Excuses, excuses...

I've always loved photography, and I bought my own DSLR. I mostly take pictures when I travel - but I really want to get into the habit of taking pictures when i'm in London as well.

I always make excuses saying i'm too busy or that my camera is too heavy to take out. But enough with the excuses - one of my new years resolutions was to set aside a day or a few hours once a month to take my camera out and take photos. And try and go to places i've never been in London to take them. I feel like it's something pretty achievable and something that I hope will take my photography to the next level. Once a month i'll post here showing the photos that i've taken.

This past Sunday was the first day i'd set aside to do this (i very nearly didn't as again i made an excuse). But lo and behold Saturday night bought the first snow of the London winter - and it was literally calling out to my camera. So armed with my snow boots out i went out to take pictures of the white beauty that was outside my window - and here are the results. Hope you enjoy!

La Bella Italia

I have an obsession with all things Italian. The beauty in this country is indescribable, from the landscapes to the architecture, the food to the fashion. I have family there and have been fortunate enough to visit many times to many different places. Here are some of my favorite Italian things:

1. Fashion

This was taken in  Milan. Italians have a thing with bright trousers and they pull it off! Their fashion ranges from stuff like this to classic simplicity, no matter what they are wearing it's effortless.

2. Coffee

Their coffees are creamy cups of perfection. They serve them at the perfect temperature, in perfectly cute little coffee bars, and are just, well, perfect.


3. Baristas

I love this Baristas uniform and how chic their coffee bars are.

4. Architecture

 Milan, Duomo

 Rome, Piazza di Spagna

5. The South

Capri

The Southern coast of Italy is hands down one of my favorite place on earth. Picturesque towns built into the mountains overlooking the sparkling water, bright flowers everywhere, cobbled streets, fresh food in quaint little restaurants - its heaven. The picture is of Capri, a stunning island off the coast of Naples.

6. The food

 Alice is Bacon

Mamma mia the food! Food in Italy is unparalleled and only people who have never been dispute this. The pasta, the pizza, the salads, they melt in the mouth, literally. Outside of Italy, I have never found Italian food that compares. 


Italy is just wonderful in every sense! Have you ever been there?

Need Summer Now

 Give in To Me

It's about that time of year again where the novelty of my winter wardrobe has worn off, the snow doesn't seem quite so exciting anymore, and morning after morning of waking up to darkness is getting slightly depressing. It's safe to say I get bored of seasons; at the end of every summer I crave my big woolly jumpers, my warm Ugg boots, and cosying up on a big couch with a steaming mug of hot chocolate. Come the end of every winter i.e. NOW, I crave the opposite; my floaty pretty summer dresses with gladiator sandals and lots of colourful jewellery like in the photo below, and spending long blue sky days out in the sunshine in the park with my Caramel Coffee Frappuccino.

Just Me No-one Else

Thrilld

On my summer wardrobe wish list are these gorgeous items from Asos:

Digging the 70's trend with these high waisted shorts from Mango. 

A floral floaty dress is always a summer must!

I adore this skirt - giving some edge to your summer wardrobe!

Lastly, I saw this ad the other day from the Monsoon SS11 ad. I think it's a gorgeous shot and incidentally the perfect photo to end my post. Bring on the summer!

Faye Dunaway

Today I am fawning over Faye Dunaway. I watched the original Thomas Crown Affair with Steve McQueen a few weeks ago and I fell in love with her style and feminine glamour in the movie.

I love it all from her perfectly twisted golden hair, to the oversized sunglasses, the flirty girly dresses and the button down skirt suits. It reminds me of some of my grandmother's old pictures - I always say to my grandma that if she'd kept her clothes from the 60's and 70's I would definitely wear them now. The same with Faye's outifts! It seemed women back then just oozed glamour. *Sigh* I always said I was born in the wrong era!

Irina Werning, Back To The Future

Today I am loving Irina Werning's 'Back To The Future' series of photographs. Her concept is to take photos from people's childhoods and re-create them with the subjects now adults. The results are gorgeous and at times hilarious! I was struck by how little some of these people had changed as they'd grown up and kinda wanna re-create one of my own childhood images now!

 

 You can find the rest of her series here: Back to the Future

Sweet Treats

People who know me will know that I am by no means a natural cook. But recently I have been trying really hard to teach myself how to cook better, and amazingly its been a success! I've come across some great recipes and I'd like to begin sharing some of them here.

