The year in review ... 2014!

2014

New year is a time for reflection so I have been having a think about my 2014 experience. It has been an amazing year and will be a pretty hard one to top to be fair. 

January

We kickstarted the new year as we meant go on by attending our good friends wedding at Durham Castle, it was a wonderful day and the bride was simply stunning. January was also quite special for me as I reconnected with a good friend … life is too short to loose good friends.

February & March

February was quite quiet, we were continuing with the wedding planning and hitting the gym hard! March was pretty much the same as February, there was a lot of time at the gym as we hit 6 weeks to the wedding. I went for my wedding hair trial with my cousin … only took 102 hair grips hehe mum was also well underway with the alterations to my dress.

Beast mode at the gym

102!!

NEW INK!!!

Really I should have posted this weeks ago. When I was down south me and the Fiancé decided to go and get new tattoos. Fiancé's sister V had been to a local place near a few times so she said we could go there with her.

Turned out fiancé's cousins partner M also a new tattoo so his cousin O said he would drive us all. The place we went Camberly Tattoo is a walk in only shop so we went for it opening. Fiancé and me knew what we wanted M and V were a little less sure, in the end the 4 of us all came out with new ink hehe O didnt but then hes not a fan. Safe to say it was an odd family day out, but fun.

Originally I wanted the design I got on my ribs but the lad pointed out that with it being round and having straight lines if I moved at all it would look awful. So I swapped to having it on my ankle opposite my cat. I can still cover it up if anyone says anything with either dark tights or trousers.

Fiancé went in first as he wanted his arm piece all re-done, in the end it took an hour and a half but it looks awesome.

Before - looks a lot darker in this pic it was actually a bit patchy

NEW INK! you can see its a lot more complete and coloured in much better. 

Here is my new mandala inspired ink!

I love my new mandala inspired tattoo. Took the guy barely any time at all. The middle is interlocking S's for me and the fiancé. 

This was us post tattooing, Fiancé looks like he was mauled by an animal, V went to give blood I got  sprained ankle and M well I'll let you decide on that one. 

So I finally got my new ink and I am thrilled. The only bad part was that we bought bepanthen cream to help with healing and it would seem that I am allergic because my ankle swelled up and hurt like hell. I had to keep cooling it down with cold water, in the end I washed all the cream off and just used a unscented lotion till I got home and could use some lavender oil. It was quite red for ages and took ages to heal which was a bit worrying as all my other ones healed much faster  but now its all fine.

When I looked it up it turns out allergies to bepanthen are quite common after tattoos so I would advise any reader to stick to either savlon or good old lavender oil.

I still want more tattoos but will have to save up big time for my back piece and any others ... well I think I am running out of coverable places to have them so they woul involve a bit of logistics.

xXx

Weight training ... time to get buff ...

With the wedding only a few months away I have decided to hit the gym hard in an aim to get buff for my big day. Part of that includes making sure that my arms are all toned for my strapless dress. This involves doing some weight training, I would do this at the gym but a lot of the machines are too wide for my shoulders so I cant get the right motion without it feeling uncomfortable. The other option is the weight room however this is usually filled with meat heads who are annoying as hell. 

So I decided that the best thing to do would be to make use of the fiancés weight gear at home. See he has a bar and barbells with lots of different weight, so I can reduce the weight to suit my needs and do stuff without feeling like I'm being stared at by a bunch of meat heads. 

As such this weekend fiancé has been teaching me a few exercises I can do at home with him spotting. First up was dead lifts, this is where you squat down with the bar in front of you then lift the bar up to your waist keeping your back straight. The next one was the squat, like it sounds you stand feet shoulder width apart then squat, only difference is that you hold the bar across the back of your shoulders. 

Mid squat - push down through your heels 

Gotta keep that back straight

It was a lot of fun, I've been doing squats at the gym with a kettle bell or with the weighted bar thingy but it was good to do them with a proper weights bar and weight. Fingers crossed after doing a few months of these along with my normal gym routine I will be all toned up and ready for my dress fitting in January. 

Think I am going to stick to doing these at home with the fiancé spotting me for the time being, never know in a month or two I might be strong enough to try doing some at the gym.

