The Vintage HouseKeeper.

A Potted History. 
There  I am , on the left. Alison Joanne May. Ali to her friends. Al to her Mum.
1976. The hottest Summer any of us remember. Showing my knees for the last time, because thereafter they are destined for a life in trousers…
I grew up near Liverpool, oldest daughter of Sue (Ludicrously, naturally glamorous) and George (Man with a moustache). Developed an irrational but amusing fear of snow and  did a horribly stressful and life-forming foundation year in art, before deciding that a girl who drew people without heads, hands or feet, probably wasn’t destined for the Tate Modern and gave it up to work in an office for a year. No really.  A life insurance office. And when the excitement of life insurance got too much for me I went to the local university (because I loved my Mommy too much to move away) and did a degree in communications and art, which involved a whole lot of  batting my eyelashes and sobbing on the shoulders of  my   poor  (gullible?) lecturers when yet again I’d failed to meet a deadline…
I met Mark when I was nineteen and by the time I was twenty five we lived in a huge flat, (a stones throw  away from the little house I live in now),  and ran a shop full of my hand-painted furniture and custom designed stencils, together. In the evenings I held interior design classes in our flat, and  taught myself to cook… anything as long as it included a tin of tuna and a paper bag full of nutty brown mushrooms. We watched Friends religiously, saved our pennies for the little cottage of our dreams and bought a cat, called, wait for it… Tuna.
By this time the extortionate rent on the shop had got the better of us and  I gave it up for five years of  interior design and ruining peoples walls with bad paint effects and too much terracotta colourwashing. We swapped the cat for a baby called Finley, (who  I dreamt into life in all his curly haired wonder) and I gave up work to stay at home and  re-invent myself in the image of the  perfect housewife….
And so, eleven months into my babbas life, in November 2004, BrocanteHome was born- the daily dalliances of a devoted Mommy, a house decorated with soul and a relationship slowly but surely, coming undone.
Thus began a document of domesticity and matters dear to my heart. The routines that sustained me, the diagnosis of  finley’s Celiac Disease, a scrapbook of poetry and books adored, thoughts on abundance, loneliness and contentment.   A life well lived. But a life Mark chose, in  2006, to leave for another woman.
And to me this is when BrocanteHome really found it’s voice.  When  I finally began to discover the authenticity I had long sought. When everyone of you held my hand as I fell apart and picked me up again when you could see that I was ready…

And so here I am, more than a year on. Happier, skinnier and less demented than ever before. The veteran of too many silly first dates, a house probably not as neat as it once was but beaming with all the joy of the mundane things I couldn’t live without, and a future glistening with dreams acheived and dreams  I haven’t  dreamt up yet..
*****
Things You Don’t Need To Know.
I write a lot of lists. I waffle. About myself. A lot.
And  I combine the two in lists of lots of things you don’t need to
know about me. But  will probably relate to regardless…
101 More Things You Don’t Need To Know About Me.
101 More Things About Me.
101 Things About Me
And just in case you feel the urge to bring a little joy to my door…
What Makes Me Happy.
One Hundred Tiny Pleasures.
*****
Best of The Best.
So with more than 1500 posts on BrocanteHome I
appreciate that finding the good stuff is getting a tad difficult. And
so to save your legs,  I hereby  offer a collection of the posts I
believe best define my personal philosophy, tell my story, demonstrate
a range of subject matter and chart the waters  of blogging a life I
adore, in all its messy glory.. 
Why Brocante?
The Gratitude Journal.
Dirty Opulent.
Just Do It.
Retribution.
The Proper Pleasures.
Layers of Life.
Frivolity and Glamour.
Shored Against My Ruin.
On Being A Daughter.
Making Memories For Finley.
On Not Being Accomplished.
The Lancashire Hotpot.
Your Weekly Routine.
The Bad Mother Weekend.
A Day In My Life.
Tears For Fears.
The One With The Fire and The Princess Dress.
A New Look For A New Life.
The Best of Times and  The  Worst of  Times.
Que Sera, Schmay Sera.
Story Of A Hotel Room.
Walk With Me.
The Tragic Heroine.
Moving On.
Vulnerability.
Snuggle Night.
One Year On.
Like A Pig In Muck.
*****
The Star of the  Show.

An angel and  a little monster. My raison d’etre. And the raison why I never get  a lie in and spend far too much of my time pretending to be  Kirsten Dunst, while he swings from the staircase in a  Spiderman suit.
*****
And The Rest of the Cast.

GanGan. Otherwise known as my Dad.

Na-Naaaaaaa. Otherwise known as my Mum.

And Helen. Otherwise known as my sister and best friend.
*****