Eyelet details and espadrilles.

H+M tee: £6.99. M&S skirt: £17.50. Hobbs espadrilles: £1. Urban Outfitters bag: £15. Warehouse sunglasses: £god knows, fill a bag for a fiver find.

Updating my wardrobe essentials game.

You can read this post in many ways:

1. I'm refining my wardrobe, and sticking to the pieces I know I'll wear forever/until they've been washed see-through.

2. I'm skint after deciding to seriously up the amount I'm saving per month, so basic's about as good as it's going to get. Tara embellishment, you were good while the student loan lasted.

3. I'm completely disillusioned with all trends right now, so just giving up on it all and going for the things I really like and/or suit me. Not necessarily at the same time.

4. I bought this top when H+M had an offer on and now I'm trying to justify spending my money somewhere other than Morrsion's.

Whichever number you pick, you're a good portion of the way to the truth.

Without trying to rehash old ground, we all know that as a general rule a certain type of bodyshape is portrayed again and again in the media. Yes, it's getting better. No, I don't think retail stores are to blame. But when it comes to trend pieces, those rip-offs from the catwalk in some capital city miles away were made to fit a certain frame, and most of the time the high street-filtered version is a pretty damn good copy (did someone say six weeks lead time?), so why should it suit me? I'm not sad about it at all (apart from shift dresses, cos I really, really want to dress like Twiggy on the daily). I accept that there's no point trying to give my own take on a trend, which is basically just a carbon copy of everyone else's, and thus *unpopular opinion klaxon* it's boring. There's a reason I follow the women's blogs I do: I like to see original, well thought out content that tells a story, because if I want to see trends I'll toddle off to Vogue, who do it very, very well.

I'm not a stylist who knows how to put perfect outfits together; I still bleary eyed chuck things on in the morning, only to re-assess in the toilet at work thinking "nah, definite miss". But I do like to document what I've jumbled together here, and hope you don't mind that it's a little more "wardrobe essentials" than "fresh off the catwalk".

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You showed me there was something more to us.

The Kooples leather jacket. Topshop dress: £15. Hobbs boots: £40. Brit Stitch satchel. Catarzi fedora: £25 (now £12 in sale).

There are many, many shades of stubborn.

Generally considered to be a "bad" trait due to quite a lot of spoilt brat connotations, stubborn's got a bit of a bad rep. A good 75% of the time, it's well deserved, but that other 25% needs an apology. Several times over. Seeing as I'm doing this on my phone (why did I book an airbnb without wifi? Or why does an airbnb without wifi exist?) and need something wordy to fill my Sunday morning, let's try to create a magical scale of stubborn, which we may all refer back to in times or need/probably an argument.

0-25% - You're wrong, you know you're wrong, but like f you're going to admit it
Also called "when the penny drops". We've all be there, even Steven Hawking. Most commonly happens when in a state of severe stress/sleep deprivation/skim reading, or all three. It's tough, but maybe just admit at the time you know you're wrong, and take it out on them some other time ("oh, you've finished your drink? Sorry, I didn't notice when I bought this round").

26-50% - You're pretty sure this is the best idea of all time
Shout out to anyone who's ever found themselves trekking to town in the pouring rain as their friend's found the most amazing place for brunch, only for it to have stopped serving at 11.30. No, we don't care that it does the best compote this side of Brittany, or whether the place down the road's fry up is nearly as good, where is my stack of beautifully fluffy pancakes? I feel this may also apply to parents, god help you.

51-75% - You're doing this for their own good, you know
More often than not, this can be applied to some sadistic early alarm (no, I do NOT want to leave my bed today, hard as it is to believe), but is also relevant when people aim to help you face your fears in some ilk, or buy you running shoes cos they heard your new years resolution was to get fit. Very nice of you and all, but that was so January.

76%+ - You're right, you've got the facts to back you up, but nah
This is the adult equivalent of being patted on the head, and told to play with your toys. Bring it up to mid twenties, and it's when you're sat in a strategy meeting and you're pushing for something, but your line manager is being a mouthpiece for the execs; they know you're sense but "I'm big, you're small" and we WILL be doing this.