Next up I need to start doing bicep curls and maybe see if I can find something to do flys on to help tone up my upper arms. The pulldown is good at the gym but its always best to switch up your exercises so you tear different parts of muscle and so you don'g get complacent, your muscle starts to remember the movements so it becomes less effective this is when its time to switch up the weight and the exercise. This is why I have been trying to rotate through some different exercises for my muscle groups, keep them guessing and when it starts getting easy ... up the weight!! 

Go Hard or Go Home!! 

xXx

Check this out ....

For anyone who happens to read my ramblings, I think you should check out my Fiancé's blog - From Fat to Fit. He will be doing a guest post at some point soon about his training regime ... he's training for the Great North Run.

From Fat to Fit

xXx

New Tattoo .... what do to???

I love tattoos, they can be amazing pieces of art that decorate, a memento, bring closure or cover up a scar.

At the moment I have 6!! 

I'm seriously an ink addict! Due to the fact I'm training to be a barrister all of my tats are discreet and carefully placed. I haven't had a new one done in about 2-3 years which is really annoying but at the same time a tattoo should be personal and I didn't want to get a new one just to get a new one. 

Fiancé is also a bit of an ink addict he's got 4. Tribal piece top of his right arm, single star inside right forearm, three stars down the outside of his left arm and my favourite a treble clef with shaded background inside of his left forearm. He wants the tribal one cleaned up and I drew him a drum stick with music scrolled up if for the outside of his right arm to balance his left stars and because he's a drummer.

Anyway the time has come to finally get a new piece of ink!! There is one piece I have been working on for a long time, I would love to have this as my next piece but its big and I need to save up. So I am trying to decide what to get next and more importantly where to get it. This one is the real killer, I need it somewhere discreet that I can cover for court. 

This is what I would like for a back piece. 

This one would


The runs down at the minute is as follows:

My first tattoo, double rose heart, in nearly the same place as my mums tattoo which is a single coloured rose. I got this just after I turned 18 and my mum took me to get it hehe its the only one that I didn't draw my self. This is at the top of my left butt cheek hehe just under my waist band. 

Next up I have my dads initials on the inside on my right wrist and mums on my left wrist. My mums initials aren't amazing the same person did my back and they weren't very good but didn't know till after I got them which annoyed me. I have considered getting some twisty pattern round these but not too sure. 

William Russell and Brenda Louisa, my amazing parents!

This is my current back piece, a tribal double infinity. I need to get this looked at before my wedding to see if it can my neatened up, like I said above the girl wasn't very good. 

Double tribal infinity.
(ps pic is from ages ago, note I have black hair and this is my old room)

 I also have a tribal pattern on my stomach just up from my right hip. Also close up of mums initials when they were new and clean. 

Two little mistakes on this one

 This one is really special to me its a cat on my right ankle in memory of my cat. It sounds odd but I had a black cat called panther for as long as I can remember until I was 19!! it was really strange the first time I went home from uni and he wasn't there so this was so I could keep him with me. 

My heart and cat were done by the same person hence they are really good compared to the others. I should have learned my lesson after the girl made the first mistake on the others but I had seen other peoples work and it was really good so thought it might have just been the compact design, apparently not. Wont be going back there, going to go somewhere that I know does good work. 

Any way the reason for this post is to ask if anyone has any ideas where I can get my next one, I'm thinking on my side on my ribs ie where Miley Cyrus has her dream catcher. You can see I am running out of places, both wrists, centre of my back, ankle, right side of my stomach then the back piece will go down the right hand side of my back to balace my left bum cheek hehe What do people think??

xXx

A day out with the boy!

So the other day I was home from work early to spend some time with my boy, see he works in retail so can end up working all weekend then having two days off in the week. This can get a little frustrating when you want to do stuff and when I work mon to fri. So the other day we decided to make the most of the sunshine, on went the shorts and off we went ... well almost. First we had to decide on something cheap and cheerful we could do in the local area, unfortunately we dont have a garden or we would just spend time out there. 

