Hello and Miaow!

You may or may not know me as Amrick, chief Kitty of Kitty’s Emporium!

Kitty’s Emporium is a place of wonder and beauty, where you will find everything from vintage dresses to vintage greeting cards, 1960s fabrics to 1970s tea sets! We are very much like a department store – stocking almost everything you can think of, as long as it is vintage!

We pride ourselves on providing eco-friendly alternatives to fashion and homeware, and ALWAYS providing you with genuine vintage items and helpful historical information about every item for sale!

We have over 10 years experience of selling vintage items, not to mention a mere 29 year long obsession and passion for all things unique and beautiful!

I do hope to update this blog as often as I can, but sometimes I might find myself too busy to write anything interesting, so keep your eyes open for updates!

Until my next post, keep smiling!

Amrick

Hello to you, from me!

Charity eBay Auctions from Kittynation.com

Dresses, tops, homeware, greeting cards, jewellery, wall art + more!

Hello all.

My family have been given a “notice to quit” our current rented home. What this means, is simply – we have to move out and find somewhere new to live, even though we don’t want to.

People mistakenly assume this happens to people whom don’t pay their rent, or destroy the property – however, I can confirm that this can happen, with VERY short notice, to anyone who rents their home privately – even fantastic tenants, such as ourselves.

This is my daughter’s home – or what she believes to be her home. It’s close to our work places, her nursery and our family. However, due to rising rental prices in South Manchester we’re now stuck without a place to move into, as all rent on similar properties within a 5 mile radius is at least £150 a month more than what we’re currently paying.

This situation has come as a real blow to my family, we were happy and settled in our little home. It also means that I can no longer trade as Kittynation.com – my stock for the store will be homeless, as we will no longer be able to afford a home which is big enough to store it.

Therefore, due to having just over a month to find a new home, pack and vacate the property, I am now selling-off all my stock on eBay – with 50% of all proceeds going to several different charities.

There will be 10 different charities, with auctions going in “rounds”.

I’m currently raising money for The Christie (one of Europe’s largest cancer treatment centres) and Down’s Syndrome Association.

Please visit my auctions and pick-up a vintage bargain for a good cause.

(sadly) EVERYTHING MUST GO.

Amrick x

When taking a gander around vintage emporiums, there’s always a splendorous selection of treasures to behold. Stylish teak home accessories such as tri-leg tables, beautiful and tactile printed furnishings, fantastic gowns and day dresses, all of which hold such a magnificent history, it’s hard not to take a moment to imagine whom first held or wore your new vintage find. Was that 1960s floral Bone China tea set an unused wedding gift perhaps? A shimmering 1970s evening dress may have been worn for the first time at a serendipitous soirée, where the original owner met their husband-to-be. The water stains and cup rings on a 1950s coffee table are a permanent imprint of discussions-past; friends chattering about work and life, lovers heatedly quarreling until sunrise, mothers taking a mid-afternoon break.

There’s so much history to each and every vintage find; a deep and rich narrative that is slowly lost over time, leaving only our imagination to fill in the blanks.

However, even though a vintage treasure may sadly lose its social history over time, there is still a profound manufacturing history available for research and dissection. So many items produced pre-1980s were handmade, or produced in small runs on home turf rather than mass produced overseas. A plethora of materials came to prominence over the first seven decades of the 20^th century, some of which have continued to thrive, and whilst others have become antiquated symbols of gone-by eras.

 

Economically Viable Fashions and Mass-Production

The aforementioned teak wood styling of the 1950s-1970s has been exchanged in later decades for lighter, more economically and environmentally viable wood. Bakelite was the most utilized material for everything from coat buttons to telephones before the invention of cheaper plastic manufacturing processes. Despite its beautiful, sleek texture, durability and its ability to produce an oddly satisfying deep “clunk” sound, lighter weight, mass-produced plastics have usurped Bakelite, leaving items crafted in this material highly collectable and immediately “vintage”, visually.

 

Lucite, Acrylic or Polymethyl Methacrylate?