And then there's the one where there's the dress from topshop you've been after for months, reduced to £15, but definitely a size too small. You get it after Cheese-mas and you actually look like a roll of camembert, but wear it anyway. I'd gauge this around the 47% mark.

Brb, off to wander the cheese section of Booths (look but don't touch).

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Don't forget who you are.

Ribbed polo neck and denim pinafore dress: c/o Fat Face. Hobbs monk shoes: £69 (similar). Marks and Spencer bag: £43. Tatty Devine bunting necklace: made by myself!

Scheduling is the poor man's time travel (bear with me, it kinda makes sense). I'm sitting with a fresh brew writing this on a Thursday lunchtime, knowing it'll be published on Sunday morning, and you'll be reading this maybe that day or in 2019 or whenever. In the interval of 72 hours, I'll have packed my bags, decamped Essex in favour of Manchester*, probably had a minor panic attack on the train as it leaves Euston and thought of pancake day approx 93 times. So, as you read this I'll be fuming at how bloody cold the North is, when in reality I'm chilling listening to a bit of Radio 1. In the past. See? Sort of like time travel.

East London, in a roundabout way, has a similar feel. I'm not an eastender by any stretch of the imagination, but I am firmly rooted there in quite a few ways. Last week I met up with Kristabel and we headed to Pitfield Street's eponymous café for a coffee. As we sat looking across the street I kept thinking of how lots of time paths crossed along this street - obviously not whilst we were talking, because that's weird and a little bit rude. If I were to turn right, I'd end up pacing the well-worn track back to my old place of work, via the local, home to plenty of breakdowns and a fair few hurrahs. Turn left, however, and you'll work your way up to the church my grandparents were married in, their first home and the bakery my cousin still works in to this day. Of course, you'll all have a vested interest in going straight ahead and ending up at the Breakfast Club because their huevos rancheros is amazing and 100% #instagrammable. And there I was sat, wearing some clothes from the brand where I had my first job. One part funny, one part kinda reading into this 100 times too much.

*With the slight upheaval, there might be a bit of change here. I've got a few posts scheduled, but can't guarantee things will be running like clockwork in the next few weeks+, so please bear with me while I sort my life stuff out. I'll inevitably be tweeting and gramming, so see you there in the meantime!

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Ever since I can remember, I was a great devourer of books.

Barbour William Morris Ruskin Jacket. Next tie bow blouse. Oasis denim skirt: £5, sample sale. Hobbs monk shoes: £70 (similar). Marks and Spencer bag: £43. Charity shop belt: 10p.

Some things get better with age (one of those things is not hummus, trust me on that one, and *insert the sicky face emoji here*). I last visited the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow on a school trip way back when, and it was a little crummy. However, we gave it over a decade and two house moves for it to mature, and it's a had one hell of a makeover. And it's amazing.

As Morris' teenage home, there's no better place to give homage to the development of his love for print and the arts. Obviously there's a little chunk about him growing up in Walthamstow/Woodford (with an interactive map, which prompts you to look for where you live, duh), but I really enjoyed the room which recreated his workshop, with rolls of wallpaper hung from the ceiling. Upstairs things are dedicated to his love affair with printing books and his socialist beliefs, along with a couple of temporary exhibitions. As we exited through the gift shop (and the café's fwis opportunity), I picked up Jazmine's Christmas present, and had a wander through the grounds, now Lloyd Park. I know it tends to be areas like Richmond and Hampstead to receive the good rep for pockets of green in London, but I will always be an advocate of areas a little further East.

Of course, I had to bring along my Barbour Morris print jacket, which felt just as at home here as it did back at Kelmscott Manor. Because a) theme, and b) I've been living in it since October, so was pretty difficult to remove from my back.

Hope you've all been having a good week so far - and, even if it's been crap, it's less than three weeks until the new year and a new start!

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