dead holdall

My trusty Primark holdall has finally given up the ghost; overworked like a pack horse its handle snapped off a couple of days ago, leaving me with no other option than to use an extremely annoying mini-wheelie-crappy suitcase to get my stuff down to London for the week.

My old bag was nothing special, I didn't even like it very much when I first bought it. It was one of those fabric tartan pattern slouchy bags from Primark. However, I grew to love its little quirks, such as a tear in the lining which swallowed all my money, and an outside pocket with no zipper, and the inevitable huge tears in the fabric after some lonnnng years of being chucked onto coaches and trains and kicked around the tube. 

This means I have to find a new bag, but it's so hard to find one that would match most outfits and be of the optimum week's worth of clothes and make up size.

A few possibilities:

[American Apparel Nylon Gym Bag]

[Head St Moritz Lavender]

[Head 1989 @ ASOS]

[Head 1989 Monte Carlo @ ASOS]

The Head bags are calling out to me, especially the peach option. Although that might look faintly ridiculous come winter. And I am thinking of winter, even though summer has only just started, because winter is going to be ACE if all the new collections seeping through on blogs are to be believed. So maybe it will have to be the American Apparel practical option. But would nylon rip easily? And the peach bag is called the Monte Carlo, which conjures up images of a tanned young lady playing tennis before crossing the hotel lobby as Brett and Danny arrive to check in. I also used to have a white version of this bag for when I went ice skating. Yes, I did reach Grade 10, and I have the sew on badges to prove it.

I hate having to make decisions on items I actually need, it adds a horrible element of pressure to shopping.

Miu miu cats and make up bags

I was just going to do a little post about how much I love the Miu Miu cat print, and how much I want this bag to put my nicest make up in:

And of course, then I was going to moan about how I couldn't possibly afford it, and if I bought an expensive designer clutch I would never actually use it as a make up bag. But then I read this post on the excellent Imwashingmyhair where they talk about the miu miu cats and then suggest a brilliant alternative cat-print by Paul & Joe. Love it!

Even better they have discovered that you can get nail files in this amazing print! And there is a mint green one! Yet more things for me to covet.

The print reminds me of those incredibly naff birthday cards you could get for about 20p off the market in Leicester, which always featured a sickeningly cute cat with impossibly large eyes and some glittery flowers. My great-grandad would always buy me one like that for my birthday, and give me 2p to get a chocolate bar with. He never believed in all that inflation nonsense. The cats also remind me of an updated version of the Tom Kitten character by Beatrix Potter. Ahh I love cats. Even the colour palette of the print is kind of similar to the Ladybird book covers:

I came across imwashingmyhair while I was, ahem, researching Lisa Eldridge rather intensely. It's a brilliant blog full of beauty news and reviews and they do it much better than me with much better pictures.