Tangerine Dream

At last, I have awoken from my dormant blog state to return anew. For those of you that are regulars - I apologise.  It has been a busy month where the tedium of everyday life has interrupted my blogging flow. It's been a month of ups and downs.  The downs being two sad funerals, my poor mum having yet another painful operation that has rendered her out of action (again) and my purse being stolen.  The ups?  Well, I have been promoted and start my new role at the end of next month which is both exciting and scary as hell at the same time and John and I have just returned from a really lovely holiday in Majorca, one that we both desperately needed. Thankfully we chose to go all-inclusive, which turned out to be a god-send as my stolen purse contained our spending money for the trip that I had just withdrawn.  So the all you can eat buffet and free-flowing alcohol was gratefully received.

We stayed in a hotel in Portals Nous which is in the south of the island.  Very simple and a little outdated but we loved it. We were so pleased with it after our 23 hour delay in getting there due to our flight cancellation, we just needed a bed and a clean pillow at that point.  The hotel was only a 5 minute walk from a small bay at the end of the road (passing by a colony of feral cats that also profited regularly from the free buffet), it provided some very funny entertainment circa 1980's and even better, the hotel was full of french people so I was in my element.  Poor John suffered a little as I ignored him in favour of our French cousins. It was so nice to be surrounded by my beloved language and I spoke it as often as I could, forcing myself  upon the poor unsuspecting French. And the constant supply of free Rosé wine also helped boost my confidence and language skills!

To my surprise, I also managed to adhere to the disgraceful luggage allowance of 15 kilos AND sharing one suitcase with John. One of my favourite things about holidays is the fact that it is an excuse to dress up. Even though it was all-inclusive therefore we stayed most nights at the hotel, I still took 7 evening outfits so I could dress up for dinner. Not everyone was of the same ilk and we saw many swimwear combinations and 3 day old holiday outfits that just kept resurfacing so I am sure I raised a few eyebrows but I tried to keep the "ball gown" level to a minimum, opting for nice bright maxi dresses or my favoured one shoulder Grecian styles that I love.

One of the dresses that I took along is the one featured in the picture below.  A gorgeous bright orange maxi that I found in a charity shop last year. It was the first time I wore it and even though I bought it in winter, I knew it would be perfect holiday attire. I think it cost around £7, I am ashamed to say that I cannot remember, age is definitely affecting my memory!

It is a lovely delicate chiffon made up of accordion pleats and it definitely has that swish factor as you walk.

And as for the shoes, well I only took one pair of evening heels which are not second-hand unfortunately, they came from my shop Wallis. But they are a staple pair from my vast collection and they are so comfortable, I knew they would be a good option (especially given my luggage restrictions!).

So, we now find ourselves at home, back in Wales and the weather I am looking at currently is decidedly gloomier than that of the Balearics.  But I still have a couple of days before I return to work, so I am making the most of them. Yesterday, I spent the afternoon rummaging in the Bristol charity shops before picking John up from work so I shall be writing about all my treasures very soon. Today is all about my blog and big cuddles with my beautiful dog (now that we have been reunited after a week apart) and tomorrow, I have an afternoon of drinking and giggling with my friends from work on the waterfront so lets hope some summer weather appears!