Tuesday 29 December 2015

Christmas Cupcakes



Christmas is over which makes me very sad! Christmas is by far my favourite time of the year. I love the lights, the trees and can't forget all the delicious food! But to add some extra christmas spirit into my home, I decided to make some cupcakes and decorate them all christmassy! And obviously I used my favourite Cadbury's Brownie Recipe!(shock) but as per usual, they turned out to me amazing!

For the icing on these we used the Betty Crocker Chocolate Fudge icing as well as making up our own butter cream. The butter cream we made up our own measurements so I'm not going to give you any. Also on for the decoration we used some holly berry and leaf sprinkles as well as iced/sugar decorations!

Overall I think we made about 18, so my friend decorated 9 and I decorated the other 9. Because there was so many we obviously had to do them in two batches and unfortunately, the first batch didn't come out too well! Me being me, accidentally put the oven up too high and left them in for too long so they burnt ever so slightly on the top but that didn't make them any less delicious! but then once I realised the oven was too high, I wacked it down to the right temp and the second lot came out amazingly! But here are some of the final products. They definitely went down a treat with my family! I also have a short video on youtube of me and my friend making them. There's no speaking involved, just some jolly music whilst we make and bake! - https://youtu.be/GthfQL8nwWE



Monday 21 December 2015

NEW YORK CITY



Hello!

2nd December 2015 is official one of the best days of my life! Purely because I got the dance to fulfil one of my dreams of going to New York City over the Christmas season, and oh my word it was amazing! It was everything that I was expecting and more! We were there from the 2nd December til the 7th December and I wished I could never leave! I went with college on this trip with our Art and Media department as I do both Photography and Film studies at college, so through out I had to juggle the two subjects around which was a bit difficult but I did it. But for this trip, I not only took pictures but I also vlogged most of it as it's definitely something I want to remember! So I'll leave all the links to the videos on my youtube channel for you to check out!

The first day, we land into JFK air port til about 5:30pm NYC time(10:30pm UK time) but then it took a while to get off the plane because they were having difficulty attaching jet bridge to the air craft. But once we managed to get off the plane and go through customs, we got straight on our coach outside the air port and headed off to our accommodation. We stayed in the YMCA Vanderbilt which is on 47th Street. Once we got to the YMCA we checked in, put our stuff in our rooms then headed back out to Times Square which was about a 20 minute walk away. By this time it was about 10:30pm, and even though I was extremely jet lagged, standing in the middle of Times Square was just one of the best feelings ever! It was so breath taking and worth the 8 hour flight!



The second day was an extremely long, tiring and foot aching day. In the morning we took a stroll up to central park which was a couple of blocks away from the accommodation and we walked through park til about half way up. It was so amazing to actually witness one of the most iconic locations in New York and to be actually stood where some of my favourite films were filmed, such as Elf and Sex in The City. It's filled with such colourful trees, people and lakes! We walked down the iconic row of tree to the Bethesda Fountain, then past the famous Boat House Restaurant, the Alice in Wonderland statue and then the lake were Stuart Little was filmed! After our long plod in Central Park we then went to the Museum of Modern Art(MoMa) this museum was HUGE and extremely pretty on the inside. If I'm going to be honest, most of it bored me quite a bit but one thing I loved seeing was Vincent Van Goghs Starry Night, it was actually quite amazing to be stood in front of it.
















Once we had finished in the museum we walked over to the Rockefeller which was a block or two away. This is where we went right to the top of the building to view the New York sky line and oh my.. I thought Times Square was breath taking but this was just something else. As we got to the top(62nd floor) it was still roughly day light but the sun was beginning to set, so we managed to see the NYC sky line at sunset and at night all in one. This will be one moment that'll stay in my heart forever. It seemed so surreal just looking out onto the city which all the lights and buildings. I can't even describe how I began to feel. One side from the Top of The Rock you can see Central Park and Manhattan, then the other side you looked out onto the Empire State building with Brooklyn lingering the background. So I definitely and 110% recommend going up the Rockefeller Building if you're ever in New York. It's about $30 to go up, but it is
SO worth it! It also had a lift were it had a transparent top so you could see yourself going up, but it also had images and lights projected on to it which was so cool and made the lift a bit more bearable!(I hate lifts, or did until the end of the trip) But after that we were meant to go ice skating but we were all so tired and our feet hurt so much from all the walking that we all went back to the accommodation to get into bed!

