Manchester day 4

Today was a weird one. The clocks changed so we ended up getting about 6 hours sleep which was a slight oversight.

I had to go back home via Manchester so I took the opportunity to meet with my aunt. I took her a weird plant because itsi mothersm Day and I felt a bit weird meeting her empty handed.

I had coffee at Takk and then Mexican burrito for lunch!

Liverpool day 3

Today will be a lazier day. We had a moochy morning to see if the weather would cheer up a bit before deciding what to do.

We went to port sunlight to the museum, lady lever gallery and around the village.

Then we had a really late lunch ar 3pm at sweet pea cafe.
We had pancakes! With cheese and mushrooms and spinach.
And vegan cake! I will definitely go here again.

Then we headed to the BBC 6 music festival- which was really eclectic and interesting.

We thought wedw be able to sneak out and get food but there was a no reentry policy so we ended up grabbing pizza from slices at midnight.
Sooo good

Liverpool day 2

An even crazier day! We booked to go round hardman's house photography studio- which is a perfect 1940s/1950s time capsule.
It was amazing!

Then we went to Formby beach and had a picnic. And a nap. And a paddle.

Then we walked through the woodlands in search of red squirrels. And asparagus. We found neither but it was a lush walk.

We headed back to town and to the new lush store in Liverpool. I bought a limited edition American cream perfume. It smells just like my yummy conditioner.
I think I'll always be a Sikkim girls fan though. More Sikkim girls fragrances please!

Then we went for noodles and to see spirited away on the right day.
It was incredible on the big screen.

Liverpool day 1

Epic first day in Liverpool! In the morning we went to speke hall. We did the Victorian tour of the house, walked around the grounds and had a look at the bell tree.
We had the first picnic of 2019 and then mooched around the house again to see all the priest holes.

We tried a wet nelly cake from the cafe which is apparently a local delicacy that no one had ever heard of before.
It's just a weirdly dense bread and butter pudding.

And very cold.

Next we went to cromby beach to see the gormley statues and walk on the sand dunes.

Then we went to the ejoy super market and had sushi from the food court.

We thought we had booked tickets for spirited away,but we went to the cinema a day early.
We ended up grabbing a drink at kazimier gardens then going to see the BBC 6 music fringe festival.

We loved the dinner lady Gogo dancers.

Manchester day 2 & 3

We ran a 2 day conference at the crowne plaza which went really well.
On the Tuesday night we had a catered dinner which was lovely, but did mean I didn't get much exploring opportunity.

After the even I took the train from Manchester to Liverpool.
I managed to leave my drinks bottle behind when I changed trains too 😭.

I arrived as the sun was starting to set over the train station. Cute.

Manchester day 1

Were are running a series of workshops in Manchester this week.
We've travelled up today to be in place ahead of time, so most of my day has been stuck on trains -usually I don't mind but the weather is so good and the trains are all hot and stuffy.

So, the hotel room has a chaise lounge, and a really awesome bathroom.

And we had a good walk around the city xebcen in search of wagamamas for tea.

Spring equinox BBQ ☀️🍔

The first BBQ of the year, the first bbq of spring annddd the first BBQ as homeowners!
Definitely iconic!
Bring on the good weather and more incinerated food!

Family dinner

To celebrate my dad's

birthday now that ray and Andy are back from skiing in the Alps!

Home improvement pt 2

We have a chalk board chimney breast!
And new lampshades.
So fancy.

Home improvements!

So, my big achievement last Thursday was arranging for john Lewis to come and measure our house up for a new floor. This was an epic headache.
My in store John Lewis experience was appalling, but the call centre got everything sorted out in the end.

We've picked out the floor now from our final 3 shortlist and the measuring guy comes on Thursday.
We had a letter saying itsi 4 weeks from measure to fitting... And we thought we had better do the worst of the painting before the new floor comes.

We spent all weekend painting and dragging furniture about. The room looks amazing- so much fresher and brighter.
I also did loads of planting- so we'll have a beautiful garden to enjoy too.

It has been a tiring weekend, but the rewards are huge! We still need to do the ceilings in all the rooms, the white in the kitchen and the grey feature walls in the back bedroom.
We talked about painting the bathroom wall pale blue instead of brown too and looked at some new towels and vathrbat wares in M&S. But one thing at a time.
Definitely getting carried away!

Date night

On Friday night Traff and I had a date! For Christmas he bought me tickets to see Soeur- A female fronted band from Bristol that we've recently discovered.

He picked me up from work and we went to Charmed Thai restaurant. It was really good but a bit pricey.
I'd definitely go again for a special occasion because the food was super good.. probably a good idea to book too as it's popular.

The gig was in moles. It was over 14s and for the support acts there were only a handful of actual adults in the crowd. It was a bit awkward! Funny though.
I had a hooch!
Soeur were really good, it was worth braving all the giggling teens!

Turkish food

Ah, once again I have been poor at updating my blog.
Last weekend I met up with kirstKi, ABI, Phil and Jon for Turkish food and a catch up.
A nice chilled day, with excellent company.
I hadn't tried turkiTu food before, it was really good.

Taking my violin for a bike ride

Didcot railway museum

Helen and I had an old lady adventure to the Didcot railway museum last weekend. We were super lucky with the weather as storm Freya hit that Saturday- our last blue skies sunny day 😭
We enjoyed the museum, and the volunteers enjoyed explaining everything to us too!

After that we had lunch in the new shopping complex and TK maxx shopping!

The living rainforest and the spotted dog pub

Giant home made pizza

Traff is sooo good at making home made pizza!
They are rarely round, but always amazing.

Purple hair

Make & cake

Today at art club we did print making. We did a woodcut style stamp using an eraser and carving the designed into it with a woodcittwoo tool.
It was really weirdly therapeutic as the erasers cut easily.
I made cats 😁

We also made lino prints. I made a scarab beetle print.