♪♫ Workin' 9 to 5... ♪♫

♪♫...what a way to make a livin'... ♪♫ 

I love this song!  It is one of my guilty pleasures, I know every word, and on a long car journey I'll quite often select the 'guilty pleasures' playlist on my ipod and sing my head off.  I'm driving to Leeds tomorrow for a meeting.  It takes me nearly three hours to get there so I plan to fill my Starbucks travel cup with proper strong coffee and sing my way up the M1.  

I am a little bit excited.  Not just because I get to spend the morning with Queen Dolly, Dr Hook and Five Star but also because I have got a new handbag.  I'm using it tomorrow for the first time.  I know it's sad to say that I'm excited about using a new handbag but there we are.  It's a Mulberry handbag and it's my new favourite thing.  

You can't really tell properly here but it's coral coloured leather.  Eek!  It is the Mulberry Alexa and the colour is called 'watermelon'.  It has a short plaited handle which fits into the crook of the arm and a longer strap which you can sling over the shoulder or across the body.  I have a couple of other Mulberry handbags but this is the first time I've bought one in such a ker-azy colour.  It is summery and fresh - I love it.  Not pink, not red, not orange but a perfect bright coral.  The kind of colour that looks amazing with a tan.  I have a few brightly coloured tops but I mostly wear neutral and nude colours; my beige, grey, khaki and parachute silk pink all look so right with this bag.  I wear a lot of black too, especially for work, but I think the only black item of clothing I can bring myself to pair this with is my leather jacket.  I don't like bright colours with black.

In this photo, the bag is sitting on a footstool.  Quite a loud patterned one, I know.  I love this room, it's our little den, shall I show you?

Our house is odd.  It's very old - two cottages that were knocked into one - and it is built on a slope so we have five levels in total, even though we have just two bedrooms.  This room is at the very top of the house - it is the lightest, brightest and warmest room (everywhere else in the house can be cold and a bit dark, even in high summer).  

You can't see it but those two chairs are in front of a TV - that's where my man watches his football/sci-fi and I watch my trash TV.  The little desk is where I sit with my laptop when I work from home and I also do any sewing up here.  We have books on shelves everywhere in this house, it drives me crazy.  The Mr and I both read a lot and he likes to see books on display.  I don't, I'd rather they were packed away, but we also have several strings of fairy lights in various spots around the house so I reckon I can compromise!  

Here's my little desk.  And some of the trade-off twig lights.

This is the only room that we can have a nice big light in - the ceilings everywhere else in the house are pretty low.

My Mother in Law keeps telling me that I need to remove all of the crystals once a week and wash them in hot soapy water to keep it sparkling.  I pretend not to hear when she says this.  The best it gets is a flick of my feather duster.

And finally, here's my little work chum.  She keeps me company when I work from home and listens out for would-be burglars, the postman and the annoying little boy next door who keeps booting his footballs over the fence.  She also patiently listens to me rabbit on when I'm in the middle of a particularly tricky spreadsheet.

This was her today and this photo makes me smile because I think she looks quite wise 

with a walrus moustache.  

See, you can go crazy in the coconut being on your own too much, thank goodness I'll be seeing real people at the office tomorrow.

Nicki 

x