Well I hope you’re all having a lovely Bank Holiday weekend. Mine is rather quiet because Mr MC has gone over to Newcastle for a karate course (we’re well and truly back to normal) taking the 2 smalls to see their grandma. The 17 year old is packing in his restaurant shifts before he goes on rugby camp next week so it’s just me and the cats – thank goodness for them!

I thought I’d cover off the rest of the holiday while the sun’s out in the UK. You’ll be glad to know that things got better. If you remember, we had a villa with its own pool on the side of a mountain in the middle of nowhere. When we arrived I was worried that everyone was going to get a bit bored but, as you’ll know if you have them, boys are very much like bears – as long as they have good food, a comfy place to sleep and an opportunity for play they’re pretty much contented. Their days were very simple. When they eventually got out of bed, they spent a lot of the day on a mutually agreed ‘how many episodes of the Simpsons can we watch’ marathon. Every so often they would emerge blinking and scratching into the sunlight, jump into the pool and fight for a while and then go back inside to forage for food. Occasionally they were tempted by a game of Scrabble or a trip over the mountain to go out for dinner which gave me a chance to wear something other than a bikini as you can see:

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  •  Top: Mango
  • Drawstring loose trousers:  Zara – bought in Spain
  • Sandals: Zara
  • Bag: Zara

(The poem on the wall is a very apt homage to mothers everywhere).

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Mr MC and I even managed to co-ordinate!

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Anyway before we even left England, I knew that all this relaxing would drive me crazy so I’d made a cunning plan for an overnight stay in Granada so that we could fit in just a tiny bit of culture.

I’d booked us into a highly rated 17th century palace hotel in the old town. Of course I should have told the boys that it was highly rated for its authenticity rather than its luxury. Mr MC and I thought it was beautiful but it didn’t quite live up to their preconceptions of a palace. Here are some pics:

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We arrived late and went straight to a highly recommended flamenco restaurant. It was fabulous. We had seats right at the edge of the flamenco platform which meant we were only 3 feet away from the very virile gypsies who were performing – so close that our plates were regularly sprayed with gypsy sweat which I thought was great, the boys less so. We then had an absolutely brilliant evening wandering round the old town going from bar to bar. Now that they’re bigger we can do that sort of thing with them and it is especially entertaining as the eldest is starting to have his first few glasses of wine. We were having such a good time that we forgot to get a good shot of my White Company dress but here’s a hint:

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It has lovely white stitching on the shirred top, I’m not sure if you can tell.

Anyway, the next morning I had them up bright and early for The Alhambra. I won’t go on about how beautiful it is. Suffice to say that Granada is now in my top 5 favourite cities. If you haven’t been, you must put it high on your list.

Before we left the hotel:

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Dressed for high heat and comfort:

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Fortifying blood sugar levels with churros for breakfast

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Granada

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Me being a total tourist at the Alhambra

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So, a brilliant overnight break from all the relaxing then back to the pool, the food and the Simpsons (apart from another little foray that Mr MC and I took alone to the Picasso Museum which is based in the house where he was born in Malaga and gives you a really interesting backstory to his life and art).

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Dress bought at a market on the Ile de Re last year.

This is turning into a long post so I’ll finish off with some random pics from the rest of the holiday:

A visitor that was waiting for us in the pool one morning

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See how big it was!:

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Mr MC swotting up on ‘how to be a husband’ the day after he decided he didn’t need suncream any more and burnt himself all over (I bought this for him before we left, it’s a 21st century ‘man comedy’ by the way if you aren’t familiar with Tim Dowling – it was obviously good – he spent the whole time chuckling):

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In Competa

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  • Lana T-shirt: White Stuff
  • Bistro shorts: Boden
  • Sandals: Zara
  • Bag & Hat: Next

Competa’s Noche de Vino or ‘night of wine’. All sorts goes on: grape treading, flamenco, fandango, the wine is free all night and it was opened by the Spanish Eurovision Singer from 1979 – what more could you wish for on your last night!

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  • Wal-G Jumpsuit: TopShop
  • Necklace: Accessorize
  • Sandals: Zara

So, as you can see all was well that ended well. We had lots to celebrate with Spanish birthdays for the youngest two and a brilliant set of AS Level results for the eldest. Did I wear everything I packed? Yes apart from one Boden jersey dress, although many things I only wore once so I could have travelled lighter … but where’s the fun in that?

I have been approaching Autumn very studiously so the next post will be about colours as I’m hoping to work with a lot of the staples that I already have but simply update them with new accents. We’ll see how that goes! Enjoy the last week of August everyone.