Guest Post from Kirsty at A Safe Mooring

Today I've got a guest post from one of my favourite Edinburgh based bloggers: Kirsty from A Safe Mooring.  Kirsty's blog never fails to make me giggle and stop and think at the same time.

Take it away, Kirsty:

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So, you want me to write about my favourite things, eh? For Red Boots? Hmm, this could be tricky. What to write about? My favourite things. For Red Boots. Favourite things... Red Boots... OH MY GOD I'VE GOT IT! I'll write about my FAVOURITE RED BOOTS!

Oh, wait. I don't have any red boots any more. My two pairs (yes, two) disappeared in The Great Decluttering of 2011. Curses. Okay, let's talk about my favourite boots in general, then. Lord knows I still have plenty of those.

I've always been fond of a good pair of boots. No fiddly laces to worry about, for a start. And as for welly boots, well. Does it get any better? Boots that you can wear to squelch through rich, sucking, wonderful mud? Boots that you can wear at the edge of sea, as tiny waves come rushing forth to nibble on your toes before scurrying back to their briny home? Boots that you can wear to - SPLOSH! - jump in a puddle??

And if I thought welly boots were good, you can imagine how I felt about SKI boots. They're like magic boots you can whizz around on! Although my excitement was dampened a bit after I first experienced what I have come to think of as the Ski Boot Cycle. This starts in the morning, when you reluctantly take your feet out of your nice, soft shoes and force them into these unyielding plastic contraptions. You fasten the four hundred clips, take a few tentative steps around, think hey, maybe this isn't so bad after all. This is Denial, which lasts until approximately 11am, when you begin to feel like your legs have been clamped into a vice that is being slowly, excrutiatingly tightened. Gradually, you start to lose sensation in your feet - first your toes, then your soles, then oh my God I think my feet have fallen off. Then at last comes the moment you have been dreaming of all day, the moment when finally, with an almighty heave, your feet are liberated from their plastic prison and the blood begins to pump joyfully through your toes again. The relief is glorious. Until the cycle starts all over again the next day...

Actually, on second thoughts, maybe ski boots aren't so good after all.

Once I realised that there was more to life than skiing and puddles, I quickly became interested in boots of a different kind. That's right my friends, I'm talking PARTY BOOTS. In this picture, my friend and I were going to a 60s disco (naturally) and we thought we looked pretty darn fabulous. Nothing says stylish and sophisticated like giant, clumpy, platform knee-high boots, right? Erm, wrong. But at the time, oh how I loved those boots.

My current favourite party boots are, I like to think, a touch more glamorous, if considerably more difficult to walk in. But when did comfort ever count for anything? (See: everything I said about ski boots.)

photo by Lauren McGlynn Photography

The sparkly boots aren't my favourite, though. They're not even my second favourite. That questionable honour goes to a pair of tan leather ankle boots that used to belong to my mum, until I *ahem* liberated them from her wardrobe. She bought them from Russell & Bromley back when they first opened on Princes Street in the 70s. At the time, it was a huge extravagance, but these boots have more than stood the test of time. The leather has worn beautifully, shiny in some places and buttery soft in others. The chunky wooden heel - that's proper wood, not the plastic-made-to-look-like-wood we're sold nowadays - is solid and steady as a rock. These boots are a lesson in the art of buying well. How many pairs of shoes in your wardrobe will last for four decades? How many will your daughter be running around town in, years from now? Not many in mine. In fact, these old leather boots will probably outlast them all.

So if the sparkly boots are my third favourite, and the Russell & Bromleys are my second favourite, what, I hear you cry, are my number ones? My Uggs? My Moon Boots? Some sky-high Louboutin concoction?

Well, no.

My favourite boots are, once again, my wellies.

Not because of my ability to run through puddles in them (although I still get a childish delight out of that), not because of the polka dots (I don't even really like them that much), but because when I pull my wellies on, it means I'm going for a walk with my husband and my dog. Spending time with the person that I love, doing something that makes us happy. And that, when you get right down to it, is my favourite thing.

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Thanks so much Kirsty!  And be sure to check out A Safe Mooring!

xx