Hi! Welcome to a new week on the blog. I have a really unexpected reveal for you today. Unexpected, in the sense that those who know me well would be very surprised by this purchase. I will show you what I have bought first, then I will explain…
Here’s the reveal, starting with the seller’s photo of the iconic Hermès box. Is it an older version than usual?
Ooh! This is the magnificent Regina by Leila Menchari. The design was originally made to celebrate Queen Elizabeth in 1972. This one apparently dates to 1987. The scarf is in almost pristine condition with only two tiny marks that I can see.
Here is another image of the whole scarf:
Regina designed by Leila Menchari for Hermès
I haven’t tried to wear the scarf yet, but these are a couple of photos of the bias folds:
Regina by Hermès – bias folds
As the scarf is quite old, it may take me a while to compile a Scarf of the Moment post. Accurate information about these scarves is fairly difficult to find. If any readers of the blog have useful insights or information about the design, I would be very grateful if you could pass this on to me.
As to why this is a very unexpected purchase for me…
I am trying to avoid being too political here, but since I went to University I have been strongly in favour of getting rid of the monarchy, or at the very least, slimming it down. In more recent years, as the Queen has reached old age, I have become more supportive of her personally. Her long reign is quite amazing – she has been Queen for all of my life, to date. So, I felt that a purchase of this scarf in the year of her Platinum Anniversary was appropriate. I have waited to see whether Hermès would produce a special scarf, but I haven’t seen one yet. This version of Regina was offered at a very good price and in excellent condition.
It has been a strange kind of week with very changeable weather. My health has also been very variable. When I felt at my best, I was able to work through some useful tasks, but at the worst times, I was unable to leave my bed.
My main focus this week has been on our laptop. It is almost out of warranty, but has had very poor performance since it was first set up. The issue has been speed. It loaded so slowly that I could almost knit a jumper whilst waiting for it. Also, programs kept crashing to the extent that it was unusable. I should have returned it ages ago, but kept putting it off because I felt too ill to do anything about it. Anyway, to cut to the chase, I have finally backed up all of the data onto a new hard drive, parcelled the machine up and had it collected at lunchtime. I will let you know the outcome.
I have managed to wear one reasonable outfit this week. My Hermès Grand Manège Love Bandana in blue, pink and red was the basis, and I put a simple navy ensemble around it. I only have one pair of earrings in red, a present from Younger Son. They bring out the red elements of the scarf.
Outfit of the day 08/04/22 with Hermès’ Grand Manège Love Bandana
Here is a larger image of the scarf so that you can see the details:
Grand Manège Love Bandana by Hermès
Well, that is all for this week. I do hope that you all have a great weekend.
I hope you have had an enjoyable reading week! I finished one book and then had a lot of false starts choosing a second. That means I have just the one book to tell you about.
The Wonder by Emma Donoghue
The book of the week, chosen at random from the Library’s ebook service, was The Wonder by Emma Donoghue. Here is the blurb:
“An eleven-year-old girl stops eating, but remains miraculously alive and well. A nurse, sent to investigate whether she is a fraud, meets a journalist hungry for a story . . .
Set in the Irish Midlands in the 1850s, Emma Donoghue’s The Wonder – inspired by numerous European and North American cases of ‘fasting girls’ between the sixteenth century and the twentieth – is a psychological thriller about a child’s murder threatening to happen in slow motion before our eyes. Pitting all the seductions of fundamentalism against sense and love, it is a searing examination of what nourishes us, body and soul.”
And this is the review that I posted on Goodreads:
I found this a most unusual book, set in mid 19th century Ireland. The plot centres around a young Catholic girl who has apparently stopped eating for several months. Many in her local area, including her family, venerate her as a possible saint and a group set out to test the circumstances. They hire an Irish nun and an English nurse, trained under Florence Nightingale, who are supposed to stay with the child in shifts to see whether she takes any food.
The English nurse begins with a very practical and fairly harsh regime and manner, determined to find out the truth and expose the girl. As the plot slowly unfolds, the reader is drawn into a charged atmosphere of strict religious observance, attempts to prove cheating and lies, and, at the centre, an intelligent and suffering child.
Some readers have found the book too slow, but I was quickly drawn into the story and enjoyed how the two main characters, the English nurse and the young girl, developed and changed.
All in all, I found the book a really interesting and satisfying read and will look out for more ebooks by this author on our system. Donoghue is also the writer of Room, which I have also read. You may remember that this book was made into a film.