First up, a close friend of mine told me how for Christmas a friend of hers had made her a pot of homemade jam. I loved the idea - i think its so much more special when something is homemade - and I decided to try and make some strawberry jam myself. A few mishaps and burnt fingers later voila! I did it and it tastes damn good. Here's the recipe that I found on the BBC Good Food website:

Strawberry Jam

Time: 1 hour
Makes about 4 pots of jam


Ingredients

1.8kg of small whole strawberries
Juice of 3 lemons
1.84kg of jam sugar
Knob of butter

Instructions

1. Wash, drain and hull the fruit and put in a large non-metallic bowl. Sprinkle over the lemon juice and sugar, gently mix. Cover with a tea towel and leave overnight. (This helps keep the strawberries whole.)
2. Put a saucer in the freezer. Tip the fruit and juice into a preserving pan or a 4.5 litre/8 pint heavybased pan. Heat gently, stirring, to dissolve the sugar. Do not boil until it has.
3. Turn up the heat, then boil hard for exactly 4 minutes (use a timer). Take off the heat to test for setting point. Spoon a little jam onto the cold saucer. After a couple of minutes gently push your finger through the jam and if the surface wrinkles it is ready. If not, return to the boil for 2 minutes, then re-test.
4. Take off the heat and swirl in the butter. If the scum doesn't dissolve, skim with a slotted spoon. Cool for 10-15 minutes. (Pot when too hot and all the fruit rises to the top.)
5. Stir gently to distribute the fruit, then pour into warm sterilised jars. Put waxed discs on straight away, cover with lids or cellophane circles, then seal, label and wipe the jars. Keeps for 6 months in a cool dry cupboard.

 
Now having all this strawberry jam and wanting to make a dessert for Valentine's Day, I decided to make a Victoria Sponge with my own jam. I also got the recipe from the BBC Good Food website and it was just delicioussss! Really soft, sweet, and fluffy cake and just gorgeous overall with the jam and cream. Here's the recipe:

Victoria Sponge

Prep: 20 mins
Cooking: 20 mins
Cuts into 8-10 slices

Ingredients

• 200g unsalted butter , softened, plus extra for greasing
• 200g caster sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 4 medium eggs
• 200g self-raising flour , plus extra for dusting
• about 6 tbsp strawberry jam
• 250ml double cream , whipped
• icing sugar , for dusting

Instructions 

1. Heat oven to 190C/170C fan/gas 5. Grease and flour 2 x 20cm sandwich tins. Place the butter, sugar and vanilla extract into a bowl and beat well to a creamy consistency. Slowly beat in the eggs, one by one, then fold in the flour and mix well.
2. Divide the mix between the cake tins, place into the oven and bake for about 20 mins until risen and golden brown. The cakes should spring back when gently pushed in the middle. When ready, remove from the oven and allow to cool for 5 mins in the tin, before turning out onto a wire rack and cooling completely.
3. Spread the jam onto one cake and top with the cream. Sandwich the cakes together and dust with icing sugar.

Oh so good! Hope you enjoy the recipes!

Photos Copyrighted 2011

Just Adorable

I saw this adorableee image on a site I found called WeHeartIt originally posted by Rafaaafrrrk. It's a lovely site where people can upload their interesting photography, and people visiting can then "heart" images they like to create their own online photo collection. This photo made me smile, and I wanted to share it with you so it could also make you smile! Enjoy!

Mountain Life

Over the Christmas holidays I went on a ski trip to Austria! It was fantastic and I wanted to share some snippets of it with all of you. From the minute I stepped off the plane I was just enraptured with the beauty of the mountains around us. This is the view of the town as we landed...

We stayed in a gorgeous lodge where hot chocolate and indulgent cakes were aplenty! Since I was burning so much energy skiing all day, (at least that's what I liked to tell myself), I allowed myself to have as much of these as I liked..and after a day battling the slopes it was just what I needed.

The first days were hard I'm not gonna lie. I think learning to ski is the hardest part. You constantly have to climb up a little part of the mountain and ski a little way down displaying the latest skill your instructor had shown you. My first teacher was called Hans and had a tendency to say "ya" constantly. So much so, I caught onto it too and by the end of the first day my "yes" was doomed to remain "ya" until my return home.

By the end of the first 3 days I'd successfully navigated my first blue run (albeit for part of it I was holding on to my instructor's poles). I was very proud of myself. My body on the other hand was not so thrilled. I felt as if someone had taken a ski pole and battered my legs with it until they were completely bruised. I was waddling around like penguin as my legs had lost the ability to bend. So much so in fact someone in my hotel stopped me to ask why I was walking like that? And ski boots, pah, well whose genius idea were they? They are possibly the MOST uncomfortable shoes I have ever worn (imagine having two 5 kilo weights on each foot whilst trying to carry your skis up a mountain).

Anyway, day 4 was the exciting part. Day 4 is where it all just clicked! The first few days I think I'd held back. Probably just from the nerves associated with doing something new, and you know the possibility of crashing full speed into a tree. But on day 4 something changed and all my fear and somehow my pain disappeared and wow what a feeling it was. There is no greater feeling than whizzing down a glistening mountain, in gorgeous sunshine, with the wind rushing past you and no other sound except other skiers passing you by.

The next few days were phenomenal and I even progressed to the red slopes. The last day was the pinnacle - we stopped for lunch on an outside deck overlooking the Alps. The sky was a burning blue, and I sat on my rocking chair with a thick blanket over me just appreciating the beauty in front of my eyes. I found myself thinking how peaceful it was in the mountains...no cars, horns, no nothing. Just silence and spectacular beauty...and everything just felt so clean, the air, the mountains, all of it so pure.

