Beautiful Belgium - The Arrival Edition

During the February half term break, myself and two other fun humans, who we shall call Rach and Cara, set out on an adventure to Belgium..

First stop was Ghent!

After getting on the ridiculously early 7am Eurostar from London, we arrived in Brussels a couple of hours later to then enjoy another short train ride to Ghent.

Somehow, mainly thanks to Rachyroo our travel guide goddess, we got on the tram to the town centre where our glorious hotel was. For someone like myself who doesn't stay in hotels very often, there was quite a novelty about it all. I'm not sure what was more fun - putting our most prized possessions - read: passports - into the safe and opening and closing it a few times for fun, OR the fun of getting to sleep in a luxuriously huge bed!

We stayed at The Novotel hotel and I really couldn't complain one bit about it. We were lucky enough to have a pretty sweet view from our window overlooking a little square, getting cheeky views of the locals demolishing beers in the early afternoon and my favourite part - hearing the bloody church bells ring for a bajillion hours straight on a Sunday morning... I swear, it didn't stop for at least two hours and when our heads were slightly sore and we were all craving frites, it wasn't the best start! However - the windows of the hotel were very soundproof!

A slightly worrying long way down.

We did loads of exploring and walking around the quaint, little, cobble stone streets dodging bikes, ate lots of delicious things and took lots of photos of each other... and the beautiful city we were in for three days.

Ghent canal by day

Ghent canals by night - photo cred to rachy

It was fun walking down the street holding hands, merging into a line when the crowds got a bit squishy, taking in the stares and the feeling of being on a school trip...

It was almost, only just though, as fun walking down the streets holding a cone of frites in our warm hungover embrace, scouting out the best spot to sit down before we collapsed in heaps. 

There was so much more fun to be had... Stay tuned!!

You should check out Cara's blog - Britventures for part one and part two of our trip away!

Finally I've blogged!! ~Christmas In New Zealand!!~

Going back to Wellington for Christmas was probably one of the best holidays of my life.

I was well overdue for some R&R and what better way to spend ridiculous amounts of pounds and three glorious weeks with my family and best friends!!

Boxing Day with the fam - win!

The weather was absolutely perfect!

Some of my favourite and best moments are....

Spending time with one of my all time favourite humans

And one of my favourite non-humans

Having icecreams overlooking this view before going to see the third Hobbit film at The Roxy cinema.

Getting to hang out with this scallywag!

These two were alright..

Catching up with family on Boxing Day

Making this to-die-for dairy free, gluten free, chocolate cake.. twice.. and eating one that Markie had made!! Recipe can be found here over at the glorious Meghan's blog

Having afternoon gin and tonics with my Mumma. Feet in pool, gin in hand - what more could a girl need?

Taking this pooch for walks down to the Hutt River near my parent's place. I feel like I took complete advantage of the outdoors!!

Spending my second to last night and last day with Meg and Mark and the boys was one of my most special and favourite times. And having 'panini coladas' on New Years eve!!

Saying goodbye to these two at the airport wasn't easy.

It was very much a last minute trip planned - flights were booked on a Friday and I was outta London on the Sunday. My parents were a bit shocked to say the least, but it was still hands down one of my best holidays.

Until next time New Zealand!!

A year ago...

A year ago, I was about to board my flight back to London.

I had had an amazing 6 weeks in wonderful Wellington, with a quick trip up to Auckland.

I hung out with some of my favourite people, met some fellow bloggers IRL, and soaked up the beauty that New Zealand has!

I still can't believe it's been a whole entire year. Since I've got back, there has been many ups and downs, health issues, work stresses, you name it. But I love being able to look back on previous blog posts and photos, reminding myself of how lucky I was to go back to my little windy city and enjoy my time there. 

I do actually really kinda want to go back right this second, but just for a holiday. London's where my life is for now, but I'd really like to sit down, chat, hug and be close to those special humans! 

That time we went to Devon

8 "ladies"

2 cottages

8 back massages

A steam room and spa pool

Life won! 

Things I'm Loving - The Half Term edition!

This last week I've been on half term. It's been a glorious week off; I had intended to have lots of 'couch' days as I'm soooo freaking poor until payday. However, this didn't actually work out as I had planned! 