OK, well I had better turn to the book I am currently reading so that I finish it in time for next week’s Reading Roundup post!
Well, I thought that I had finished with the Spring/Summer 2022 Hermès scarf season when I purchased Le Premier Chant. None of the other scarves had caught my eye or imagination. The colourways didn’t appeal. But then I made the error of looking on The Purse Forum…
… the modelling photos of one particular scarf began to get to me…
… but, but, but, I don’t wear the main colour! Mmm, it looks so lovely…
And so I fell even further down the slippery slope…
This is Hermès Story by Jonathan Burton, a 90cm silk twill in colourway #08, Marron Glacé, Bleu, Pétrole, code H003875S 08.
Hermès Story by Jonathan Burton for Hermès
Description
The image on the scarf is of an amusing scene. A beautiful woman and her motley group of followers pose for a selfie. They are surrounded by clouds of butterflies and birds. She rides a wooden steed, perched on a mountain top, and her companions are precariously balanced, one upon another, for the moment of the photograph. Will they collapse and fall?
In this colourway, the whole image is a study in rich textures. The background looks like molten chocolate, delicious and smooth. The creatures’ fur and feathers are coloured in shades of blue and beige with hints of white. They seem so soft and tactile. The blue border frames the scarf and there is a contrast hem in black which sets off the whole design.
I was attracted to the glowing colourway, despite my misgivings as to whether the scarf would suit me with my grey hair. There are modelling photos further down the post, so please tell me what you think. The scarf would also look wonderful as a hanging in my bedroom!
Colourways
These are the colourways for the Spring/Summer 2022 silk twill 90cm scarves. I have added in the codes to help those of you who wish to purchase this scarf.
“British illustrator Jonathan Burton presents his second collaboration with the Maison with a design that pokes fun at our era, one where social media and self-presentation result in all kinds of means—sometimes dangerous—to impress. Perched on a snowy mountain top, an equestrian and her comrades pose like acrobats: if one of them stumbles, the whole pyramid collapses! Despite the somewhat unsteady performance, everyone is dressed to the nines and hopes to look their best. The giraffe dons a bow tie; the turtle and the pelican picked out their best hats for the occasion. The selfie is a success and the phone blows up with likes!”
Details
Here are some closeups of my scarf in a slideshow format:
How I wear the scarf
This is such a beautiful scarf but, because I have recently purchased it, I have only managed to wear it to try out different knots. Here is one outfit I have put together. As I don’t wear brown clothing, the scarf will be used to liven up my navy ensembles, mainly in the colder months. For me, this particular colourway does not read as Spring/Summer.
Outfit of the day 20/03/22 with Hermès’ Hermès Story scarf
Scarf ties
I have tried on this scarf in a variety of ways. At the moment, as it is so new, the silk fabric is very crisp and stiff so doesn’t fall easily into soft folds. Anyway, you can get the general idea of how it looks when worn. Apologies for the repeated sight of my face! I tried to photograph just the scarf without me peering at you, but I had a lot of trouble with the lighting and angles. I am a hopeless photographer!
Hermès Story – selection of scarf ties
Background information
This is not the kind of scarf with lots of useful background details, but I have found the following. If I come across any more information, I will add it here…
Jonathan Burton jonathanburton.net His official website with loads of wonderful designs, including this one. He is also on Instagram and Twitter
Here is an “unboxing” video from YouTube showing Hermès Story:
I hope readers have found this exploration of Hermès Story both interesting and useful. Once again, if you find any errors or have any additional information that I could add, please don’t hesitate to contact me.
If you have been following this week’s posts, you will be aware that I had my second COVID booster injection on Monday afternoon and that I have been suffering ever since from a bad reaction. Today, I am a little better but still have extreme fatigue and very “fuzzy” thoughts. So, today’s post will show you the outfit that I wore on Monday, but I cannot manage to write very much commentary.
This is the ensemble, based around the stunning Hermès scarf Jaguar Quetzal, designed by Alice Shirley:
Outfit of the day 28/03/22 with Hermès’ Jaguar Quetzal scarf
Yes, my love of purple is rather obvious again! I will show you the scarf again in a larger image…
Jaguar Quetzal by Alice Shirley for Hermès
I am feeling very tired now, so will sign off. If you have any questions about this post, please ask them in the comments and I will try to answer them as soon as I am able.
Hello readers! Unfortunately, I have had a bad reaction to my second COVID booster jab and I have been very ill for a couple of days. So, this will be a bare bones post.
