A Weekend in The Southamptons

I recently spent a lovely weekend with DoubleCoz in Southampton.

We chatted, we caught up.  We walked.  We ate, we shared a bottle of wine, maybe two.  We shopped a little, we relaxed a lot. 

We had such a fabulous time at Jury's Inn.

I loved the teal, grey and white decor.  Restful.  Sophisticated.

So much did we love the hotel that we did not venture out to eat at night, drifting down to the great hotel restaurant to dine each evening.  We shared a double double-bed room; the beds were uber comfy.   Such a pleasant stay, such pleasant company.

You first met DoubleCoz briefly here on a cold day when we were well-wrapped and hardly visible.

DoubleCoz always looks so great.  She is somebody who has always "got" smart casual, unlike me.

 

She looked so pretty wearing grey jeans (possible M&S Relaxed but not totally sure), and her new grey cardi and pinky brown vest from Primark.  Doesn't she look lovely.

Yes, we did a bit of shopping.  I bought some jeans, the subject of an earlier post.  We also bought a "team" top from Primark in Greenery and white, which I'll show you when the weather warms up.

DoubleCoz took me to a fab Danish shop she'd discovered called Flying Tiger.  An amazing shop, lots of great stuff.  And yes, I got Sis a plastic bag (rare these days) for her collection!

Like Ikea, it has a "yellow brick road" to follow, but shorter.

Have you been to one of these shops?

But as I was in Southampton, I needed to check out an Ikea armchair, for comfort and colour.  (Oh Pout, such thinly veiled excuses!)

It's the Strandmon, now in some new colours.  This is the aqua/duck egg blue colour here, and in a light stoney colour.

Do you have one of these armchairs?  They seem to be very popular.  No surprise, they're so comfy.

So why the armchair?  Well, I like the design. But the main thing is that as arthritis sets in at various points around my pensioner's body, I seem to no longer feel comfortable sitting too long on a comfy sofa.  I start to slouch.  Or worse,  I start to do this weird twisting of body thing with legs tucked under.  

I need old lady upright sitting for stuff like crosswords and suduko and telly watching (and perhaps the odd sneaky afternoon nap). 

Have you found yourself drifting towards armchairs lately?

And drifting to sleep in them?!

 

 The Photographer says I have become a cat.  I daytime sleep. 

Bertie is pleased, he says that I finally "get" him.

OK, back to Ikea.  I looked at my upright old lady armchair.  That took about two minutes.

Following their "yellow brick road", like sheep being led to the fold, well that took a lot longer.

I'll share some of the sights I saw along the way.

Well, what's not to love about floor to ceiling shoe storage?!

I really do want to get my garret to look something like this.  It's in the eaves, so the bare bones are in place.

I always love this island unit.  Just look at all that dinky storage.

This suitcase was clever; one of the storage compartments is a back-pack, which can then be used when you get to your destination.  Pretty clever, huh?

I love their stackable mugs.  We Sibs have them in each of our houses.  Because they are truly stackable and space-saving.  And look, sibs, new colours!

This new range is very similar to the Mateus pottery range which many of the Swedish bloggers I follow use at home. 

Mateus mug.

The Scandis favour handleless mugs.  I think the bumpy design prevents you burning your pinkies.

Breakfast in sofa-bed

I hope The Photographer is getting inspiration from this pic :-).

But the thing that we both fell for, big time, is their new range of glassware.

It makes me want to chuck out all my mis-matched glasses and start again!

And here's my Senior Moment.  I saw these voiles (great price and sizes) and knew that recently I had decided to replace the window dressing in a room back home with this sort of arrangement.  And could I for the life of me think where it was so that I could remember what size I needed to buy?

No I could not.  But I took a photo as a sort of pictorial aide memoire and only several days after I got home did I remember that I needed them for a makeover of a shower room.

What a dip-stick!  I'm now going to have to go to Southampton Ikea all over again.

Never mind.

 



Because I have a weakness for these.

And Son has a weakness for these.



Here's DoubleCoz with my shopping.  Guess what's in the bag?!!!

A la perchoine.