One of the most ubiquitous and celebrated scientific creations of the early 20^th century, in terms of plastic, was of course Lucite. Although Lucite is purely a brand name for what is technically called “Polymethyl methacrylate” (or PMMA for short), you can understand that a tag line such as “Beautiful Polymethyl Methacrylate Accessories for your Home” may have been a bit of a mouthful for the average consumer to pronounce.

 

A Brave New World of Plastics

Lucite artifacts as we now know them in a vintage sense, were for many decades incredibly desirable, and its ethereal, glossy translucence seemed entirely futuristic and almost out-of-this-world, for a nation to whom “plastic” was a radical and new creation. Bakelite was heavy, robust, masculine, not to mention mostly opaque, yet with the invention of Lucite (or basically, acrylic) a whole new world of choice opened up to those in the home ware design industry.

It must have been a very exciting time for designers of the plastic prevalence era, Lucite offered strength whilst remaining reasonably lightweight, infusions of color were easily added to create psychedelic hues, the plastic could be injected and molded in to almost any shape, and cutting and joining the material was a relatively simple task.

 

Encased Forevermore – Lucite Creations

In terms of clothing, accessory and home fashions, Lucite was used to create some astounding pieces; jewellery such as pendants, lamp bases and wall art were designed using an injection process that would allow for the inclusion of other items to be enclosed within the Lucite. There was a penchant for encapsulating and preserving expired marine life, such as seahorses, tiny crabs and shells within crystalline pendants. Beautiful and sturdy lamp bases would feature carefully arranged dried flowers deep inside the casing, providing a splendorous depth of field once the lamp was lit.

 

From Kitsch to Collectable

Lucite fell out of favor after the mid-1970s, and was perceived to be too kitsch a creation for the more fashionable-minded, making these fantastic trinkets the reserve of old ladies and junk shops – however, as the appreciation and understanding of what is considered beautiful is ultimately a cyclical philosophy, thankfully there is now a generation of Lucite lovers (more than likely born after its heyday), whom view vintage Lucite creations with the same awe and wonder as those lucky enough to have experienced it for the first time, all those decades ago.

For many gamers of the pre-seventh generation consoles, there is a certain nostalgia attached to the seemingly synthetic midi music that sound tracked the plethora of games that were produced in the era preceding such consoles. Of all the game genres that developed over that period, there is one which has advanced and flourished far beyond any other; the archetypal RPG.

Prelude

Although the RPG has always been a successful and prominent game genre, due to the basis of the game relying mostly on fantastical storylines and in-depth character portrayals, the RPG transformed in leaps and bounds when the gaming market saw the introduction of the 32-bit console. Graphics and visuals seemed to explode on to the screen with such vibrant colours and speed, and the audio capabilities of such consoles as the Sony Playstation allowed music to be streamed from the disc during gameplay, giving a richer, fuller music experience to accompany the game.

However, despite this advancement in audio, most game sound tracks were still limited to the use of midi scores, saving precious and meager disc space, to allow for the what-was-then, a sumptuous array of graphics, and the newly prevalent use of in-game FMVs.

This limited space for the musical scores, along with a distinct lack of dialogue audio (making the game easier to distribute worldwide, suitable for all language markets) would mean that the music that was produced for the most prominent and long-awaited RPGs would ultimately have to tell a story with nothing but the use of instruments.

The art of the instrumental was, during this period, mastered by very few. Every game did have it’s own individual musical score, however, arguably there are none in the game sound track industry quite as lauded and revered as Nobuo Uematsu.

The Flow of Life

Nobuo Uematsu, born in 1959 in the Kōchi Prefecture, Japan, had always been innately gifted in music. He taught himself to play piano proficiently by the time he was around 11 years of age, and although he was naturally talented, it wasn’t until 1985 when he finally decided upon a music-based career.

Uematsu joined the infamous RPG creators Square (now Square Enix) in 1986, where he most fortuitously met RPG master Hironobu Sakaguchi, whom promptly asked him to work on the soundtrack for a number of games titles. Unfortunately for both Uematsu and Sakaguchi, most of these games were less than successful (such as Genisis and Alpha), and just as Sakaguchi looked to end his career with Square, he decided to create one last title for the company – Final Fantasy.