Anyway after a little bit of googling we found a local 18 hole mini golf course 5 minutes drive away and off we went. It was a lot of fun, a bit easy most of them par 2 but oh well we had a good time and took some funny pics. I know this selection are a bit small but meh. 

xXx

A wonderful weekend in Didsbury

So myself and the fiancé spent the recent bank holiday weekend in Manchester with our friends. We went to stay at their new apartment with some other friends from Southampton. We dont get to see these friends that often so it was really nice to get together for the whole weekend and chill out. We were also celebrating the fact that Saturday was exactly a year to the day of our wedding!! So it would be exactly a year until we were all celebrating again, but in a more formal setting and with different outfits.

Our friends apartment is amazing, its in an old converted hospital so all the ceilings are very high and the exterior is amazing to look at. The surrounding flat  blocks were also really nice all finished to a high standard so they made the area look really cute. Anyway aside from a beautiful exterior the interior has been done really well, its like visiting an expensive hotel with plush carpet and close up artistic canvases of the building.

Their flat is really nice too, rectangular space with the bedroom and lounge on the exterior wall and a second bedroom almost like a mezzanine level over the kitchen dining part of the lounge. Its hard to explain but very cool as the little second bedroom has little slat shutters you can open and look down on the lounge from.

Anyway after we had arrived and caught up on life we went into the city centre to visit an art gallery. It was really nice, the three girls went on a fashions of the 17th century tour while the lads had a wander round. There were some really amazing paintings on display and some very peculiar ones. The gallery had an exibit on that was really odd, all the pieces were exquisit compositions but the subject matter was a bit unusual at times. I will let you decide, the artists name is Raqib Shaw.

After a few hours in the gallery we went back to Didsbury to get ready for dinner. Fiancé had decided to try out a new outfit he found on Pinterest. Casual shirt, black waist coat, burgundy casual dicky bow,  blue jeans then tan shoes and belt. He looked very cute, totally rocked it.

                                             

Our meal was amazing, we went to a local restaurant called Alberts (http://albertsdidsbury.com/) the staff were really friendly and the atmosphere was cool. My main was  a little bit late and our waiters looked distraught, kept looking over from the pass where they were hurrying the kitchen along, then profusely apologised for my wait. After our lovely meal we went for a walk to a local pub, which was huge, for a drink then decided to call it a night. 

Right to left, Groom, Bestman, Groomsman.

On Sunday we went back to the Trafford centre to play mini golf. Having never been to the Trafford centre it was definitely an experience. A bit like the Metrocentre or Meadowhall  but with more decoration. The mini golf was really good, well maintained, clean and actually a lot of fun. We played 18 holes but had to go round as two groups so it was girls followed by the boys. Strangely enough the boys were a little bit more competitive then us girls hehe

The couple that mini golfs together...

I love the fiancé and the groomsman in this one!

Well hello ... 

A baker, an engineer and a med student walked into a bar ...  heheh After mini golf we decided to have a look in Selfridges. The med student had no idea what this was so fiancé (baker) explained, I knew making him watch Mr Selfridge would come in handy. The food court was amazing! I could have spent a small fortune, and thats just on American candy hehe we kept it under a small fortune and just got some Hersheys kisses, a pot of Lucky Charms and I treated the fiancé to a pot of Reeses peanut butter, he was very happy about this.

After running round the food court we decided to go for a wander into the main clothing area. Did you know there is a Primark inside Sefridges?? well I didn't. It's the tidiest Primark I have ever been in, no clothes on the floor they were hanging on rails and there was a really nice capsule collection to choose from. I bought a cute long sleeve light grey crop top and a little blue and cream handbag. Then was presented with a giant yellow Sefridges bag! it was awesome much nicer then the plain brown Primark ones hehe 

After we got back from the Trafford centre the lads cooked us an amazing dinner, we drank lots of wine and fizz. Then played a rather hilarious game of Balderdash until 2 am!! On the monday 2 of our group went home and the rest of us went decided it was such a nice day we would go to a local park and have a picnic style lunch. Then we went for a stroll round the park and got home just in time to pack up and head for the train. 

Overall it was an amazing weekend. 

Good Food, Good Friends, Good Fun!!  

xXx

Birthday boy!!!

Just a quick recap to celebrate my amazing Fiancé turnin 26 the other weekend. As part of his birthday treats I made him breakfast in bed, now this isn't much of a treat unless you factor in that I am never awake before him! See I am a night owl and he is an early bird. Being a baker and getting up a lot at 3:20 means that he finds it really hard to lie in, it reaches 8am and his body tells hime its time to get up, which if you think about it is a major lie in from 3:20.

