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I have one & only one New Year's resolution this year:
to buy absolutely nothing new

The only exceptions are food, fabric, underwear & art supplies. For clothes I will buy vintage, charity shop or 2nd hand online. For CDs I will download music (not sure if this counts or not?) or borrow or buy 2nd hand again. Books will probably be the hardest. Not because I don't love charity bookshops, but just because working in a bookshop means I constantly find things I want to buy. But that's it. NOTHING NEW.

I don't need anything that's new. I could just wear the clothes I have for the rest of my life. Of course, I don't want to do that, but there are way's around it & every time I visit that mystical universe that is "town" my heart sinks, I get angry & shaky & very very sweary. I'm a hypocrite, yes. But I haven't shopped in Topshop for over 2 years now & I haven't missed it. Even though 2 of my favorite dresses are from there, I can honestly say that I do not feel the need to walk into a Topshop ever again in my life, so why not cut out everything? I've done a pattern making course so I can make stuff if I can't find it 2nd hand, & I should make stuff really.

The only thing that bugs me is stemming from a trip to Primark I was forced to make last week taking a small family friend Christmas shopping. A velvet skirt I've been mulling over? There. In every colour. For like £5. Aviator jackets, bomber jackets, practically perfect, again every colour & only £15. It's so easy, it's not fair. I am a "head-shopper" as my friends & family have dubbed it, I have a habit of thinking up garments that don't exist anywhere but in my imagination & then spending like a year, 2 years looking for the perfect version of it. Usually I find it...eventually or I get over it. & it fuels my ugly superiority complex when it comes to things like clothes & music. I feel like it was my original thought & I went so some pains to find it, but it's a little soul destroying every time I walk into one of these shops who appear to have a carbon copy of my imagination. Is this just me? Or is everyone ok with this now & should I just shut the fuck up?

Ok rant almost over. Just one more thing: I have realised the more I continue to exist that to do anything I may remotely want to do (whatever that turns out to be) I need money. & so spending my months wages a couple of days after I get paid is not going to work, especially when I'm not at college or when I venture out into the cruel real world. For now the only money earning skill I have seems to be the Saturday girl at Blackwell's & so I'll have to milk this as much as possible until I get that avidly awaited lightbulb moment. I just wish it would hurry up. Hopefully, though, in the meantime this resolution will give me something to fixate on, to strive for & think about. & save me a bit of money!

What are your resolutions?

Photographer: Jessie Craig
Date: June 2010
Stylist: Kate Carnegie
Model: Elena Sudakova
Source: The Ones2Watch

Winter

Photographer: Billy Kidd
Date: August 2010
Model: Luisa Bianchin
Source: I was shot by Billy Kidd

Autumn

Photographer: Sigurd Grünberger
Date: September 2010
Stylist: Keiko Seya
Source: Sigurd Grünberger via Paranaiv

Summer

Photographer: Vanina Sorrenti
Magazine: i-D
Date: February 2010
Stylist: Marina Burani
Model: Shalom Harlow
Source: Smile via Paranaiv

Spring

Would've done Christmas but the family got to the gingerbread biscuits first! So especially for you, iced ginger biscuits! Merry Christmas everyone! Or whatever else you celebrate, even if it's just snow & time of school/college/work. Sorry the blog's been so rubbish but in just over a week we'll be in a New Year & I have a small feeling 2011 might just be amazing. Even though this year has been a vintage for sure.

I'll do more reminiscing later, but as I'm working until Christmas Eve & going to Cornwall the day after boxing day I'll leave you with this & some lovely timed posts of four magazine spreads from the year summing up the seasons (comments off so please leave them here!). Because that, my friends, is how I roll.

See you on the other side!

In a break in the recent political broadcasting on this blog. This post would be entitled. Trousers I would like to buy from ASOS. Very important, I'm sure you will agree.

Boy -
There's something about wearing trousers that don't fit that makes me reminisce about the 90s & my childhood. But I need a waist, otherwise I do actually look like a boy (I mean, I have the hair) & the colour of these top trousers is actually heart stopping. I need something that colour in my life...if only it was those trousers. The second one's are made of Viscose *eugh* so I cannot purchase, but colour & shape alone make them share-worthy.

Knitted -
I adore how unflattering these are. Especially the top one's with the arrows bending to show off curves most people hate. I also like that they would be really really warm & make me feel quite Nordic... with my thoughts of hopefully going to Sweden at the end of my education next year I think it's seeping into my tastes & everyday life.



Leather -
Ok, so everyone in Grazia had those Isabel Marant one's, mostly women with kids but fuck it, I'm 18 & I've wanted some leather trousers for like 2 years now. Topshop made some crap attempts at it & charged loads, then there were those disgusting wetlook leggings. But how beautiful are these? Even the faux leather one's...

Anyway that was nice. I feel much better now. Although I have to confess that I made this post whilst watching the Commons debate on drug legislation because it's important. You can watch it here in limited quality, but just listen, please listen! Even if it's just for the first few minutes to listen to the dick with greasy (drug-addict style if you will) hair be shot down by everyone when he suggested the classification of Cannabis to a Class C caused a raise in drug prosecution and NHS treatment. NO ONE HAS EVER DIED FROM CANNABIS USE. *Ahem* sorry about that. Also the R.I.O.T trials done in Brighton are very interesting to listen too as well as it's MP who also later attacks said dick-with-drug-addict-hair to an extent where I would've liked something more physical. But hey.

That's just me.

So I've been asked for "art" from a couple of my friends this Christmas & after weeks of oogling through etsy I now realise it's too late for anything to be delivered from America. So for inspiration I was looking at this amazing blog & came across Casey Burns, who has vaguely entered my conscience once before. The prints are pretty expensive but maybe if I start with the ideal I can then at least head out into the overpriced world of Clifton with some idea of what I want to buy for people...



Sorry this blog has taken a beating of recent as I've been swamped with Christmas presents & protest. Very conflicting thoughts so not being able to put together cohesive internet rants is unfortunately, one of the side effects. It does mean though that I spent yesterday making gingerbread decorations, putting up the tree, watching 2 Christmas film (Christmas with the Cranks & Serendipity) & managed to make flyers for the anti-tax dodgers protest this weekend. Now if that isn't multi tasking I don't know what is.

Please please please reblog this flyer if you're in Bristol. You can e-mail me (neonpeg@gmail.com) if you want the .pdf to print off flyers to hand out. There's more information here about protests all around the UK & if you've found yourself alienated by the student protests then let's refocus the target on the people who are really taking the piss & focus our anger in a more productive way!

We must sing, we must sing.

Watch the full video here.

Repeating the word progressive does not make it so.
Politics is about fair and not fair not popular and unpopular.
Charging horses at kids is not justified in any way shape or form.
Pushing people into space that does not exist is inhuman.

We are angry.
We are justified.

Good luck to everyone taking part in the London march today. I will be dabbling my new hobby of watching BBC Parliament & getting very shouty as if I'm actually in Parliament...

My friend Sophie gave me this shirt after she got it in a charity shop for £2 or something, saying it suited me more because it was too big, too short & it fitted my "turbulent love life", gee thanks. It's pretty awesome & lovingly 80s though so I'm pretty stoked all the same.

Also is is officially Christmas in my eyes, bought a tree today that my mum insists we have to acclimatise to our house (even though it's as cold as outside anyway) before decorating & taking away all the fun. But more importantly I'm wearing my reindeer necklace & this t-shirt/dress is my first present.

Woo!