Friday Fun

Photo from Zooborns

The above are a very cute pair of sun bears. Apt because we are not having much sun here at the moment. The rain has been persistently showery and catches you in the oddest moment. It's very frustrating.

However last night was a beautiful summer evening. The dusk light was stunning, grey clouds scattered across a pinkish sky. I was walking home from a later than normal work finish through St James park and thinking how lucky I am to walk to and from work through some beautiful bits of London.

And to finish up an old story, this weekend I'm off to my sister-in-laws hen do. I asked her about it and she reassured me that of course she wanted me to come. So I'm off to down to the South Coast of England for a Spa day followed by a night on the tiles. Shall report more on Monday! Although no photos I forgot my camera...

Hope you're all having lovely Friday's and have great weekends!

A night at the opera

At the beginning of July we went to the opera with my parents, sister, sister's other half and some other friends of my parents. We were off to the Royal Opera House to see Il Barbiere Di Siviglia by Rossini.



And it was fabulous! I would thoroughly recommend it if it comes to an Opera House near you. Although we were nearly thwarted by some different problems, first the lead female singer Joyce DiDonato fractured her leg on the first night! And so was performing in a wheelchair. Amazingly enough this worked really well, all things considered. Then at the beginning of the performance out came a lady and you could hear the collective groan of wondering what had happened. When it was announced the lead male singer had gone down with a cold so would not be singing but would still act and there would be a singer on the side of the stage! Again it worked really well, once you remembered to focus on the acting singer not the singing singer.

The Royal Opera House is also one of my favourite buildings in London. Inside and out. I took some pictures of the floral hall, now called the Paul Hamlyn Hall, which is just stunning. At the top of the picture above you can see the box where you can stand in the Amphitheatre Bar and look down on everyone drinking in the floral hall.

I'd recommend to go just to see the building, and the operas are normally pretty spectacular too!

Wee Birdy, Alex Monroe and Lucky me!

Wee Birdy had been holding a week long give away last week of lovely treats for her readers and amazingly enough I won one of them! I have been lucky enough to win a necklace from Alex Monroe. And here is the beauty I have won:

I hadn't heard of Alex Monroe before reading Wee Birdy but I am now in love. His pieces are all nature inspired and are just amazing, detailed, quirky and timeless.

I shall be thinking of him for gifts this year, I always prefer buying from someone like Alex whose pieces so truly reflect him and his inspirations and where it's not part of a huge faceless chain.

Anyway, check out his other bits and bobs on his website and when I receive the package I shall post a picture of it on.

More apes and animals for my pleasure :)

From Animal Talk via Cute Overload

Saw this today and boy does it make me smile, apparently these two are best friends. How cute! Check out the full story here. Now now now!!!

Hope you're all having nice weekends.

Friday fun - Musical Rats

Photo by Ellen van Deelen via BBC news

Just came across this on the BBC news website, check out the musical rat! Love it!!

Moose on the go

Firstly, my apologies, I'm not sure if this post is ethical within the blogging world but it seems to me like a worthy thing to blog about.

So here goes, in his words...

Dad died in 1991. Cancer of the oesophogus (wind pipe) took him away in just 12 months. Dad was 45 at the time. Survival rates were just 2%. He didn't really have a chance. Today, it is Britain's sixth biggest cancer. The 5-year survival rate is still just 8%. More research will be needed if other people's dads do stand a chance.

Mark "moose" Twigg had decided to raise £100,000 to fund research. It might take ten years. It might take twenty. I will just have to keep walking, running and cycling until we get there.

Moose has been on the run for 12 years - half-marathons, marathons and now double-marathons (52 miles from London-Brighton on 4th July 2009).

It all starts again on 5th September with a new challenge: a 1,200 km bike ride from London to Nice in the South of France heading through Paris and Lyon on the way. I am guessing this is going to hurt so please do help me to make it worth the pain.

http://www.justgiving.com/moose-on-the-run/

Much love m x

Today I feel like this...

Photo from Cute Overload from a Belgium TV ad

Not sure why, maybe it's me being upset it's Monday. Or that I've been drinking far too much for the last few weeks... Must become better behaved and look after my body more. Any tips to rejuvenate myself?

Happy Friday!

Image via Cute Overload

Finally it's Friday. It's been a long time coming this week. So for your pleasure a red panda, courtesy of the ever great Cute Overload.

It's been an odd week. Busy and long and tiring and a bit up and down to be honest. I feel all ready for the weekend except that's busy too. Off to a jazz night tonight and the opera tomorrow.

Enjoy your weekend's.

Ta ta for now, m x

Stories about me (again) - warning long post...

Bridechka recently did an amazing post where she was asked five questions and gave really interesting lovely answers to them. She then asked others to ask to be 'interviewed' if they wanted and I couldn't resist. So she sent me through my own five questions. Here goes!