So for his birthday I said I would get up and make him breakfast,which I did, even got to wake him up for a change hehe the breakfast consisted of a protein shake, cereal and bacon & fried egg sandwich with tea and juice!!

Doesn't it look yummy.

He was very happy when I walked in with a tray laden with food.

Happy Fiancé

We then both sat in bed and ate our breakfasts. After breakfast J decided it was time to open his haul of cards, so off he popped to collect them from the sideboard in the front room.

He didn't do too badly, £180 total which is great when you consider he's 26 and family money tends to stop or lower the older you get. After we finished breakfast it was time to divest Fiancé of his money so we popped up to the metrocentre. He got quite a nice haul, few new tops and some other bits of clothing. Fair to say he is now all clothed out for the foreseeable future.

Anyway fun was had all round and we had a lovely day out. After the metro we went out for a delicious dinner with my parents at a cute little restaurant in Durham. It was awesome and J decided to try something new, pan fried seabass with roasted salsify and celeriac purée. 

xXx

Cancer, We're coming to get you!! Race for Life!!!

So to try and motivate myself to really keep going with my new fitness kick, and having been inspired by the fiancé, I have decided to sign up for the Race For Life 5k in Durham! 

So I have until July 7th to turn myself into a runner ...eek!! Now I know its not an especially long run however I am not a distance runner in the slightest! At school I hated anything over 200 metres, I was always a sprinter and have managed to avoid doing any running since year 9 when options allowed me to drop PE. So now I have to up my cardio work and move away from the bike and onto the treadmill! 

Luckily I have a secret weapon ... the Fiancé. He is currently in training for the Great North Run and doing the Blaydon 10k in June as a warm up so I not only get a running buddy to train up with but also someone to give me tips that he's picked up. 

If you want to sign up to a Race For Life in your area just go to raceforlife.org.uk and search using your postcode. If you want to donate to my race just look me up on Just Giving. If your feeling in an especially giving mood you could even look up the fiancé and donate to his Just Giving page for Breast Cancer Care. 

I will keep you updated on my progress :D 

xXx

Gotta love a good scarf ...

So the other week I finally got to the hairdresser and had my layers cut back in, lots of choppy layers so  I can either wear it down or tie it up underneath and have a fake bob.

A few says after this I saw Kimberly Wyatt on the telly with a gorgeous blue scarf tied up headband style. So I decided to try it out, here are the results to far ...

Now having dark hair I usually cant get away with head scarfs or bands etc because they dont really stand out, but after seeing how nice her one looked I thought I would have a go. First attempt was the top right, a little lilac scarf I had in the bottom of my scarf box. Its a band style scarf about 4 inches wide so really good for a neat wrap and small bow due to the length. My next attempt was the bottom two pics. This is a new scarf I got in the Monsoon sale, now I was trying to save money but it was just so pretty and exactly the colours (blues, pink and grey) and fabric I wanted. This one is a standard square so needed folded into a band or twisted to give volume. I folded it for the bottom right, tied it up  then left the ends loose. I really like this scarf as it adds a pop of color to an outfit, the other night I wore it like the bottom left pic with a plain black maxi dress, it added that dash of colour to brighten up a dreary winter. After success with these two scarves I decided to start branching out so raided my scarf box, result is top left, this is a black and cream, Primark square skull scarf that I tied like the Blue one but tucked in the ends in around the knot almost making a flower (must try this with the one).

I think my first few attempts have gone pretty well, might be taking a trip to Primark soon to look for some more scarves to play around with, can't go wrong when they are about £3 each hehe

Side note, I still cant think of stuff to wear for work specifically but my Geek Chic outfit collection is growing hehe top two are new bottom set are pre-christmas.

I also seem to have infected the Fiancé with the Geek chic bug. After seeing me rocking my fashion Wayfairers he got some, then liked them so much he got real Ray Bans!! I'm totally jealous cuz they are awesome. See ...

Rocking the Fashion Geeks!!

Real Deal Ray Bans!! Jealous Much! 

xXx