The rich tapestry of storylines and characters that have been created for the Final Fantasy series of games since the seminal title was released in 1987, have never failed to capture the hearts and the imagination of those whom played them. The player is whirl-winded away to vast continents and worlds of differing terrains and spectacles, none of which had been seen in game play previously – especially in the West, and even more so when the legendary Final Fantasy VII was finally released.

Musically, the Final Fantasy games need to express and reflect all the whimsy and power withheld in the games graphics, in terms of alien landscapes, extraordinary characters and unbelievable monsters, and Nobuo Uematsu seemed to grasp this concept with both hands.

Sending a Dream into the Universe

His instrumental tracks were created in such a way that they could endlessly repeat, depending on the level or scene in the game, and he managed to score such intricate and luscious, not to mention, memorable melodies that players never once were bored by what they heard. In fact, so beautiful were many of his songs, that Final Fantasy fans from around the globe would actively seek out his scores and midi files to listen to once game-play had ended.

His now immortal arpeggio track “Prelude”, created for the title screen of the first Final Fantasy, has remained the musical centerpiece for many titles in the series that were to follow, with the heavenly and ethereal rise and fall of the melody providing an entrancing and unforgettable theme.

Despite the many Final Fantasy titles that have been developed whilst he worked for Square/Square Enix, Uematsu has prolifically produced a suitable ditty or instrumental masterpiece for even the most basic of in-game scenes. For all things Chocobo-related, he created a number of eccentric and capricious tracks that, although differ wildly from each other in actual style, all centre on the same Chocobo theme melody. The battle music from each Final Fantasy title created a sense of urgency and empowerment, with an end-of-battle fanfare that would fill players with achievement, pride and joy. Boss battles, such as the famed Sephiroth fight in Final Fantasy VII, were sound tracked by truly sinister scores such as “One Winged Angel” – the operatic vocals, deep timpani drums and haunting horns creating an awe-inspiring in-game experience. For other major battle tracks, players would aurally witness Uematsu put down the requisite virtual orchestral instruments for a harder, metal guitar sound, as heard in “Still More Fighting” featured again, on the Final Fantasy VII soundtrack.

His theme title tracks have always been a firm-favourite with Final Fantasy devotees; including amongst others, the medieval introduction “The Place I’ll Return To Someday” that opens Final Fantasy IX – this diversity in his musical output shows that there isn’t an instrument nor genre of music, no matter how obscure or perhaps, archaic, that he can’t master.

Memories Erased In The Storm

Fans of Uematsu have been so affected and moved by the scores he has produced over his career, some have chosen to incorporate his musical works into major personal events in their lives; from brides walking down the isle, mothers compiling their birthing CDs, funerals farewells and beyond – the Final Fantasy soundtrack fans make no qualms about embracing and encompassing Uematsu’s music into even the most intimate of occasions.

However, Uematsu’s scores are not just seen as trivial in-game ditties, loved by only game-playing fans; in 2007 there began a worldwide orchestral tour, performing some of his most-loved scores as part of the Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy concerts – received with the highest praise by classical music-lovers and fans alike.

Good Night Until Tomorrow

When Uematsu took on the task of scoring scene after scene of video games like Final Fantasy, he changed the way the industry looked at game soundtracks. He offered unnoticeable loops, and extravagant and moving melodies that actually affected the players perception of the game. Uematsu is one of the world’s most genius of musicians, whom many would argue should stand proudly aside historic greats such as Mozart and Beethoven in terms of prolific and innovate musical output – however, sadly there is only one seemingly insignificant detail that lies between Uematsu and his place in the musical halls of fame: the fact his music was created for video games.

Perhaps when both the music and creativity of video games is more generally accepted to be an art form in its own right, creative genii such as Uematsu will receive the mainstream recognition they deserve.

So, it’s been 7 months since I was photographed and interviewed for Rebecca Lupton‘s wondrous blog “The Mothers“.
Yunalesca was 17 months old at the time, and I am using this particular blog-event as a milestone, because I said:

“I am so looking forwards to Yuna being able to talk properly, it will be a world of wonder for both she and I … her first word was most definitely cat, or “Aaahht!” … She was about 10 months old, and … things have progressed slowly since that point, but I know her speech will blossom when she’s ready, and I’m so excited.”

