It's Almost Like Shopping At Home.

Seasonal wardrobes, out of sight and out of mind.

It used to be so easy in South Africa. Clothes or rather winter clothes consisted of throwing a jersey or jacket over one's summer clothes. Okay, perhaps socks, spencers and stockings but that would be ample.

Don't get me wrong, there were cold spells had for the three months of true winter and some people went crazy with buying winter clothes. Clothes that one couldn't really wear without looking silly because the days usually flashed temperatures in the upper twenties. Of course the shops advertised winter clothes already before the end of summer, but honestly, a few added extras are enough to survive an African winter.

As you can guess, Bob and I were used to minimal wardrobe changes until we came here and faced our first true winter. In fact, I think that first one was one of the coldest and most prolifically snowed in one ever, almost making Bob turn tails....! Oh my, that was the winter we had to put a big wooden log under the front tyre to stop our chariot from sliding down the hill because, who knew that handbrakes gave up their ghost in freezing temperatures. Nothing like holding a handbrake in your hand!

We became adapt at dressing for the cold and kind of collected winter togs. Oh yes, the two of us are hoarders and often the garment needs to be falling to pieces before we get rid of it. Every end of autumn we go through our wardrobe and take out the summer stuff and fetch our winter stuff from our barn, where it gets housed in our suitcases. So far no problems. We each have about a suitcase full of seasonal clothes we store out of season.

Today I took a look at mine ( in fact this year we've used a big plastic container and left it in the bedroom ) and discovered a whole slew of newish clothes. Well, newish as I haven't seen or worn them since May. I tell you, it felt as if I had gone shopping and now I can't wait for it to get colder so that I can put them on.

Biggi