Author: ramblingmads

I am a thirtysomething from London, with a cat, a husband, bookshelves which keep threatening to crush me under their load and chronic health conditions. Basically your average over stressed millennial. Welcome.
gardening, healthy, lifestyle

How does your garden grow

ramblingmads

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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

ramblingmads

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

ramblingmads

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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

ramblingmads

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.

ramblingmads

books, reviews

Book Review – Frog Music by Emma Donaghue

ramblingmads

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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.

ramblingmads

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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ramblingmads

books, rip, terry pratchett

“Terry took Death’s arm…”

ramblingmads

Sir Terry Pratchett died today it has just been announced. He was one of my favourite authors and I have pretty much all of his books.

I met him once, he won the Carnegie Award for The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents and I was at the Polka Dot Theatre in Wimbledon for the ceremony as part of a school delegation. I was 14.

Somewhere I have the photos I took on a disposable camera, he was kind and funny, charming to those who queued to get their books signed, as I did.

His books meant a lot to me. Growing up I was pretty socially awkward and preferred books to people. The Discworld was the perfect place to escape to.

He was an immensely talented writer, knighted for his services to literature, and a campaigner for Alzheimer’s, having been diagnosed with it a few years ago.

I grew up with his books and with his knowledge, that libraries exist in L-space and bookshops are just genteel black holes that know how to read.

It’s a shame there will be no more stories, and I will be thinking of his friends and family at this time.

Thank you for the stories Sir Terry.
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ramblingmads

beauty, beauty boxes, make up, my little box, reviews

My Little Super Box

ramblingmads

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I quite like that My Little Box has a theme each month, last month it was My Little French Box and this month it’s My Little Super Box.

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The packaging is really cute and addressed to the Marvellous Madeleine, which is always welcome!

Inside is a whole bundle of goodies.

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As well as the usual mini magazine, there are superhero stickers, a t-shirt rolled up, and three full-size beauty products.

My Little Beauty branded cheek and lip tint in coral, I do like a two-in-one product.

Garnier Miracle Sleeping Cream – I don’t currently use a night cream so I might give this a road test.

Kerastase Cristal – a conditioner for dry hair and split ends. Not sure about whether my slightly greasy at the roots and grumpy at the ends hair will like this, but it’s worth a go.

On the little ‘what’s in my box’ sheet it gives the prices if you were to buy the individual products and trust me when I say the £13 this box cost is an absolute bargain.

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ramblingmads

paris, travel, wish i was there...

Paris, mon ami

ramblingmads

Is there a place you’ve visited that you could happily move to? Although I fell for Venice last year when I went there, my heart still belongs to Paris.

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I love London, it’s my hometown, it’s where my friends are and as Samuel Johnson said

when a (wo)man is tired of London, (s)he is tired of life.

But Paris, especially in Spring, is beautiful. My French is atrocious, but I can learn, I have French names so I would fit in, a whole district and I share a name.

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I love the faded glamour of Montmartre and Pigalle, the wealth and gloss of the champs Elysee. The view from Sacre Coeur and the gargoyles on Notre Dame.

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The madness of Parisian drivers, reversing down one way streets and ignoring traffic lights, the bistros on every corner, the Metro, the smell of fresh bread.

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I don’t find charming the fact that no one scoops the dog poop or how rude shop assistants are.

But nowhere’s perfect, right?

Where’s your favourite place?

ramblingmads

beauty, beauty boxes, latest in beauty, make up, reviews, skincare

Latest in Beauty – The Beauty Bible Loves

ramblingmads

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I bought this on a whim. But it’s full of nice goodies and randomly came with three samples of Avon’s Cherish eau de parfum.

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A mix of sample size and full size products.

Pitrok Crystal deodorant wipes – not something I’ve come across before but probably incredibly useful, especially if you commute in the summer.

Crabtree & Evelyn Verbena & Lavender hand cream, handbag size and nice scent.

Merumaya Melting Cleansing Balm sample – you just get one but it seems to be really easy to use and a nice little tester.

Dr Organic Dead Sea Mineral Bio-Plasma Mask – I do like a face mask, and Dr Organic products are usually out of my price range.

Bellapierre Cosmetics volumizing mascara – I’m a bit fussy about mascaras but my mum and bestie do quite well out of that fact.

Rituals Miracle Scrub – a hand scrub which I will be road-testing not on my well moisturised hands but on my boyfriend’s sandpaper palms.

John Masters Organics detangler and shampoo samplers. I was thinking of changing shampoos, well I will be testing this next time I wash my hair.

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