However, 7 months on from that blog, I’m sad to say that nothing really has changed in relation to Yuna’s speech. In fact, Yuna doesn’t even say “Aaahht!” anymore.

It’s really rather hard trying to communicate with a toddler at the best of times, as I am sure most parents will agree – however, if your child seemingly has no real way of communicating their needs to you whatsoever, it can feel like you’re forevermore stuck in the newborn days – Yuna can definitely communicate that she’s unhappy, because she has a fine set of lungs that seem to be permanently stuck on full-throttle.
Yet, like a new mother confoundedly catering to her newborn’s needs, I am a walking collective of implements to ensure I appease my daughter’s needs.
Her screams are akin to that frustrated newborn – yelling furiously for milk, sleep or a nappy change. I have become attuned to Yuna’s routine to such an extent that I am always on-hand with either a drink, snack, book, nappy or dummy; however it’s frustrating for both her and I when I don’t quite provide for her needs immediately.

It’s very hard to explain to other parents that you meet in the park, or at play group, that your child doesn’t talk yet. They often comment that their child “didn’t talk until they were 3 years old”, yet in the same breath, mention that their child could point out their needs or make an understandable, substitute noise in replacement of “real” language.

That’s when I know I am suffering a completely different experience to most other parents. Yuna is 2 years and almost 2 months old, and she doesn’t point let alone talk. She doesn’t wave hello or goodbye. She seems to completely ignore passersby, receptionists or checkout ladies whom coo over her as we go about our daily tasks. Yuna… just doesn’t interact.

More often than not, my parents or father-in-law will pop around to see her, to which we (the adults) exclaim “Look Yuna, who’s here?” (taken from one of her favourite shows “In the Night Garden”), yet they’re met with a stony-faced reception.
This isn’t because she doesn’t know who these people are – my mum visits almost daily, my father 2-3 times a week and the same for my father-in-law. Yuna just doesn’t seem to … care that they’re here.

Our close family have come to understand Yuna’s particular “character traits” and duly amuse themselves with her apparent coy and aloof toddler attitude, however, her lack of reaction to the attention of strangers can become overwhelmingly disappointing, to both the stranger and ourselves.

We live very close to a Thai restaurant, and often the staff will sit outside the front in the daytime, accommodating the chairs and tables otherwise reserved for the patrons come evening. Last week we were talking Yuna for a toddle (or should I say, a sprint – Yuna can run faster than any child I’ve known of her age!) and as we passed by the restaurant, a beautiful, young Thai lady was soaking-up the sun, checking her mobile phone.

Yuna ran straight up to her, but not to interact, more to get to the window behind her so she could see herself in the reflection. She placed her little hands on the lady’s legs to get closer to her desired window-spot, not caring for a second about the lady in the way.

Of course the lady immediately tried to engage Yuna; blonde hair in bunches, dressed in little pink shorts with a ladybird pattern belt, a pastel rainbow striped vest with a glittery red heart in the centre and little velcro-fastening Mary Jane shoes adorned with plastic daisies on the toe.

“Oh hello cutie! Look at you!” the lady exclaimed to Yuna “How are you today?”
Yuna was understandably too enthralled with her own reflection at this point for anyone to grab her attention. However, we picked her up to continue to our destination, and the lady tried and failed to engage Yuna further; waving and laughing, cooing in both English and Thai, yet as usual, Yuna seemed utterly oblivious to the lady’s attempts to interact.

We laughed it off, as we usually do. “Oh, are you not saying goodbye?” the lady said, as she frowned dramatically and pretended to wipe sad tears from her eyes. We held Yuna’s arm and made her wave as she watched a bus passing by behind us.

If you’re reading this blog post, you must understand that it is becoming increasingly hard for me to discuss these problems with anyone. I’m constantly torn between two camps of thought:
1. Don’t rush her – all children develop at a different pace.
2. Don’t leave it too long before intervening if you believe she has a problem.

