BHW bits & pieces

The bank holiday weekend went something like this...

 

On Friday night Mitch and I went to see El Dorado at the Arcola Theatre just off the Kingsland Road. It was meant to be a black comedy but it was seriously dark so I didn't laugh much - it was v.good though! A small but compelling cast, minimalistic set with excellent use of sound and lighting. The bar attached to the theatre was pretty cute too and sold the tastiest crisps I've ever eaten. Afterwards we went for pizza at Bite (they picked the best cheeses for their four cheese pizza - not enough places are ballsy enough to wack on some gorgonzola).

Saturday saw us head to Rivington Street to buy Mitch's wedding suit. I had a feeling that going to a proper tailors would be hella intimidating but the guy at Mr Start was v.patient and super helpful. We were also given beer to drink whilst Mitch tried stuff on which was cool and kinda reminded by of wedding dress shopping. In the evening we went to a friend's birthday. Not only did he make his own bread but the most a-mazing dip (cream cheese, tomatoes, mushrooms and other stuff - I need the recipe). It was a hilarious night of plenty of booze (including Mitch's signature punch), food and a good old game of mafia.

Sunday started out very chilled - lunch with my nan, some sewing (finished the top of my friend's baby quilt) - but come the evening it all went down hill. Moriarty hadn't come out to play for the last two nights so on Sunday I decided that that was long enough. I took the lid off his cage to find that he was curled up in his nest and v.poorly indeed. I know it must sound crazy, getting upset about a hamster but he's our little hamster and seeing him like that was unbelievably upsetting. Frantic googling of his conditions lead us to the same advice: take him to the vet. Amazingly Mitch found a 24 hour one so we made Moriarty as comfortable as possible in a shoe box and drove him over there. The vet was impressed with how active he was (Moriarty had perked up somewhat in the car and waiting room) and prescribed him antibiotics and some 'recovery diet'. On sunday night I couldn't sleep and I woke up with my stomach in knots. Moriarty made an unusually early appearance on Monday morning and thankfully, seemed much improved. By the evening he was climbing the roof of his cage - the medicine seems to be doing the trick!

Certain that Moriarty was in a better way state than the night before, Mitch and I went out to buy a few essentials for our long weekend in the Lake District (and a rucksack which I didn't really need but it was only 12 quid and I bloody love it). The rest of the day was spent being incredibly productive and ploughing on with wedding-related stuff.

So, although Ronny O'Sullivan didn't win the snooker and the bank holiday weekend felt, at times, more like an endurance test than a relaxing long weekend (I certainly didn't feel well rested coming back into work on Tuesday), I'm just glad that it was sunny and Moriarty is on the mend.

around here lately

★ Reading: Journey into Fear by Eric Ambler. Not my usual genre but hey, who doesn't love a spy thriller set during WWII. I'm only a couple of chapters in but so far so good.

★ Watching: Catching Fire (at the IMAX - it was amazing); Star Trek Voyager (they still haven't got home yet), Elementary season 2, LOADS of Come Dine With Me and Fresh Meat season 3.

★ Making: Bunting for the wedding - miles and miles of it. Ok, I'm exaggerating, it's more like 30 metres but it feels like a lot more. I'm also ploughing on with my crochet blanket which I started many moons ago. 

★ Eating: Soup (and lots of it) and mince pies. The latter because...

★ Feeling: V.festive all of a sudden - lights on Oxford street, purchasing people's Christmas presents and discussing what MItch and I will be cooking for xmas dinner probably had something to do it :)

★ Listening to: I know it's early buuuuut... today, at lunchtime whilst the office was empty, I put on Sufjan Steven's Christmas Unicorn. It's quite possibly the happiest song ever.

★ Wearing: Wedding dresses. On Saturday I went wedding dress shopping. I was extremely nervous but thanks to two of my lovely bridesmaids and the v.nice lady in the shop I had nothing to fret about. It was actually a lot of fun. DMs - it got cold over the last week or so so they've been busted out. 

★ Looking forward to: As well as Christmas and a busy December, the coming week is also pretty exciting... pub quiz on Tuesday, more dress shopping on Thursday afternoon followed by a trip to Hyde Park's Winter Wonderland for sausage and gluhwein, celebrating a postponed Thanksgiving with my friend Alex on Friday (my first ever thanksgiving!) and lunch at my parents' house on Saturday.

★ Loving: Nights in with Mitch - watching tv in my pajamas, whilst crocheting and drinking camomile and spearmint tea - and plenty of cuddles with Moriarty obvs.

