Month: Mar 2015

art, challenges, healthy, instagram, lifestyle, mindfulness

Mandalas and mindfulness

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Mandala means ‘sacred circle’ and in Eastern cultures are symbols of wholeness and eternity.

They are often used as a form of art therapy as they are absorbing and meditative.

I’ve been trying to practice mindfulness and learn to control my anxiety better.

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And this week I’ve been colouring as a way to relax the part of my brain that panics and worries, and stimulate my creative side again.

I got the first issue of Art Therapy magazine which had some interesting patterns to colour in.

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I’ve got some colouring books for adults to work on, so far I’m quite enjoying it and I do feel calmer when I’m doing it.

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I’ll be posting them over on my  Instagram so if you’re interested come and take a look.

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beauty boxes, clean eating, food, healthy, lifestyle, recipes, skincare

The Vegan Kind Mystery Box

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So a little box of treats winged its wayt to me from Glasgow.

I am trying to eat better and stay away from chemical heavy cosmetics and beauty products so I thought The Vegan Kind’s boxes would be worth a look.

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This is apparently a mystery box, presumably they are themed. This one contained several edible things and a body wash.

There was a pouch of pear puree which went into my herbalife shake along with a banana.

The red banana powder is something I already use and like, so this was a bonus as it’s not particularly cheap.

The gingerbread topper mix – designed for I think granola or muesli will either end up in a shake or on a fruit salad.

Quinoa crisps which I will try during the week with some quark dip.

Teabags – I like a herbal tea every now and then – so these will be drunk at some point.

Recipe card – what a lovely idea, including a recipe card so you can make something tasty – this one’s for a super green smoothie.

Finally the Organic Surge shower gel – started using this yesterday – smells amazing and really cleansing. And it’s a generous full-size bottle not a dinky sample.

I’ve also ordered their vegan beauty box to test out, will review once it’s delivered.

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life, studying

Mortarboards and gowns

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Today, Callum, my boyfriend, finally graduated with his Masters degree in psychology.

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We went to the Barbican arts centre in Central London for the ceremony as he did his degree with OU. It took him 6 years part-time while working, training and playing sledge hockey with team GB.

I like to tease him because I did my Masters in a year while working and found writing my dissertation exhausting. He didn’t have to do a dissertation for this.

I am really proud of him for keeping with it even when they changed his course twice, and he struggled with the sheer cost of it all.

He looked very fetching in his blue robe, shaking hands with dotcom millionaire, chancellor of the OU Baroness Martha Lane-Fox, who gave a somewhat rambling speech advertising the OU to people who had just graduated!

Actress and baking goods businesswoman Jane Asher was awarded an honourary degree for her charitable work for the National Autistic Society and Parkinson’s Association, and she also made a speech that could have done with an edit.

My hands ached after clapping all the new graduates off the stage and I was glad to escape the Barbican (a place I ordinarily enjoy being in) for the streets of the City of London.

We went for dinner in a slightly eccentric restaurant, that I’m sure had moved further away, despite being exactly where I remembered it!

Now we need to find another space on the wall for his certificate (mine aren’t on display, I don’t feel comfortable). There are mutterings of another degree, perhaps in history and I’m still trying to decide whether or not to do a PhD!

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The stage before it all kicked off

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adventures, challenges, exercise, healthy, herbalife, lifestyle, yoga

Ouch!

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I went to my first Fit Club session last night, led by my friend Kayleigh and now I ache all over.

I am not remotely fit, but it’s time to remedy that, having spent the last few months changing my eating habits, I’ve decided my sloth-like habits need to as well.

Wednesday nights are Fit Club, and hopefully Thursday afternoon will be yoga, I’ve sent an email to a local yogi so fingers crossed there’s space in her class.

Bits of my body ache that I don’t really get why, and since I walk everywhere, really shouldn’t.

What’s your fitness routine? Are you a gym bunny or a sloth like me? 🙂 Let me know your favourite exercises/work outs in the comments.

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gardening, healthy, lifestyle

How does your garden grow

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I have a tiny patio out the back of my flat and it is covered in plant pots. Some have flowers (my daffodils look great) but others are growing useful, tasty plants. I have a chilli plant, basil, sage, parsley and hopefully spinach when it comes through.

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Last year's chilli harvest, currently making olive oil delicious

Most herbs get their start on the kitchen windowsill, no squirrels digging them up there, lots of sun and I can keep an eye on their moisture levels. At the moment mint, lemon sage and lavender are chilling with my aloe plant, a bromeliad and some baby bonsai trees inside.
There’s also my cacti garden, probably the easiest plants to look after and in the front room a gerboa daisy is hanging out with desert dwelling cactus and poinsettia (still alive three months after Christmas).

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I’m hoping my raspberry cane will yield some fruit in the summer and I got a gooseberry to go with it.

My parents have raised vegetable beds in their back garden but I don’t have the space so everything has to grow in a pot, including the banana tree a friend gave me to carry home on the Tube.

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Soon they will be flowers

Waiting for things to spring back to life, to flower and blossom is frustrating but will be worth it when Spring properly rolls around.

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blog awards, blogging

Liebster Award

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The lovely Marcella nominated me for a blog award – the Liebster Award. It was a little while ago, so I apologise about only getting round to writing this post now.

I have to answer some questions she asked on her blog and nominate some bloggers of my own. So here we go!