My parents and father-in-law are very much in camp number one; they’re clearly qualified parents themselves, however, even my mum is slowly coming around to the realisation that Yuna isn’t developing quite like all the other children we’ve known over the years (coming from an Irish Catholic family, you meet a lot of children!)

Yet, even talk of option number 2 seems to send our parents in to a frenzy of opposition.

We’re currently waiting for a letter from the NHS for Yuna to visit a child specialist unit, via referral from our GP. I’ve been under a barrage of comments from our parents, from an altogether different era, whom insist that having specialists “poke about” and “interfere” with Yuna can only be a bad thing.

“You’re going to get her labelled for life you know?!” they say to us in relation to her up-coming NHS appointment.

I feel as though I’m doing a disservice to my daughter by apparently worrying too much about her development. Even whilst writing this blog post, I feel as though I am, in some way, belittling and dishonoring the abilities of my amazing daughter in some way.

Almost like I am an unbeliever in my own genetic output.

“She’s clearly not stupid” one family member said to me.

“I have never questioned her intelligence – ” I retort “You can be a modern-day Einstein and still not have the ability to talk, you know?”

It’s hard for people to understand that personality, intelligence and the ability to communicate are such complex, often abstract concepts.

My father-in-law feels we should wait for Yuna to talk when she’s ready, and sees our response to her lack of speech as perhaps a little prematurely overreactive.

However, it’s not Yuna’s inability to talk that has driven us to intervention, it’s Yuna’s constant screaming in place of other forms of communication that is so hard to cope with.

She used to sleep so well, from 6pm until at least 6am, in her own cot, in her own bedroom.

However, since Christmas 2011 we’ve been woken at either 3, 4 or 5 am with a constant scream. Not a typical toddler-yell that can be sated with hugs or pure ignorance, but a scream that will continue literally on for hour upon hour if Yuna is not either taken to our bed to watch a DVD on the computer (a computer we had installed for this very reason) or taken downstairs to be entertained.

Perhaps this is pure toddler self-assertion -  Yuna’s testing the water to see exactly how far she can push her parents, however, this screaming is common-place in our everyday life ever since she was around 7 months old. Whether it’s breakfast and she’s unhappy about something (what, we never really know) or we’re out and about and she needs something, she breaks out this uproarious, uncontrollable din, to such an extent that passers-by will often feel the need to comment, or at the very least, stare judgmentally.

I’ll be frank – I often feel like telling them to “fuck off”. They look at me, desperately trying to contain my screaming, fitting toddler, with an expression that simply says “why are you letting her do that?”

I’ve been prone to “esprit d’escalier” many times throughout my life, none so much as these situations with Yuna in public. If all my efforts were not placed on trying to stop Yuna from hitting me and pulling my hair, I would probably blurt out “Do you think I want my daughter to do this, you fucking idiot?!” However, that would be just plain rude, much like their judgmental stares.

I feel I am usually quite coherent and to the point with my blogs, yet I really feel like I’m struggling with this one, so I’m sorry if what I’m typing seems to go off on a tangent.

I thought I’d do so well at clarifying my opinions and problems with this blog post, yet I’m beginning to flail.

I do truly believe that Yuna will talk at some point, and perhaps she’ll astound us all as we’re hoping, and wake up one morning talking complete sentences – boy, will I look like an overreactive idiot then, eh?
Maybe she’ll get the help she needs to talk and we’ll be hearing the wonderful and beautiful voice and ideas all hidden away in that little head of hers.

Whatever happens, I just want our family to live a happy life, and right now, I feel that we need some external support to achieve that.

Seth has been taken to one side at work due to his lack of attention, caused purely by sleep deprivation (Seth is the most hard-working, reliable person I know) – he’s taken holiday time off to help me with Yuna because she’s been so much of a handful. It can be said without much hesitation that Yuna is a two-carer toddler; on a bad day, it can be impossible to look after her on my own.

Right now, I feel like I’m in a quagmire of tiredness, guilt and confusion – I barely sleep, I feel guilty that perhaps I’m just not reacting to parenthood as I expected and pure confusion as to whether this is “just what it’s like” to be a parent.