Third day: This is the day we got on the metro and headed down to Brooklyn! We walked half way along Brooklyn bridge which was such a nice experience, it had such beautiful views of the city and me and my friend even managed to write our names on the bridge. After the bridge we walked a few blocked up to where the 9/11 Memorial(Ground Zero) and One World Trade Centre was. First we looked at the North Tower memorial and stayed there for a bit... I think this is the only place in the big, noisy city where people are quiet, It was quite haunting in a way but a peaceful kind of haunting. Like knowing that there once stood a tall sky scrapper in that very spot that is now gone along with the thousands of people, but it was so pretty and bright that you didn't really think too much about the horror behind it. One World Trade Centre was the next place we went too after Ground Zero as it was directly next to it. We had to que for a while to go though some from of customs and then to get into the Sky Pod(a lift that goes up 1000ft in 60 seconds) Even the lift in there was entertaining because as you went up, there was a time line in how the city was built. Except, in this lift the screen went all around the outside so that it looked like windows. For any of you that have been to the Harry Potter studios in London, you would know that when you first go in there, you go into a small cinema like room to have a presentation and then once that presentations done, the screen rise and your revealed a little surprise(not spoiling it for those who plan to go) and the exact same happened in Tower One. Once you're at the 102nd floor you go into a small room where you stand to watch a little presentation on a screen, then once the presentations done, the screen shoots up and you have the whole of  New York right in front of you. My jaw dropped as soon as the screen went up and I've never been so amazed in my life. But that moment definitely topped the breath taking Times Square and The Top of The Rock.




















After One World Trade Centre we walked over to the Staten Ferry terminal and took a ferry ride over to Staten Island. During the crossing you go past the Statue of Liberty which was so nice to see as it's also a very iconic thing for New York. Then once we got back over to Brooklyn, we took the metro to Canal Street in SoHo where some of us did some shopping.  My friend and I were dying to find a Victoria Secret and have a brows.. So we found it, and spend about a good old hour in there, purely because of how amazing the costumer service was. The lady who helped us was just so kind and friendly and help out so much, so I'll definitely go back there if I ever get the chance to go to New York again! By then it was quite late so we caught up with some of the other girls in our group and got a taxi home to go to bed!

Day four came, and by then the balls of my feet no longer existed! Well, that's what it felt like. We had done so much walking, and lucky us had much more walking to do on the fourth day! On this day we went to Grand Central Station and took the metro to Queens and went to the Museum of Moving Image(MoMi) This was definitely my favourite museum out of the two! There was so many amusing things in there, such as the original mask for the film Mrs Doubtfire. There was also some really fun interactive exhibits such as making your own animation or flip book! Unfortunately I never got to do the flip book one but I did make my own animation! and this will be in my New York Day 4 vlog for you to see! Coney Island was our next destination after MoMi. So we got back onto the metro and took a long ride down to Coney Island. Let's just say that Coney Island is one of the most beautiful beaches I have ever been too! It felt like such a romantic movie moment! This was also another place where I could of just stayed forever. Luckily we got there in time to also see the sun set which was such an amazing feeling. And this is where I also got to do a short photo shoot with one of my friends on the trip with me, and the pictures turned out amazing! So glad I got an opportunity to do a photoshoot on the beach of Coney Island. Unfortunately, Coney Island shut their very popular theme park over the winter, but even just walking past and looking at the abandoned theme park was still amazing. Now, this is where one of the high lights of the trip come into play. We got back onto the metro after Coney Island to go back to the accommodation(some wanted to go back to Canal Street to do some shopping) So the group of us got off at 59th street like our teacher said. Just to turn around and see both of our teacher doing the typical slow movie moment of 'NOOOOOO!' basically telling us it's the wrong stop. But we didn't think anything of it and thought they were messing around with us, but once we walked past a map in the station we soon saw that we were still over the water in Brooklyn and not in Manhattan. Ooops. But by now we were basically pro's in using the metro so we got back on the next train and got back safely!



















