Every Pronkponie should have some

Found at Clarks, so they are uber-comfortable. Wore them all of Friday night at PROUD Camden dancing to 90s indie tunes and was still able to go trawling the streets of London on Saturday. Result!

Think we should wear matching hers and hers ones to the Pronkponie launch shindig.

The London Pronk Number 1

So there I am, feeling guilty that I haven't done any pronking in two weeks. I've been flat out writing my story on the women chiefs for the Sunday Herald (published yesterday, looks great) and rewriting my story for TIME after the editor asked for it to be reworked. These two stories are the climax of a lot of hard work and early-year stress and it's crucial I finish with a bang. BANG. So now off to London to visit the queens...

Started off in Anthropologie - where I'd never been before. Loved the interior decor of that shop. Less of a shop and more of your cool-Icelandic-aunt-who-has-been-living-in-Barcelona-for-20-years' house where she flogs her stuff to pay for more international adventures. She obviously travels first-class because the stuff is extortionately expensive. Happily, managed to find the sale corner tucked away and bought this gorgeous cushion, reduced from £78 to £19. Bargainous!

I love it because it embodies all the things we've been talking about so far: hand-stitching, anataomical floral drawings, natural fabrics, colourful unusual prints, embroidery, super squishy comfortableness. And because it was cheap. I'm going to take it to my house in the south of France. At the moment it's basking in some rare Scottish sunshine on my front lawn.

Kwaai Lappies

I was in need of topping up my all time LOW inspiration levels yesterday.... so I took the afternoon off from "full time" job and went wandering. As usual I ended up in Woodstock, a suburb of Cape Town that never fails to inspire me. Driving down Main Rd in the pouring rain I spotted this shop. Of course I had to go in. Didn't buy a single thing but walked out feeling like I was part of the real world again. Kwaai.

Later that same day I found a new sample-maker through very convoluted means (too boring to explain here). Basically a very lovely mother and daughter team in Salt River who used to manufacture for Nocturnal Affair. Another door opens. Even more kwaai.

Par Avion

So I'm standing in the post office queue in Pollokshaws Road in Glasgow. It's entirely unglamorous. The post office is in the back of a grotty co-op supermarket and everyone in the queue is here to do unglamorous things like pick up dole cheques or pay their road tax. I am here to apply for a new passport in my shiny new(ish) married name and I'm mouthing a silent prayer that the bureaucrats in the passport office don't misplace my ticket-to-ride and leave me trapped on this cold island for the rest of my life.

So there I am waiting my wee turn when my beady eye spots these old-fashioned airmail envelopes and I think one thing... QUEEN SIZE DUVET! Picture it: a white queen duvet cover with an extra panel along each side (in that Helon Melon style... I think it was her) in red and blue envelope stripes. On the top right in beautiful red embroidery it says "Par Avion" with maybe an old-fashioned plane doing a whirly-whirl in the sky with the words flying out from a banner behind the plane. The sleeper is transformed into a secret letter hidden in a big envelope to be transported over night to dreamland or the land of their dreams.

One door closes...

In my quest to become a glamorous entrepreneur I find that some days are utterly uninspiring and I wonder if my fluffy dreams of designing beautiful things full time will ever become a reality. And it's on days like these that I get an email from sample-maker saying "we cannot develop your product range as it will pull us in a different direction". Now we're back to square one, trying to find someone else who's going to make the crazy ideas in our heads become beautiful, luxurious realities.

On a lighter note, I did manage to visit Weavewell, they make gorgeous tapes and ribbons and you can custom make your own designs. Will put that idea on the back-burner for now...

Pretty bugs

Saw this poster on Etsy today... think i have a thing for metamorphosis

I'm bok for *CIY Saturdays

*Create It Yourself...Instead of making jewellery on Saturday (class was cancelled) I made this bag! Not very professional, but a kind friend left me with some fabric and now I have a semi-stylish-shweshwe-shopper. Thanks Clara

So bok for this! It's silk nogal.

And then there was Nurse Betty.

It all began with a sailor boy.