The Weekly Roundup

Well, it's been a while since I've done one of these! Not so much  weekly round-up, you might say, as this week's photos cover at least the last month.

Life has been sunnier of late, with the weather brightening up, seeing more of friends and family, getting fit and eating well.

 I've been going to bootcamp a couple of times week with my best friend, which we're both really enjoying doing out in the sunshine, and I've also been making time for things like yoga and Body Balance to keep things that little bit more Zen. I'm  bit of a worrier at heart, so I really have to make time in my life for relaxation and make the effort to stick to it.

We've also managed to have the first of the year's barbecues, with two in a row last weekend. The first was round at my friend's house, and it was great to get everyone together for a catch-up and a cheeky cider or two, The second was put on by my parents, who had just returned from a Caribbean holiday and were wanting to hold onto the last moments before going back to work.

Other than that, it's been very much about working, Sunday carveries and trying out lots of lovely new products. I was lucky enough to get my hands on one of the recent Space NK goodie bags, so it's going to take me while to work through that little lot! I've already discovered a fair few gems though, so keep an eye out for those.

This week, I got tickets to see both Kasabian and the Pixies over the next few months, so really looking forward to both of those! It's been a while since I last saw some decent live music, and I can't wait to go along and have a dance.

 As for today, we were meant to be going to a music festival, but it's been overcast and raining up until now, so after dropping a certain someone off at work, I treated myself to breakfast before heading home to do a bit of blog photography and prep some posts. As I'm writing this, the sun has begun to pour through my living room window, and the clouds have passed to reveal a beautiful blue sky, so I think it's time to get my wellies on and head on down to the event. It's actually a weekender, but we've only got tickets today, and the good stuff won't be kicking off for another hour or so.

Bit of a short one today, I'm afraid, but watch this space for plenty of posts coming up over the next week. They are all scheduled and ready to go, which is a situation I haven't had time to get myself into for some while - it feels pretty good, I tell thee.

Hope everyone has a lovely bank holiday weekend - fingers crossed this isn't the last we'll see of the sun!

xx

Sunday Catch-Up

Hello everyone, hope you're all out enjoying the lovely sunshine this weekend and making the most of it. Judging by the various Facebook, Instagram and Twitter snaps I've seen that does seem to be the case, and it'd be rude not to really considering there is no telling when the next spell of sunshine might be!

It's still pretty boiling over here in Brazil, in spite of the fact that it's meant to be winter. It's kind of like the UK weather, but in reverse, as when it's ridiculously hot all the time, all you want is a nice cloudy or rainy day so that you can cool off a bit, but much like the illusive UK sunshine, it rarely happens!

I would really love to be back home at the moment, as I just adore the atmosphere of s good sunny day in England. It seems to put everyone in such a good mood, and there is nothing better than sitting in the garden, sipping a Pimms and lemonade, with the smell of barbecues wafting overhead and the faint sound of a lawn mower in the background, haha.

But anyway, speaking of home, this brings me onto my good news! It's been a pretty epic week this week for me, as as well as having a lovely little trip away which inevitably involved some shopping, eating and beaching, we also got some really good news! Basically, we have got the go-ahead to move home at the end of July, and I couldn't be happier! I know I've already mentioned on here that I was going to be moving home in the summer, but since then a spanner had been thrown into the works, which was going to make it a lot more expensive as well prolonging our time here by a few months. Well, thankfully that is no longer an issue, and with the end of July being just eight weeks away it feels like the end is finally in sight! I will be finishing my job for good in four weeks, at the end of June, so after that it will be all about getting ourselves sorted and ready to go! I'm thrilled that we're going to back in time to (hopefully) enjoy a bit of summer - or, at least that we won't be arriving in the dead of winter, which would probably be a bit of a shock to the system seeing as we are pretty acclimatised with the weather over here. Hey, we might even be able to squeeze in a late summer festival, which would frankly be awesome, as I've really missed going to them over the past couple of years.

Anyway, onto the rest of this week's goings-on. We travelled to Vitoria, which is the state capital, to spend a couple of days there, and it would have been rude not to pop into the shopping mall while there and pick up a couple of bits. I didn't get much, but I did pick up a few things, so watch this space for a mini-haul video, which I'll probably be posting on Tuesday or Wednesday. I did pick up a couple of new books, too, which I've just realised I forgot to include in the video (I've already filmed it) - Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn, and Eighty Days Blue, by Vina Jackson. I've actually just noticed that the latter is the sequel to another book, which I haven't read - bit of a fail, but hopefully it'll be worth a read anyway!

On the Tuesday night, we were out celebrating our good news, and we went to a new Asian restaurant/bar called Taj. The food was absolutely phenomenal - I had grilled duck in a tamarind sauce, which was served with jasmine rice, oriental veggies and a yummy apple chutney, and the hubby went for a seafood Pad Thai, which was also amazing. Of course, it was only fair that we washed those down with a couple of cocktails, and I went for a sake cocktail with apple and ginger, followed by a couple of pineapple mojitos - sooo good. I wore my new Zara dress, which you can just about see in the top right-hand image - the top part is sheer, with monochrome stripes, and the skirt is faux (I assume) leather body con. I'm sure you'll get to see it in all it's glory before too long, anyway!

