Weekend in photos

Afternoon all.

Tuesday is upon us and if you're anything like me, you'll still be saying a tearful farewell to the wonderful weekend that has just passed and attempting to tackle a new week with a smile on your face, a positive mental attitude in your mind and a large mug of green tea (or wine) in hand. 

My weekend was such a mishmash of small jobs and running about that I feel I need another weekend to get over my weekend, uh. Feeling old.
 
However, I definitely started my weekend off right with this little treat on Friday after work, builders tea and a scone with clotted cream & jam. YUM!

The cute little cat mug is from Joy which you can find here!



Lets rewind though a bit further back to Wednesday when it was my friends birthday. We went out for a meal and ended up embarrassing him with a Happy Birthday sing song and a birthday cake, which he wasn't too happy about but I did manage to get one snap of him smiling.

Lets then skip forward to Saturday which was a day of being an adult; I cleaned my house, went food shopping and even decided to pop to the gym! How mature and sensible am I?

It's sickening.

Two things make this god awful photo amazing: 

1. The crazy bun.

2. The sneaky cat.



I've been quite good with my diet lately (ignore the photos to come) and I've been working out a lot lately and really pushing myself further and harder. So much so, I can actually see muscle forming/growing in my thighs!

Ok, fine, it's not necessarily the place I want more muscle, but there's definitely a change a foot!

May I also add that this MyProtein cookies and cream bar is heavenly! It tastes delicious and hasn't got that blerugh protein taste to it, which is always a plus.

I think I'm going to try more of their range as this bar helped to fill me up during my workout yet it didn't make me feel heavy, bloated or too full...I think I'm onto a winner here.



My cat Bubba is going through a really whiny, rough time at the moment because he still misses his brother who passed away at Christmas, so he's started doing really odd things like this. 

Spot the cat



Saturday evening I popped round to my friends house to pick up some really late Christmas presents. We're both quite eclectic individuals, so she picked me up some vintage pressies for me.

This is supposedly from the Victorian times :O But most importantly, it's a cat face dish. A cat face + A dish = Instant love.



Another cat item but a cat necklace this time (check out the additional black cat hair all over this background, what a profesh blogger I am!)

The front:


The back:


She also picked me up this 1940's/50's nail care kit, in mint condition!





On Sunday, I woke up early and made a breakfast fit for a queen; scramble egg on brown toast, green tea and a home made smoothie. YUM!



I then headed out with my friend (whose birthday it was on Wednesday) and went to Tottenham Court road to Franco Manca, a well known pizza company that specializes in sourdough pizza (review to come!)



Excuse the lighting...



We may have then headed to my favorite type of shop (an American sweet shop) and I may have spent my entire life savings there.

I'm not going to tell you how much this cost, but it was a lot...enough to buy at least three outfits from Primark...eep.

I would like to point out the only things that are mine in this photo are the Sour Patch kids in Cherry flavour, one root beer and the Oreo's! 



On Sunday evening I did some meal prep for half the week (which I may blog about next week, if I have the time), had a lovely bath and went to bed early as on Monday I was going to be travelling to my companies new office. This meant an earlier alarm, along with a longer and more expensive commute and a lot more hassle...lucky I like my job!

It was a lovely weekend, full of healthy/naughty food, random trips to the gym and mini adventures, so, all in all, an ideal weekend.

<3

Body Shop Haul

Last week, our beloved Body Shop had a 40% sale on their website and in store, which included a whole host of incredible items.

I, for one, have been aching to purchase a few products from there for ages but I really couldn’t justify buying even more cosmetics to add to my humongous collection…but hey! There was a 40% off sale?!! How could I pass up such an incredible opportunity!?

So below is my incredible, nay, my beautifully stunning Body Shop haul!

The total should have come to over £80 but I got it for £50.10…BARGAIN! 

Rainforest Moisture Hair Butter - £3 for 50ml/£8 for 200ml

Many eons ago, I always used this wonderful hair butter and absolutely loved it but why I stopped buying it, I'll never know.

My hair is quite long and is prone to tangles and frizz but this hair butter helps to combat these hair terrors and always leaves my hair feeling thick and luxurious.

However, be careful when washing it out, this butter has almighty staying power and even when it feels like it's you've washed it all out...you probably haven't...



Moringa Body Butter - £13 for 200ml

This was my one and only selfless purchase, as I got this for my mum for mothers day. It's definitely an acquired smell but my mum absolutely loves it.