Walking around in Witley

Last Saturday Mitch and I got the train to the little village of Witley. The reason being: to have a nose around the venue which we'll be using for our wedding reception :)

After about an hour in the village hall - taking photos and measurements, just generally talking about what we're hoping to do to decorate the place - we took a v.leafy path back towards the train station. Witley is a lovely green place - sheep on one side, horses that looked like cows on the other, ducks, and lots of big old trees.

Luckily for us, it decided to absolutely pour with rain the minute we arrived at the train station and it stopped just as we emerged at Clapham Junction. After stopping off for a spiced pumpkin latte (had to be done) we wandered into TKMaxx and, omg, the clapham branch is amazing - more specifically, their knitwear section. If I had had the money I would've bought about 6 jumpers (ahem, mostly from the men's section - they have the best knitwear). Showing some restraint, I came away with 2 and I love them.

If, like me, the unusually mild October weather hasn't curbed your want for knitwear and Clapham isn't too much of an arse to get to, go! Go to TKMaxx! What I also found when perusing the knitwear rails was that it's also quite inspiring. Not only did it make me want to buy jumpers but also to have a go at making one... First though, I need to finish my scarf. It's coming along v.nicely, not long to go I think.

catch-up

Despite a much quieter week I still feel like I need to find my bearings with august. How is it the 22nd already?! 

We reached a very exciting milestone last friday :D

A trip to Norfolk at the weekend to see my grandparents also involved a stop off at a windmill and the opportunity for Mitch to pose with a rather beautiful car.

Mitch and I popped into the Great British Beer Festival on Friday with the view of staying for a couple of hours. A lot of half pints later and we were being kicked out after enjoying a thoroughly good evening  which not only included beer but also a few games of thumb wars, meeting lots of new people and eating spaghetti carbonara (made by two sicilians) at 1am. Spontaneous evenings - you just can't beat them.

Another beautiful house for a location shoot last week. It had a willow tree in the garden. I do love willow trees.

New books! Birthday book token has finally been used up. I think I spent it wisely.

As a treat to myself, I bought some new pens. Is there anything better than a new set of pens? I very much doubt it.

hello surrey

Last weekend was bloody good for a number of reasons:

1. we got to leave London. Of course I love my city, but I love it even more when I've spent a good few hours away from it. We didn't stray too far from the capital - namely Guildford and the very pretty little village of Witley - but there were plenty of green fields, sheep, castle ruins and beautiful flowers which was a v.welcome change of scenery.

2. we took some rather big steps towards planning the wedding. Yes, I'm talking venues. We even have a tentative date which is scary but also unbelievably exciting.

3. I got to see my parents which is always nice but this weekend they were especially amazing as they not only drove us to Guildford but knew all the best questions to ask when it came to checking out the venues. AND they bought us lunch. I honestly don't know where I'd be without them!

4. Saturday night unexpectedly turned into a fabulous night out of drinking and tonnes of dancing at The Effra Social (a.k.a my other living room). 50's and 60's tunes were the soundtrack to the evening and one of my oldest buddies was in attendance. Pretty much perfect really.

5. Sunday was sublime - the lazy day that I needed after all the excitement of the day before. A leisurely stroll to Herne Hill Market via the Brockwell Park car boot sale - where I found these scales for £2! - before chilling in the park with an icecream. Lush.

6. Lastly, as if the weekend couldn't get any better, in the evening we went to watch The Postal Service play at Brixton Academy. It was a-mazing :) everything I could've hoped for and more - Jenny Lewis was there to sing her parts AND they played some new stuff which sounded sa-weet! I didn't take any pics partly because my camera is crap but mostly because I was having such a good time. Thankfully though, this guy got some good ones. 10 years is a long time to wait for an album tour but The Postal Service was definitely worth it.

good distractions #3

This online zine 
Issue 4 of Pebble Magazine - I especially liked the article about urban exploration and their vegan lemon and blueberry tray bake looks pretty good.

This short film
Some of my friends from uni made a film set in the not too distant future about the very last bookshop... You can see more of their stuff here.





This place
We're not going to Perugia for a good two and half months but I am already super pumped for it. Although the holiday has been sold to me as a week of eating, drinking and lounging by the pool (we're staying with my friend at her parent's villa in the countryside) I hope that I'll be able to venture into the town at least once - looks pretty no?

image source

These dresses
From Kate Spade Saturday

The event
Yes I'm talking about the wedding, no I'm not going to bore yout with details. But, what I will say is: there's SO much stuff to plan, thank god for my pinterest board!

These satchels
Such pretty designs from Melin Tregwynt made with wool woven in wales.

 

These guys

Hanging out with these two, how can I possibly get anything done? :)

diet pills and the UK wedding show

I'm going to keep wedding talk to a bare minimum on here, that said, this post is sort of about weddings but it's mostly just me having a rant.