Here is the first book:
The White Girl by Tony Birch
The first book of the week was The White Girl by Tony Birch. This is the blurb:
“Odette Brown has lived her whole life on the fringes of a small country town. After her daughter disappeared and left her with her granddaughter Sissy to raise on her own, Odette has managed to stay under the radar of the welfare authorities who are removing fair-skinned Aboriginal children from their families. When a new policeman arrives in town, determined to enforce the law, Odette must risk everything to save Sissy and protect everything she loves.
In The White Girl, Miles-Franklin-shortlisted author Tony Birch shines a spotlight on the 1960s and the devastating government policy of taking Indigenous children from their families.”
This was a simply and well written story about the plight of Aboriginal people living in the Australia of the 50s. I found the racism suffered by the people absolutely horrifying: ranging from petty acts by local youths to institutional systems set up to disadvantage them. I had heard about how families could be torn apart with efforts made to suppress Aboriginal lifestyles and culture and the book really drove all of this home.
The writing style makes the book accessible to a wide age-range and it could easily be used as a text by schools as well as being read and enjoyed by adults.
This second book of the week was completely different: The Innocents by Michael Crummey. Here is the blurb:
“A brother and sister are orphaned in an isolated cove on Newfoundland’s northern coastline. Their home is a stretch of rocky shore governed by the feral ocean, by a relentless pendulum of abundance and murderous scarcity. Still children with only the barest notion of the outside world, they have nothing but the family’s boat and the little knowledge passed on haphazardly by their mother and father to keep them.
Muddling though the severe round of the seasons, through years of meagre catches and storms and ravaging illness, it is their fierce loyalty to each other that motivates and sustains them. But as seasons pass and they wade deeper into the mystery of their own natures, even that loyalty will be tested.
The Innocents is richly imagined and compulsively readable, a riveting story of hardship and survival, and an unflinching exploration of the bond between brother and sister. By turns electrifying and heartbreaking, it is a testament to the bounty and barbarity of the world, to the wonders and strangeness of our individual selves.”
I am so glad that I chose this book. Usually, I enjoy fast-paced thrillers and crime novels, but this slow and detailed story really caught my imagination.
A brother and sister of 12 and 10 are left orphaned in a cove on Newfoundland in the 19th century. They have previously worked with their parents to eke out a living from the land and sea around them, with twice-yearly visits from a ship which replenishes their stores. The two children carry on with the numerous tasks that keep them alive in harsh conditions. Occasional visitors come by and liven up their existence, but life is very hard.
The reaction to this book is very varied, but I am amongst those who were absorbed by the story and the amazing details of daily life and the fight to survive. The darker side was very realistic and I felt necessary to the whole tale.
Here we are at the beginning of a new week. Yesterday was Mothers’ Day in the UK and I had a wonderful day with lots of treats! Younger Son sent me a lovely box with 40 different tea sachets and Elder Son (who lives with us) gave me some cute sparkly heart-shaped earrings. ES also made me the most amazing “afternoon tea” which I ate in the evening and brought me a scone with jam and cream with my afternoon pot of tea. Confusing? Sorry… 😂🤣😂🤣😂.
Here is a photo of that amazing “afternoon tea” – I didn’t manage it all, by the way…
Mothers’ Day afternoon tea 2022
Doesn’t that look delicious?!?
This afternoon I am meant to be going out for my latest COVID booster jab. As I am feeling very poorly today, I hope that I am able to get there. Anyway, I will try my best.
OK, I know that I said that today’s post would be a Scarf of the Moment, focusing on my latest scarf from Hermès: Hermès Story. Well, I must stop making promises like that! It’s taking me a longer time to write the post than I envisaged, so today I will show you a couple of outfits that I wore during the week.
Yesterday, we actually managed to go out to a garden centre! I feel a bit silly that such a mundane (for other people) trip seems like a high achievement for me, but I am so pleased. Lovely Husband drove us to the nearest one and we walked for a while, then stopped in the café for a drink. I went back to the car, as I was very tired by this point, whilst LH had a wander around. When we arrived home I was exhausted so went up to bed with a drink and a snack. It was so lovely to see the countryside in the dazzling Spring sunshine with all of the flowers and this really lifted my spirits.