Drops of Youth Concentrate - £30 for 50ml 

I have read so many bloggers going wild for this line of 'Drops of Youth' products and as my age is becoming more and more apparent with every waking minute, I thought that I would give this a go. 

I will be doing a full review on this beauty someday soon, so watch this space.



Seaweed Mattifying Moisture Lotion - £12 for 50ml

Though I haven't heard many reviews about this moisture, my oily slick skin needs all the help it can get, so I'm hoping this is my new miracle cream that banishes all the oil from my face and leaves me looking normal...one can only live in hope.



Vitamin E Lip Care with SPF 15 - £4.50

For sometime now, I have been on the hunt for a for a lip balm with SPF. Why is this so hard to find?!

Anyway, I bought this beauty and my life was complete...until I lost it two days after purchasing it...

Back to the Body Shop I go!



Baked to Last Bronzer - £16

And last but by no means least, this, disgustingly beautiful bronzer.

Just look at it...

How dreamy is this bronzer?

I've had my eye on it for such a long time and finally, I have finally been able to give it a home in my makeup collection.

Uh, what a dreamboat.



If you're sad you missed out on the 40% sale last week, do not fear! The body shop has a 50% sale this week, so hurrah for The Body Shop and hurrah for sales!

To smoothie or not to smoothie?

If you follow me on twitter (if not, add me here: @Kirsty_LDN – shameless plug) you will know that in the beginning of the year I jumped on the proverbial smoothie bandwagon and decided to replace my normal every day breakfast of toast, porridge or cereal with a smoothie. Now, I am fully aware of what a jumped up pretentious twat I sound like but I really wanted to address the question that everyone asks me whenever the topic of smoothies is brought up…

Have I seen any benefits?

After making a smoothie every day for breakfast for a month I saw barely any differences whatsoever and to be honest I had no idea what I was looking out for.

Would I have more energy? Would my skin be flawless and goddess like? Would I sprout wings all of a sudden and have the ability to fly? The possibilities of changes were endless...

But no.

After a month, nothing had changed. No extra energy. No goddess like skin and sadly, no wings.

So why didn’t I give up then and there? Let’s face it; smoothies are not the cheapest new fad to get into. Machines can cost anywhere between £20 to £200 and along with buying an endless supply of fruit and veg, it's definitely tough on the ol’ purse strings.

However, I thought there must be some sort of positive in this whole process, right? I was getting more of my five a day in me, which can't be a bad thing and without sounding like even more of a pretentious bugger, I actually enjoyed making the smoothies and their taste.

(Even thought they didn’t turn me into a gorgeous super hero)

But skip forward a few more weeks and slowly but surely I started to notice a few positive changes...

Weight

As mentioned above, I have replaced my normal breakfast with a morning smoothie. Aside from filling my smoothies with an assortment of fruit and veg, I also include nuts, seeds and oats, which really help fill me up so I wasn't actually losing out on any calories.

But Kirsty, no one cares about that, how much weight have you lost?

Since I’ve started nearly 3 months ago to this very day, I have lost 9 pounds; so YAY for weight loss.

I'd like to add, this wasn't in conjunction with any exercise, it was weight loss completely from addressing my eating habits.

Skin

Without sounding like a walking stereotype, when it comes to that time of the month you can guarantee my face is going to explode with some awful looking volcanoes and not just any old spotty volcanoes, I'm talking about those monsters that hide underneath your skin and grow to the size of a 50p piece...I mean those beauties.  

But in the last three months I haven't had any sort of breakout (touches every bit of wood around me).

Along with the vanishing of the volcanoes, my skin tone has mildly evened out .

Energy

I’ve always been a morning person who can easily wake up at the crack of dawn with a spring in my step and a smile on my face but as soon as the clock hits 9pm, I’m done in. Even though I’m not the greatest fan of staying up late, after these last few months I have been able to do so without feeling like a complete zombie. Could it be the smoothies? I think so.

 

Since starting this whole smoothie malarkey, I have been so excited for my breakfast each day; I get to try out new fruits and veg regularly along with creating new concoctions every day and of course, I'm seeing such positive results!

Don't get me wrong, it's not all sunshine and happiness; it does take willpower to keep up with the new routine and to not binge on all the food in the world but the results are worth it....I think?

I've spoken to many people about their results and not everyone has seen as many positives as I have but I genuinely think it depends on how strict you are and how long you've been doing it for.

My only advice is to keep at it and to not give up. Remember, it will take time for you to adapt but if you still feel hungry, don't starve yourself! Have a healthy snack and don't feel bad about it.

