Its all fake darling

Funny things keep happening to me.

I recently had done my first ever set of gel nails, a craze I never thought I'd become a part of, and I loved them, another surprise. Last night whilst out shopping after work I found myself coveting black faux fur cropped jackets, I even tried one on and now, not even 24 hours later, I'm desperate to get my hands on one before the work's Christmas party.

My friend, who recently got married, the wedding being the reason behind the false nails, is a huge fan of falsies and is quite partial to the occasional fake tan. She looks fantastic but its never crossed my mind to become a copycat. Is she to blame for these happenings?

I am concerned that within a few months I'll be booking my first ever spray tan and popping into Paul's on Oldham Street to enquire about hair extensions. There's absolutely nothing wrong with fake nails and the like but it's just not like me. Or at least I thought it wasn't me. Maybe its a phase? I can just about cope with the nails but if I catch myself even walking towards a pair of white jeans I'll be having serious words with myself.

There's a limit.

Giving in to the cold

After walking around Manchester in the freezing cold wearing only my cape (and clothes underneath, obviously) to keep me warm I finally decided enough was enough. I needed a proper winter coat! With sleeves! Capes look good but that's about all they do.

I hadn't realised how dull shopping for a coat could be! Over priced, too thin, too short...the list went on.

Finally I found one I liked. This coat from Warehouse is classic and looks fabulous.

London

St Paul's Cathedral

Catching a glimpse of a bridal shoot!

Our room

The view from our hall way's balcony

John Torode's Smiths of Smithfield

Macaroni cheese with smoked haddock

Corn beef Hash

Enjoying the complimentary slippers

The Theatre

Enjoying American pancakes and root beer in Soho

The Diner

Afternoon Tea at the hotel

For my 25th birthday the boyfriend very generously bought me tickets to see Diana Vickers on stage in The Rise and Fall of Little Voice. This was followed with my mum offering to pay for our hotel. Thanks mum!

We booked the hotel via lastminute.com's top secret scheme. For those of you who aren't familiar, the hotel has such a good deal that they choose not to put their name to it until payment is received. You are given the star rating and a brief description of the hotel, keeping the address withheld until your payment is processed. We took a chance and ended up staying in a brand new 5* hotel, right next door to St Paul's Cathedral for £95. Result!

What a fabulous weekend! Super-duper posh hotel, discovering John Torode's cafe and loving the peanut butter milkshakes, wearing my gorgeously pink suede ruffle shoes bought especially for the occasion, hearing Diana's voice live and finding her impressions of Marilyn Monroe, Edith Piaf and Shirley Bassey dreamy, being hugely relieved to find Balans restaurant (recommended to us by my step-sister) after running in the rain and trying to avoid the puddles, window shopping on Oxford Street, satisfying a pancake craving at an American Diner and having a girl-crush on the girl behind the bar (think blonde Dita Von Teese), wishing Manchester had an underground system, looking out for celebs and wishing we could visit more often.

Stitches

You may remember the fabulous Lipsy dress I treated myself to a few months a go. I bought it with a friend's wedding in mind and as the big day is only weeks away I thought it best I try it on and check all is still well. At the time it fitted beautifully but I must have lost some weight as the dress was slightly too big!

Drastic action needed to be taken. Spending the day hitching my dress up would not be ladylike, especially whilst juggling my glass of wine, camera and handbag, all wedding essentials!

Several of the men folk at work have their suits altered at Stitches so I decided to give it a try. Apparently they have contracts with lots of the big designer stores so if its good enough for them I thought its good enough for the Lipsy lovely.

One lunch time I wandered over, taking my friend for moral support, and waited in the queue to 'try on'. The fitting cubicle is in their reception area so having to stand in my socks and dress was slightly embarrassing!

I wasn't stood for long though, the staff were fantastic and very quick! A lady pinned in my dress, checking all the time that I was happy and then I was told it would be ready in an hour!

I collected the dress, paid my £14 and rushed home to try it! I was so impressed, once again it fitted perfectly and you couldn't even tell it had been altered, their work was faultless.