Anyway, here is a collage showing my outfit:
Outfit of the day 24/03/22 with Hermès’ Dans Un Jardin Anglais scarf
Outfit details:
purple cashmere v-neck jumper – Pure Collection. I don’t have an image of this to put into the collage.
grey cotton jeans – Lands’ End.
purple leather and gold “Gancia” wrap bracelet – Ferragamo.
purple suede ankle boots – Duo Boots.
purple Africa leather midi-Selene handbag – Massaccesi.
Silk scarf, 90cm, in lilac, purple, aqua, green and orange – Dans un Jardin Anglais – Hermès. Tied in an asymmetric wrap.
Yes, I l💜💜💜💜💜💜💜ve purple!!!
I haven’t made a collage for this outfit that I wore on Tuesday. It was based around a vintage silk stole by Roberto Cavalli in the most gorgeous blues with animal print. It really lifted my outfit consisting of a navy cashmere/merino v-neck jumper and navy trousers…
Outfit of the day 22/03/22 with Roberto Cavalli’s animal print stole
Looking at the photos, I am so pleased that I had my hair cut last week!
So, that’s all for this week and I hope that you all have a very Happy Weekend.
Well, I have finally finished the book! At last! OK, it was very long, almost 900 pages, and I was enjoying it, but illness and distraction got in the way of concentration. I simply found it very hard to focus properly.
Anyway, here it is…
Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone by Diana Gabaldon
So the book was Diana Gabaldon’ latest episode (9th!) in her Outlander series: Tell the Bees that I am Gone. This is the blurb:
“The past may seem the safest place to be . . . but it is the most dangerous time to be alive. . . .
Jamie Fraser and Claire Randall were torn apart by the Jacobite Rising in 1743, and it took them twenty years to find each other again. Now the American Revolution threatens to do the same.
It is 1779 and Claire and Jamie are at last reunited with their daughter, Brianna, her husband, Roger, and their children on Fraser’s Ridge. Having the family together is a dream the Frasers had thought impossible.
Yet even in the North Carolina backcountry, the effects of war are being felt. Tensions in the Colonies are great and local feelings run hot enough to boil Hell’s tea-kettle. Jamie knows loyalties among his tenants are split and it won’t be long until the war is on his doorstep.
Brianna and Roger have their own worry: that the dangers that provoked their escape from the twentieth century might catch up to them. Sometimes they question whether risking the perils of the 1700s—among them disease, starvation, and an impending war—was indeed the safer choice for their family.
Not so far away, young William Ransom is still coming to terms with the discovery of his true father’s identity—and thus his own—and Lord John Grey has reconciliations to make, and dangers to meet . . . on his son’s behalf, and his own.
Meanwhile, the Revolutionary War creeps ever closer to Fraser’s Ridge. And with the family finally together, Jamie and Claire have more at stake than ever before.”
Phew! That’s a long blurb. Well, this is a very, very long book. And this is what I had to say about it:
There’s a lot I like about this book, although I also have some serious reservations. I really enjoyed meeting the main characters once again and finding out about the descendants of Jamie and Claire. I also loved the amazing detail about life in the mountains in the 18th century: the food, the living conditions, the minutiae of domestic management. Gabaldon has obviously done an incredible amount of research and this shows.
I also enjoyed much of the plot. There were highs and lows and some nail biting moments that sustained me through this very long book. A lot happens in the story.
But, and it is a big but, the book is far too long and rambling. The plot moves from one set of people to another, often with no obvious purpose except to squeeze in another piece of research driven information. There are long sections that were just unnecessary and should have been cut. And we didn’t need the details of every meal prepared by Claire! As for her new “powers” – well, this emerging story line is absurd!
I will, no doubt, read the next book, but can someone please rein Gabaldon in before she writes it?
Hello everyone and welcome to a new week on this blog!
I am trying to write a detailed Scarf of the Moment post about my gorgeous Hermès’ Story scarf, but it is taking a while. Despite all of my efforts, I can’t seem to get good photographs of the various scarf ties. I’m a pretty poor photographer anyway and using an iPad isn’t ideal, but I am trying my best. Just a couple more to do. I hope to have it ready to post on Friday.
In the meantime, here’s a lovely Tweet for you:
Screenshot from Twitter 20/03/22
As a I am a tea addict, this image caught my eye when I was browsing through Twitter. The account is a great one to follow for wonderful art by women.
Right, I will now attempt to return to my photographic efforts!
Former professional school librarian, now retired through chronic illness. Trying to keep cheerful by reading, drinking lots of tea, blogging my new life, and my love of bling!
The Librain
The Librain......retired 
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