We enjoyed all weekend!

This weekend has been lovely, one of the best I've had for ages. It was only a quiet one, just Anthony and I and a few visits to various places around the Forest of Dean and Herefordshire, relaxing in the evening and of course watching some of the live sets from Reading and Leeds festival.

We had an extra long weekend due to the bank holiday and work kindly giving me Friday off this week which was lovely, Anthony also managed to rack some flexi-time so he to could have Friday off. It's quite rare we get to spend this much time together so when we can, we really try and make the best and most out of it.

I recently was offered a new job, which is great news as it's better hours, more challenging and something I feel I am much more interested in; Theatre recovery practitioner, sounds posh doesn't it.

Can't wait to wear scrubs again!

To celebrate my new job, Anthony took me out for a fabulous meal at a kind of local pub, The Cross Keys, Ii really was the best food I'd tasted for a long time. I had guinea foul for the first time ever which was really tasty, although I thought it tasted very similar to chicken but the sauce was delicious. We got all dressed up nice to go, and had a lovely time when we got there. Now getting there was a totally different ball game. It was a nightmare, we were late due to be lost in winding country lanes, I mean literally driving around a tiny village for about 20minutes to half an hour. When we arrived the food and the atmosphere in the pub was definitely worth the wait and I'm sure we'll go back again.

Our pretty little country pub

Surprisingly on Saturday the sun was shining so we got up bright and early-ish, had some bacon and sausage butty’s and headed out to Hereford. Admittedly I felt like I was on my way to work, but when we got there I felt a bit differently. We explored the city, found a wonderful lane full of independent retailers and cafes, it was quite refreshing to walk past all the lovely shops and not see a huge commercial building. The best thing of all, it had a cheese shop! A whole shop dedicated to cheese! I love cheese.

Say cheese Anthony!

 

Best moment of my life

All in all was a really nice day out, I bought myself a new outfit which made it even better. Next time we head to Hereford we'll try and find some other hidden gems to explore.

Saturday night I taught Anthony how to cook spaghetti bolognaise. It was the hardest thing I have ever had to do, not because he was rubbish at it, just because I wanted to do everything and help him out a bit. In the end I sat down with a glass of wine and dictated what to do and even though he was a little slow to say the least, we got there in the end after nearly two hours of cooking and it tasted lovely. He was a proud man, and I was proud of him, he'll be sorted for life now.

Hopefully we'll have some more weekends when we head out and do something a little bit different, September will most probably be quiet, due to our holiday at the end of the month. We do have a wedding party to go to in a couple of weeks which will keep us entertained for now. Next time I won't leave it so long before I blog again. Until then see ya laters!

We have all the Moomin mushroom ragout!

This is a recipe that I've used a few times now, and I have to say it's a lovely accompaniment to a meal. I got the recipe from my Moomin cookbook and is one the few recipes within it not to involve cream! It's really easy, effortless and also healthy. It goes well with most meats, I've also had it on toast and the cookbook suggests having the ragout with rice or potatoes so it's up to you to decide.  

It’s not like your usual ragout but is still homely and delicious perfect for a quick dish. So here's how to do it.

Ingredients:

Everything you need!

1. 300g mushrooms (choose a mixture if possible)
2. 2 onions (I used 3 as they were really small)
3. 1 courgette
4. 2 tomatoes
5. 1tbsp oil or butter
6. 1tsp salt
7. Pinch of pepper
8. 1tbs dried marjoram
9. 1 or 2 cloves of garlic

Method

1. Chop the mushrooms and onions then dice the courgette and your tomatoes.
2. Heat oil or butter in a frying pan and brown the onions.
3. Add courgette, garlic, tomatoes and seasonings and cook for around 15minutes stirring occasionally.
4. Serve and enjoy!

Your finished product

 

We partied all over town!

My birthday was at the start of July but due to being really busy birthday plans were put on hold. I went out with my friends from work on Saturday night for Chinese food and to go clubbing. One word for it could be messy, but all in all it was a really fun night, and the food was amazing, although I did pay for all the fun I had on Sunday morning with my raging hangover! As I've got older my hangovers have just got worse and worse, and every time I wake up and say "I'm never drinking again!" and I always do.

Before everyone drank to much.

Hereford isn't my preferred place to go for a night out but I'm starting to realise that it really is who you're with that makes it a good night. We've got another night out planned in a few weeks for a leaving do, hopefully the night will be just as much fun, hopefully my hangover won't be quite so bad he he.

