Its been nearly I year since I last did a blog post, very rubbish of me! I just wasn't inspired to write anything and then things got busy...I got engaged in December and by April I was married! I loved planning our wedding so much, and I loved the actual day as well. But a month on (yes its our 1 month wedding anniversary already!) I'm resolving to start writing again. Probably mostly about fashion, with other bits of pop culture thrown.
Today its cold and grey again, not very May like. So my mind has been day dreaming about summer and the impending Jubilee celebrations. I happened upon the perfect dress for the day
Hobbs Flag Tie Dress £39
Its like wearing a string of bunting! Its one of last summer's designs so its on the outlet part of the Hobbs website reduced from £99 to £39, bargain! If only the weather was warm enough to wear it...
I love a good quiff. Its not a hairstyle I can pull off myself but on others, its awesome. I particularly love my popstars to be quiffed. Throughout the ages of pop it has been proven that donning a quiff is the surefire way to stardom. Lets take a look at the evidence....
Elvis of course is probably the most famous of the early quiff pioneers, getting out the grease in the 1950s. However my favourite 50s pop quiff comes from the legend that is Cliff Richard. So famous is Cliff's early choice of hairdo that he is often referred to as "Quiff Richard" ha ha ha (excuse my sides from splitting with laughter)
Now, if this next pop star was a category on Family Fortunes our survey would probably say "The Smiths" was the top answer, but you'd definintley win a bonus prize for naming "Quiff" as something people relate to melodic 80s mardy bum Morrissey. Like Brian May's regal curls, Morrissey's gravity defying hairdo has stood the test of time and he is still rocking a quiff today.
Keeping the quiff flying high for the girls is Elly Jackson of La Roux. Supporting the theory that a quiff = pop success, Elly's quiff got bigger and bigger as her career took off until it reached a staggering height of 15 inches (probably, maybe, this is just a rough estimate) upon reaching number 1 with Bulletproof.
Taking the quiff to Europe are hyperactive twins Jedward. After lasting for weeks on the X-Factor (I'm sure some would say it felt like years) the guys have had chart success after teaming up with Vanilla Ice and came 8th while representing Ireland in the Eurovision Song Contest earlier this month, promptly hurtling their tune Lipstick to the top of the charts throughout Europe. With their boundless energy and ever increasing quiff size I think Jedward are set to conqour the world!
Now the case studies all point to a formula of Catchy Tunes + Big Quiff = Guaranteed Pop Stardom. However there are anomalies to this equation. Just cast your mind back to 1997, if you went to the Smash Hits Tour that year you would have seen Jimmy Ray flashing his quiff all over the place whilst promoting "Are You Jimmy Ray?". He had the catchy song, he had the big quiff, sadly he was only a one hit wonder never to be heard of again. Who knows, maybe he flattened the quiff after the first single and that's why we never heard from him again?
I found a dress that I've not worn for ages in my wardrobe this morning, so decided to fling it on for work. But then I got loads of compliments on it so thought I would share with the blogging world...
I got it about 4 years ago, its a Laura Lees for Topshop design. I loved the Laura Lees collection and bought quite a lot of the dresses that she did for Topshop. They were always a mix of pretty prints with quirky embroidery, and cut beautifully. This dress is a classic example of Laura Lees.
I also managed to get a beautiful dress from her mainline collection at a bargain price on Ebay but its never fitted me :( Seems her Topshop sizing is a lot more generous than the mainline collection!
Yum yum my obbsession with pineapple is still going strong and I've discovered some delicious pineapple desserts for summer. Del Monte do an ice lolly made from pure pineapple juice. My word they are absolutely scrumptious and so refreshing! According to the packaging one lolly counts as one of your "5 a Day" too, bonus!
I love cake and one of my favourite pass times is baking and experimenting with different flavours. I've been wanting to do some kind of pineapple cake for a while now so I bought a fresh pineapple this week and got in the kitchen. I decided to do a variation on the traditional cupcake. I wasn't sure how much of a flavour the fresh pineapple alone would give the sponge so I decided to use pineapple yogurt as well.
So, after a bit of thought and Googling for inspiration, I decided to take my basic cupcake recipe but replace half the butter with a quarter pineapple yogurt, also leaving the milk out (there's enough dairy already). Once I mixed everything together I crushed up the pineapple and folded it into the mixture. For the icing I used more of the yogurt just mixed with icing sugar.
I really wasn't sure how they would turn out but they were delicious! Really light and summery with a zingy kick, yum!
