February Favourites

Hi there everyone! It’s time for my February Favourites! Woo!

Isn’t it crazy that February is over with, time goes so very quickly when you are having fun. Without further ado let’s jump right in!

Website

My website of the month is the incredibly humbling www.52-lives.org. The aim of the website is to help somebody once a week for a year. You can nominate somebody to get picked for the week and the site then appeal for volunteers to help out. It is so very heart-warming and the kind of idea that I love.

Music

As always it is hard to pick a favourite song of the month but I have listened to this new track by Sam Smith non-stop since I first heard it so I think it deserves a mention:

Another favourite of mine is Dance with Me by LE YOUTH which includes a brilliant sample of No Scrubs by TLC

Book

I have finally got round to reading this book, it’s always so hard to read my own stuff when I’m swatting up on all my nineteenth century literature but I managed to grab a weekend and devoured this book. The twists and turns are brilliant and you change sides throughout. A must read.

Food/Drink
I may have mentioned before but I don’t really like hot drink. I HATE COFFEE. Tea is ok and I only really like Hot Chocolate if whipped cream is involved. BUT I have found my drink! We went to Leigh’s parents over the weekend and his mother didn't like this so I gave it a try and I love it. Chai Tea Latte! All the froth without the coffee. It’s spiced yumminess that perhaps is better in the winter months but I might just drink it all year round.

Fashion

I've made a few fashion purchases this month (when don’t I?) but not enough for a haul so instead they are being dropped in here, because I just love clothes.

Dorothy Perkins - Blue Chevron Pencil Dress - £22

Dorothy Perkins - Pale blue textured dress - £19

New Look - Grey Kimono - £17.99

Film

EVERYTHING IS AWESOME! If you don’t know what I am talking about then you haven’t seen The Lego Movie, and if you haven’t seen The Lego Movie you are wasting vital time by not going to see it. Leigh wanted to go and I went along to keep him company but I thought it was hilarious and laughed more than the children in the cinema. Surprisingly the cinema consisted of about 30% kids and 70% adults!

We might have also bought The Lego Movie game to play, because EVERYTHING IS AWESOME!

Random

My random favourite of the month are these 2 cookbooks which I bought from Amazon. It does say for students, but in my mind that just means cheap good food. There’s tons of recipes including one  for cheese and ham puff bites and another delicious sounding one for Coconut and Lime Icecream.  I got the Vegetarian one and the Standard as I’m always on the look out for new recipes.

I hope you have enjoyed my February Favourites, let me know what your favourites are this month in the comments below.

The light is hanging around in the evening and it’s starting to get a bit warmer so dare I say it spring is on its way!

xxx

Chicken Soup - Recipe

If you are a regular follower then you will know that I am a fan of broths instead of thick soup. With that in mind with lots of cold and sniffles going around what better than a little chicken broth to make you feel tip top. It's so simple to make and tastes lush.

Ingredients

2 onions, peeled and sliced  
2 sticks celery, finely chopped
2 carrots, peeled and finely diced
25g plain flour
55g butter
1.2 litres chicken stock
1tsp of ginger
500g cooked chicken, skinned and shredded
1 tbsp freshly chopped spinach
salt and freshly ground black pepper

  

Method to the madness

  

Melt the butter in a large saucepan over a medium heat and gently fry the onions, celery and carrots until they start to soften.

 

Stir in the flour and cook for 2 minutes. Add the chicken stock and bring the mixture to the boil, stirring as you do so. Season, to taste, with salt and freshly ground black pepper, then reduce the heat until the mixture is simmering and simmer for 10 minutes, until the vegetables are tender.

 Add the cooked chicken and cook until heated through. Season, to taste, with salt and freshly ground black pepper. 

Stir in the parsley and serve.

 xxx

Ikea Haul

Quite possibly one of my favourite  places in the whole world has to be IKEA. I get a little bit too excited when I see that blue and yellow sign and as a result I try and limit my trips because I don't think my inner child could handle the excitement.