The Photographers' Gallery

A friend and I popped along to the Photographers' Gallery to check out their latest exhibition. We saw some awesome photos from David Lynch, Andy Warhol and William S. Burroughs. At a £4 entry fee, it was a pretty good deal to see some awesome artists. It brought back memories of using Andy Warhol as an artist model when I was doing 7th form photography at school! 

Andy Warhol

David Lynch

The plan of all plans

A group of us from work had decided that it'd be fun to go to the London Dungeons during half term with some 2 for 1 vouchers we had. This didn't end up happening after discovering that it was going to be over a 2 hour wait in line! So we decided to explore London instead! With 2 Kiwis, 1 Ozzie, a Canadian and an Englishman, we were all set to have loads of fun! 

We started off with attempting a selfie beside Big Ben - SUCCESS! 

Cue the awkward photo bomb by Westminster Bridge...

We walked up past Downing St, past the horse guards - where the horse scared surprised us all with attempting to get into my bag! - carried on down The Strand, The Mall, meandered our way to The National Gallery to get a glimpse of Van Gogh's two Sunflower paintings, which are together for the first time in London in 65 years! 

We popped into the National Portrait Gallery to sneak in a cocktail in their restaurant up on the 4th flour, which also had amazing views of London! We went through to Trafalgar Square, Leicster Square, China Town, and ended up in Soho at the Tucan Pub where the wine started flowing all very nicely! 

The Toucan pub's Guinness bar stools were ever so fun and ever so heavy! We headed to the Maple Leaf, a Canadian pub, to watch the hockey, then stumbled to a few more pubs before heading home at 11! 

This has got to be one of my favourite photos of the day - simply because these lions aren't the easiest thing to climb onto! Cue most of Trafalgar Square getting a loving view of my pants as I was pushed up onto the lions, and then as soon as we were both up we were told to get down.. booo! 

It was probably one of the best days I've had in London! I'm actually the 'worst Londoner' who lacks in a sense of direction, knowing where places are, but it was the perfect day to pretend I knew things, explore a city which has become my second home, and spend time with some awesomely crazy cats!

Linking up with the lovely Meg for things I'm Loving!

2013 - What a year!

Last year I wrote this post with a few goals in mind. I did indeed move house, go back to New Zealand for 6 weeks, joined the gym and read more books! 

This year has been filled with...

SNOW!! In January and February it snowed like it was nobody's business! So much fun to be had! 

February was moving month for me, therefore no internet for nearly a month! However, there was a repost of a favourite post from the year before, some reminiscing with a post for my Mumma's birthday and how much my sisters mean to me

March was a busy month with a wedding filled with hilarious antics and making homemade icecream with my kiddies at work

In April, I got my craft on, explored gorgeous canals in London and appreciated Instagram!

May was birthday month for me and celebrating 200 posts!!!! (sorry about the lack of giveaways I had planned, instead you got a pic of my deep fried mars bar - win!), having another egg moment, and one of the best trips up to Glasgow

June was a month of loving's; counting down the days until I went back home, more egg moments with the ol' blind incident, getting up in Spring's grill and joining in with the grateful project

July I sadly said goodbye to a great friend who moved back to New Zealand, I MADE IT BACK HOME, and started to really appreciate what I had left behind

I was still in New Zealand for most of August with a fun filled month! I went up to Auckland for the first time and got to meet the lovely Simoney and Cat IRL!!! I wrote a post about my beloved Blue Rabbit who is now back in London with me, I spent loads of time with one of my favourite people in the whole entire world and her family! And then I had the dreaded goodbye on my venture back to London.

September I was back into the new school year ready for the fun and challenges of my second year working with deaf kids, lemons were thrown but gratefulness was seeked out, goals were made to do something 'Londony' each month, and I became gluten free! (ha, I totally feel like that part on Pitch Perfect where she's all like..."guys... I have nodes...")

October was a bit of a dry spell with a lot going on, but I was able to find some loving's and love on the amazing friendship I've made with a special lady - so special I think that's the third time in this post.... yikes!

November made me fall in love with Call the Midwife, reflect on my life in London and love on more friendships, and made my lazy ass get around to summing up our trip to Budapest!

Finally, with December nearly at a close, and only two posts that I've squeezed out of myself (3 including this bad boy!), my favourite from this month has got to be Dinovember. And this song - happy by pharrell williams!

Thanks for sticking in there with this looonnnngggg post and my year of irregular blogging! 

I'm looking forward to a brighter and better 2014! Happy new years chicas!!

xxx