Time to go home I think

We saw all of Blink 182

On Friday night I went with my friends to watch Blink 182 in Manchester. I wasn't overly excited and to be honest I never thought they were that good, so I drank a bit too much cider and the evening passed a little bit quicker. What got me the most was that everyone seemed so young! I mean they are actually children and admittedly I am used to going to over 18 venues so I never have to deal with this occurrence. It really did make me feel old and put me off the whole night, don't worry I do have some positive things to say about the night.

See look at the smile. It wasn't all bad!

Blink 182 were supported by Twin Atlantic and The All American Rejects. I've seen Twin Atlantic a couple of times before and they never disappoint. They seem to be making their way up the ladder pretty damn quick and before we know it, they're going to be a household name (I can hope anyway). The All American Rejects were alright, quite standard and the lead singer definitely had Tourette's Syndrome. I've never heard someone swear as much as he did. They took be back to be my youth of being a teenagers again, I used to love them. Although now, I feel I am too old and it just didn't seem quite right.

Explains it's self really...

The thing that really impressed me and this may sound really dumb; to be honest I don't really care. One of the members of the band had his birthday on Friday and instead of have a birthday cake, he had a birthday ham! I would much prefer a birthday meat, I mean I'm not massively keen on cake anyway and with meat you can do other things with it (if you wanted too),you could even turn it into birthday curry. I'm starting to think celebratory meat could take over the cake. It will become tradition to have meat instead, but anyway on to the main event.

I never had high hopes for Blink 182 and usually this makes gigs better but unfortunately Blink were still pretty pants and I won't recommend going to see them unless you are sixteen. I mean it took me back to my teenage years for about five minutes then I would notice how young everyone was and how rubbish Blink 182 actually are. I mean the comedy is very adolescent and the singing really isn't great, I mean Tom Delonge sounds like a child himself. What really irritated me was the fact that the kids who were there in their Blink 182 t-shirts and hats, didn't even know Dammit, my mum probably knows Dammit. I don't think these kids even know how dance or start a mosh pit as there was hardly movement down in the standing area; I always find that's the best part about the gig!

Blink 182

On a positive note to the concert, the stage was set out really well and the back drop was really artistic, a bit emo but I can handle that. All the band were on stage at the time which was stated on the program, my seats were in a really good spot, no one's fat head in my way or anything like that. The best part of the night was seeing one my best friends and former housemate, Hayley. I haven't seen her for ages and even though it probably wasn't the best place to try catch up with someone, it was just fantastic to see her and just laugh about anything! Even though I didn't really enjoy the band it was worth going just to catch up with an old friend.

Hayley and I

I would recommend going to the Manchester Arena, it's huge although do be aware that it is sitting and standing. From where I was sat I could see everything! It's central and really easy to get to. Apologies for all my criticism but it really is just my opinion.

We have all the fancy dress!

During July Anthony and I have a couple of fancy dress parties to attend, one being mine and the other being his sisters. His sister's party theme is the Oscars and mine being the 80's. I love fancy dress and think my 21st was the first un-themed party I'd had in years!

I've been looking at dresses for ages for the Oscars party and finally bought one yesterday, even though it's more of a cocktail dress and not a ball gown it's a very pretty dress. It looks lovely on and quite summery.

The pretty dress I bought yesterday

I've bought some accessories to go with it just to try and glam it up a bit. I've got a purple sparkly hair band and a silver/grey pashmina which matches my bag and shoes I already have. My jewellery on the other hand is still undecided but I've got some time to plan. I think it's going to be a lovely evening, and everyone's going to look gorgeous, I'm hoping there's going to be lots of dancing too!

My fancy dress admittedly not so classy, the 80's terrible hair and clothes but great films and icons were created in this time. My personal favourite would have to be Madonna and Back to the future, all of them!

Best film of all time!

I've already got my costume as I used it for a party last year, I'm going as a Ghostbuster, I've got my jumpsuit ready just a few more iron on transfers and it will be complete!

This will look even better in July

I'm looking forward to my night out, it's in Bristol and after a few bars the plan is to head to an 80's night club which is pure cheese. Even if we do change our minds on the night, if the company's good which I'm sure it will be the night will be epic. Roll on July!

We have all the parties!