So the last and final day... for this we packed our bags and got them ready to go then we took a leisurely stroll down past the Empire Building to the Flat Iron building where we found the coolest dog park ever! After that we dragged ourselves to the New York high line to walk along it. For those who don't know, the New York high line is an old railway track which has now been converted into a beautiful path for people to walk along! We hit the high line then my friend and I went off and did our own thing as the rest of the day was our own. So we took a hike back to 5th avenue area and did some last minute shopping before we had to be back at the accommodation for 3:30pm to get ready to get the coach to the air port. Whilst we were shopping we went into Urban Outfitters where I got some new Calvin Klein underwear then we went into Bath and Body works. We sadly don't get this in the UK, but I wish we did. It's a shop full of candles, body mists, body lotion and all that sort of stuff. And it smelt so good in there! I brought a body mist and a room spray from in there but I really wanted to buy lots of their 3 wick candles, but due to there being a weight limit for luggage I couldn't. Bath and Body works was only 2 blocks away from where we were staying so we took a really slow walk back to the YMCA but along the way we found this amazing pizza place that did slices of pizza the size of my face for 99c. So getting that was a definite must and a good way to end the day!

4:30pm NYC time came along and our coach was outside ready to take us back to the air port. By 5:30 we were going through customs to go on a sad. but shorter, plane journey home. Thankfully our flight back was only 6 hours long due us flying in the direction of the wind, but it was the sadess journey I've ever done. On the coach on the way to the air port we went over one of the bridges and towards the end of the bridge, if you turned around, you could see the whole of New York lit up through the back window. It was such an incredible but heart breaking sight. New York is definitely one memory that I'll never forget. I made so many new friends whilst we were out there too which was nice as well as discovering more about myself. I really really hope that one day I get to go back and relive every moment...


Day 1 & 2 Vlog - 
https://youtu.be/nqW6zxInNCM
Day 3 Vlog - https://youtu.be/DEBss4Z7zmg
Day 4 & 5 Vlog - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BX1uOXBI5yQ





Saturday 19 December 2015

Bat Cupcakes


Last weekend was Halloween and for this year, I spent it baking Bat Cupcakes and other halloween themed cakes with one of my closest friends! Unfortunately our versions of the bat cup cakes didn't turn out like they should of done/the ones that inspired ours! But once again I used my trusty Cadbury's brownie recipe to create these incase cupcakes and we went along this step-by-step guide to create the oreo bats on top! It took us four hours to get a final piece but it was so worth it in the end!

So for the bat themselves you need mini oreos, normal sized oreos, icing, white chocolate chips and small brown M&Ms - but as I live in the UK it's extremely hard to get a hold of small M&M so we improvised and used milk chocolate chips, which worked just as well! I made 6 bats so I needed 12 of the mini oreos, 6 normal sized oreos, 12 milk chocolate chips and 6 white chocolate chips. The mini oreos take care of the eyes and ears, normal sized ones are used for the body and wings, white chocolate chips for the fangs and the milk chocolate chips for the eyes!

For the icing we used left over oreo tops and crumbled it up til its like a sand like consistency, so that it wouldn't clog up the piping nozzle. Then we put 200g of butter and 600g of icing sugar into a bowl to create the buttercream icing! After we took about 4 big spoonfuls of the butter cream and put it in the bowl which we smashed up the oreo in, and folded it until it was thoroughly mixed together.

For the rest of our cupcakes we used small sugar halloween themed decorations, 'Creepy confetti' and poping candy! For some of them we added extra colours down the side of the piping bad to add a little something extra to the butter cream so that they all didn't have just a boring coloured butter cream on them because it's halloween so we had too!


             

Thursday 29 October 2015

Pumpkin Carving


So we all know that halloween is this weekend and I'm sure many of you have plans! But for me, I spent my pre-halloween carving pumpkins with my best friend and on the actual day of Halloween I'll be spending it creating awesome cup cakes with another close friend of mine! Fortunately for you, we filmed this and put it on my best friends youtube, so I shall leave a link here for you!

I've only ever carved a pumpkin once before I did again this year, and lets just say they didn't go swimmingly either times! I did the same design this year as I did about 2 years ago, and yes, I did a pug - we all know I LOVE pugs! My best friend on the other hand, did what any other normal human would do and she did just a typical pumpkin face. Hers was definitely better than mine!

