An Afternoon at Sketch

The first time I saw Sketch was on Made In Chelsea, being a reality TV junkie, I really wanted to go here for as long as possible.

Having just turned 21, this was a treat from my mum and seeing as we love an afternoon tea outing, I chose Sketch of all  places.

If the food isn't enough to gab about, the decor is insane. I literally thought I was about to go on a Disney ride as soon as I walked in. Tea is mainly served in the Gallery and its basically the most beautiful, quirky but insane use of a room.

It has big plush suede and leather sofas, chairs that look like sponge fingers and it literally is all pink! I'm not a pink fan, but this is a camp and outrageous bubblegum pink you can just about handle. It's a pretty dim light room, but to sum up, for me it was like being in a Wes Anderson movie. The walls are adorned with David Schrigley artwork and these are not your run of the mill prints. They are basically hand drawn prints in which I can imagine Schrigley sat down and just thought, 'what do I fancy drawing today?'

The tea itself is a treat, a frothy treat. There are sandwiches with caviar, scones with fig jam and meringue desserts along with raspberry marshmallows. There are steaming pots of berry tea and vodka cocktails, all in printed cutlery with words such as 'Dreams' or 'Ghost'

See what I mean when I say not run of the mill?

Also, another thing to mention...the loos are giant neon eggs. Yes, you read that correctly. If the decor didn't throw you already, when it's time to excuse yourself, the bathrooms are basically what I imagine space to be like. There are giant neon eggs which you clamber into and once insider, animal noises play, along with facts about animals. This is the ultimate truth.

Here's me enjoying facts about bullfrogs, whilst enjoying the facilities.

                          

(Note...I wasn't actually peeing at this point)

And here they are from the outside.

As far as birthdays goes, this afternoon rounded off my 21st nicely. Who said birthdays had to be one colour?

sketch.com - 9 Conduit Street, London W1S 2XG

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#TheHomelessPeriod

Hi guys,

Only yesterday I learnt about this petition called the #TheHomelessPeriod. As women we need to help each other as much as we can, especially when it comes to health and hygiene. I hope you all dont mind me using my blog to promote my piece, but I want to bring awareness to something serious. Yes, I do use the word sanitary a lot and yes, I mention tampons, but it's just a word and this is something serious we all need to hear about.

Thank you.

*

David Cameron has said removing sanitary tax is ‘very difficult to do’. Ed Milliband has cited it as ‘ridiculous’ and Nicola Sturgeon has called it a ‘long standing failure in our tax system’ but what about the women who cannot even afford sanitary products, let alone protest the tax? I look further into #TheHomelessPeriod and the people who want to make it easier for the homeless women on our streets.

Let’s get the tricky part out of the way. Let’s just say the words that we all say but don’t really want to say. Periods, blood, tampons & sanitary towels. Yes, I know all very honest words in which we women know all too well. Each month we groan and complain about our cramps, our breakouts and every so often we’re a little moodier or a little angrier, but rightly so. We all get them or got them and deal with it all as soon as it happens, but what about the women who do not have the essential products to take care of themselves?



It’s hard enough for when women get their periods, so how must it feel for a homeless woman? Who every day is looking for food and shelter, and then has to find some sort of material to keep herself healthy and clean. Homeless women should not have to endure this, sanitary products should be a basic right in which women can access, as and when. People are now starting to take notice of this, and a petition has been created to finally start dealing with this issue.



Oli, Sara & Josie are 3 interns who met at the London advertising company, BBH. Together they took notice of this issue and began to see how it affected homeless women. They contacted homeless shelters and found that women found it easier to find items such as toothbrushes and some food, rather than any form of sanitary product. With this, the trio started up a petition on change.org and called it #TheHomelessPeriod. They wrote an open letter to Simon Stevens, the NHS Chief Executive and asked for them to give homeless shelters a yearly allowance for sanitary care.

Their featured petition video features the voice of  Patricia. A women who used to sleep rough on the bus day and night, who used to rip up pieces of cloth to act as sanitary care. Patricia asks ‘Why do women have to rip up a cloth, put between her, to protect herself from bleeding?’

With the services of free condoms being available in health clinics, as well as homeless shelters, sanitary products are not an easily given thing. As well as being taxed at 5% as a ‘luxury, non-essential item’, gaining these items for homeless women is only the beginning. People are being encouraged to donate sanitary care to shelters, but what’s more is we need this to be a free of charge service in which women do not have to worry about how they will take care of their health and hygiene.

Without these products for women, they can become increasingly ill. With lack of showers, infection can be caught. Periods can be irregular for women, so cramps occur and with no money to buy pain relief or sanitary care for when they do occur, women are left hopeless.