This weekend, the hubby is hard at work, so it's a bit of an uneventful one. I'm planning on spending the rest of the day taking some photos for upcoming blog posts, sorting out some paperwork for work tomorrow (fun) and relaxing in my hammock with one of my new books.

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday!

xx

Monday Catch-Up

Happy Monday, everyone. I realise that's somewhat ironic, considering most people are anything but come Monday morning, but as this post is going up as we're nearing the end of the working day, hopefully things have improved a bit on that front by now!

You may have noticed that I didn't manage to get any posts up over the weekend, and that is because I've been holed up in bed with a lovely bout of the flu since Friday. I'm still here now actually, but I've just about managed to muster the energy to put what should have been yesterday's post together today, which is basically just supposed to be a bit of a Sunday chitchat about the week gone by along with my Instagram snaps from the week.

It was a pretty standard one to be honest, and being ill I can't currently recall anything particularly exciting to tell you. My head feels as though it is stuffed full of cotton wool, which means that besides not being able to hear anything, my mind isn't quite in it's usual working order either! I can't seem to remember anything that happened before Friday, but since then I have been house-bound, so I have been watching countless Youtube videos, sleeping and trying to read a book, and not much else. So perhaps less of the chitchat than usual. Let's all just ignore that fact and behold the photos instead, and I will get back to you with a more exciting post tomorrow.

Hope you all have a great week.

xx

Week in Pictures

1. Sushi for lunch with the hubby at the new shopping mall that opened this week

2. Having a sneaky Friday lunchtime pamper session with the L'oreal Mythic Oil hair mask and Elemis Tri-Enzyme Gel Mask

3. One of the week's healthy breakfasts - homemade orange, carrot, beetroot, spinach, acerola cherry and ginger juice, and greek yoghurt with banana and almonds.

4. Bit of a Saturday selfie - first time I've been able to curl my hair in ages as it's been so dry and damaged.

5. Simple Saturday makeup

6. A naughty McFlurry following the sushi lunch at the mall...not one for McDonalds but these are the very occasional exception.

7. Snuggled up in bed with tea, biscuits and my blog reading list on Friday evening.

8. Relaxing in the garden hammock at sunset.

9. Feeling ill on Monday so catching up with my Bloglovin' feed while the hubby watched sport on TV.

Hope everyone's had a lovely weekend.

xx

Week in Pictures

I didn't intentionally abandon my blog all week. On Monday, my laptop cable finally decided to throw the towel in, closely following the battery, which had already packed in a few weeks before. So, after three days in the computer hospital, I went to pick up my fixed wire, only to be told that they hadn't had the right parts. Needless to say, this annoyed the hell out of me, as if they'd only said so earlier instead of holding onto it for half the week then I could have taken it elsewhere. I promptly did exactly that, and luckily got it back, all sorted, withing a couple of hours. However, upon bringing it home and trying to log on, I was confronted by a very uncooperative internet connection (ie, it was completely dead). So, again I was forced to stay away from my blog until someone came to sort things out today.

I didn't do a 'Week in Pictures' last week, as it made way for Mother's Day gift ideas, so that means you get a double-whammy of my recent Instagram shots today instead. Don't get too excited.

It's been a week of hard work, new products and cat-related tales. If you read my lifestyle blog, Organised Chaos, then you will probably have seen that my cat, fondly known as Mr Whiskers, has been bringing his girlfriend around for tea a fair bit lately. He's actually still a Tom cat, which I know is a bit naughty of us, but he really is the gentlest cat you will ever meet, and if anything, the new lady in his life wears the trousers in that pairing. He's a complete gentleman with her, and lets her eat all his food. Anyway, since that post, 'Mrs Whiskers' seems to have decided to move in permanently, and has now taken up residence on the bean-bag in the living room, where she sleeps all evening. In the mornings, her little head pops around the door the second we open it. We're pretty certain she's got a few buns on the oven, so we keep obliging when she asks for food - will let you know if there are any developments on that score, as and when!

In other news, I read 'The Fault in Our Stars' by John Greene in one sitting last night, what with having no internet to play with, and I must admit, it was very sad. I wasn't expecting much, having frankly found 'Looking for Alaska' (a best-seller by the same author) a bit rubbish, but as a friend from work offered to lend it to me, I thought I'd give it a go. I do find all of his books a bit teenagery, but then I do think that's the age group they are aimed at, but this particularly story was very moving, and a real eye-opener, too. I'll probably be reviewing it properly on my other blog before long, so watch this space.

That's about all of interest I've got to tell you this week, hope everyone is having a lovely weekend as usual!

xx

I'm on Instagram - Are You?

Hello lovelies. I've been so addicted to Instagram lately, now that I'm following quite a lot of you, and have been really enjoying having a little nose at what you've all been getting up to. If anyone else is on Instagram, and I'm not following you, then please leave me your user name in the comments below - I'd love a browse through your pictures. You can also follow me - my user name is @melotw.

Have a lovely day.

xx