while, our friends Phil (I know, two Phils, so confusing) and Gwen turned up and we scaled the festival once more, picking up some honey nuts and free olives! There was a whole hog roast which when we saw it first was a whole pig, then as we came away from the festival we noticed it was just a few bones. We all headed back to our flat for cups of tea, Doritos, and happy hundred-mile-an-hour World Cup talk. I can’t wait for the tournament to start so we can have lots of friends over the flat or meet up at local pubs to watch the matches. I’ve even got my face paint all ready to draw England flags on my cheeks. I think the World Cup is the perfect time to be really patriotic, and I am massively hoping for an England win. I think it would be a memory I’d never forget – being 22, with all my friends and my boyfriend, watching England win. I think I would cry!

I apologise in advance for the soppiness! I just want to dedicate this little tail-end of the post to the one I love most in the world, Phil. He puts up with my tapping away at my laptop either blogging, editing photos, or finding things to write about and takes a good chunk of all my outfit photos. He doesn’t understand why I do it and sometimes whines a little but he gets on with it regardless and I am very thankful for his help. Sometimes it’s hard to get a genuine smile infront of a tripod so you can probably tell in my photos when I’m being photographed by him. I do love him tonnes. We’ve been together two years come the 26th of this month, and I can’t wait to spend another two years plus many, many more with him. Aw!

Whew! It’s been a while, hasn’t it? On the plus side, there’s sure a lot to post.

Three of my most favourite bloggers all got ModCloth’s Blogger Of The Moment! And these lovely ladies would be Delightfully Tacky, Lulu Letty and Selective Potential. I am super proud of these girls since they have worked so hard blogging their little hearts out, day in day out for us to enjoy. They dually deserve it. I’d love to have a ModCloth dress named after me one day, although that’s a little bit far-fetched since I own zilch from ModCloth so far! Heheh. Check out their glorious namesake dresses, why don’t you.

I’m a total sucker for a travel post, especially if it’s somewhere I’ve previously been – so when Yishyene posted up her photos from Copenhagen, I was thrilled and spent the course of the post pointing and shrieking, “I’ve been there!” or, “I know that!” I’m easily excitable, don’t you know? They are beautiful photos, however, so you should check them out. Copenhagen is a very attractive city and I’m hopefully going back there at the end of the summer.

Joy are giving away a free pretty black floral dress in-store with all transactions over £75 – and offering a white version after the 20th June. Okay, so it may not be free but with a shop chock full of quirky dresses and on-trend pieces, you might be hitting that three-quarter century quicker than you think, with a free dress to boot! Check out the offer here.

I do believe a blog is really worth reading when the author is totally true to themself, telling all about their favourite hobbies and interests without any stopping power. So to hear that Elizabeth of Delightfully Tacky had finally got her paws on the Winnebago she’d dreamed about at the centre of her US roadtrip, it was quite a heartwarming read. Reading these blogs everyday makes you feel like you know a person sometimes, so I felt really congratulatory of her finally getting to her goal. Go, girl!

Independent Fashion Bloggers discuss the real price of being a fashion blogger, which makes for an interesting – and a little terrifying – read. I am totally nosy and would love to know everybody’s fashion budgets sometimes, but it does make me shudder at the thought about the hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds some people could possibly be paying to keep up their little here web hobby. Any thoughts on this, ladies?

My absolute-dime-of-a-bird Aimee Marie posted this aaaages ago but I’ve really wanted to link it here. It’s her say on 20 things you should definitely do and you know what? For a productive summer, I am copying down all these points into my diary and am going to fulfill them. Every single one. We’re even going to complete the last option together!

This is perhaps the cutest advertisement ever – and it doesn’t make me want to get a scooter any less than I already do! Lucky Tieka of Selective Potential and her husband Brett are together the faces of Genuine Scooter Co. and I particularly have enjoying fawning over her (perfect shade of) mint green scooter. Meow! The little photoshoot to complement it is so cute, and you should end this post without checking it out.

I don’t really know what happened – my blogging mojo just vanished. But I’ve been eager to get back and get writing for the past few days, despite being held back by work, gym, and the inevitable crashing-out-in-dire-need-of-sleep that happens afterwards, and as soon as I finished work today at 1:30pm I made it my absolute mission to submit a post today. With two hours of the day left, I’m cutting it fine but my promise (to myself, granted) is not about to be broken!

Of course, the beautiful weather outside had to be enjoyed first. Britain is yet again enjoying a little heatwave – and high time too! After beginning the week – and indeed, the month of June – with gloom and rain, we hit highs of 29C today. Wow! It definitely felt it too, just five minutes of being outside in my sundress and not in work protected by air conditioning (so saintly) resulted in a slightly disgusting sticky back. Ewww! I wouldn’t trade it for anything, though. Ha, you can certainly tell I’m British just by my constant need to talk about the weather!

[Dress - H&M | Shoes - Primark | Hat - Peacocks | Bag - New Look]

If I had to pick words to sum up my style, it would be tough to narrow it down to one just one thing at all. But as I was on my way down to town this evening to pick up some Saturday night snack food, the words “student hippy” kept flashing in my mind. And it’s such a farce – because I’m not at all a student! And I’m not even a hippy, as such. I mean, you’ll catch me in a park perhaps running, but that’s it – none of this flowers in my hair shiz. I look through my wardrobe and see a lot of bold colours, punky cuts, sharp patterns, stand-out polkadots and mod stripes. I don’t really own anything suitably summery apart from this dress. It’s so comfortable and flowing and airy, it makes me feel like I should be making headgear out of daisies. Plus I really love the style of a bandeau dress, especially these ones that stretch across the bust. Means they can double up as a skirt, too! But, back to the point, it makes me feel a little hippie-ish – like I should be en route to Glastonbury via Stonehenge or something.

Phil took my outfit photos today. I don’t usually ask him – I know it winds him up something rotten and he doesn’t really understand it, nor my love of blogging. But since he kept banging on about how much he loved my outfit today, I thought it might make it a little more bearable for him, the photographer! To compensate for this, I promised to take a few photos of him showing off on his mountain bike. He has had a dodgy wrist for a couple of weeks now – ligament damage or tendonitis, we think, although Carpal Tunnel syndrome has been feared – but was ever so glad to get his bike out and go for a ride this morning just in time to enjoy the sunshine. I love him and his boy hobbies – cars, mountain biking, and rock guitaring. After showing off his hill jumping skills, he changed into some less stinky clothes and man, my man looks handsome today.

I had to completely force him to let me take this, by the way! He thinks this outfit is crap – hates this t-shirt, infact – but I love it. I don’t want to turn him into some fashion man thing, but I simply just wanted to show him off looking quite cool (in my eyes). His t-shirt is from a Wildhearts gig in 2001, his shorts are are from Chain Reaction, his shoes are Converse, and his hat is an Element hat that he impulse bought at Reading festival one year – and I love to steal it.

I hope everybody’s having a great weekend so far, and has a cracking Sunday lined up! I have a day off work tomorrow at long last and we’re heading into town with a couple of friends to enjoy a one-yearly European food festival. My mouth is watering at the thought of German sausages, French bread, Spanish tapas, juicy olives, and street vendor pancakes. I’m such a foodie! And pleased that my little town is getting this food carnival. I’ll (hopefully) be back tomorrow with another post. Hope you haven’t missed me too much ;]