Nadia’s Questions:

1. Why did you start blogging? I had another blog a long time ago and I realised I missed it, so here I am!

2. Phobias? Spiders, ewww, they make me feel sick.

3. Costa or Starbucks? Neither really, I don’t drink coffee or tea so these places are wasted on me.

4. Superstitions? I say hello to cats, and magpies, don’t open umbrellas indoors or walk under ladders and I have been known to pick up pennies in the street.

5. Favourite song? errmm, not sure, there’s so many I like. But ‘Ampersand’ by Amanda Palmer is definitely up there.

6. Party or stay home? Stay home and party in my pjs 🙂

7. Single? Nope, live with my long suffering boyfriend, Cal.

8. Favourite lush product? Celestial is my go-to moisturiser, although I love a lot of their products.

9. Junk food junkie? Nope, clean eating and looking after myself at the moment means no junk food.

10. Heels or flats? Flats, I can’t walk in heels, ever seem a video of a newborn giraffe, staggering about? That’s me.

11. Pet peeves? I live in London, we get a lot of tourists, they walk incredibly slowly and clog up the pavement, I wish they wouldn’t, I have places to be!

Ok, so I need to pick someone to answer my questions.

I nominate: Dorkchops, Everything Nadia and Beauty and the Mechanic

Here’s your questions girls.

1. Favourite food?

2. TV show of the moment?

3. Desert island beauty essentials

4. If you were putting together a beauty box – what 3 items would you most want to be in it?

5. Favourite book?

6. Heels or trainers?

7. What’s the one place on your bucket list you’re determined to visit?

8. Short nails or long talons?

9. Pets?

10. What are your new season colours?

11. Where’s Wally?

Ok, so there you go. Pass it on. 🙂

beauty boxes, glossybox, make up, reviews, skincare

March Glossybox Review

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March’s Glossybox arrived today, so let’s take a look inside. The theme seems to be pink and black.

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NCLA nail polish in Like…Totally Valley Girl. This is very pink and I don’t really feel I will get much use from it.

Sleek Make Up Pout Paint in Rosette – another really pink product. Although giving it an experimental squeeze produced clear, very sticky, goop.

Essence Lash Princess Volume Mascara – clearly beauty box companies think we can never have enough mascara. The bottle’s pretty but due to the extreme sensitivity of my eyes I doubt this will be for me – one for the Give and Make Up box I’m putting together.

Naobay Moisturizing Peeling milk – apparently this is designed for removing dead skin from your face. Will have to give it a go.

Dove Youthful Vitality Shampoo and Conditioner for ageing hair – I am 28, as is my hair (I was born with a full head of dark curls that gradually went blonde) I am not ageing. My mum will be getting these – she’s almost 60 and was complaining about her thin hair the other day!

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All in all a mixed box. Next month is crunch time, which box will I keep and which will be cancelled?

Apparently next month’s Glossybox is inspired by the Golden Age of Hollywood. As my profile pic is Rita Hayworth, that should be (hopefully) right up my street.

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make up, nail polish, nails inc

Nails Inc in a box

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So I found a discount voucher for Nails Inc and as I can’t resist nail polish I treated myself.

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I got nail kale nail strengthener, top coat and two nail polishes as well as the blossom nail decoration set.

Nails Inc sent me a free gift of three mini shades and randomly a kinder bueno chocolate bar.

Free delivery on top of that. Ordered Saturday and here this morning. Rather chuffed. Now if only my nails were not so brittle.

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books, reviews

Book Review – Frog Music by Emma Donaghue

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Based on a true story about a murder in San Francisco when it was still a new city, Donaghue spins a story involving circus folk, music, measles, baby farms, dancing girls and frog hunting.

Jenny Bonnet (pronounced Bonn-ay) was a teenage tearaway who spent time in a reform school before becoming a trouser-wearing frog hunter in the ponds and swamps around the fledgeling San Francisco, supplying the restaurant trade with that delicacy, frog legs.

When she was 27 she was shot dead in a guesthouse outside the city. No one was ever convicted of the killing.

Using old newspaper articles and court records, Donaghue fleshes out the story of Bonnet’s life and death. Narrated by Blanche Beunon, a French acrobat turned stripper and prostitute, who befriended Jenny shortly before her death, the novel depicts the struggles of immigrants, living hand to mouth in Chinatown.

The details of Bonnet’s life were scarce so this allowed Donaghue, whose last book was the harrowing Room, a lot of scope to write an imaginative, colourful narrative peopled by outrageous characters and a complex tangle of emotions and motives at its centre.

This book is well worth a read, whether historical fiction is your thing or not.

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blogging, upcoming

Upcoming…

ramblingmads

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Hi,

Just wanted to talk about upcoming things on the blog.
I will still blog about beauty boxes, beauty in general, books, baking and, invariably shoes (I love shoes).
But I have other interests and things I want to blog about, and as this is my blog, I will.
If you aren’t interested in a post I’ve written, skip it and come back when I write about something you keen to read about. There will always be variety.

For example, I want to talk about feminism and what it means to me, or learning yoga, or my journey through the minefield of depression and anxiety, shoes (seriously, I love shoes), trips, events, days out, why people are incapable of walking at anything but snail’s pace (my pet peeve), my new diet and healthy lifestyle, why snails make me cry and why geese are evil!
So stay tuned, keep an eye on the post tags, check out what’s new, say hi, and admire shoes with me (mmmm, new season, new shoes). 🙂

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