Coffee from Bali

I have some serious wanderlust going on at the moment. My bestie came over on Saturday night with tales from her travels to Bali and a bag of delicious coffee as proof. It is so good, already had four pots of the stuff, shared of course.

Her stories of a massage every other day and a visit to a nigh on deserted island, make me green. But I still love to hear them and dream of getting away.

We usually get away a couple of times a year for maybe a long weekend and a week or 2 somewhere else, but with the wedding coming up we decided to wait this year. I know we have a week away booked for straight after the wedding and planning for a couple of weeks over Christmas somewhere, but I want to go now *stamps feet and pokes out bottom lip*

Oh well I guess I will just have to wait, I mean it's not really that far away (about 13 weeks! eek), I think I am just feeling a little frazzled at the moment. Time is flying and I just feel like I'm trading water, planning a wedding is not easy when you're as disorganised as me.

Brighton Tattoo Convention

This weekend we did something a bit different, we took a trip to Brighton to attend their annual Tattoo convention. 

Brighton Tattoo Convention

It was held at the Hilton hotel in Brighton, and was jam packed full of artists doing their thing. The loud buzz of the tattoo guns was overpowering as you walked in, with two floors full with artists from all over the world.

Our only complaint would be that there seemed to be a lot of people doing the same thing, I understand that the traditional Sailor Jerry style is very much in fashion at the moment and so where the money is,  but it would have been nice to see a bit more variety.

By Paco at Gilded Cage Tattoo

One stand that did impress was Gilded Cage Tattoo a lot of the designs were so intricate and detailed. I fell in love with the above print and had to have it for our home. There was actually a girl getting this tattooed on her leg while we were there, beautiful.

I was even more surprised to find out that they are actually based in Brighton, think a visit may be on the cards in the not too distant future...

We picked up a few other business cards too, saw some friends who were manning the Sailor Jerry stand, and Alexis Camburn from Holy Cow Tattoo she was engrossed in her work so didn't get to say Hi. Overall it was a great day and I'm really glad we went, not sure we'll be there next year but you never know. 

Bookshop Thai

As part of our New Year goals we made a pact not to order take aways. So at the end of each month if we succeed we can treat ourselves to a night out. So we did it, and Saturday night the Bookshop Thai was our restaurant of choice.

It literally is a Thai restaurant in a bookshop, we love books so being surrounded by them while we ate really was a treat. We were seated in a little nook, quite early evening so it was nice and quiet too.  

I can't remember the names of all the dishes but they were all delicious, we will definitely revisit this little gem.

As you can see I made an attempt to use my camera a bit more, the quality still isn't great and I still have a long way to go, but I'm working on it :o)

Sugar Roses

I don't know if I've mentioned but I am planning to make my own wedding cake. They just seem so expensive and putting the word wedding in front of anything seems to bump up the price ten fold, so I though I would give it a bash. 

We had decided on a traditional fruit cake as this is on of our favourites, it can also be baked months in advance so that would take some of the pressure off. But I still wanted it to look a bit fancy so on Saturday I attended a cake decorating class with my mum and aunt to learn how to make sugar roses.

We started with a tear drop of icing and just started adding petals.

They shape up quite quick,

It can be fiddly and you have to remember to do things in the right order,

I was super pleased with how they came out, a little direction goes a long way.

Also had a quick bash at buttercream roses, they are crazy easy when you know how and have the right tools.

What do you think? Not bad for a first attempt.

We took the class at Dee's Creative Cakes she does do scheduled classed, but you can also book in for a private class if there is something specific you want to do, like we did.

Treat Day!

This is me and my man getting a little over excited about our treat day milkshakes.

Part of a pact we have made for 2014 to help get us into shape is to cut out the take aways and to treat ourselves to 1 treat day a week. Thankfully this weeks treat day fell on my besties birthday, so we headed out to the local American Diner, The Pelican for dinner. It's a lovely little restaurant filled with retro furniture, and American themed food, (They do the best breakfast pancakes). We both went for the deluxe burgers made with homemade patties, cheese and bacon. Accompanied with the above milkshakes and a side of rosemary fries, which are amazing. One of our group even wanted another bowl for afters they are that good.

After we had all had our fill, we headed off to the FILO pub (First in Last Out) for birthday drinks and festivities.

So far we are doing very well with our, 1 treat day and look forward all week to the feasts we plan for the Saturday, I know its only been a week but hopefully the promise of super tasty, naughty food at the end of the week will help us suffer through the healthy, vegtastic week days. Not that the healthy food is horrible, just that we both have a fairly sweet tooth and are quite week willed when it comes to a junk food binge.

I did however fail miserably on one of my other goals for this year, to take more pictures. I took our little camera out with us, and left it in my bag the whole night. Even the above was sent to me by a friend. So I really must try harder with this one and get over my hang ups of whipping out my camera in public. 

Mexican Night!

Arriba, Saturday night , we were in Mexico! Well not quite, but it was Mexican themed. There were Margaritas, Chilli and Tequila Sunrises.

We periodically go over to our friends house for night of drinking, they have kiddies, we don't it's an easy way to get together. We don't usually theme the evenings but for some reason this time we did, and it was great fun. We even cracked out the playing cards for a drinking game which took us into the early hours. Easy rules thankfully, everyone get a card, lowest card takes a glug from the designated cocktail in the middle. The end of the game was reached when we ran out of booze.

Just wish I'd taken more pictures, Adam took a few videos of the cocktail glug reactions, which I personally feel should never see the light of a public forum. So they will be for personal consumption only.

Needless to say Sunday was spent nursing hangovers in front of the T.V.

Do you ever do theme night's with friends, any suggestions for our next one?

Rainy Day = Cake

The weather today was grim. Heavy rain, hail, thunder and lightning, so we ventured out in the morning to get some breakfast and do some shopping at the fishmongers and butchers (hark at us). Then it just got too much so we decided to be shut in's for the afternoon, indulged in a tasty bacon sandwich made with butcher meat, then I got down to some cake baking. 

Go to sponge cake recipe, courtesy of Rachel Allen "it's so fluffy" mmm, strawberry jam and whipped cream. Think I put too much cream in though, because it all squidged out when I tried to cut it, oh well didn't stop it being scrummy.