Talking to some of the ski instructors I found myself a little envious of the happy simplicity of their lives. Most were born and bred on the mountain, never visited a big city, brought up in a tiny village, and they seemed extremely content. I found myself wondering if I could be happy living somewhere like this?

My experience on the mountain was so memorable and after experiencing the rush of skiing I am itching to go back. I'd love to hear about your mountain experiences?

Photos Copyrighted 2011

“I'm leaving because the weather is too good. I hate London when it's not raining.” Groucho Marx

London is where I was born and bred and quite frankly it's an awesome city (apart from the weather). The newest feature on my blog is gonna be called "Street Treats" where I'm going to share my snapshots of my city with all of you.

The pictures below were taken at London Bridge today. Enjoy!

Twinkle lights

Those who know me will know I have a twinkle light obsession! They add sparkles, romance, and just a general fairytale-esque feel which is why when I passed this restaurant's cute window display today I couldn't resist snapping a photo! I loove the way they've gathered them to look like twinkle light curtains...

Hipstamatic

I am a newly reformed iPhone'er. For 2 years I clung to my old Blackberry adamantly claiming I would never change it. But, lo and behold 6 months later I was the proud owner of a shiny new iPhone (moral of the story never say never). A few weeks ago I met a photographer who told me about an iphone photography app called "Hipstamatic" which I had never heard of. I downloaded it of course, and guys...its FABULOUS.

Now let's give you a little history..."In 1982 Bruce and Winston Dorbowski began producing a DIY camera made entirely of plastic after dropping out of art school. The molds were made by hand and each camera was assembled in the brothers' cabin workspace". This camera was called the Hipstamatic and for various reasons never became mass produced. Now the iPhone app "Hipstamatic" recreates the "look, feel, unpredictable beauty, and fun of plastic toy cameras of the past".

The app offers you a multitude of different lenses, films, frames and cases to work with each adding a different look to each picture. Some are included on download and some you have to buy for about 50p. The possibilities are endless and the effects are beautiful especially in creating "vintage feel" photographs. My grandmother has albums full of gorgeous black and white polaroids and "old" looking photos. I always wished that I could create photgraphs that resembled them...now I can.

10 years ago I would use a disposable camera and I wouldn't know how the photo turned out until I printed it. Now photography has lost some of that unpredictability. This is something you can partly relive with Hipstamatic. Furthermore, it has solved my problem of not always being able to carry a heavy camera around - my phone is always on me, and this app gives me the ability to take pictures of things I see in my every day life easily.

Now the cherry on top! An exhibition recently opened in London displaying the best of people's Hipstamatic photographs. Pictures are uploaded every day onto their facebook page for people to share and comment on. The photos in the exhibition were picked from these. I love that these are everyday normal people who have taken these beautiful photographs. Hipstamatic makes a certain level of artistry available to people who wouldn't have access to it otherwise.

Today I went to see the exhibition. It was in an unassuming place called 'The Orange Dot Gallery' in Euston. It was so unassuming in fact I walked straight past it (but i'm not gonna lie I do that quite alot). The pictures look like polaroids on a clothing line held up by minature pegs. I took photos of the exhibition using Hipstamatic myself...oh the irony!

What struck me was the quality of the photos, along with the range of colours, effects and subjects. Many of them could have been taken by a professional photographer. It is a wonderfully innovative exhibition! Due to its resounding success the exhibition has been extended to 13th February giving you all time to go see it! Here are a few of my favorite pics on display just to give you a little taste...

Here is my favorite picture that I have taken so far with Hipstamatic (not in the exhibition ;) of a broken leaf. I hope to make my Hipstamatic photos a regular feature of my blog.

 

Let me know what you think. Would love to see some of your shots?

My "me" day

It's funny, i consider myself a pretty open and optimistic person...and generally i am. But then there are times that for whatever reason i bottle things up in my sometimes crazy little head. At these times i can become a mess of negativity and confusion. One such time was last night; having finished university i am now faced with becoming part of the "real world", which for me and most people like me, means making important decisions for myself that will affect the way my life goes from here. Last night for various reasons this overwhelmed me a little. Luckily a very special person was there to comfort me which now brings me to this blog's title.

This person suggested that rather than get myself all worked up, instead, to take a step back, take some time, and do something to clear my mind to allow me to face these decisions with some perspective. And that is just what i did...something i will now fondly refer to as "me day". Today i decided to at least spend part of the day just letting myself take a breather and do something for me. I headed into central London and just let myself wander and window shop and bought a cuuute top...anddd to finish it all off i had lunch for one at a great restaurant called Carluccio's in the adorable St Christopher's Place. I had the Pasta Giardiniera which is just one of the most deliciousss dishes - penne pasta, with spinach balls and courgettes which i then drown in parmesan....its so yummy i cant stress enough.


I read my book and (a favorite past time) people watched. A woman was sitting across the table from me also dining for one, and i thought sometimes a little alone time can be just the medicine.

Now, though still faced with the same things, i feel better. So next time you feel a little lost take some time, and do something nice for yourself - a bubble bath, a lovely meal, seeing a loved one, whatever it takes. You'll be amazed what a few hours of time set aside for you can do for you.