Last Sunday Mitch and I went to the UK Wedding Show held at London's Excel centre. Overall it was pretty much what I expected, lots of stalls trying to get you sign-up to/buy stuff, people in the wedding biz talking at you, collecting email addresses and giving out countless brochures and leaflets. We'd only gone to the show because A) I was curious and B) we thought it might give us some ideas for our day. Suffice to say, I found the experience rather terrifying. As we entered the show a big lovely 'Bride' sticker was slapped on me, which served as a beacon for wedding biz people to pummel me with a barrage of questions about 'the big day' - photographer, venue, catering, make-up, dress, hair, entertainment for the guests, chair covers (I do not understand this one in the slightest). I realise they were just doing their job, and a couple of them seemed genuinely nice, but as we haven't really started planning anything yet the constant questions just served as an overwhelming reminder that there's tons of stuff to organise. Needless to say I was super happy to take a seat away from the stalls to watch the fashion show, which was by far the best part of the day. It was great to see a variety of dresses (even if they were all waaaay out of my price range) on models of different sizes. It's definitely given me some food for thought...

If the fashion show was the highlight, the event's low point revealed itself in the free 'goody bag'. Amongst lip balms, perfume sachets, more leaflets (so many leaflets!!!) and gems for your nails, there was a box of diet pills. Yes, diet pills. What The Actual F**k.

A 37 day 'treatment' of diet pills recommended, no less, by 'french doctors' (so many things wrong with that sentence alone). For a minute I thought: 'maybe I'm overreacting, they're just another thing to ignore like the nail art set'. But no it's not ok to give out diet pills like sweets. It sends a terrible message to brides-to-be, that message being "you need to loose weight for your wedding and here's a quick fix to do it". What if someone wasn't even thinking about slimming down for the big day, those little pills, filled with what looks like sawdust, may make them think that they should loose weight, the UK Wedding Show clearly thinks we all should. And surely, if you're interested in looking and feeling better about your body for the wedding, you'd do some some exercise and eat more vegetables not take diet pills! I was and still am horrified, much like everyone I've told. I don't think I'll be doing another wedding show again, Mitch and I (along with support from our friends and family) will be just fine figuring it out on our own.

A couple of non-offensive things we also saw that day...

One of the wedding dress stalls sold only vintage pieces. There were some beautiful lace ones but alas I'm not quite the right shape for a vintage number. It didn't stop me admiring the jewellery though - how about those pearl earrings in the clam shaped box! Fabulous, no?

Please excuse  my crappy phone photography. Upon leaving the excel centre we got  a spectacular view of the Air Line with the setting sun glinting off the suspended carriages. This picture really doesn't do it justice. It looked like something from those future concept sketches from the 50s and 60s. I'm yet to go on it but one day I will, I'm guessing the views are pretty good.

he asked me on the brooklyn bridge

The most exciting thing that happened in January took place in the very first 10 minutes of it - basically the rest of the month hadn't a hope in hell of living up to it :)

post pizza doodling in hoboken

We were standing on Brooklyn Bridge on new years eve, the small crowd had just counted down to midnight and we were watching the fireworks, Mitch said he needed to tell me something and pulled me over to a less busy bit. Then he got down on one knee, held up a ring and asked me to marry him. I said yes (obvs) :D 

We've been together for around 4 years (the dates are a little hazy, we never really had a moment of 'now we are boyfriend and girlfriend') and living together for nearly 3. The proposal was a complete surprise, although a number of my friends had already called it. We rang our respective parents to tell them the news but that was it, no one else knew and for the first three days it was our secret. It took a while for everything to sink in and to be honest I still can't believe it's actually happening. Talking to Mitch about wedding ideas/stuff is pretty surreal but fun. There's seems to be a lot to think about and plan but I'm not worrying yet it's just super exciting, the wedding day of course, but also all the stuff that happens after that - the rest of our lives really :) 

I'm not a gushy person BUT these things must be said: the proposal was v.romantic, I'm unbelievably happy and I love this man more than anything ♥

a golden half wedding

Back in September one of my v.good friends who I've known since secondary school got married on one of the hottest days of the year. Not only was the weather perfect, but the ceremony went smoothly, the bride looked beautiful, the food was amazing (much curry was consumed) and the party afterwards was so much fun, the music was especially awesome, a mixture of bhangra and well known chart stuff - I danced continuously for hours. Best of all, aside from the fact that my friend got to marry her lovely boyfriend of 7 years (I think it's 7...), the wedding brought (almost) all of my bestest buds from secondary school together. I still see them fairly regularly but rarely as one big group. It really was one of the best days ever - I couldn't stop smiling all day.

Mitch and I didn't bring a digital camera to the wedding, so we were completely relying on my little golden half and until last week I still didn't know whether they'd come out alright... Thankfully most of them did :)