I feel like I need to justify my love for my daughter, because I am being derogatory towards our experience of parenthood with this blog post – however, I of course love Yunalesca with every cell in my slowly deteriorating body; yet, I’ve helped to raise 10′s of children throughout my life, and none have been such a handful.

When I hear friends or relations are planning a second baby when their first (i.e. equivalent of Yuna) is only 1 year old, or 18 months old, all I can think is “If I were to have another child now, I would officially stop functioning”.

Again, that’s when I know, that our experience of parenthood, has to be different from those around us.

INFJs have uncanny insight into people and situations. They get “feelings” about things and intuitively understand them. As an extreme example, some INFJs report experiences of a psychic nature, such as getting strong feelings about there being a problem with a loved one, and discovering later that they were in a car accident. This is the sort of thing that other types may scorn and scoff at, and the INFJ themself does not really understand their intuition at a level which can be verbalized. Consequently, most INFJs are protective of their inner selves, sharing only what they choose to share when they choose to share it. They are deep, complex individuals, who are quite private and typically difficult to understand. INFJs hold back part of themselves, and can be secretive.

/// I awoke, with a startle, palpation-heart at 3:34 am. Red number lights of our alarm clocks being the first thing I recognised. The sweat covered me whole. I dragged myself sideways from the sofa-bed in the shed, hands searching-blind in the dark for the misplaced glass of water.

Slowly recovering, one hand firmly against my chest, I used the free hand to grasp the bedclothes wrapped around my significant other; “I may be having a heart-attack, just so you know”, as flippant a comment that could be made given the circumstances.

Sliding his way with speed towards me from his far side of the mattress, my partner felt my heart beating heavily through my chest, checked my head: prognosis, perhaps: bad dream.

After a minute or two, all was back to normal. As normal as we could envision after a possible pseudo-heart attack at 21 years of age.

I lay cold, sans covers, for what felt like hours. I felt the blood pumping though every vein and limb, like the universe was granting my body a second chance.

I eventually unwitting fell back to sleep, and awoke to a knock on said-shed door.

The grey, forlorn face of my father greeted me.

“Amrick, it’s bad. Grandad died last night.”

The words were soft and psychedelic, almost a hazy-hue of platitudes falling from my father’s mouth. I wasn’t sad, because I knew he had already died, intrinsically, innately.

A week passed by. Outside the funeral, the priest apprehended my self-penned private eulogy, meant for my grandad’s coffin and corporeal form, on the way in to the church.

“May I read, please?” He begged. I did submit. His eyes widened and closed, like a human camera, taking candid shots of my utmost emotions.

Minutes later, his eyes once again met with mine “Would you like to read this to your Grandad at his funeral?” The mere thought of doing such, smashed my faux-composed nerves (purely on behalf of my already fragile mother) to teary-shimmering smithereens upon the cold, concrete council pavement beneath my red-shoe feet.

“No, I’m sorry, I just… can’t.” I nervously adjusted my emblematic Kelly green cardigan and matching pig-tail bows.
“Perhaps you would allow for me to read it, instead?”

“Yes, OK.”

We wept, laughed, wept and sighed. We drank Guinness, raised glasses, laughed, sighed, wept some more.

Then two weeks later, as the world stopped spinning so fast, and we all tried to find our feet upon the still-cold ground, more details were revealed about my Grandfather’s passing.

My mum sat with me around her long, down-lit wooden dining table, drinking icy Baileys in special Baileys glasses, gifted to us from my previous-to-my-Grandad departed Nanna, wife to aforementioned Grandad.

“Well. Uncle Peter says it’s been confirmed as a heart-attack. It’s how your Nanna (whom died a slow, disgusting death via cancer) always wished she would go. He felt little pain, he was gone within seconds.”

I hacked-back a teary sob, keeping such composure I’m so well known for.

“His estimated time of death was about 3:30ish in the morning. We think he got up to get a drink of water, but never made it. Uncle Peter (with whom Grandad was living with, after living with us for a number of months after Nanna had died) found him perched frontwards over the edge of the bed, close to the side table.”