1) Since you're a wedding graduate, I would love to hear about if your relationship has changed and if it has, how it has changed since you got married?

I feel like our relationship has changed and I feel happier and more in love. Amazing really as we've been together for six and a half years now. But I think marriage makes you work harder, I'm in this forever so I have to enjoy it and do all I can to enjoy it. I think J also feels the same, well I hope he does. But we've got on really well, worked at things together and are building a shared vision of the future. I also feel like I've changed, like I've grown up and I notice my priorities have shifted slightly. Things that used to wind me up don't so much any more. I guess all I can say is that for me it's been fabulous for the first six months and I truly hope and pray it will continue to be for many years to come.

2) What is your favorite (only one! thats what makes it hard) memory of your wedding?

This is too hard! But one of my favourites is how neither J nor I could sing our second hymn 'So sings my soul' (that's not the title but I can never remember it) because we were both so emotional and looking at each other and just knowing this was absolutely the right thing to be doing.

3) Tell us the story of how you nearly broke your nose before your wedding :)

This is slightly embarrassing but hopefully will amuse you! We have an annual staff Christmas party which is all the administrative staff of where I work. I work in a small department of a large organisation. So there were probably about 200 - 300 people there. I'd had a few drinks of course and was dancing like a crazy lady (this happens often after a few drinks). I was wearing my new boots which had no grip. At some point a drink got spilt on the floor and during my dancing I slipped but fell forward... Apparently I had my arms round some other people at the time hence cushioning my fall with my face. I remember my head rebounding off the floor and thinking it's all okay and then my colleagues saying you're bleeding.

At which point the pain hit... Not only did I nearly break my nose but I also manage to push one of my front teeth back behind the other one. So in my drunken state and realising this was wrong just pushed it back into place. Which thankfully the dentist tells me is the right thing to have done. I now have a lumpier nose, it wasn't broken but something isn't quite right and a split tooth, not visibly but by golly can I feel it when it's cold!

Sorry a very long story but hopefully will amuse you!

4) Do you still dance ballet every now and then? Or take classes?

Not any more, I took it up again for a while and loved it but the classes were too hard to make it to. I should though because I think Ballet is amazing and I find it hard to motivate myself to go to the gym...

5) Whose marriages do you feel like are good examples for you and your husband? Who's relationships do you try to emulate to make yours that much more successful?

Both our parents have been married a long time and I know for me this is very inspirational. To know that things haven't always been easy but that they are still together and happy is really great. My eldest sister has also been someone who I have learnt from and who I've seen work at relationships to make them successful. Something which I've definitely learnt from her is the value of working and committing to a relationship and not walking away when you feel like it's too much. Less of an emulation now but I think friendships can also be learnt from when building successful relationships. Every single relationship you have will have different aspects to it which can be used and built upon to help create the relationship you desire.

So, I hope you've enjoyed this a little anyhow. And sorry for a very indulgent week of bits about me!

What I now have to offer is for anyone else who would like to be interviewed please leave me a comment saying 'interview me' and I will create five questions for you.

And finally thanks Bridechka for your questions, they were great to answer and have really made me think about a lot of things!

M x

Blog Goggles giveaway

The lovely Blog Goggles is doing a giveaway this week of these fabulous earrings:

They are from A Squared on Etsy. So if you're interested in the opportunity to win them hop on over to Blog Goggles and have a look, if you haven't already :)

A weekend in France

The first weekend in July was spent in France with my husband, middle sister, mama and papa. And it was a lovely weekend. We travelled down on Friday with my mama and papa and stopped over night in a little auberge about half the way to our destination. It was a classic French auberge in a tiny little village called Chepy. And the food there was great too, €16 for a three course dinner! Good value huh?

Top Row: Chepy Mairie, Chicken!

Bottom Row: John in the Limeray auberge, dinner! Mmmmmm

Then on the Saturday we travelled down to Limeray in Loire. This was where my sister joined us and we were all together. We had a lovely dinner, as shown above and enjoyed our evening together dining outside in the July warmth.

And then it was the big day... The Promenade Gourmande. This is a 5km walk around the vineyards while tasting the local food and wine. The weather was perfect, hot and sunny. Perhaps too sunny, I got a little sunburnt, oops!

At each stop there was entertainment and of course wine and food! Some of which is shown above.

It was a really good weekend, much fun and really lovely to get away from everything for a while. We travelled home on the Monday, really feeling like we'd got away from it all and freshed (although perhaps a little hungover too!)

Meme Part II

And now for the rest of the Meme...

Do you admire any one’s style?

Lots of peoples, so here goes… Eva Longoria, Kate Moss, Blair Waldorf, Serena van der Woodsen, Jenny Humphreys (for the Gossip Girlers I admire their on screen style)

Describe your personal style?

Simple, Classic, but with colour, where possible I aim never to dress all in black, there must be a splash of colour somewhere

What are your favourite movies?