Fireflies

On Friday evening the boyfriend took me to see Fireflies at The Lowry in Salford. What a fantastic, energetic, hilarious and heart rendering play! 

I'm not even going to try and review it, I doubt I would do it the justice it deserves, so please click on the link and see what the professionals have written. 

Red

I haven't posted in so long. My new job demands so much more of my time, gone are the long lunches when I could sit and write, find new recipes or search for pretty dresses on ASOS.  My normally tidy house and well stocked fridge have both suffered and I have even been guilty of buying the odd ready meal, albeit from Marks and Spencers, to save me cooking. The secretary is so busy she needs her own secretary! 

I did manage to find the time to escape to Edinburgh for my friend's hen do. It was a fabulous weekend filled with cocktails, gossiping and dancing! We hired a huge apartment which turned out to be a great idea, it meant we could all get ready together and drink wine with the X Factor on in the background before going out to try out Edinburgh's finest bars, then in the morning we sat in our pj's and ate mountains of toast. 

A previous guest, another hen perhaps, had left May's edition of Red Magazine. Red is not a magazine I normally choose but it kept me entertained for the whole train journey home, quite a feat.

I really enjoyed so many of their features, in particular an interview with Jodi Picoult. I am a huge fan of Jodi's work, in particular My Sister's Keeper (I stress, the book and not the film) and Change of Heart. In the interview she listed the books that were important to her, including Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes which was written over 20 years a go. In Jodi's words 'it's about a profoundly retarded man who becomes a human guinea pig for a procedure to reverse his condition'. This will be my next read, no doubt it will be a weepy. 

Another article that caught my eye was 'Making friends with food', a column written by food writer Joanna Weinberg. She writes so beautifully about the friendships she has formed over platefuls of delicious food. As someone who loves to cook, feed her friends and have people over for tea I read it nodding in agreement. Joanna tells us she isn't a host who executes four course triumphs but instead serves her guests simple stews with hunks of buttered bread and chocolate bars for pudding. She dreams of busy kitchens full of people stuffing their faces with their elbows on the table surrounded by empty bottles of wine. I dream of just that, once I have a kitchen big enough for the table! 

Next time I am travelling on the train I know exactly what to buy for the journey. 

I was so proud of my Yorkshire puddings I wanted to show them off for all the world to see. 

To me a Yorkshire pudding should be both crunchy and chewy, not too dissimilar to a meringue and golden in colour. Perfect with roast chicken or dipped in treacle for pudding! 

New Shoes

After whining on about my struggle to find work shoes that are comfortable, long lasting and most importantly cute, I never thought I'd find a new pair with such ease. 

The pair from Next I posted about a few months a go have served me well, they are comfortable, look great and the heels have held up well against heavy footfall to and from work, but no shoes last forever. They are starting to look slightly worn and a new pair needed to be sourced. 

On Friday my best friend visited for a pre-birthday (I turn 25 tomorrow) lunch and shopping trip. We met my friends in Piccolinos for a long and lovely lunch where I had seafood risotto, minus any evil parsley, and and two glasses of mega expensive wine (£7 a glass!). Then we headed to Marks and Spencer to find my friend's boyfriend, sorry Fiance, some winter gloves. A quick detour around the shoe section saw me cooing over the red lovelies I have pictured above. I tried them on expecting to be disappointed so was surprised when they fitted perfectly and at only £25, they were a bargain! I headed to the till impressed with my find. 

On Monday I will be pairing them with my new black pencil skirt from H&M and heading to work with happy feet!

Lily Cole

Lily Cole is beautiful. I would very much like to be her friend but after reading that she achieved 5 A's at A Level I fear I wouldn't quite cut it. Instead I will admire her from afar. 

Redhead Day

My sister sent me this link and I read it feeling rather proud! Coming from a family of redheads I find it fantastic that somebody would want to celebrate us in such a way. For years I have been saying how special we are and to read there is an annual ginger gathering and ginger-only modelling agencies surely confirms this.

