A Brighton State of Mind

A few weekends ago I spent an amazing day in Brighton with my friends! It's been 4 years since I was last there for mine and By's 1st anniversary! so my visit was looong overdue! Growing up we used to go to Brighton loads because it was a straight direct train from Harpenden to Brighton which was the end of the line and it has a special place in my heart so I was mega excited about our visit!

There's no denying it, aside from London - Brighton has to be the coolest city in England.



and we started our day as we planned to go on - by eating some amazing food! Laur and Caz had spotted this very cool eatery called Bill's.  I loved everything about it, from the fun little jars of chutneys and jams that lined every wall...



to the bunches of coloured raffia and tissue paper that hung in every corner...



They were used to wrap up any purchase that was made but I just thought they were a pretty awesome way to decorate a place in general!

Even the pots that held the cutlery were cool!

You were able to browse as you please whilst you waited for your food to come, and then you could tick a card on your table with what you wanted to buy and at the end of your meal your purchases would get added on to your bill and arrive at your table all beautifully wrapped up - genius!

Of course it wasn't just the decor that was first class, we got these rather delicious smoothies - pineapple pieces and all!

and the food was AMAZ-ing, check out my french toast! What a way to start the day!

The girls got scrambled eggs on toast and eggs benedict, the menu reminded me quite alot of Granger & Co, but this place was slightly cooler in my opinion and the service was a million times better!

It was so good that when we met up with Jo and Nats later on we may or may not have gone back for round 2 and I got this amazing lamington! 

We were seriously lucky with the weather, and so we couldn't pass up the chance to head to the beach!

We sat for a spot of sunbathing...

and Caz and Jo went down to the water to check out the temp, pretty chilly indeed!

Of course you can't go to Brighton without taking the obligatory tourist pics on the pier!

They even had some Jubilee and Olympic themed ones this time around too!

and we took a little rest after our busy morning on these jolly deck chairs!

After some shopping in The Lanes, we hunted out Boho Gelato, as I had read it was one of the top 10 things to do in Brighton!  With flavours like choc pretzel, white chocolate coconut crispy, carrot cake, birthday cake and even dairy free flavours we were glad we paid it a visit! 

Being the milkshake fans we are, we turned our ice creams into milkshakes! 

and in my opinion nothing pairs better with a milkshake than a cupcake! So we headed to Angel Food Bakery, one of my favourite ever UK cupcakeries, to complete our treat filled day!

I'll let those pictures do the talking! Let me just say you won't find better tasting cupcakes this side of the Atlantic that's for sure! How I loved having a cupcake fest accompanied by some of my best friends (we missed the others who couldn't make it!)

We said goodbye to Jo and Nats and headed back to the beach...

There were so many people packed into every little beach cafe and bar so we decided to pick up some take away slush puppies and sit ourselves right at the water's edge!

and of course just when you think a day can't get more perfect...

You hunt down a Mexican! Believe it or not Dos Sombreros seemed to be the only Mexican in Brighton, lucky for us!

and you know you're off to a good start when free tortillas and salsa are involved!

Caz had a fajita fest...

and Laur went down the Tex Mex route with spicy chicken and sweet potato fries!

I was absolutely loving  my chicken Taco's complete with mango salsa and super creamy refried beans!  As most of you know I've been to more than my fair share of Mexican's in my time and this one more than impressed!

In my opinion there is no better day then one spent with amazing friends and amazing food! 

Milkshakes, Cupcakes & Zoo Lates...all because I turned 26!

My birthday began in the best kind of way - opening presents!

Apparently my love of coconut has spread to Shropshire and thanks to Alli I got some awesome coconut body butters and lip balms - yum!

My love of America is obviously more widely known so this Martha Stewart 'American Food' recipe book from my mom went down an absolute treat! Inside are recipes for all my favourites such as Key Lime Pie, Corn Dogs, Fish Taco's and Pulled Pork!

and some peanut butter Oreo's and a milkshake and ice cream recipe book from By were equally exciting! but best of all he bought me some amazing FireForks for toasting 2 marshmallows at a time (for s'mores fun) you can check out how cool they are when we made s'mores back here.

My mother in law had the day off work too so she went out especially to buy a blender to whip me up a special fresh strawberry birthday milkshake (it was delish!) and bought me my favourite flowers - gerberas, with some added ranunculus later on in the day!

and I got a rather impressive amount of birthday cards relating to cupcakes! 

My friend Nicola even managed to find one with an Oreo cupcake on! which means she must have psychic powers because I spent the majority of my birthday whipping up these... 

for these lovely people...

because what's better than zoo fun accompanied by cupcakes! Each summer London Zoo opens its gates for something called 'Zoo Lates' where from 6-10pm for adults only you can enjoy some of the animals they have to offer, and also enjoy some delicious food (we all know I'm not the biggest animal lover in the world so yes I was mostly there for the food!)

but this tiger was pretty cool! Unfortunately there was an even bigger tiger lover than Jade hogging all the glass space so Jade never got to introduce her tiger from her t-shirt to the real tiger! 

Her animal themed t-shirt was appreciated all the same though!

Here's nearly all our group - I'm not sure where Amy and Sam were hiding (and By is behind the camera!) It was so lovely to have so many of my friends all in the same place! 

We planned our evening around the penguin performance! so we stocked up on dinner before the show began! There were loads of various food stalls to choose from..I was torn between a few but Mexican, as it so often does, won out in the end! I had some amazing pork tacos and enjoyed my second milkshake of the day!

so it was smiles all round!

There was a huge crowd that had gathered for the penguin fun! Unfortunately, the star penguin was apparently pretty tired and not up for coming out to see everyone!

so instead we had to watch two members of the crowd dress up and act like penguins, and then 5 minutes later the show was over! so that was a bit disappointing...we were hoping for actual real penguin action!

We consoled ourselves by bringing out the cupcakes!

Laur has the same birthday as me! so it was double-y exciting to be able to celebrate it together! 

 

I love this group shot of everyone enjoying the cupcake action, clearly Jade has enjoyed it a little too much since somehow frosting had made it's way to her nose! I'm sure she won't mind me sharing this slightly embarrassing pic of her since she seems to have established a tradition in our friendship to share embarrassing pictures of me! 

cupcakes + birthdays = 2 happy girls!

One of the best parts of the night was the silent disco! Silent discos are usually pretty entertaining as they are...a load of people wearing headphones dancing around (whilst those watching on can hear nothing but just observe everyone's silly moves)

So Zoo lates' silent disco was made twice as hilarious due to the fact that we were also dressed as zoo animals whilst the silent dancing was happening!

and since there were so many other dressed up dancing animals, no one really looked twice!

Smiles all round for the dancing butterfly, ladybird and tiger!

The little lights strung through the trees added extra ambience...

but our carousel ride to round off the night was not to be as it closed just as we joined the queue!

but after a day packed with cupcakes, shakes, Mexican and silent dancing dressed as a lion it didn't damper our spirits! so it was a fun filled day all round!