London Jubilee Weekend. What to do, what to do?

This weekend sees the party of the decade hit London town.
We're celebrating our gracious Queen's Diamond Jubilee (Americans, that means she's been on the throne for 60 years).
Cities, towns & villages all over the UK will be taking to the streets to show their appreciation.
Street parties, picnics, Pimm's & dancing.
London will be the party epicentre. So seeing as I'm 'The Londoner' I should probably give you a heads up as to what's going down!
Unfortunately I wont be in the city (I planned a little trip away without looking at the calendar, rookie error) but here's a list of what I would have gotten up to.

Ok, most importantly you're going to want to check out the flotilla. 

On Sunday The Queen will travel along The Thames with a fleet of ships, boats, yachts & canoes that will span 7miles. 

It will run from Putney Bridge to Tower Bridge and over a million Londoners are expected to line the banks in hopes of catching a glimpse of Her Royal Majesty.

If the sun shines it will be a glorious day! Everyone will be laughing and friendly, girls will be in little dresses and people will be gorging themselves on Pimm's & icecream. 

If it rains... I would probably skip it, but maybe that's because I'm just a fair weather patriot.

If you're planning on taking littluns along with you, I recommend Battersea Park as they're having a little Jubilee festival.

Turn up at 12pm for fair ground rides, cakes, outdoor cinemas and dancing. 

Alternatively, join London's biggest ever street party. 

Trestle tables will run from Piccadilly Circus to St James. Bring your own lunch & pull up a chair, or buy something delicious from one of the stalls along the way. 

If you fancy being a little bit fancy pants, The Ritz, Fortnum & Mason & The Wolseley are even getting in on the action. 

Book your place at the table here. 

You might remember that that Bompas & Parr took over the roof of Selfridges last year and turned it into a vividly green lake that visitors could boat around? 

Well for the Jubilee, they've turned it into a crazy golf maze & will be offering visitors a spot of afternoon tea. 

Tickets have sold out online but they're keeping more on the door. It starts tomorrow, so get your royal little behind down there sharpish. 

If festivals are more your thing, you'll want to check out Field Day. 

An East London event which describes itself as "A celebration of all that is bold, daring, innovative and imaginative in the world of alternative music."
It's their 5th anniversary and I've only heard great things about this in the past. Well worth looking into.
On Saturday and tickets are £45, you can buy them here.

Personally the event I'm most sorry to be missing is God Save The Clam.
The foodie popup people behind The English Laundrette & Rock Lobster have teamed up with Pitt Cue for a "Punk style clam bake and banshee cocktail bar on a rooftop in London fields."

I have been looking forward to this for months.

1st course:
Pitt Cue links, burnt lettuce, smoked anchovy salad cream, dry rub fried toast
The clam bake:
Clams, cockles, mussels, devilled crayfish & crab claws, sea beets & samphire - steamed over seaweed & charcoal, sides of Cornish Early Potatoes in Smoked Dripping, House Sausage, BBQ leeks, BBQ Corn & Grilled Sour Dough
Dessert:
Glyns Screwball Sundae Bar - Find out what the Fat Elvis or Strawberry Shortcake Sundaes are.
Buy your tickets here and make sure you tweet me a picture of every course so I can live through you!

Of course, even if you're not in London or the UK, I hope you'll all be making my Queenies to take to your picnics & garden teas?

I'm leaving this as a bit of an open ended blog post.
If you have a fab event or party that you think people should know about, let me know in the comments and I'll add it to the list.
A sort of Londoner guide to London, by Londoners!
Sound fair?

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Summer in The City

This weekend was utterly glorious. 

The sun didn't let up for a second. Thankfully Dickie is a member of a fancy pants members club in West London, so we could escape the haze & catch a few rays! 

Yes, I spent the whole day singing "she wore aaannn itsy bitsy teeny weeny..."
It's from Accessorize (who knew they had an amazing bikini selection?!) and you have to buy it as separates.
Top here. Bottoms here.
*Sizing wise I got bottoms in 10 & top in 12.

Dickie wore short-shorts.

Look at that dreadful posture! My mother's going to kill me.

After a few hours of snoozing on the grass while Dickie read me excerpts from his delightful book, American Psycho, we decided it was time for drinks. 

We wondered up through the grounds to the bar, making eyes at the well dressed tennis players on the way. 

We bumped into the lovely Charlie S.

After a few glasses of Pimms, we headed home to change into our pyjamas. 

We had heard a rumour that Ping Pong were offering all you can eat dimsum to anyone in a onesie... for free. 

Surely this couldn't be true?

I attempted to verify it on Twitter but it was all a little unclear. 

Having decided that free dimsum was a worthy trade for our dignity, we decided to risk it and jumped in the car. 

I drove, the boys took photos...

When we arrived we were thrilled to discover a bustling restaurant filled with people in their finest onesies!
Even the littleuns had gotten in on the action.

Oh boy, did we go to town with our ordering.
We started with a fairly modest order of 14 dishes between three.

And then moved on to round 2...

The food was delicious, the staff went above & beyond to be helpful & friendly.
We left seriously impressed!
Sadly it was their last "OnePiece Sumday" but I've asked them to let me know about all their future events, so I'll be sure to tweet if anything good comes up.

By the end of the day we left tanned, stuffed, exhausted and very happy.

You know the best part? 

We were already in our pyjamas. 

Ready. For. Bed. 

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The Summer House

Whenever I've been at my parents' house in the country, I've found my self sneaking to the bottom of the garden for a little DIY time. 

When they moved in, there was an unloved little potter's shed, covered in weeds and looking a little worse for wear. 

My dad wanted to knock it down, but after a little persuasion (and a very nice bottle of whisky) he said that we could keep it, but getting it into shape was my responsibility. 

It's taken some time (seeing as I'm usually in London) but my little project is finally coming together! 

My paparazza of a mother popped out to see how I was getting on... 

Here she is...

And here's a little before pic... 

She's not finished yet, there's still lots more to do. 

I'm going to whip up some curtains for the windows & of course it will have to have some thoroughly British bunting! 

When I'm done I'm going to wrap her in a huge pink bow & give her to my mummy as a reading room. 

I hope she'll like it! 

I've been using Pinterest (as usual) to find inspiration. 

source

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What do you think? 

Do you have any suggestions or ideas for my little hideaway? 

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Sunkissed Saturday

Yesterday, Dickie & I dragged ourselves out of bed (separate beds, cheeky) & spent breakfast, brunch & lunch in a sun soaked little pub garden in Putney. 

I'm having a little love affair with London at the moment. I just don't think there's anywhere prettier when the sun shines! 

Everyone's so much happier, there are British flags flying everywhere... it's just dreamy! 

You know what else is dreamy?
This...

Obligatory outfit informations:
Silk top from Anthropologie (pyjama section), shorts & sandals from H&M, bag by Prada.

Today we're off to Dickie's fancy pants country club so we can swim, slather ourselves in Hawaiian Tropic & listen to The Beach Boys all day.

What are you up to? 

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