All those bullies were just jealous, I'm sure of it.

My New Job

Recently a fellow secretary at work announced she would be leaving the company to pursue a career in mental health nursing. For me this meant a job opportunity working for the Head of Department, a much busier role and a possible pay rise. I discussed it with the boyfriend and decided I had nothing to lose and applied.

Two interviews and a long 10 days later I was called in to a meeting to be told I had the job, if I wanted it. Of course I wanted it!

The boyfriend and I celebrated in Ning which for a Tuesday, was a real treat.

I start next Thursday, wish me luck!

Miss August Bride 2010

As you know my best friend is getting married next August. She won't mind me telling you that she has gone slightly wedding crazy, understandably I suppose, I imagine I would too.

As a way of recording her plans and sharing her planning tales she has followed in my foot steps and set up a blog.

Enjoy!

x

Vivienne Westwood

Me likey...

The Angel Take II

On Friday evening the boyfriend and I went to The Angel to take full advantage of the fantastic Manchester Confidential deal, £15 for a three course meal. We first visited back in February and were so impressed I'm surprised we waited this long to go again.

It was a set menu, herb-scented mussel and port of Lancaster smoked haddock broth to start, pot roast pork loin with lyth valley damson and claret, roasted carrots and duck fat with fondant potato for the main course and summer pudding to finish.

Despite the restaurant failing to receive our booking through the ManCon website they couldn't have been more accommodating, quickly rearranging tables to fit us in. The service was excellent and the food, delicious. The pictures above are from the website and there were slight differences between the food you can see and what was presented, a mussel or two less, slightly less clotted cream but these things didn't matter. The portion sizes were perfect, we full satisfied but not too full.

I have never tried summer pudding before, always choosing something a bit naughtier but this was a pleasure to eat.

It was an excellent evening.

Cash 4 Kids

A huge well done to my friend, Heather, for helping to raise money for Cash 4 Kids, a charity supporting deprived children in the North West of England.

Heather, her brother Graham and his work mates have raised a fantastic £5,269!

Click on the link below for more details...
www.justgiving.com/tower2tower09

Summer Holiday

Bento boxes in Walrus

Grease at the open air cinema


On our motor boat on Lake Windermere

I have now returned to work following a wonderful week off.

On Monday we went to Hebden Bridge to stay with a family friend in her hotel. She had allocated us her 'Juliet' room, a lovely room with a balcony. In the evening I wore my new mint green Grecian dress then we met in the bar for wine before going to Rim Nam, a local Thai restaurant. The food was fantastic! Giant juicy prawns, succulent duck, lots of crispy, meat filled parcels dipped in salty soy and then a desert I wish I could remember but by then a wine fuelled fog had surrounded me.

Tuesday was spent wandering lazily round the shops and reading the latest OK! and Heat with big mugs of tea, slightly regretting the amount of wine I drank the night before. For dinner we went to a great pub, The Stubbings Wharf, for local cider and excellent pub grub. I had game stew in a huge Yorkshire pudding and the boyfriend had steak and ale pie. This was followed by a huge portion of treacle sponge and custard for me and cider sorbet for him. Both lovely. Then it was onto my friend's bar for their weekly quiz, where we missed out on first place by 1 point! I can't take any of the credit though, I only managed to answer the maths question. This wasn't down to too much wine, just my inability to retain general knowledge. I have since learnt though what the Kremlin is.

Wednesday was home to Manchester, a quick outfit change then straight to Selfridges. I bought a black and cream striped mini-dress from Warehouse and a new pair of leggings from Topshop. I could have bought much more, namely a pair of black trousers for work that fitted perfectly and a cute red puff sleeve jumper, but I resisted. I love wandering around Selfridges, especially the food section, lots of huge bowls of delicacies and delights that leave me lingering in front of the glass counter and ridiculously expensive American breakfast cereals that remind me of childhood trips to Florida. There are often new oils and balsamic vinegars to try and the spice section never fails to excite. Recently I bought some unexpectedly super-hot paprika which I tried in a Spanish beef stew, and loved, so this time I bought the sweet version. Then I headed to Marks and Spencer for fresh bread, three different cheeses, Parma ham, plum tomatoes and chutney, all things that make for a very tasty, but effortless meal.