Like any girl I love going out and just dancing the night away, having a few drinks and gossiping with my friends. That was how this night was supposed to turn out. I love Bristol, especially for going out and thought that Laura's birthday would be like our student days.

I went out in Bristol for a friend's birthday a couple of weeks ago which I had been looking forward to for ages! It was going to be so nice to see all the girls again, since we all moved out of our student house I don't think we've all been together since, so this will be lovely occasion. Although this isn't how things turned out, one of my friends caught a sickness bug, and during the night everyone seemed to be falling out so most of them headed home about 1am. Me, Anthony and two of our friends stayed out but that was it. Why everyone fell out I have no idea! All in all despite the drama, I had a fantastic night, visited a few bars, one really rubbishy club and then hit the Cooler which is an 'indie' nightclub in the centre of Bristol, one of my favourites from my student days.

The Cooler night club and live music venue

If I knew I was going to end up in The Cooler I wouldn't have bothered with dressing up all nice, to wear jeans and Converse would have suited me just fine. I would have been able to perfect my dance moves, these days heals and dancing for me just isn't what it used to be. It's more like a close call in accident and emergency for a broken ankle.

The night for me went really well until we'd all had too much to drink, everyone got a bit crabby and Anthony told me off for pinching someone's bum, this was just a joke to make them think it was Josh who'd pinched their bottom. Anthony didn't see it like this at the time. It's all in the past now and we have just laughed about it since.

Josh, me and Anthony

I do feel I'm starting to get old though, we finally got in about 4:30am and had to drive home the next day, the next morning was horrific, I just couldn't move. My hangovers are getting much worse with my age. I've decided to stop drinking so much on nights out maybe add a few glasses of water just to ease the pain of the morning after. To this day I don't know if Laura enjoyed her birthday, in all fairness I didn't see her most of the night, maybe the next time she goes out everyone will get on and just stop arguing over nothing!

We have all the getaways!

I have been meaning to blog for ages! Admittedly I am two weeks late to blog about this particular subject. Anthony and I had been together for a year at the end of April and what better way to celebrate by going away for the weekend and sharing a bottle of bubbly and of course some steak, which of course I cooked. Nom nom nom...

We stayed in a little apartment which was attached to the owner's huge farm house and I mean huge! It was massive and the amount of land they had, you could have spent a day exploring their garden, it even had a brook running though it! They had the cutest little lambs too, they were pets of the owner as they needed to be bottle feed, they would come and bleat at our door, they were just too cute to shoo away. 

The Bridge over the brook to get to our apartment

North Wales was definitely not what I expected, I'd never been before, I only live twenty minutes from South Wales and I'm not going to lie, it's really not my favourite place to go and the accent goes straight through me (no offence to any Welsh people). The north was a complete contrast of this, hardly any Welsh accents to get on my nerves, the area was lovely, and extremely pretty.

We spent a day at the seaside which was amazing, really was my lucky day. They had a games arcade which is my weakness I spend so much money in them and hardly ever win anything. I really do get addicted, on the bright side though it wasn't all wasted I won Smurfette on a grab machine and won so many tickets I lost count but did win me a Hello Kitty mug. We also got some sweets and played on some of the video games in there and finished off with a coffee.

My Smurfette toy



We had some adventures in the mountains and ate at a really nice fancy-ish pub, the food was gorgeous. Although trying to find somewhere to eat on a Sunday afternoon was a total mission! I mean most pubs serve food all day don't they? Not in North Wales they don't, if you're a minute after 2:30pm, that's it no food for you. Don't worry we did eventually find somewhere to eat, we didn't starve.

The Mountains really were something I had never seen anything like it before in my life. It was beautiful, the pictures that we took just don't show how fantastic the view was. Despite the terrible wind and rain we braved it and it really was worth it, there are no words to describe how beautiful the view was.

Anthony fighting the wind and rain on the Mountains

The view, this picture really doesn't do it justice

Of course a well deserved coffee after freezing in
the mountains

All in all despite bad weather it was a lovely weekend and I wish we could have them more often but realistically with saving money for the future and my plans of moving out, they are few and far between. Maybe it's a good thing we don't do it every often as this way we can truly appreciate the time we have away without anyone bothering us. Our next trip we've got planned is to Somerset in September for a week and we've got a hot tub, I cannot wait, but until then it's just getting on with general life things. Obviously we'll do things on the weekends we do spend together. I would definitely recommend spending some time in North Wales though, really worth a visit, I've never seen anything like it ever!