Something For The Weekend

I slept in for far longer than I meant to today, but then:

So, on with the rest of this post!

Something to eat:

Vegan Blueberry Shortcake

Vegan Fruit Tacos with Chocolate Tortillas

It's Mother's Day weekend over in the US, so I hope all the mums out there are having a lovely Saturday and here's some lovely idea of delicious things to enjoy this weekend!

Something to read:

How much should your job play into your identity? Who I Am vs What I Do.

Are you one of those people who leaves snippy notes on things to let others know that you're angry with them? Yeah? Stop that. How to aggressively tackle your own passive-aggression.

Feeling overwhelmed? What would the gypsy in you do? Also, realise the wonder in your life.

Something For The Weekend

Something to do

If like me you're not a fan of crown braids then this reverse crown braid might be just what you want. It's so cute and simple. I just hope my hair is long enough to pull it off well.

If you are constantly trying to get decent photos of your pets but always end up with furry blurs, like I do, then check out these tips on photographing your pets!

Something to eat

I am dying to try this strawberries and maple cream recipe, it sounds so summery!

Something to read

I am neither married or have kids, yet, but quite a few of my friends are living in marital bliss and/or popping out babies. So, if you are worried that your friends are all going off and getting married and/or having kids, leaving you with no one to hang out with on a Friday night. here are some reassuring words.

Something to watch

If you don't already watch Game of Thrones then where have you been? Under a rock? Go and catch up with it right now and join me in my fangirly-ness! Also, read the books.

Sunday Catch Up

Pigeons in Westgate Park, Canterbuy

This week I received a great email from an agent I've been chatting to detailing what sort of changes they would like to see happen with my manuscript. It's really interesting to see what a professional thinks works and doesn't work. They are a really lovely person, we talked on the phone too, and very no pressure about the whole thing too which is fantastic. So I've been reading that email and thinking about it all week. I think it's very important as a writer to be open to change. I've no issue with changing even large parts of my manuscript as long as the core is maintained and it will improve the overall novel. But I also know people who argue over every little thing and refuse to let go, like a dog with a bone. 

So...each to their own?

Canterbury West train station

We went to Canterbury on Friday! We haven't gone for well over a month I think? So that was cool. We didn't get much but had a nice breakfast at Boho Cafe, got some birthday cards from Paperchase, wandered about for a while, bought macaroons from Patisserie Valerie, went into Whatever Comics but they didn't have anything we wanted and then we walked around Westgate Gardens for a while before getting the train back home.

Westgate Park, Canterbury

Westgate Park, Canterbury

Saturday I mostly worked, read through another email from the agent I've been talking to. I'm going to do some rewrites for her to see if we're thinking along the same lines. So that's pretty cool. I'm starting the rewrites and editing today.

Westgate Park, Canterbury

I've also been arranging with my mum to go to Yorkshire at some point in June because my Grandpa is coming over from Canada. I've only met him twice before. Once was when I was a little baby so I don't actually remember that and the other time I was a teenager, still at secondary school I think, so I don't really remember that much either. I just remember that we had a meal and he had really white hair. Like amazingly white. So it'll be nice to see him again.

We also made some yummy food this week!

 We bought this thing for making poached eggs in the microwave because it was £1! There is one cooker in the house which is downstairs in my fiance's Gran's kitchen and she has a hole in the wall to pass things through so we don't like to disturb her too much, she sleeps in her front room. It made surprisingly good eggs! Although one did explode a little because I left it in too long. It was still edible though.

Quesadillas

 Quesadillas! We ended up with one burnt, one without enough cheese and one that was just right. The second attempt, last night, faired much better but we didn't get a photo.

Poached egg on potato waffle

Trying out the poacher again and it went even better this time because my fiancé did them and he actually reads instructions unlike me. I do love potato waffles. It's like I'm five years old.

I also did Bloggiesta this weekend for the first time ever! Hopefully the blog seems a bit neater now, what do you think? We also passed the 4,000 pageview mark this weekend!

Canterbury West train station

All photos were taken and edited by me!

Something For The Weekend

Something to watch:

Gunbuster 2: Die Buster

I love this anime to bits. It has cute girls, space monsters, lots of shouting and over-powerful weaponry/fighting moves and it's all about friendship, courage and guts. In short, it's awesome. It's also from Gainax which is one of my favourite animation studios and directed by the same person who did FLCL which is another favourite anime, and it's only six episodes or 98 minutes long.

Something to read:

Image Source

I downloaded a copy of Leaves of Grass because the Kindle version is free! I don't actually own a Kindle but you can read it on your computer so I thought, why not? It's free, so who am I to say no?

Something to eat:

Vegan Baked Corndogs

I have never eaten a corndog in my life, so of course I want to make them myself at home! The only reason these are a vegan version is because that's the recipe I found, obviously you don't have to make vegan ones if you don't want to. Mine will at least be vegetarian though.

Baked Tofu in Peanut Sauce

My fiancé loves tofu, whereas I only like eating it if it's cooked in certain ways. I'm really fussy about food textures and if it's too squidgey then it needs to be as far away from me as possible. Grilled tofu is yummy, as is however they cook it at Wagamama, and firm cubes in my miso soup is a must so I'm hoping that baked tofu is going to be good. Fingers crossed!