Thursday we got an early train to Windermere hoping for sunshine, a boat trip, fish and chips and lots of greedy ducks to feed. The pretty tourist town delivered, with the exception of rubbish 'chippy' chips (coming from Grimsby I have high expectations of fish and chip shops). We had a fantastic day, thankfully we had remembered the factor 30, with my red hair and pale skin I am very careful in the sun. Plus tans are horrid and the plan is to look 35 when really I am 50. We had to endure a long and noisy two hour train journey where a group of teenage campers sang every track on their I pod libraries, out loud and might I add, terribly, and, to make a bad situation worse, a group of toddlers squealed for a whole hour without once being told by their parents to shush. Then we went to Spinningfields to watch Grease at the open air cinema. Our seats weren't great but the popcorn and complimentary glass of Eve certainly helped and we had fun. I walked home singing...'totally devoted to youuuuuuu'.

On Friday we went to Walrus for bento boxes (very tasty but soggy tempura prawns) then wandered to the Chocolate Cafe for hot chocolates and chocolate marshmallows, both gorgeous. We sat in the sunshine and watched the world go by. Then it was home for a short sleep, (just a short one, you should never over cook the power nap) before getting dressed up and heading to EastzEast for possibly one of the best Indian meals I've ever had. A busy restaurant with a good atmosphere, excellent service, nice wine and a very good choice of dishes. To kick-start we had poppadoms and the pickle tray which had pickles I'd never tried before, like plum and ginger. For our main course I had the prawn dopiaza, the boyfriend had the chicken shashlik which is served with a masala chickpea sauce, and we shared a peshwari naan. For pudding I chose a traditional Indian desert that was soft white patties in a milk syrup delicately flavoured with saffron, cardomon and pistachios. It was all delicious. I have been raving about it ever since and can't wait to go again. Next time I'll make sure I haven't been out for lunch only hours before and actually have an appetite.

Saturday we had a very late breakfast in Cup and bumped into my friend, her husband and their beautiful son Roman. Then we saw The Taking of Pelham 123 at the cinema which we enjoyed. I had planned on seeing Coco Before Chanel, but I hadn't realised this was in French and rather shamefully subtitles on the big screen are a bit too much for me. I'll wait for the DVD.

Sunday was back to Hebden Bridge to meet my mum and sister and their men folk for Sunday dinner, expertly cooked by my friend. It was gorgeous! Roast chicken, huge Yorkshire puddings, creamy mash, lots of veggies and excellent homemade gravy. The sun was still shining and we were home in time for Jam and Jerusalem and Louis Theroux's latest.

You'll notice that food featured heavily in our week off, as a result this evening I will be torturing myself in front of my Davina DVD in the hope that if I get off my ar*e and do it three times a week I'll be back to my normal size in a month or so. Here's hoping.

It was a pleasure to spend a week with the boyfriend, he is rather good company!

Roman

A quick update on my friend's new baby. With her permission I can now say welcome to little baby Roman Arthur! 

He is adorable and is already making his mummy and daddy very happy. 

I hope I look as well as my friend does this soon after giving birth, she looks fab. 

x

Ruby Red Toes

At 5.30pm on Thursday my annual leave officially began! The boyfriend and I have a week off work, our first since Christmas. 

I headed straight to The Macdonald Hotel for a luxury pedicure! I recently entered a competition on Manchester Confidential to win an over night stay at the hotel and unlimited use of the spa. Sadly I didn't win but entrants were given 50% off treatments for the whole of August. A perfect way to start my week. 

It was such a treat, an hour of being pampered. I chose ruby red nail polish and my typically not-so-pretty feet now look beautiful! The red goes splendidly with my black Bertie sandals and padding bare foot around our flat makes me happy.

