Second-hand find: Pointy earrings

Pointy earrings from the Oxfam charity shop in St. John’s Wood. Price: 6 pounds. I love the bold, studded design as I don’t like my jewellery to be too cutesy & dainty.

I don’t really know what the material is, but the colour is something in-between silver and gold.

The old-fashioned clasp means that you have to fasten the screw until tight enough, which almost stopped me from buying them, as I thought they would be really painful to wear.

But they have turned out to be super comfortable, almost as comfortable as normal earrings – something I’m too afraid to wear at the moment, as I have a very active (and surprisingly strong) baby in the house, who happens to loooove grabbing shiny things.

He even managed to sneak himself into these pictures, while mum was busy taking pictures of herself. Can you spot him in the corner? I think he is pretending to help me with the laundry.

Second-hand find: quilted 70’s Laura Ashley bag

Dark grey vintage Laura Ashley bag from my favourite charity shop, St. John’s Hospice shop, in St. John’s Wood.

Price: 8 pounds.

I love the pattern and the fact that it is easy to slide over the pushchair’s handles.

It’s perfect for holding all the baby necessities such as wipes, drinks and food as I don’t have to worry about spillage. I’ll just chuck it in the washing machine…

‘Skwish, skwish’

And while we’re talking about wooden toys: I found this other classic Manhattan Toy the other day in one of the second-hand shops in St. John’s Wood. It only cost 99p.

It’s called a Skwish because the black cords are elastic, so not matter how hard you ‘skwish’ it it always snaps back into shape. This is the classic version, where complementary coloured wooden poles and balls meet.

It costs around 12 pounds on Amazon and comes in other versions too, like the colour burst one. There’s even a natural coloured one for the purists.

Elliot seems to like it so far…he particularly likes to throw it on the floor.

Who let the dog out?

I love quirky cushions, and this hand-made wool one barked at me the other day in the Octavia Foundation charity shop in St. Johns Wood.

Who can say no to a bulldog? SoI handed £3 over to the guy at the till, and the cushion was miiiiine. When I came home I googled the name on the back (that’s one of my favourite things about second-hand shopping, checking to see if you’ve found a real gem).

And I padded myself gently on the back when I discovered that this pillow is still in production…..at £92.50. On sale here at the moment.

Dressing the bump – Japanese polka dots

I had a dinner date with some friends in East London last week. And with all the young hipsters running around in that part of town old Mette kinda felt the pressure to retro-dress-up the bump a bit.

Looking in my closet the options were very limited, but then I remembered this dark blue polka dot dress with puff sleeves, which has a very high waist. I bought it ages ago in a second-hand shop in Japan for around 3 pounds.

But the big question was: could I squeeze the bump into it?

I could. So I chose to ignore the fact, that it’s made from 100% polyester and left for a lovely dinner at one of my favourite East London restaurants, Lennie’s Snack Bar.

Here I’m wearing it with a pair of studded ankle boots from Topshop to make it less dressy.

Second-hand find: Big colourful wool scarf

I’m sick with the flu at the moment (well, it might just be a cold, but an evil EVIL one that feels like a flu).

So when I’m over this I’m not going to go anywhere without a warm scarf wrapped around my neck. I’ll probably go for this big colourful one, which is my all-time favourite.

I bought it in the Trinity Hospice Charity shop in Chiswick for around 6 pounds. It’s 100% wool and perfect for keeping neck and chest warm.

Right, I’m going to head back to bed now, but I have two new posts about my favourite Copenhagen cafés in the pipeline, so will be back soon….cough…cough…sniffle…

Read my second-hand guide to Chiswick

Second-hand find: Anglomac Camel Coloured Coat

This winter jacket is not very thick but has a thin layer of insulation, so it’s perfect for this time, when winter slowly starts to loosen its grip.

I bought it aaaages ago (5-6 years) in one of my favourite charity shops in Copenhagen, Røde Kors at Nørrebrogade. It cost around 150 DKK (£17).

The first couple of years I didn’t wear it that much, but today it has become one of my favourite jackets. I really like the colour and the warm fur (sheep skin??) collar.

When I bought it I had to take it in a bit by moving buttons etc. But with my growing belly I suspect I have to take it out again soon.

Dressing the bump: second-hand Diane von Furstenberg dress

The observant reader may have noticed that this blog has taken a slight turn away from second-hand shopping towards comfort-food, comfortable footwear and cakes recently.

