Thoughtful Thursday

Reading ~ Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

Loving ~ Cuddles with the cat whilst I read 

Wearing ~ Comfy leggings and fluffy socks

Anticipating ~ My course being finished, my exams over, and the 4 month break before the next one starts! 

Eating ~ Sundried tomato and feta pasta

Drinking~ Relentless energy drink

Wishing for ~ More money so I can buy the £200 worth of clothes I currently have in my shopping basket on Dorothy Perkins website

Craving ~ Dolly mixture

Listening to ~ From Eden by Hozier

Wondering~ If now is the best time to start redesigning my blog

Watching ~ Nothing. Although I really just want to catch up on The Vampire Diaries

Learning~ that I really should have started revising weeks ago....

Cooking ~ Homemade lemon cake

Searching ~ for the Sims 4 release date

Planning ~ If I can get away with going to the pub this weekend

Choosing~ the best way to procrastinate

Trying ~ very hard not to procrastinate

xxx

May Favourites

It's May Favourites time! I've been a bit busy with revising but here are some of the things that I've been loving this month... 

Music
There's a couple of singles and an album on my favourites list this month - 

Firstly Sleepless by Cazette

Secondly Goddess by Banks

And the album of the month is Flume - Deluxe remix. This is an album from 2013 but I have only just got round to giving it a proper listen and it's really good, especially some of the remixes.

Books

No new books for me this month unless you count the ones I have been reading for my course. If you fancy reading any nineteenth century literature I recommend The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. This has been by far the best book on the course. It's a story of love, marriage, betrayal and mystery told through lots of different points of view. There's plot twists and old school romance and it's just a really fun, easy to read nineteenth century novel.

Food/Drink

I have a new found love of croissants which although regrettably aren't the most healthy thing to eat but they just taste so darn good. 

Last month I discovered croissants in a can and I blogged about them here, so if you haven't already try and make some!

Home

After saying for ages that I needed cake tins I have finally got round to getting some and I was also gifted three, so now I can make as many cakes as I want and find a home for them all. 

The rose tins I found on Amazon for £5.99 and the set of three are £6.50 from Wilkinsons.

I was given some lovely ceramic mixing bowls as a present and they just look so pretty in my kitchen. I am loving open shelving at the moment and just wish I could redo my kitchen! Look at their beautiful pastel colour. I managed to hunt down their location so if you want to get these bowls you need to head on over to Sainsburys.

 Fashion

A couple of fashion pieces for you! I wish I had more money this month because there are some lovely summer pieces out at the moment that I am dying to get for my holiday but here are some I have purchased already.

Starting with this lovely swimsuit! I am just in love with floral so this is perfect!

Swimsuit - Next - £28

I love this midi skirt, as mentioned I am loving floral  and the best thing about this skirt - it has pockets!

Skirt - Dorothy Perkins - £22

Beauty

I recently went make up shopping for the first time ever with a good friend and a separate blog post will be coming about all of the things I bought but I thought I should mention my favourite item out of the whole trip which has to be my eyebrow mascara. Yes, you heard me right - eyebrow mascara. It helps keeps the eyebrows neat and darkens them slightly. It is also a hell of a lot easier than sitting there trying to fill in the brow line with a pencil or eyeshadow. This one is from Maybelline in the colour Dark Brown. Honestly this has been a revelation!

I feel like my favourites are a bit sparse this month but I will be on my 'summer holiday' and on a little break from Uni in June so I will have time to find and do more things that I'm sure I will love. Anyway I hope you enjoyed reading this post, let me know what you love this month! 

xxx

Pink Raspberry Cake - Recipe

Ingredients 

200g butter, softened 
200g caster sugar
3 free range eggs
1/2 tsp pink food colouring

250g self-raising flour
1tsp lemon juice
100g raspberries

  

Method to the Madness 

Preheat the oven to 180C /350F / Gas 4. Grease a cake tin. 

Mix together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Add the eggs one at a time and beat before folding in the flour. Next add a little bit of food colouring at a time until you get a lovely pink colour. 

Drop in the raspberries and pour in the lemon juice stirring in before pouring the mixture into the tin. Well trying a bit first and then pouring in....

Pop in the oven for 45 minutes or so until it is lovely and brown. Once the cake is cooked place on a wire rack to cool. 

I cheated a little bit with the topping as I was in a rush to head out to the park and dish up the cake to my friends so I added some food colouring to Betty Croker's cream cheese icing and spread on to the cake adding some more raspberries for decoration.

All of my friends loved it! 

xxx 

 

Going where the sun keeps shining

We have finally got round to booking our holiday for the summer. The school prefers it if I take my holiday when the kids aren't in school but the bad thing is that we can only go when it is super expensive and super busy. 

We spent most of a Sunday trying to find the best deal possible, but with no real idea of where we wanted to go it was a bit tricky. Santorini came up quite a few times, as did the south of France but looking for a cheap but nice flight and hotel in July when we only left 8 weeks to book was very frustrating and not particularly easy.

In the end we decided to go to my Grandparents villa in Portugal because the flights were quite reasonable as we managed to book in a sale and the accommodation will be lovely and most of all free! 

I used to live in Portugal so going back after a few years away will be so much fun. We are going with my brother and his girlfriend, and my parents will also be out there so (minus another brother who is in Australia) it will be my first family holiday in a very long time. When I was a teenager I couldn't stand going on holiday with my family as it wasn't 'cool' but now I'm older I love spending time with them! 

We are also hiring a car so we will be able to get out and see a lot more than we would have done otherwise, especially as my grandparents live at the top of a mountain. There are incredible views though!

I'm really excited about packing a bag and flying away for 10 days, I feel like I need a break after Uni and work!

xxx

Keeping up

I feel like I haven't blogged in ages! I have been so darned busy with work and University that I just haven't had the time!

Work has just been mad. I am enjoying it so much but the time just fly by and I am trying to keep on top of all the work. I have never been in a job before where I get in to work, look up and realise that it's lunch time and the morning has flown by. It's really refreshing to be somewhere that I'm not bored 80% of the time and that keeps challenging me. There are so many different events taking place as well as the weekly tours around the school that I have to do for people. This weekend I worked Saturday as we had an Open Day and I spent the whole day rushing around making sure it all went smoothly. We've also had a Fashion Show and we are having a Garden Party next week. It's just all so much fun :)

University has also been non stop. I've just handed in my final essay of the course and now I have just 3 weeks to try and revise like mad for my 3hour exam and I am terrified! I have a massive stack of books to get through and this isn't even half of them:

Looks like I'm going to be doing lots of reading over the coming weeks but I have taken half term off so I'm going to have a few extra days to study! I've also just signed up to my final course in my degree - Advanced Creative Writing and I am really excited that I am finally nearly there and that I am finishing on something fun.

Although I've been super busy I have still found time to make my garden grow, it's amazing that I have managed to keep something alive as I am normally completely rubbish with keeping plants alive.

I have also started my 'I must lose a stone' diet again so I've been making some very yum and colourful dinners. It is hard to stick to all of this when there is a buffet lunch available every day for me but I'm going to try and be good especially with Summer approaching (although I say that optimistically).

Things are ticking along nicely with a holiday being booked soon and another Summer in London approaching.

xxx