I have been carefully planning our week off and after a quick trip to Grimsby to visit my dentist and an oh-my-god grey, meant to be white, filling later I'm back in Manchester, wine in hand with dinner in the oven. The boyfriend is out with 12 friends from Lancaster, his home town. Apparently having a lads night out on our week off is ok because its the weekend and only the week days count as actual annual leave! Hmm. 

Our plans include Coco Before Chanel and too much popcorn, visiting my friend/adopted big sister and her son at her gorgeous hotel in Hebden Bridge, a day out in Windermere, eating too much in EastzEast, testing The Chocolate Cafe's hot chocolate which I'm informed is 'lush, rich and an endorphin inducing revelation', wandering round Selfridges in the hope I leave with a new yellow bag, having breakfast in Cup, pretending I'm abroad and wearing pretty outfits. 

Super. 

Hen Party

This week I began the daunting, but equally exciting task of planning my best friend’s hen do. The bride has decided she would like Ladies Day at Newcastle Racecourse to be the main event and what the bride wants, the bride gets. I hope. This makes a refreshing change from a pub crawl in Blackpool wearing matching t-shirts and penis shaped headbands. Not that I don’t love a penis shaped headband, quite the contrary.

I’ve heard on the bridalvine that the best man is planning a long weekend in Benidorm for the stag do. My initial reaction to this was slight panic. Having to compete with sunshine, cheap cocktails and sandy beaches was going to be quite the challenge. But then I realised that firstly, it isn’t a competition and secondly, the bride’s wishes are completely different to the groom’s and as long as I follow her guidelines I’ll be fine. Plus, without offending the stags, isn't Benidorm a bit tacky?

On an obviously more important point, a long weekend in Benidorm doesn’t warrant posh dresses, fascinators and fabulous shoes.

One of my fellow bridesmaids prudently asked if it was too early to start shopping. My response? Its never too early to start shopping.

Give Blood

As a student I gave blood fairly regularly, anything for free tea and biscuits, but since graduating I’ve only been once or twice which is terrible considering there is a drop in centre within walking distance of my office (Norfolk House Donor Clinic).

Last week my friends and I decided to make the effort to go so appointments were made and armed with the latest OK! I went today to donate my pint!

The two orange club biscuits afterwards made it all worth it.

I promise to try and make it a regular thing.

A New Arrival

From previous posts, in particular 'Baby Shower' you will know a friend of mine has been expecting a baby.


Well, the baby has arrived!

I've not asked for permission to post this so for now all I will say that 'it' is a little boy and mummy and baby are doing well.

Congratulations! Can't wait to meet the little guy.

I will be popping to The White Company during my lunch break to choose a gift. (After 39 hours of labour, yes you read that right, I doubt my friend will read this for a while so it will remain a surprise!).

Huge Feet

This morning I realised I hadn't updated you on the French Sole situation.

I met my friend (who is due to give birth in exactly 6 days!) for lunch at Bacchanalia (average, nothing special) before heading to Selfridges. Upon arrival we discovered that oh heck, they had a sale on. My French Soles were reduced by £36, a huge saving!

Their website warned me that their sizes are on the small side but I was stunned, traumatised even, that I needed a size 8, I'm normally a 6 and a half! But the purchase was made and I went home to parade around my flat in my new 'I've just been promoted and I've wanted these for months' shoes.

And then it hit. They were too small. The next day I returned to Selfridges to wish them well and say goodbye, more trauma!

I am awaiting an email from frenchsole.com to inform me that the next size is back in stock.

Miss Senior Secretary!

Just a short post to share with you all some news...

My work have promoted me to Senior Secretary! Whoop whoop!

Tomorrow I shall be meeting my friends for lunch and proposing a trip to Selfridges to finally, yawn, buy the French Soles I have been dreaming about.

Hopefully I'll be skipping home with a yellow shoe box shaped bag!

