This Week I...

...finally met up with my friends for the first time since Lizzi's wedding. We went to Cafe Rouge for a breakfast that lasted 3 hours. Bacon and pancakes!

As we hadn't seen each other since before Christmas we used this opportunity to exchange our Secret Santa presents. This resulted in the table being covered with glitter. You're welcome Cafe Rouge.

 

My other slightly Christmas related activity this week was making cookies with my boyfriend using the leftover frozen dough from when we made Christmas cookies back in December. Using just four coloured icing pens limited our decoration options, but they don't have to look pretty to be delicious.

How was your week?

This Week I...

 ...was a bridesmaid for my best friend Lizzi! It was so lovely to spend the morning with the girls having our hair and make up done. We all looked so pretty!

Lizzi and Lewis did a great job with their decorations for a winter wedding. How cute are the light up Mr & Mrs? And that cake was delicious. Chocolate, carrot, and red velvet!

My boyfriend scrubbed up pretty well and impressed everyone with his moves on the dancefloor. Seriously, I think he's got himself a fan club.

How was your week?

This Week I...

...went to my friend Lizzi's Hen Do in Edinburgh!

It was a pretty packed weekend with lots of fun activities.

First up was a cocktail making masterclass at Revolution. The class is made for hen parties and was really fun. Our barman James even made sure to include non-drinker me and Lizzi's pregnant sister. Non-alcoholic strawberry woo-woo = yum! 

On Sunday, after a night of karaoke, we had a much needed spa day. I had my first proper massage which I found to be part relaxing, part torture. 

After the spa we headed to a hotel for afternoon tea. The food was amazing and there was so much of it! This photo only shows half of what we had. Little smoked salmon bagels, warm scones, sticky toffee cake. And it wasn't miniature portions like regular afternoon teas.

This Week I...

...had a weekend in London to celebrate the fact that Lizzi is getting married in less than 90 days!!

We stayed at the Grange Strathmore hotel, in a room for all four of us, and immediately put on the bath robes upon arrival #luxury.

In the evening we surprised Lizzi by taking her to see Breakfast at Tiffany's starring Pixie Lott.

The next day, after a glorious breakfast buffet, we decided to do a spot of shopping, heading first for Harrods. Their Christmas World is a magical place and I want to live in it.

How was your week?

This Week I...

...went on a school trip to London.

We took the 6th Formers to the National Portrait Gallery to see the Giacometti exhibition and to the Royal Academy to see the Ai Wei Wei exhibition which was really good, especially since I'd read up on the exhibition the day before so I'd know what I was looking at.

On Sunday I went to a wedding fair at a potential venue for Lizzi's wedding, 

We walked around the grounds and used it as an opportunity to take some group shots, cos that place was pretty!

How was your week?

This Week I...

...started my new job as an Art Technician at a secondary school.

No more tiny children with sticky, sticky fingers! Now just students who are all taller than me!

At the weekend I went out-out with my gal pals for the first time in ages.

I'm sure Lizzi would like me to draw your attention to her face. It was a work of art. 

And this week I finished up a personal project of putting all my videos from the last two years on to a dvd, and then I made a cover for the dvd case.

#memorypreservation

What did you get up to this week?

This Week I...

...went to my friend's wedding!

She's the first one of us to get married and it was very exciting.

Let's just pause to talk about my outfit: It took a shopping trip in Cambridge on Monday plus two hours shopping the next day to find it. I already had the skirt and I wanted to find a colourful blazer to go with it, which I eventually found in the teen section of New Look. The yellow top from Primark and £5 heels from Peacocks completed the look.

Laura and I have been friends since playgroup (as this photo demonstrates) and it was a little surreal to watch her get married.

It was forecast rain for the most of the day but we were quite lucky and only needed our umbrellas a couple of times throughout the day.

We had a lovely meal at the reception followed by some awesome dancing (especially once I'd kicked of the heels) until 1am. Though I am paying for it now with aching muscles! And there was a photobooth with was a lot of fun.

How was your week?

This Week I...

...went on my friend's hen do! That's her in the orange jacket.

We had afternoon tea on a bus around London which was...bumpy. Putting jam on my scone felt like I was on the Generation Game.

But it was fun to dress up and hang out with my friends. Less than a month until the wedding!

How was your week?

This Week I...