As a result I now have a baby bump to show for it (and a scanning just confirmed that it aint just a food baby :-))

Dressing the growing bump is becoming more and more difficult and I’ve had to sort through my closet to dig out everything oversized and stretchy and hide away anything with a waist.

I’m not a big fan of the high street shop’s maternity ranges (too cutesy and unimaginative) so I’m trying to make do with stuff from my closet for as long as possible.

Tonight I’m meeting up with some friends in Soho and I felt like wearing something cheerful. So I decided to see if I could still squeeze into this Diane von Furstenberg dress that I bought in Chiswick for £40 last year (here’s how it looked back then).

I made it into the dress and will enjoy wearing it tonight as I know it’ll become too small very soon.

Second-hand finds: furry hats

Nothing keeps you warm during a long cold winter like a good fur. Especially when it’s wrapped around your head.

I notice a lot less real furs on the streets here in the UK than in Denmark and other Scandinavian countries. This partly has to do with the colder climate and tradition (Denmark is the world’s biggest mink producing country + our strong connection to Greenland has made seal fur very popular).

But I suspect it’s also political, as people in the UK are a lot more anti-fur than in Denmark. (Fur farming has been banned in the UK since 2004, and this is probably a bad example, but just read what the always obnoxious Liz Jones has to say about the subject.)

This is not going to be a long defence speech about why I choose to wear real fur, as most people know the arguments pro & con, and I don’t expect everyone to agree with me but just respect that this is my personal choice, just as I choose to wear leather and eat meat.

And I do get some of the anti-fur arguments, but what I don’t get is the aggressive behaviour a lot of anti-fur protesters display. Throwing red paint at people, standing in front of Selfridges screaming and “setting free” thousands of mink resulting in them dying a slow, cruel death in nature etc. just doesn’t seem neither constructive nor very intelligent to me. It just makes them look stupid and spiteful.

To me fur is not a fashion statement, nor about showing off or enjoying the blood-dripping torture of innocent animals. I just love the way it feels, the texture and the way it protects me from the cold.

My take on it is that I’ve chosen to only wear vintage & second-hand fur and would never wear fur from endangered species. If I were to ever buy a new fur I would make sure the animals have been responsible reared and humanely killed and I would prefer to wear a fur from an animal that hasn’t JUST been killed for its fur.

Enough said, back to the hats I wanted to show you:

Over the years I’ve accumulated three very different fur hats. Let’s start with my least favourite. This I believe is a red fox and it cost me next to nothing (DKK20/£2)  in my favourite Red Cross shop in Copenhagen.

The second one is black (or very dark brown) and from the same Red Cross shop. I paid around DKK 80/£9 for it. I’m not really sure what animal this is from. Fox again?

And here’s my favourite. I believe this one is fox as well. I bought this from a lovely woman on as sunny summer day at a flee market at Østerfælled Torv, close to where I used to live.

The woman’s mother had just moved to a smaller flat, so she was selling all the things the old lady didn’t use anymore. I paid DKK250/£28 for it.

The red vintage coat, milkshakes & burgers + a very MERRY Christmas to you!

It is Christmas after all. And as the 24th is the big day of celebration in Scandinavia I decided to be a bit festive and dig out my red vintage wool coat.

I bought it many, many years ago in one of my favourite charity shops in Copenhagen and paid around DKK 200 (£22) for it.

I don’t wear it that often as red is not really my colour, but today it felt perfect. I took it for a little excursion to Wardour Street in Soho where I met up with the dear husband and one of his colleagues for lunch.

During our stay in Denmark we’ve been gulping down what feels like 10 kilo of traditional Christmas fare. Pickled herring, warm liver pâté with mushrooms and bacon, ham, grønlangkål (curly kale), sausages, sylte (brawn), roast pork etc etc.

You name it, we’ve eaten it.

So today we both craved something completely different and headed straight for Byron Burgers on Wardour street. (Read my review of it here). I decided to go Full Monty, it is Christmas after all, and ordered a vanilla milkshake to go with my juicy cheeseburger. Yummy.

And not we’re back home, relaxing while looking at our non-existing Christmas tree (well, we do have a couple of fairy lights dangling here and there).

Husband is chopping away in the kitchen, preparing one of my favourite pasta dishes and we have two movies lined up in front of the DVD player: The Last Exorcism + American, The Bill Hicks Story. Now that’s my idea of a cosy Christmas 🙂

And now there’s only one thing left to say: MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!!