If you're doing anything similar, have you seen any positive changes? 

L'orchidee Champagne Afternoon Tea

If you're not aware, I enter a heck load of competitions.

A lot of the time this hobby is tedious, frustrating and very time consuming, but sometimes, sommmmmeeeetimes....it pays off.

At the end of January I received an email from Gemporia about a competition of theirs I had entered back in December. Supposedly, a winner was picked for a prize but the person never got in contact with them so instead they chose me as the winner (sad for the original person, but great for me!)

They told me I had won Champagne afternoon tea at L'orchidee Boutique Patisserie in the Westfield in Shepherds Bush. 

As I live only a few minutes from Shepherds Bush I was unbelievably chuffed that I had won such a lovely prize so close to me! Champagne, tea, scones, cakes…what could be better?

After booking a reservation with L'orchidee, I decided to bring my sister along with me to enjoy the prize as well. So off we popped one sunny Sunday afternoon to go have a little champagney treat!

First things first (must not quote Iggy) everything about this experience was perfect; the food, the tea, the staff, everything! It can sometimes be very awkward or hard to explain to staff members that you’re a prize winner and give them information on what you’ve won, but at L'orchidee they were all very polite and well informed that my sister and I were receiving complimentary afternoon tea.

We only had to wait a couple of minutes before being served our array of savoury & confectionary goodness!

Firstly, we tucked into their selection of sandwiches which included brie and tomato, egg, beef and rocket, salmon and salad and chutney; which was lovely variation of scrumptious sandwiches (FYI, the chutney one was easily my favourite!)

Let's face it though, I wasn't there for the sandwiches, so as soon as we could, we dove into eating the most beautiful looking cakes I ever did saw.

I had really high hopes for the yellowly/purple cake, because, well, just look at it! But infact the best ones were the hazelnut ones and the macaroons!

As sacrilegious as it may sound, I'm not usually a fan of macaroons but L'orchidee macaroons were delectable, they were soft and chewy and oozed perfection! 

But I'll be honest, the real show stoppers were their heavenly scones! They were warm, soft, light and tasty; absolutely delicious! Paired with fresh clotted cream (drools) and a pot of jam, they were easily my favourite treat of the day (aside from the champagne of course).

I was unaware before I visited, but L'orchidee have a selection of specialty teas.

I ADORE tea and as I don't drink coffee, I find it difficult to find places that have a selection of different yummy teas. Considering I spend a lot of my time in Westfields, I am so happy that I now know that L'orchidee has such a beautiful selections of teas so I can just pop in there at anytime and try a new one out!

This time round I chose their beautifully light and floral L'orchidee French Blend with Jasmine, Lavender and Earl Grey Ceylons.



The staff were attentive and polite and the food was absolutely delicious. I'm so incredibly happy that I was chosen to win such a lovely prize and I'd like to thanks both Gemporia and L'orchidee for such a wonderful experience.

<3

Valentines in Camden Town

I wholeheartedly realise that I am nearly a month late for a Valentines post, but I'm doing a quick catch up of blogs at the moment and I wanted to document how I spent the day of love.

I for one love Valentines day, even as a singleton. I love the cards, I love the smushiness, I love watching nearly every fella trotting around with bouquet of flowers in one hand and chocolates in the other. What can I say? I just love love.

(What a creep)

Anyway, my Valentines day was spent with my good friend Khadija bounding around Camden town. This was her first time ever visiting Camden town (I know, right? Sacrilegious) so I thought I'd give her a guided tour.

I showed her the delights of a few markets, including Camden Market, The Stables and Camden Lock and then dazzled her with the weirdness that seems to spread like wildfire here.

Then once I had dazzled her with Camden's business, eccentricity and charm, we popped into a cute little Italian restaurant called Al Parco near Camden town tube station. I've never been to this cute little restaurant before but I would highly recommend it. Tucked away on a side street, it has very reasonable prices, beautifully fresh food, great staff and a lovely atmosphere.

I tend to take pizza very seriously and after spending a good while in Italy, I can be a bit of a pizza snob. However, Al Parco is easily one of the best pizzerias I've been to outside of Italy and I cannot wait to visit there again.

After our romantic valentines meal (cheeky) we popped off to a photo booth to take same really awful photos together. If you can't tell, we didn't know when our photos were going to be taken, so these happened...awkward.

Did you know Camden has a Wholefoods? I may have popped in there too...




<3