Birds on Shirts

Hello, dear readers.  Hope you are enjoying your Sunday.  It's a bit wet and grey here.  A perfect day for sitting in my garret and chatting away with you!

I recently picked up on a blogger's maxim (can't remember whose) that when she buys something she thinks first "can I wear this in at least three different ways".

Well. I bought my Zara shirt recently and I've already notched up a few ways.

And when one of my blogger besties mentioned that she had some sort of shirt and bird arrangement, we said "hey, let's collab".  I'm looking forward to seeing what the lovely Anna has in her aviary.

Before we get started, I need to apologise for the rather weak photos.  It was a windy day and the place I found that gave a little shelter had me backing up against the sun. 

But I wanted to give you outdoorsies as the shirt has birds on it and I wanted the birds to be in their natural habitat!


OK, well what springs to mind with a shirt like this is jeans.  Striped shirt and jeans, It's a heavenly pairing.



Here, the shirt is simply worn with M&S jeans and old Jones nude heeled loafers.

In some shots you will see me attempting to batten down the shirt tails as these little birdies just wanted to fly!  Eventually, hands firmly in pockets seemed the best way to keep these shirt ends in check.

The shirt is made with a striped fabric adorned with beautifully embroidered cranes.  Their little feet are mustard, so instantly in the shop I was thinking jeans and mustard cardi as one of my three ways.

And then, with mustard and stripes done, here the cardi appears to be tossed aside like a worn-out teddy.

Now you may see me in a callous light at this point, tossing used items aside, but in my defence, know that Mr Tipper Truck, my teddy of 49 years, is lovingly placed on the bed next to me as I type.  So if any of you dear readers were concerned about teddies in my care being abandoned, rest assured that was just a figure of speech - no teddies have been callously discarded during or prior to the writing of this post.

Tip'a Truk (for he has reinvented himself as a rap-teddy) is not for tossin'!

Ooops, The Pout is off on one of her digressions again.  Focus, Pout!!!

My second way to style the shirt is influenced by one of my blogger besties across the pond.

Kellyann wore her shirt , also striped, with jeans, a chunky handbag and cute booties.

You can see that I'm not a handbag person any longer - just look how I'm holding my Gianni Conti brown leather bag.  So very handbag-newbie!

Why oh why did I not copy Mrs R's pose, so much more glammly nonchalant.

Back to my crane shirt.  It's got that longer in the back arrangement.  Think I will come to appreciate that more and more as I develop my old lady derriere.

And then I thought, hey Kellyann made a feature of her statement necklace.  So I quickly pulled back the collar to do the same.

Hers is one of those pretty floral statement pieces that I just wish I could find.

I worked the look with what I have, that being the old belt hardware necklace; I thought the matching was subtle as its bronze elements echo the brown leather in the shoes and bag.

OK, that's look No. 2 sorted.

For my third look I switched shoes to metallic toe flatties.

I added a navy linen mix cardi.   And I attempted to hold down those flying birds again!

I added a matchy matchy bag, a light stone Tula bag.

Over the shoulder is how I feel most comfortable with a bag.  If I have to wear one.  These days I make sure I am wearing deep pockets and leave those bags at home most days.  In my dotage, it's one less removable item to worry about leaving in a restaurant.

I have to say I have worn this shirt quite a lot since it came home with me, and each time the base is a pair of jeans.

But my fourth way was with white jeans, seen here in Brugge.  My accessories are an old battered Tula backpack ... oh yes, and a carrier bag filled with Belgian chocolate :-)!

The above are everyday casual outfits (not tailored!) and based around the old faithfuls, blue jeans.

However,  I have been getting truly excited about styling this shirt with my Next linen summer skirt, seen here.  Maybe this stripey shirt would work with it, maybe with a trendy half tuck ... and pearls.  Yes, I fancy another attempt at floral and pearls.

However, my focus has been on the house this week and I've had no time to experiment further.

Yes, the house is getting a good seeing to - a clean and de-clutter.  I have often said in my brutally honest way, that I only seem to really look at the house with a critical eye just before guests come to stay, friends are popping round for drinks ... or even at the mere hint of someone potentially popping in for coffee.

Then, and only then, do I look at the house with the eyes of a visitor.  And what I see needs cleaning, de-cluttering, re-arranging or removing.  Guests will be coming to stay shortly, and when I looked around with that critical eye, I realised that I haven't had one of these must-tidy-the-whole-house events since March.  Six months of turning a blind eye to the mayhem!

 So I have been doing great, if exhausting, things in the house this week.  Bags have been filled for the charity shop, no longer needed items have been identified for onward selling or dumping, things have been re-organised better, or maybe just organised !

Oh, dear readers, I just love this process!   But you probably do this on a on-going rotating basis and you are always house-ready for guests.  I'm probably revealing a bit too much of my slobby side.

And, excitedly, I had a real duh moment yesterday.

We have two double bedrooms.  My eureka moment was hey, instead of switching clothes to and from wardrobes during the seasonal changes (note cleverly avoided use of non-vernacular "transitional"), why not designate them winter and summer bedrooms, keep the seasonal clothes in the appropriate room and the out of season room becomes the guest room.  Oh, it was an idea so cunning that I immediately stuck a tail on it and called it a weasel.  Cunning, because it saves me a HUGE amount of work in autumn and spring.  And I like anything that saves Pout energy!

Oh my, how I have again digressed.  As I often do when chatting away to you guys.  

Focus, Pout!

OK, here's the shirt, hot off the Zara website.

Now, why don't you pop over to Anna's blog here and see what bird she's got fluttering on her shirt.

And then maybe drop me a comment telling me how you style your stripey shirt?

And finally, birds on shirts, flying away with the wind ...  

I leave you with a seminal song.

A la perchoine.