Homeless women are now resorting to shop lifting to secure sanitary products as they have no other choice. Many often feel embarrassed if caught, with some saying they have no other choice and do not know what else to do. A report from St Mungo’s, which looks into women’s experience of homelessness, says: “Male focused services often fail to comprehensively address the needs of their female service users. Expecting women to simply fit into homelessness services which have been designed for homeless men is not good enough. Service providers must understand the particular needs of homeless women.”

Sara, one of the founders of #TheHomelessPeriod was interviewed by The Independent and told them ‘When you put yourself in that situation you can’t stop thinking about it. It seems absolutely ridiculous. Anyone in the UK can get free access to contraception but someone can be in a position when you can’t get access to feminine hygiene products’’. With newspapers and social media picking up the story, the petition has now had over 60,000 signatures to secure free sanitary care for women.



Founders of #TheHomelessPeriod are now pleading for people to donate as much sanitary care as possible to homeless shelters, until the NHS finally realises how in need these women really are. Through their petition page, they ask for people who want to help the issue to set up crowd funds for these women, anything that will help them stay healthy and hygienic.

Government figures state that the number of rough sleepers rose by 37% last year, and it is evident that not enough is being done. Women should not have to find bits of dirty cloth to keep themselves clean, nor should they have to steal products and then face the shame when caught. Tampons nor towels are a luxury, they are a necessity.

If you wish to support this issue, please sign #TheHomelessPeriod.

Changes need to be made, period.

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Afternoon Tea at Le Bouchon Brasserie

'What's the occassion for this afternoon tea then?'

Dear mother, you must know by now that one never needs an excuse to have afternoon tea. So with no excuse needed, we kept it local and took to a hotel to consume cake and tea.

I live in Essex and the thought of braving the tube on a Saturday afternoon in the muggy heat, didn't seem that appealing. So when I saw this on Buzzfeed, not that I knew there were many places to go in Essex, I decided to take my mum out for tea.

Le Bouchon is a brasserie & hotel located in Maldon, Essex and although smal, it has a dining area, cocktail bar and obviously is a hotel. First impressions were good. It's a very intimate but modern hotel, with a great dining area and a sprawling cocktail bar. Staff were friendly on arrival and more than helpful and we were immediately seated for our tea.

The tea priced at £21.95 on a Saturday includes a glass of champagne and a cocktail list is provided with your tea, because naturally why question alcohol. Tea and coffee is offered and then comes the cake.

The tiers included savouries and sweets with prawn & cucumber sandwiches as well as cheese & chive scones. The sweets include fruit scones with jam and cream, as well as mini Eton-Mess, macarons, peaches & cream cupcakes and chocolate brownies adorned with raspberries.

As I don't drink tea, I went for a cocktail. It was well needed after I'd had a very heavy night before, so  Cosmopolitans were in order.

What I liked most about this tea is the quality of the food provided, it was all extremely fresh, as well as the drinks provided. For this price, it really is a treat. The service is stellar and the atmosphere is extremely welcoming.

Of course the location is ideal for people, like myself, who live in the county, but if in passing or fancying something different, this really is a lovely brasserie & hotel to dine at. I'm definitely thinking about staying here in the future, and thats solely down to just spending a few hours there. I wouldn't think twice about recommending this to my friends.

Till Next Time,
Ellie

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Love Your Face

I have a very frequent habit of critisizing my face. I run over the bump in my nose, try to conceal a beauty mark on my chin, mock my ridiculously thin eyebrows or try to pretend I don't have a 'chubby chin'.

Truth is...I really just don't care anymore. I'd had a habit of telling myself I wasn't up to standards of people and picking at the things that just don't matter. I wasn't prone to spots, but when I got one I might as well of stayed in and excluded myself from life. No way, no more.

Now I understand as women, we're raised to find our flaws and not consider ourselves too beautiful, because that would make us big headed right? Aren't we taught to bashfully say 'I'm really not' when someone say's you're pretty? Should I conform to standards and just go along with this? No I think I won't.

I do wear a lot of make up, but not too look my best for people. I look good for myself. I cannot count how many times I worried that my lipstick was too red or my eyebrows were barely there. I will overspend or not spend enough on make up, but if I can at least resemble Rita Hayworth, well...that's pretty okay with me.

I have bad days and good days. Days where my skin is so oily, I'm curious as to what the hell is going on under there. I also have these really good days where I think, damn if the tip of my eyeliner could kill. This is natural, and I've only just started accepting it. Pull at skin or tweeze things too much, there are more important things too do...like watching Game of Thrones.

I think it's time to start accepting things as they are and stop putting yourself down based on too much blusher, or foundation making you look pale. There should be higher priorities in life. Like your own happiness and enjoying cake, and dancing to Donna Summer more.

Love your face, the way it is.

Till The Next Time,
Ellie

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Is It April Already?

I feel like a bit of a bad blogger. 

I've had major writers block over the Easter holiday and writing seemed like something I could just jump back into. Hm...not that easy. However, I'm still amazed that it's April already. I'm not quite sure where this year is going, but here we are.