...went out for breakfast with these ladies, and Laura - not pictured but not to be left out. We love tiny pots of jam! And Cafe Rouge, if you want to use wooden boxes instead of plates then I'm not going to stop you.

After breakfast we went shopping and Laura bought the cake toppers for her wedding! The man in the Lego shop was very helpful in finding the perfect Lego hair for the bride. I think the Lego groom looks like Wesley from Buffy, which is cool.

I've also been working on the example piece for a DT lesson. It's going to be a mini ice-cream cart. Hopefully. It involved sawing wood which was not easy. I wonder how the 5 year olds will manage...

How was your week?

This Weekend I...

My regular 'This Week I...' post is a little late because I just spent the weekend at Centre Parcs with my home girls.

We did Adventure Golf, which was pirate themed! 

I rocked climbed.

We went to a roller disco. The skates I picked out had light up wheels!

My friends kayaked. 

We went to hula-hoopa-size.

This is what hula-hooping 3 hoops looks like, but I got up to 5!

And to top it off we won the quiz on the last night!

How was your week?

Ever been to a Centre Parcs? What activities did you do?

This Week I...

...was out and about.

Two of my cousins were staying with us for a few days after camp so we took them to Cambridge for the day on Monday.

The weather was lovely and we enjoying watching people punting, including those who almost crashed into each other.

On Thursday me and my friends went to the beach! I love me some beach.

It was raining on the drive there but the sun came out when we arrived.

While my friends were napping or reading magazines I set about digging a hole because that's what you're supposed to at the beach.

Then we won big on the 2p machines and finished the day with some fish and chips.

How's your summer going?

Are you a lounger or a digger at the beach?

This Week I...

...had two days work at a local infant school delivering workshops for the Letchworth Arts Centre.

The children were making aliens to stick on the string balloon planets that I made during my internship.

On Friday I had to pop to London because part of my braces had broken so I had to go to the dentist to have it fixed. It took all of 5 minutes.

So to make the train trip worth it I also checked out the Hunterian Museum.

It is awesome and gross. And awesome. And gross.

It's rows and rows of dead stuff in jars!

It's really fascinating but it's no secret that I'm a medical light-weight (I once fainted in a first aid lesson. There weren't even any pictures, the teacher was just telling a gross story) so the key was not too look at anything for too long.

There was a skull fused to another skull, a foot from someone who had elephantiasis, a skull that had had a tooth growing in the nasal cavity, the skeleton of a 7 ft 7" giant! It was awesome.

And gross.

On Friday night my friends and I had a long awaited sleepover.

It turns out that sleepovers are still as fun as they were when we were teenagers.

And then the next day, since none of us were working, we hit the shops, including Primark where we tried on these glasses.

Standard.

How was your week?

Painting: Lizzi

This is my latest painting. It's my friend Lizzi. She's my most depicted friend in my art work.

I think this is partly because she lives the closest to me, so I can quickly pop round to get a photo or draw her, and partly because of the hair.

Here's some of my previous Lizzi art.

This was a drawing I did for my A-level art work.

Lizzi sat for me and I think we put a The OC dvd on to keep her occupied.

This was another A level piece.

We had a lot of fun taking photos for this piece.

Every so often we talk about doing an updated version now that her shoe collection is way bigger.

This was a piece I did for fun to experiment with adding textures on the painting.

See what I mean about the hair?

This painting was done during my first year at university.

This is the only painting Lizzi's actually asked me to do, a portrait of her and her boyfriend for his birthday.

I think I should start painting my other friends or I might start getting accused of favouritism.

Bring and Share Christmas Dinner

For the past 6 years my friends and I have carried out the tradition of a bring and share Christmas dinner.

It all started when a friend of ours at the time said he wasn't really into Christmas, so we wanted to change that.

We spent many weeks planning the first dinner on a white board in the small room we hung out in at school, like it was a military operation.

We said it should be an annual thing, and so far we have done it every year since.

2007

Every year is different. Sometimes we forget to cook the brussel sprouts.

2008

Sometimes the jelly doesn't set so we have shop-bought pots.

2011

Sometimes we have incredible chocolate cake creations.

2011

And sometimes, well, most times, we struggle for oven space.

2010

The people change as friends enter and leave our lives, along with the length of my hair, but one thing stays the same; there's always so much food!

2012

And this is what this year looked like.

(8 people really don't need 5 different puddings, but we had them anyway!)

2012

Complete with tinsel and Christmas jumpers.