However my friend had a car and has just moved house so a trip to THE BEST PLACE ON EARTH was on the cards. I took Leigh along so he could keep an eye on my spending and off we went.

I didn't pick up any furniture, although I had my eye on a £25 frame (somebody wouldn't let me get it...). I did manage to get a few little bits and pieces though.

First up this gorgeous little plant pot which now has pride of place on my dining room table. I also got the flowers separately, they are real and are actually cheaper than some of the fake ones. I just have to remember to water them!

 Pot - £4 Flowers - £2.50

I also picked up a new throw which I am using as a tablecloth in all these pictures because it's such a lovely colour and I wanted to show it off. I do love grey!

 Throw - £5.50

I also love to keep things in jars so I picked up a couple of large-ish jars so I can keep my pasta and cereal in. They just look so ascetically pleasing sitting around my kitchen and much nicer than bags and boxes.

Jars - £2 each

Going along the same theme I also picked up this Carafe which I am going to use as a vase on the off chance a certain someone buys flowers for me....

I also got this clear glass bottle with a stopper lid for when I make home made lemonade in the summer. This will probably never happen but I just liked the look of it too much to put it back.

Bottle - £2.50 Carafe - £1.50 

Because I do a lot of cooking and recipe blogs I like to display my ingredients. For this I picked up 4 small glass bowls, which actually also serve quite well as dessert bowls. I picked up some white dishes too - a plate and a couple of bowls - as I find the presentation of food when I'm taking pictures for the blog looks better on white.

Glass bowls - 70p each  Plate - 80p  Deep bowls - £2

I also picked up a set of 2 new white mixing bowls as we were using our old ones to catch the rain when our ceiling collapsed in so I thought this was an excuse to buy new ones!

 

Set of 2 mixing bowls - £3.50

I already have this pot in white but when I saw they now did it in pink AND sea-foam green I had to pick them up. No idea what I'm going to use them for but I'm sure I can think of some surface they can clutter up.

 Pot - £2.00 each

We picked up some tealights as standard, vanilla is one of my favourite smells and I do seem to get through these so quickly.

 Tealights - £1.50

Last but not least, the one big item we got which required man power on Leigh's side was a coat stand. We have been meaning to get on for the last 3 years but have never got round to it but I'd had enough of finding coats everywhere so now they are neatly hung instead!

Coat stand - £25

There was so much more that I wanted to pick up but I wasn't allowed to. I will have to box away my inner child until next time it seems!

xxx

Just for you

Brighton Fun

If you are a reader of Miss Mint then you will have seen my Wanderlust post about mine and Leigh's day trip to Brighton.

However I took so many lovely pictures that I needed to share them all with you so there's going to be a bit of an overlap on posts but I hope you don't mind!

The day started bright and we headed down to Brighton, nearly missing our train as per usual. It doesn't matter how much time I leave we always have to rush for the train!

 

We like to share.....

Once in Brighton we went for breakfast at Bill's. I booked ahead and I'm glad I did because it was heaving by the time we left. We spent ages looking at all the jams and chutneys but in the end we decided to go for a Mango Chutney and it is delicious. When I get paid I'm definitely going to buy all of their stock!

After breakfast we went down to the pier managing to get caught in this crazy wind, rain, hail combo so we stayed in the arcade until it stopped and then went to the end of the pier to take some pictures of the choppy sea and sun dappled sky.

 

 

Next up we went and got some chips and had a walk along the beach in the sun before it started hailing again.

We ran up to the station to get the train to Stamner House where we had booked Afternoon Tea. The place was gorgeous and we pigged out on quite a bit of food which given how much we had already eaten was quite a challenge.

After tea we headed back to London! 

This is definitely the shorter version of the day trip if you want to read the full blown account then head over here and give some of my other blog posts a read too. 

Happy Valentines kids! 

Cara x