For the video we both made an effort and dressed up to make it a bit more fun and to get into the halloween spirit a bit more, especially as this is only really the acceptable time for adults to dress up. Jade dressed up as a dead Alice in Wonderland Doll and I dressed up as a cat. The preparation for this did take us an hour or two just to do all our hair and make up but as you'll see,  it was so worth it and Jade did amazing with hers! Unfortunately, we were going to do like a mini photo shoot so we could show what we had done but we ran out of time as we had so much to do! 


Sunday 27 September 2015

Sunday Baking



Cadbury's Brownie Cupcakes

Sundays are meant for jogger bottoms, baggy tops/hoodies, messy hair and no make up! but for me, as well as all of those, it's my usual baking day. From brownies, to pizza dough balls, to cheese and bacon turn overs. But for these past two Sunday's I've done a bit of a mash up of brownie cupcakes.

Last Sunday(20/09/15) I really fancied a really cute chocolaty cupcake like the ones they sell in a tea room near me, but everywhere I went they had sold out of the ones I wanted - so instead I decided to make my own.  The recipe I used is from the Cadbury's website. This is my go to website for anything I want involving chocolate! Even though it was a recipe meant for just a plain brownie, I used it to make cupcakes. And I loved them that much that I decided to make them again this weekend as I had ingredients left over. When I first made them and used the same measurements of ingredients I managed to get 18 cupcakes all together.



For the brownie itself you need:
175g of butter
3 medium eggs
250g caster suger
 75g plain flour
50g of coco power
175g of chocolate(of your choice)
1tsp of baking power(i only used this as I made them into cakes and wanted them to rise a little)
Cupcake cases

For the topping you need:
125g of butter
125g of icing sugar
50g of chocolate(of your choice)
A piping bag and nozzle
Cadbury's bar chunks(optional or anything of your choice)
Reeces Pieces bits(optional or anything of your choice)
- the first time I made them I used chunks of a Hershey's Cookies and Cream bar

Steps:

  1. Preheat oven to 180 ⁰C, gas mark 4. Grease and line the base and sides of a 20 cm square cake tin with baking parchment.
  2. Melt the chocolate and butter in a bowl over a pan of simmering water. Cool slightly.
  3. Whisk the eggs and sugar until thick and creamy, pour over the chocolate mixture and fold in.
  4. Sift in the flour and cocoa and fold in the nuts. Pour into the prepared tin, making sure it goes right into the corners and bake for 25-30 minutes. The top should be crusty with a slight wobble underneath.

    Then prepare the buttercream by beating together the butter and icing sugar until light and fluffy, then beat in the melted chocolate. Place into a piping bag with nozzle and pipe onto the top of the cakes.


http://recipes.cadbury.co.uk/HomeCategory/RecipeDetails?r=47055 - brownie details
http://recipes.cadbury.co.uk/HomeCategory/RecipeDetails?r=48189 - icing details

welcome to me


 Sunday 27th September 2015

 Hiya, so all this is all completely new to me and if I'm going to be honest, I don't have a clue ho to use it so if you've got any advice then let me know! but I've originally created this because I've just had so many interesting and exciting things happen to me this year, for example, I've passed my driving test, went to Wireless Festival, my parents got married, visited Brighton and danced at Sadlers Wells in London. And I've got so many more to come so I thought this would be a good idea to put them all on here as memories and so others can see what I'm up too! Also some of my friends own blogs and it just looks like fun!

This blog is just going to be a bit of everything and anything so it's not strictly one thing or another. But just so some of you don't get disappointed, I'm not a beauty blogger!

Now you're probably wondering a bit about me. I'm a 17 year old girl who lives on the south coast of England who's currently studying at college and hopes to go off to university. I'm a dancer and photographer and a rather awkward person at times! I do love beauty and fashion (so there may be a few beauty posts) as well as travelling, and luckily for me I've got a lot to do within' the next year!

Regards to travelling, in December 2015 I'm going on a trip with college to New York for photography, hopefully at the end of March 2016 I'm going to Germany to go see one of my best friends, Paris in July 2016 with dancing, Canada July/August 2016 with my family to see my brother and hopefully somewhere else within' Europe for my boyfriends 21st birthday!(Sh, he doesn't know) and if I pluck up the courage I really want to vlog most of these events as I personally think that seeing live footage is just more interesting than pretty still photos!