Sunday Catch Up

So as I mentioned yesterday we had cream teas for breakfast twice this week! It's been really grey and rainy all week so it was something fun to do on an otherwise boring day. The cat teapot is from The Tea Emporium in Bath, my boyfriend bought it for me a few years ago. I was sitting on the left in the top photo, I don't drink Earl Grey with milk but the boy does because he is a heathen. Also check out our stylish milk bottle, we don't own a jug. I want one shaped like a cat, if that exists?

I also discovered Pinterest this week and have whiled away many an hours looking at pretty things and food. The thing I love so much is how easy it is to find recipes. I judge food by how yummy it looks so I like browsing through pictures until something catches my eye. We also need to decorate our house at some point so it's cool to see different ideas and what other people have done in their homes.

Image from here

I made mexican lasagna for dinner last night and the boy loved it, he's requested that I make it again at some point which is always a good sign. He doesn't eat a lot of vegetables, which is weird when you consider he's a vegetarian, so I've decided that I'll just have to cook him yummy veggie based dinners and find out which ones are his favourites. Plus vegetables are so cheap anyway and good for you. But then I've always been a bit of a vegetable and fruit freak. He also doesn't eat fruit...yeah I don't know how he's still slim and healthy.

We walked to the big park near us, King George VI Park. It's just a big patch of green with a kids play area, a shop that I imagine is open in the summer and trees. It's about 20-30 minutes walk from our house and it's on top of the cliffs so it's a pretty stunning walk there and back. You can also see my boyfriend's Dad's theatre/cinema from the entrance which is cool. While there we saw a dog that looked like a bear:

Japanese Spitz aka Bear Dog

and a little Shetland Sheepdog that the boy said reminded him of an overexcited child in a fur coat. On the way home we saw Ring-necked Parakeets:

Photo by Mark Kilner at King George VI Park, Ramsgate

We didn't go around all the park, so I'm sure we also missed seeing some other cool stuff. There's some weird building in it that we want to check out next time we go.

Last night's dinner was this:

From The Vegan Stoner

Not sure what I'll be making today though.

Aside from walking around and eating I've been working, as usual, and playing lots of Skyrim, as usual.

I also received a really lovely email from Julia, a reader of this blog, which totally made my week! Julia is going to also be reviewing for Mostly Reading YA soon and has a great little blog called Wright Reading that you should check out. It's not been going long but already has some great content. So don't hesitate to email me or leave comments if you have any questions or just want to be friendly!

That's all for this week!

Something For The Weekend

Something to eat:

Cream teas

Have cream teas for breakfast! My boyfriend and I have done this twice this week because we are greedy piggies. It's been really grey and miserable here but cream teas are a sure fire way to brighten your morning! Plus they don't have to be as crazy fattening as you might think, or you can look at it the way my boyfriend does "you're supposed to have a big breakfast!", your choice. If you can't eat cream for one reason or another you can get dairy free options and there's a few recipes about online you can try out! My boyfriend took the photo by the way, and yes I do own an awesome cat teapot.

Mexican Lasagna

Okay so I sort of mixed together two recipes I found online and also altered them. The two recipes are from here and here. 

But what I used in my version was: Tortillas, black beans, sweetcorn, chopped tomatoes, ketchup, Tabasco, chopped onion, chopped green pepper, grated cheddar cheese and chopped jalapeños. I did it all in the over too because I'm lazy and we don't have a cooker upstairs just a little counter top cooker and I didn't want to go downstairs to fry things. 

I mixed together the chopped tomatoes, ketchup, Tabasco, and jalapeños. Then I mixed the black beans and sweetcorn together in a separate bowl. Cooked the onions and peppers in the oven until soft, then mixed them with the sauce together. 

Covered the bottom of a cake tin with some salsa, layered some tortillas on top that I ripped into four pieces. Then a layer of sweetcorn and black beans, then the sauce, then cheese. Tortillas, sweetcorn and black beans, sauce, tortillas, cheese and finished.

I only cook for two people so feel free to keep layering as much as you like depending on how many people are eating it! My boyfriend was very impressed and requested that I make it again so that's always a good sign! Plus everything in it is pretty cheap to buy and you could easily swap the cheese for faux-cheese if you are vegan or allergic to dairy.

Image from Pinterest

This is really easy to make. Get some strawberries, pop them into an ice tray, fill with melted chocolate, freeze and voila!

Something to make:

Image from here

I don't know about you but I always seem to have tons of piles of paper around and I spend far too much time rummaging through them searching for that elusive piece that I need but can never find. I also tend to have lots of cereal boxes around because we recycle our cardboard and sometimes it piles up. So, why not put them to some use? You might want to reinforce the 'shelf' first but that's easily done and it save buying one of those racks that are so often plastic and ugly.

Something to style:

This ones more for the girls, or from some daring guys with amazing long hair.

Image from here

Image from here

Whether you are bored at home or going out here's some cute hairstyle that might be fun to try out.

That's all that I have to share with you today, let me know if you try out any of these and what you think! Especially if you're not a UK person as I know that cream teas are really hard to come by abroad.