From Russia with Love

Mr Zissou and I weren't planning on doing gifts this Valentine's Day but when I saw this little figurine of a couple riding on a wolf, at a car-boot sale, I thought it would make a sweet present:

Valentine's Day gift: Russian Gzhel porcelain figurine

I did a bit of research about it online and found this very helpful post which explains that the figurine is an example of traditional blue and white Russian porcelain called Gzhel.

Gzhel porcelain figurine and framed Genevieve Gauckler coaster

Gzhel pottey was often inspired by Russian folk tales and this one depicts the story of Prince Ivan and the Grey Wolf. The magical story is about Ivan's quest for the Firebird who stole a golden apple from the king. The wolf is at the center of the story as initially it eats Ivan's horse, but becomes a good-guy by shape-shifting and helping him perform a number of tasks, and later bringing Ivan's sliced-up body back to life so he can rescue Helen the Beautiful and live happily ever after with her.

This was Valentine's breakfast in bed:

I  got this idea for "fried eggs" made from white chocolate, pretzels and M&Ms on Pinterest. I have way more DIY projects on there than I'll ever be able to do so I thought I'd start by making these for Valentine's Day because Mr Zissou is crazy about breakfast and particularly eggs, because deep down he believes they give him special powers. 

If you're interested in making these my top tip is not to be tempted to melt chocolate in the microwave (I would never try cut corners like that!) as it just heats unevenly and burns; rather double-boil it. Once the chocolate is melted put dollops of it onto baking paper and squash in the M&Ms and pretzels. If you go to the M&M shop you can buy just yellow ones. Pretzels are strangely unpopular in the UK so I couldn't find the straight sticks and had to make do with curly sausages. I also tried Milkybar Giant Buttons for the eggs but they weren't big enough. 

We cooked a little dinner at home and I wore this dress I got in the Fever London sale.

Dress: Fever London
Shoes: Rage
Alice band: Sunshine and Carousels

Since I love theme dressing I teamed this very red dress with a few heart-accessories and matching lipstick.

The polar bear brooch is by Trinket at Neighbourgoods Market in South Africa.

Brooch: Trinket
Earrings: Primark (?)
Dress: Fever

This dress is great for swooshing around in. 

I suppose that because we made quite an effort for Valentine's Day last year we were reluctant to do anything very commerical this year. Even though my view of Valentine's Day varies between cynical and soppy each year, the thing that remains is my love for dressing up a bit. You may notice that in last year's post I was only showing a glimpse of my outfit. It was before I made the scary decision to appear in photos on this blog, so I hope you enjoy the outfit posts that have come since then. 

Happy Valentine's Day everyone. Do svidaniya!