Sleep Eat Repeat

I don't pay much attention to my posts. Life happens and I try to summarise it in a (often very long-winded, essay style) post. Having read my posts and followed me on Instagram, some of my friends have highlighted, however that I am a bit of a foodie. Well, after a hectic weekend in Lithuania and busy week to follow, this weekend was dedicated to sleeping and (of course) food.

With Richard enjoying work drinks in Brighton, I got to spend my Friday evening with my beautiful friend, Chloe. We had dinner at Carluccio's which I always trust for good, simple, well priced Italian food. Particularly, I love the Covent Garden restaurant because there, you forget that Carluccio's is a chain and instead feel like you are in a lovely, welcoming on-off restaurant. I had a mozzarella salad for starters and spinach pasta for mains which I absolutely love. The dish is so simple but tastes incredible! Chloe had a prosciutto-based salad and tortellini for mains which she loved too and insisted that this be our new go-to place. Although thoroughly full, we needed another place to sit and catch up; not wanting any alcohol, we decided to visit the Haagen Dazs café in Leicester Square.  I wanted to try their ice cream macaroons but as they were out of it, I enjoyed some mango and raspberry ice cream with a latte. The dessert (as always) was incredible and our waitress was lovely; having long ago finished our desserts, we continued chatting and she kept on brining us glasses of water. After staying at the cosy café for far too long, we eventually made our way home

After a lazy Saturday morning, me and Richard decided to head to Westfield in Sheperd's Bush for some pre-holiday shopping (we are off to Turkey for a week on Saturday!) The shopping centre was quite busy and I didn't manage to find anything for myself (September isn't quite the right month for short searching). Mooching around the shops, we completely lost track of the time, realising we were cutting it fine for our dinner reservations back in Wimbledon. Not wanting to hurry, we cancelled our reservation, continued to window shop and had dinner at Po. I had squid for starters which was far too greasy for my liking and stir fried noodles with chicken and prawns for my main which was basic but relatively nice. Not wanting to go home just yet, we spent the rest of the evening at Ca'ppucino, sitting in the comfy, white chairs with our hot drinks and an incredible (warm) chocolate and pear brownie with vanilla ice cream and some melted dark chocolate. It may have been the best brownie I have ever had!

For the first time in forever, I managed to have a lie in on Sunday. It was exactly what I needed and pretty much set the mood for the rest of the day; laziness. Sigh... After staying in bed for far too long and watching some rubbish Sunday morning telly, me and Richard eventually headed out to Fulham to buy some food in preparation for our steak dinner (and some incredible carrot cake which we bought from Wholefoods). Our dinner proved to be very successful; the food was great, which we enjoyed with some gorgeous red wine. After our huge dinner, we spent the evening watching tv and recuperating from our hectic weeks, preparing for the one ahead.

Muah

Roo xx

Wedding of the year: Edita & Donatas

As mentioned in my "checking in post", I spent this weekend in Lithuania to celebrate my cousin, Donatas marrying Edita - the new member of the family.

It proved to be an exhausting, non-stop weekend, in which -along with the 1.5 day wedding - I tried to incorporate seeing family members and some sightseeing -as this was Richard's first visit to Lithuania- along with some sleep (which there really wasn't enough of).

With a 6am start on Saturday, I had a rushed trip to the hairdresser's, rushing right back to make up my face, get dressed, before making my way to the bride's home. As the maid of honour, I spent most of the day with the bride and groom, seeing very little of Richard and the rest of the family. Nevertheless, it proved to be a beautiful day and a wonderful evening. The sun was shining, the weather was hot and Edita got what she wished for: autumn pictures, with orange leaves, everywhere!

After the church service in the city (a beautiful, intimate church off Freedom Avenue - a.k.a Laisves Aleja), the bridal party played games and drank champagne outside Kaunas Castle. We then travelled up to Raudondvario Dravas which is where the civil ceremony took place. The site was so busy, with endless numbers of weddings but so beautiful too - it was once a large estate owned by a rich family which has now become the go-to place for weddings. After more games and more champagne, we had to fulfil the Lithuanian tradition of the bride being carried over the bridge by the groom (along with the bridesmaids and their groomsmen).

