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.

Jour #7 - Desperately Seeking Neutral

Just look how far downhill we've travelled this week.

You've now come to expect ...

The head.

And the rest.

Next chinos and lacy top. A pretty neutral OOTD.

I didn't think it could get much worse.

But my goodness, it just has - this one is bad!

I even photographed with a Venetian blind marking its territory about my person!

Then after working to the constraints of the bathroom mirror (and its blind) for two days, I found ...

... a wardrobe mirror!  Oh what luxury.  What new technology.

I was sooo excited.  So excited that I didn't spot The Photographer lurking behind me as I shot my Magasin equally neutral ecru/black linen top worn over my neutral shorts combo. 

So! Last day of the hols.  Back tomorrow to technology.

The chateau does a lovely scrambled egg breakfast.  And loads more.  I'm starting to think we come here just for superb food.  And the superb service.  And the superb decor.  And the superb location.  Oh heck, we come here for loads of reasons!

But I am embarrassed to tell you about one of Rennes' big pulls. Which got me doing what I did today. The last day of my hols.  You have to come from a small island to understand why I did what I did.  And to know and understand my back-story.

For I went to IKEA, just a 10-15min drive from the chateau.

To pay homage to this armchair, as it turns out.

I found it here in Rennes 3 years ago.  In neutral fabric.  It was a Goldilocks moment - it had me at hello.  It was perfect.  I fell for its comfortable sitting experience.  It's looks. And it's colour.  Neutral.

Since then I've searched 2 stores in the UK.  And 2 stores in Denmark.  Searched hopefully online - UK, Denmark and their HQ Swedish site.  All of them countless times.  

Each time I've found the chair in other colours 

but not neutral, the colour I crave.

Sometimes I thought I'd imagined it, but then I found a photo of me sitting in this very armchair in this very Rennes store, 3 years ago.  I reasoned that it must have been an introductory one-off.

But no!  It was there today.  In the Rennes store.  Blatantly available in this colour.   You see, the thing is that only France seems to sell it in the neutral fabric.  Both in-store and on-line.  Why?!!

I checked the flat pack dimensions.  It's a huge box.  

We didn't have room for it in the bloomin' car!

And on that bombshell, peeps,

A la bloomin' perchoine!

Tidy Desk, Tidy Blog #2

Here's where I have been typing for the past couple of weeks.



This space is oh so easy to keep tidy. 

This is an ex-show house and the fittings came with the house.  

Including space-age light fittings!

A fitted office isn't something I would have chosen, but it does work.  

Everything can be shoved in cupboards.  

Out of sight, out of mind :-).

All but the biggest books can be stored away in the cupboards.  Paperwork, printer stuff and all the rest of the office paraphernalia 

is hidden away in the capacious, smooth-sliding drawers. It makes such sense.

I've found it so easy to work in this tidy space.  

I kept it tidy.  It kept my mind tidy.  That was the deal! 

'Aver, the desk chair that came with it was pretty but not too comfortable after a while.

So, whilst in Southampton last weekend we popped into Ikea.  

Ok, it was somewhat longer than a simple "pop in" :-).  

I don't think it's possible to just "pop" in there.  Not for me, anyway.  

Me and Ikea have history.  

I have a 1980 Ikea catalogue.  That's not sad.  That's passion.  

It's filled with classics of our time - the Poang armchair, the Billy bookcase ...

But, back to the plot.  In there I found this amazingly comfortable office chair.  If swivels 360 degrees.  It reclines.  It's so comfy I could fall asleep in it.  And it's just £35.  

Meet your perfect office chair, here, the Torkel.  You're welcome.

Doesn't it look the business?!

The stylish chair can just about be seen in the corner - it's there, waiting for guests.
And waiting.  And waiting.
I feel a bit Norman No Mates, actually. Maybe I'll move it ...

A La perchoine.