O Brother Where Art Thou, Walk the Line, Legally Blonde (I & II), Top Gun, Dirty Dancing

What is your favourite fruit?

Gooseberries and Rhubarb, sorry it has to be both

What inspires you?

My family, my husband and my friends

Your favourite book?

Can I have all the Tintin and Asterix books?

Do you collect something?

Nope. I hoard everything! Ha ha!

What is your favourite smell?

Food cooking when I’m really hungry

How many times do you press the snooze button before you get up?

At least 2, on a good day…

Cats or dogs?

Dogs without question. Specifically Schnauzers, Beagles and Daschunds

What do you look forward to coming home to after you've been away?

My husband

So there we are. And now to the tagging. I'm never too sure about tagging people, I don't know if people like it or not, but I would be very interested to hear these great bloggers answer some of these questions if they do want to join in!

Peacock Feathers and Diamond Rings
Being Brazen
Canadian Bride
Indian Summers
The un-bride
Blog Goggles
Being Red

And of course if I haven't mentioned you and you want to do it let me know so I can come read all your answers too! M x

Meme Part I

Anna and the Ring tagged me in a meme recently which is rather long. So I've decided to split it so you get two posts with the meme in them. And then when I tag people they can chop and choose which questions they would like to answer! Works all round yes?

So here goes...

What is your current obsession?

Looking at the sales on websites and not shopping them

Coffee or tea?

Tea all the way

What would you eat for your last meal?

Steak, Bernaise Sauce and chips, with mustard and mayonnaise on the side. Plus a great bottle of red from Bordeaux or Burgundy

What was the last and most exciting thing you bought?

My new dress for my sister-in-laws wedding this summer, see this post for a picture

What's the best gift you have ever been given?

This one’s tough, there’s nothing which really stands out as the best gift I’ve ever been given. Lots of gifts are special for different reasons. Some of the jewellery I’ve been given has become very special, but then so too have some books I’ve been bought.

What is your favourite ice cream flavour?

Pistachio

What do you think of the person who tagged you?

Anna and the Ring - She seems lovely and bubbly

If you could go anywhere in the world for the next hour, where would you go?

Bed

Which language do you want to learn?

Arabic

What is your favourite colour?

Red

What is your favourite piece of clothing in your own wardrobe?

Skinny black jeans from Ted Baker, work wonders for my bum and legs and go with everything

What is your dream job?

Ummm… another tough one. I think not knowing this is probably why I have no idea where I want my career to go. But I think something in food, wine or luxury goods.

If you had £100 now, what would you spend it on?

Shoes. Nice new pretty flats for summer. Or new wellington boots, my other ones broke :(

More to come shortly!

On drinking with colleagues

Last night was our summer party at work. Well yesterday afternoon. And it was great, we had a lovely late lunch somewhere on Portobello road, coupled with plenty of drinking and then watched Public Enemies. Which by the way isn't great. I just found that I couldn't get emotionally invested in any of the characters... But I digress, we then finished off with cocktails in a bar somewhere down the road.

I feel like crap today.

Anyhow, what I was really thinking about was that I'm very lucky to get on with all the people I work with. We have a small office, somewhere around 15 people and everyone is really nice, so it's fun to go out drinking with them. Although of course you do have to change your behaviour slightly just to make sure you don't say or do anything too ridiculous.

And it got me to thinking this morning about the sense of drinking with the people you work with. In many ways it's the perfect opportunity to get to know them without the constraints an office brings. But in other ways it can make it harder to manage people when you know them too well and let personal feelings get in the way of management.

What do you think about it? Is it something you do regularly or something you try and avoid?

And my apologies for the rather disjointed post, my brain is not in fully functioning order.

And off to France I go...

Well have gone. I'm currently in France soaking up the countryside, wine and food. Long weekend with the husband, parents and middle sister. Stories and photo on return :)

Enjoy your weekends!

M xx

One lovely blog

The lovely, and newly wed, Rachel has very kindly given me an award. It has admittedly taken me far too long to post this but here I am finally getting round to it! The rules are to pass it on to 15 newly discovered blogs but I don't know that many blogs so I shall start with a few which I've really been enjoying recently and perhaps add some more in as I go!

Being Red - Very stylish blog, well worth looking at for inspiration
Weebirdy - all about exciting things in London
Startfromwhereyouare - Full of great ways to make small changes and live greener
Model Mentality - the new incarnation of Red Frame
Ramblings of a fab brunette - a Toronto mother and cupcake baker
Blog Goggles - Amusing, stylish and cute, all rolled together in one blog
Being Brazen - Fun, amusing, sweet and full of interesting things to think about

Sorry I've not put in more but hopefully you might enjoy reading some of these. I know I do! And if you know of any lovely new blog can you put a link in a comment? Thanks x

And now for the dress on me

For those of you who were interested here's me in the dress. I love the pockets!