A frank surge of understanding hit me head-long, as I knew, intrinsically, at 3:30am that my grandfather had died of a heart-attack, because, I too, lived it vicariously with him, more than 25 miles away.

Today I had a visit from the lovely Rebecca Lupton, mama and photographer-extraordinaire!

In-between working as a professional photograher and being mum to little Winnie and baby-bump, Rebecca has been working hard on a fantastic blog-project called “The Mothers”. Rebecca travels around the North West, mainly Manchester, and takes photographs of mums with their children. She capitalises on basing the photographs in the native surroundings of the family home, giving a real insight in to what it’s like to be a mum. She also adds depth to the beautiful photography with a number of interview-style questions for “The Mothers” to answer.

Below is a short excerpt from our interview. Be sure to click the link to Rebecca’s blog to read more

” Amrick and Yuna

 Name: Amrick

Child: Yunalesca, aged 17 months

Location: Manchester

Expectations of Motherhood: Wow! My expectations of motherhood were vast and crazy, I simply couldn’t wait to have my baby. I was diagnosed with quite severe PCOS (Polycystic Ovary Syndrome) when I was just 18. I’d had irregular periods for about 2 years, I’d also gained a lot of weight in a very short space of time with no changes to my diet or daily activities, and my skin was terrible; I had the worst acne. It took 2 long years of diagnosis, until I was finally told I had PCOS. I was basically told that my chances of ever becoming pregnant were slim, and advised of the miscarriage rate of women with PCOS (which is relatively high in comparison to “normal” women). So, from being 18 years old, I always believed that having a baby of my own wouldn’t be an option for me…”

Visit “The Mothers” Blog.

This is well overdue, but here’s the mix I did for the Leeds’ based music website A Negative Narrative.

A HAND-PICKED, KITTY-LICKED HALF-HOUR OF CARTOONIFIED DELIGHT

Ahoy, aloha and apologies – it’s been a while since we added to our Negative_Equity_ mix series. This time we’ve leant on our friend Amrick who runs an online vintage store. Every once in a while she cherry-picks the finest morsels of music to provide her customers at Kitty Nation with a  musical gift to accompany every order – a Kitty Licks CD. She therefore seemed overly qualified to cheer our sad ears and clean-up our looted brains with a mix.

By: Kitty Licks

Prelude – Nobuo Uematsu & Risa Ohki
Spock Thoughts – Leonard Nimoy
Geeks In Love – Lemon Demon
EXCERPT – Enid & Rebecca (From: Ghost World)
Venus & Mars – Wings
Kiss Me Son Of God – They Might Be Giants
EXCERPT – Our Pets’ Heads Are Falling Off (From: Dumb & Dumber)
Raspberry Beret – Dump
EXCERPT – Opening Sequence (From The Game: UmJammer Lammy)
If Mama Had Four Hands – Sarah Lee Guthrie & Family
A Bushel & A Peck – Perry Como & Betty Hutton
A Smile & A Ribbon – Patience & Prudence
EXCERPT – Billy Liar
Heal – Michiru Ōshima
Hammond Song – The Roches
Sunday Part II – Cibo Matto
EXCERPT – Casper
Goodbye Sadness (Tristeza) – Astrud Gilberto

Good evening!

I sated my lamp obsession today with a little addition from my childhood : the lava lamp. Please don’t be confused by my childhood admission, I wasn’t born in the 1960′s, rather, the 1980′s.  However, as a teen in the early 1990′s, there was a short-lived and oddly genre-scattered resurgence of 1960′s paraphernalia and culture. Grunge, shoe-gaze and the baggy-sound took some influence from drug culture and psychedelia of the sixties. Pop-music (see Deee-lite and Betty Boo) and teenboppers were tinged in retrospective black and white couture of Mary Quant, and huge, horrid bright florals, bastardising the beauty of the sixties flower power prints, in to a nauseous-swirling reproduction.

Many of my friends and I had blow-up chairs and back-packs. Tie-dye t-shirts, fibre-optic lights and… lava lamps.