Finally, we reached the venue for the reception which was surrounded by endless trees and other greenery. The evening was filled with a lot of alcohol, a lot of food and even more laughter, as I learnt of the many many, weird and (mostly) wonderful Lithuanian wedding traditions.

Come Sunday, the celebrations, alcohol and food continued. It was a far more relaxed day, most of which I spent wearing a veil (the bride's veil has to be passed on to Maid of Honour once she marries). We eventually headed home for a mini-rest before heading to Akropolis -the shopping centre- for dinner, bowling, coffee and a little family reunion.

Monday was our last day in Lithuania, most of which Richard, Rudy and I spent in Kaunas, sightseeing and eating.

For those who know me, will know I dread any trip to Lithuania - in spite of it being my hometown, it is not my favourite place to return to. Nevertheless, this year proved to be a really enjoyable trip. The wedding was beautiful and it was lovely to be part of the celebrations and to see two wonderful people, who are so clearly in love officially unite their lives and families together.

Muah

Roo xx

Checking in

Apologies for the lack of blogging recently. A combination of preparing for a weekend in Lithuania, spraining my ankle, suffering from quite intense, very sudden flu and a weekend visit from Bex left me little time or energy to write.

Time for a breather...

I have just returned from a weekend in Lithuania and whilst I am too sleepy to write an update right now, one will follow shortly. 

Muah

Roo xx

Hen party celebrations

My cousin, Donatas is marrying the loveliest girl; Edita - a wonderful person who has become a bit like a sister to me. The wedding is in two weeks and I was lucky enough to be asked to be Edita's maid of honour.

One of the maid of honour's responsibilities is to organise a hen party. I, for one have never been a maid of honour, nor attended a hen party so this proved to be quite a daunting task, as my nearest and dearest have been made very aware - it has been a stressful time. Anyway, after much planning, I decided to celebrate Edita's last big night out before the big day at a cabaret show. To be more precise, we went to Proud Cabaret Camden for the Beautiful and Damned show. 

So on Saturday, having prepared a couple of snacks and dressed myself back into the glitzy '20's, I had a visit from Edita and one of her bridesmaids. We snacked, opened a bottle of sparkling Rosé and chatted away before heading out to Camden (to Edita's ignorance) to meet the other girls.

We entered a dark, smoky room, being welcomed by waitresses dressed in bras, bottoms, suspender belts and heels who showed us to our table. The music was low and we had just about enough light to decide on cocktails and settle ourselves in before our pre-ordered starter was served. I had the prawn and mango salad which was very simple, having one large prawn with a tomato and mango salsa. It was a little basic but did taste quite good. Some of the other girls had smoked salmon with horseradish which seemed to be more substantial and tasty. As for the main, I had bream with mango, coriander and lime puree. I have to say, the fish was cooked perfectly and tasted wonderful but with no side dish, it wasn't quite as filling as the chicken and potatoes which was one of the other choices.

Having had our mains, the first part of the show started. The best part of the entire show was by far the hostess, who was so funny and entertaining. She struck the perfect balance of being funny, inappropriate and had quite a voice for her moments of singing. At one point, she even brought on all the hens onto the stage and made them mime L-O-V-E as she sang. The performers were generally really good, consisting of women only, which was a little disappointing. I have only ever been to one other cabaret show, but whilst this one was a lot better, I do feel like Guanabara had struck the perfect balance by having male and female performers.

During one of the intermissions, we had our desserts - I had the poached pear and ice cream but having also tried the passion fruit cheesecake, can confirm that they may have the second best cheesecake I've had in London (the top place going to Roxie's). Once the show had finished, the middle tables were moved apart, creating a dancefloor. The music was so old-school and feel-good, we spent most of the evening dancing about; afterall, who wouldn't want to dance to 'My Girl'?! Our ticket package got us in to the club right next door, but with the music being current pop and the place far too busy, we returned to the best type of hen party music: classic cheese. 

Whilst planning the party proved to be more stressful that I ever thought it would, Edita had a great time and was so appreciative of the effort. That, combined with a genuinely good, fun night out meant it all paid off in the end. There is only one big event left now, of course. The wedding...

Muah

Roo xx