These were only the first trial so they need prettying up a bit (yellow food colouring, jelly pineapple sweets maybe?) but the little brollies will definitley be staying! I'll be making these again soon, look out for them on the Cakes by Crumb stall at the next Lickity Split event...
Recently I have been on a mission. A mission that has consumed almost all my free time be it at home (online) or out on the streets. My mission was to find the perfect outfit to wear to a friend's wedding in May.
I don't have much experience with weddings. Whilst I can easily throw together an outfit for almost any occasion I really struggle with weddings. Am I too dressy? To casual? Are the colours suitable for the season? Arghh!!! Its a minefield! I thought it would help to have an idea of what I wanted before I began to shop so decided to go for a maxi. Over the last 4 weeks I have discovered that whislt I can pull off a day time casual maxi, I just don't suit the more glam styles. These were my two favourites -
Ted Baker Hobbs
Tried em both on, both looked awful!
I finally found a maxi skirt I loved in Topshop, I think I loved it so blindly that I didn't realise how awful it looked on me. It went back to the shop. It was at this point that my other half suggested I stop the maxi hunt and go with something more "me", i.e. 50s prom style. So I did and found the most lovely dress in Laura Ashley, it fits like a dream but is also a little different with its kooky postcard print.
So the mission is complete and I can't wait for the wedding!
A worrying thing I noticed with all the trying on of clothes though was a large amount of lovely brand new clothes with nasty orange rings around the necks. With spring (summer!) upon us all the lovely white and pastel colours are being tainted with Tango-ed make up stains from people who have tried them on. I'm blaming these people who I stumbled across on the telly the other night
Girls (and boy on the left) you'll look a lot more beautiful without all the fake tan and foundation!
We've had a bit of sunshine recently, but not much and its still blimmin' freezing! (despite the people I've seen round and about wearing flip flops tyring to convince people otherwise!) I'm urging spring to get sprung and there's loads of cute little green shoots popping up all around, from the daffodils and crocuses in Sheffield's beautiful Botanical Gardens to the Dragon Snaps starting to grow again in my own little garden.
The promise of warmer and sunnier weather has crept into my subconscious too and I seem to have suddenly gone crazy for all things pineapple! I was out for Sunday lunch a couple of weeks ago and had the urge to order a pineapple juice and lemonade, never had it before just suddenly fancied some fizzy pineapple action. It was beaut and I've had to stock up at home! The next pineapple related desire came in the form of this pefect pineapple print sun dress from River Island -
I love it! I'm thinking the next step in the pineapple obbsession must be cake related....Pineapple Upside Down Cupcake anyone?!
I'll leave you with this tune by the Avalanches from which the first part of this post title is taken
For as long as I can remember I have loved watching the Brit Awards. Its always been an "event" for me, I can vaguely remember Fine Young Cannibals refusing their awards in 1990 and from then on I watched it every year, through the early 90s when Lisa Stansfield and Seal always seemed to win best male and female, through to Britpop era which brought lots of Brit controversy courtesy of Jarvis Cocker mooning Michael Jackson, Chumbawumba dousing John Prescott witrh a bucket of water and of course Liam Gallagher's verbal battles with erm most of the other nominees! And of course, one of my favourite ever Brit moments comes from the Spice Girls performance in 1997, who were my 13 year old self's favourite band in the world ever!
But this year I felt a bit underwhelmed by it all. For a start I don't like it being held at the o2, it just felt like a big televised concert. Earls Court was much better as it always felt like a proper awards do. Over the last few years the categories seem to have been whittled down, we didn't even get an Outstanding Contribution this year. I liked artists being recognised for making a great video or putting on an awesome live show, seems the Brits don't care about that anymore.
I thought the artists performing were still pretty good though - Take That, Rihanna, Mumford...until this afternoon. The Grammys are on ITV2 from the other night. I've never watched them before but I'm enjoying watching it so much more than the Brits, even though I don't recognise some of the artists. For a start, it just feels like they've got loads more performers and they're all better, even Cee Lo Green and Rihanna who both performed at the Brits were better at the Grammys, just look at this Cee Lo clip to see what I mean, he has Gwyneth Paltrow and Muppets!
Rihanna had Eminem and Dr Dre! As I type Sir Mick Jagger has just popped out on stage for a sing a long! Kings of Leon presented an award alonside Miley Cyrus! Its surprise after surprise. Everyone is singing live which means sometimes they miss a note or forget a line but for me this just adds to it and the atmosphere and energy is coming at me through the telly!
I want my awards show to be more energetic and exciting and actually full of awards. Brit organisers take note please.