Betty Silver

A friend and I hadn't made plans for the weekend so decided to treat Betty Silver to an outing and get together for a sewing day. Once she arrived the boyfriend was put to good use and sent for wine and Maltesers. One wine bottle turned into 3. I don't know what's worse, the calories or the units?

10 months a go I bought some black and white flock fabric from material heaven Abakhan. It was a bargain and I had every intention of making cushion covers but never quite managed to make a start.

With my friend's encouragement we made a return trip to purchase the cushions needed and with scissors in one hand and wine in the other we began our envelope cover mission with a little help from Kirstie.

We had a great afternoon, I was so chuffed with the end results! The boyfriend has been warned that if I find a single droplet of spilt tea on my beautiful cushions he'll be shipped back to his mum's!

To my sewing partner, thanks for all your help! x

Baby Shower

Baby showers are an American thing recently adopted by us English folk, although suitably toned down, thankfully. No-one could compete with the Tiffany gifts given at Miranda’s baby shower as seen on Sex and the City. Lets not be silly.

A friend of mine is 8 months pregnant and as I love to bake and feed people I suggested we organise a small tea party/baby shower for her and some friends. One last get together before the baby arrives and life is never the same again.

After being told not to ‘make a fuss’ I decided to ignore the boss and secretly ordered some decorations from babyshowerhost.com. Who knew these websites existed? There must be some keen baby shower hosts out there. I was also directed, by the gorgeous Nigella, to a fab online specialist cake company where I found the rather cute cookie cutters, as pictured above.

Then I set about planning my menu. We decided against alcohol from the off, if the star of the show couldn't drink I didn't think it was fair to let everyone else get giggly on the wine (plenty of time for that after the stork drops off the new arrival). As afternoon tea was the theme I decided upon smoked salmon sandwiches and cute cup cakes plus one show stopping cake to grace my Nigella cake stand. Any excuse to show it off.

Saturday was spent tied to a hot oven wishing outdoor kitchens existed. Then Sunday arrived and we whizzed through homemade lemonade, chocolate and Guinness cup cakes, a stunning red velvet cake with American frosting, rocking horse shaped double choc chip cookies (the Flamingos were sadly made redundant – their skinny legs and necks made transporting the pre-cooked cookie from work top to baking tray near impossible), sandwiches and orange jellies with jelly babies hidden inside. What a mission but 2.30pm arrived and we were ready. There was a slight last minute rush but my friend’s husband helped out by getting the ladders out and putting up our bunting!

We had a great afternoon, two of the girls bought their children, one being just a year old and the other only 7 weeks! Gifts were given, photos were taken and it was a really lovely occasion.

My latest lovely from Lipsy

I wasn't actively on the look out for a new dress but when one catches your eye and dazzles you it's hard to resist. Even harder when it fits perfectly and looks fabulous! Pay day had finally arrived only a few days previously so I knew I could afford to splash out and with summer practically on the door step I figured I'd need a new dress for all the parties I was planning on attending!

This little darling is strapless, has origami pleats in the skirt, a deep waistband and a boned bodice. Gorgeously perfect for this season. I honestly couldn't help it!

The Gorgeous Girls Aloud

This post is a little late, I had hoped to get it written last week but I've been a busy girl enjoying the glorious sunshine, shopping and drinking wine. A little too much of the latter two, but that's another post! 

As you know, my friends and I headed to Birmingham to see the fabulous Girls Aloud one Wednesday in May. A hotel was booked, a dress was bought and I was excited!

It was my job to print off directions to the hotel and the NIA, Google helped me out and I had the maps at the ready. Once we were all lip glossed and looking lovely we headed out to the venue. My friend, map in hand, lead us girls to...not the NIA, but Birmingham's business quarter. I'd mistakenly printed directions to the law courts. Never again will I be given the task of sorting out directions. 

A speedy emergency taxi ride later we eventually arrived! Once wands (a tradition) and drinks were purchased we took our seats, which were, by the way, excellent!

The next morning we all woke up with super hangovers wishing we'd gone a bit easier on the Sailor Jerry's, fantastic night though! Thanks girls! x