I loved my lava lamp so much as a teenager. I had decorated my room a rather foreboding, but what I felt was ultimately cool, shade of lipstick red. In the corner of my teenage den hung a poster of Jarvis Cocker, giving the “V” and the Manic Street Preachers, camo’d-up, avec-Richie. Underneath on a 1980′s Habitat TV trolley was my stereo stack-system (the first Sony system with a CD player, I had cunningly acquired from my parents), a framed-photo of my beloved cat, Ben, and my lava lamp.

I would gaze at it for hours whilst my vinyl of choice played on repeat, lying on my bed, perhaps writing some juvenile wistful whimsy in my diary. Boy, I loved my bedroom as a teenager. It was MINE. My place, my own little stamp on the giant world I was slowly realising I was really a part of.

I’ve been utterly obsessed with lamps from an early age, and perhaps this was an influence of my parents. They too have spotted lamps across the household landscape. Lighting up those dim and dull corners and recesses, which would otherwise be ignored in a room.

Since having Yunalesca, my imagination has been piqued to some degree, in decorating her everyday vision of home with odd and novel, and not to forget, exciting, artefacts. This is how I was raised myself, my parents’ house had a pretty piece of porcelain or strange curio in every corner, and it has only effected my aesthetic principles in a positive way.

So, it’s been on my mind to purchase a lava lamp for some time, if not for selfish reasons, to educate Yunalesca in the wonders of decorative lighting!

I was on a short shopping jaunt today, actually to return some wild and bright winter socks I bought for Yunalesca in the wrong size. However on my trip I wandered in to a chain of shops which I admire and love, yet will not name because, I’m not like that. But they always sell awesome stuff, that’s all I’ll say. I wandered through the lighting department, as I tend to do, and spotted before me the most beautiful lava lamp (or Lava Lite, as it were) for just £15, in traditional, truly psychedelic yellow lava, purple liquid colouring. It was only £15 and I knew it was meant to be.

My new Lava Lite and I were immediately united via the checkout and it now sits proudly in my living room, for all, including Yunalesca, to admire and be astonished by.

Through a little research I found that Lava Lite was the original, US trade-name for what is known in the UK as the Lava Lamp or, as it was originally known, the Astro lamp. It was invented by an Englishman (although born in Singapore) called Edward Craven-Walker, whom then went on to sell his US sales rights to a German fellow, whom then went on to proliferate the magnifience of the lava lamp in the US of A.

A beautiful, and still to this 29-year-old, amazing piece of simple-science, presented in your home, for your viewing pleasure.

OK, long story short (and more to follow)… My mum recently had a small clear-out of her loft, she probably only managed to excavate about 8% of my junk, however, she found a lot of my school reports and work from primary school and the start of high school.

Thought I’d just share these poems I wrote about celebrities of my choice. They are from about 1994, so I was just 11 years old. They gave me a real “laugh out loud” experience, because I was only a child, and it’s a bit of a surprise to me I could forumulate opinions such as these at that age. Enjoy!

PS. Please ignore my atrocious spelling!

“BOY GEORGE: He is a stereo, on full blast. He is a dog, sharp, yet shy. He is pink. He is lively at night. He is pink Champagne, sparkling and bubbly. He is a bowl of Chilli Con Carne. He is a beret hat, he is a Blue Tit.”

“CILLA BLACK : She is a radio, loud and lively. A Platypus. She is green and bright. She is outgoing, she is night time. She is sparkling white wine. She is a carrot, she is a parrot.”

“JOHN WAYNE : He is a plug socket, full of energy. He is a bird of prey. He is fiery red. He is early morning. He is a double Scotch on the rocks. He is a hot piece of toast. He is a Stetson, he is an eagle.”

“JOHN MAJOR : He is a hoover, boring and life-sucking. He is a tortoise, slow and heavy. He is grey and dull. He is midnight; boring. He is a cold cup of tea. A sausage. He is a top hat. He is a pigeon.”

We just had a momentous trip to Blackpool. Read about our previous visits here.

Until I get time to write an account of our most recent visit, have some photos of the Blackpool Model Village!