Magpies Laundry

I went to Rome a couple of weekends ago, to celebrate a friend’s 40th …. the best part of four days of rambling the streets, stopping for coffee and long, long evening meals. It seems an age ago already … but I’m sure in part that’s due to the evil bug I picked up on the airplane that’s had me flat out on my back for the last week. Sigh. Such is the price of pleasure, I suppose.

Whilst we did tour the Vatican, and see most of the sights (lest you think me uncultured!), one of my highlights was a trip out to Borghetto Flaminio … a fleamarket on Piazza della Marina, just up from the Piazza del Popolo, on the Sunday.

You know how I like a fleamarket?

The sun was shining, it was busy, but not too noisy and overwhelming, and the treasure-to-tat ratio was pretty high. A lot of vintage and second-hand clothes, and a lot of other little delights ….

I was tempted by this Pucci plate … but it was expensive, and I didn’t want to be risking it in my baggage on the way home …. nor risk having to pay excess baggage!!

I think this is the *most* awesome telephone I have ever seen …. I still want it. But there was still that annoying baggage allowance thing.

Stunning orange oriental vanity set ….

 

 

 

 

A lot of beautiful inlaid boxes … I do love little boxes …. and knick-knacks and gewgaws. Somehow I think my minimalist intentions are doomed to fail from the very start – once a magpie, always a magpie?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, I love Indonesian shadow puppets as much as the next girl, but I wasn’t expecting to see any in a Roman fleamarket!

But I was … hoping …. for linen – and I found it. When it comes to old linen and lace, I have no self-control at all. None whatsoever. I know it’s a failing, and probably the sign of some kind of fatal character flaw, but there you have it.

That little dress was so beautiful …. and as for the crochet lace bedspread … big enough to smother a double bed? It took *every* *ounce* of willpower I had to haggle on that one, but I knocked the extremely very nice lady down from EUR85 to EUR45 and I’m calling *that* a BARGAIN.

 

 

 

 

The other thing I have a weakness for (OK, *one* of the other things I have a weakness for) is silk scarves. So imagine my delight when a good old rummage through a pile of the beauties yielded me this 4ft square of Valentino adorableness?

win, win and win again.

And the last great love of my life … big, impractical rings, the sort that make housework impossible ….. I’ll take two, thank you! The black one in the middle was a gift from my daughter, and two on the outside …. vintage fleamarket treasures from Rome.

Ahhhhh … I can still taste the espresso.