Let's recap.

March was a great month. I managed to regain my social life and something life changing happened, something that would quickly make me lose my social life once more...the US version of Netflix. I suddenly considered the Gilmore Girls to be more important that sunlight...damn you Netflix.

Asides from obsessing over the two Lorelai's, here a couple of things I did:

• Celebrated my best friend's birthday with him - I went to Farnham where we ate thai food and listened to vinyl and consumed alcohol - which is the responsible thing to do on birthdays.
• Saw Blade Runner : The Final Cut - interesting movie, a lot of Harrison Ford facial expressions.
• Started contributing to online magazines, including Kettle Magazine & Zusterschap Collective.
• For a while I couldn't get into reading, usually I'm a massive bookhead, but I've just finished Paula Hawkins, The Girl On The Train (an amazing read, the next gone girl for sure) and have just started scoping over Amelia Freer's, Eat Nourish Glow.
• Began learning how to cook other things - asides from chicken dippers and carrot cakes. I credit my best friend as an amazing cook, so I'm taking lessons from him - so far I cooked a carbonara and didn't kill my dad!
• I have a 9 month old niece who I spend time with, my little Emily Rabbit, who has just begun crawling and has better eyebrows than me and I simply have to write about her because she is a total babe.

Another big positive was that I firmed up my university decision. As of September I'm off to Sheffield to study Journalism Studies. Nervous is an understatement, but extremely excited to be moving away from home for pastures new... though, life without a dishwasher seems challenging. 

I'm also excited to be writing a load more for online publications. I've been writing a lot of personal pieces, as well as culture. I think this is a great way to start getting a real feel for writing, and I get super excited when I see something has been published.

I'm hoping to be a lot more active this month on my blog, get involved with more bloggers and note to self - The Gilmore Girls can wait till you get home, sunlight is important Ellie.

Till Next Time,
Ellie

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Baking Chronicles - Carrot Cake

I'm a real try hard baker. When I say that, what I really mean is 'I buy all of the ingredients in hope of an edible, normal shaped, tasty infact, cake'. I'm quite a dreamer, meaning I want to be Nigella Lawson or have an icing sugar range in Waitrose, we all need an achievable goal sometimes.

Despite the flat muffins, the Betty Crocker assisted mix and the pistachio cake that made my dad ill, I've learnt the one cake I'm really truly good at making is a Carrot Cake. There's nothing overly fussy about making it, nor does it contain the spices of unicorns and Jesus. It's a basic recipe I've played about with from Dan Lepard. To find the original recipe, click here!

I call this the only cake my dad truly likes because usually he'll tell me if he doesn't like something. This is a simple cake with lots of nutmeg and cinnamon, cream cheese and yes, real actual carrots. I opt out of using dried fruits because they are food of the grown ups and I personally don't like chewing through wrinkly fruit. I also up the spices in this cake because I've noticed the flavor sometimes disappears halfway through and I also add more because the cake smells only what I envision Christmas to be. I also like to use a vanilla butter cream in the center because think, why would not have vanilla butter cream in a cake?

Let me know if this recipe works for you!

The cake
175g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp ground nutmeg
200g light brown sugar
150ml sunflower oil
2 large eggs 
200g carrots (3 small-ish ones)
75g chopped walnuts (optional)

The middle
200g icing sugar
150g butter (Stork works best)

The top
200g soft cream cheese 
100g unsalted butter 
125g icing sugar

Somehow if you manage to keep chill throughout this, you'll end up with a little something below.

So, firstly...

Gather all your ingredients and realise you gotta stop buying organic because it's still a week till payday.

Combine your flour, baking powder and all the spices - again keep adding till you smell Christmas.

Mix oil, brown sugar and 2 eggs - sorry, not that attractive!

Add grated carrot to the unattractive mix, have a moment's silence for the skin you lost whilst grating.

Put all your ingredients in the bowl, like everything, and mix till you feel like it might pass as bakeable.

Put your mix into two rounded tins, and pretend you didn't spill most of it on the side...like I did.

Bake for about 25 minutes, or as the experts say 'till a clean skewer comes out' but you know...until it's no longer gloopy. You should end up with something like this...hopefully.

Then add a whole lotta love to the middle of the cake and yes, lick the bowl.

If you got really bored after this long process, you can just ice the top of the cake in the morning...like I did. I put a load of almonds and walnuts on top because it looked fancy.

And then finally, attempt to enjoy (if edible) and if not, well at least you did something that involved an oven and sugar!

I hope you enjoyed this somewhat tutorial!

Till next time,

Ellie

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Bucket List: Skydiving

I've never been afraid of heights, never really had that going to be sick, can't feel my legs and fear that the floor will come crashing through premonition. I've always quite enjoyed being way up high and possibly putting myself in the fear of the unknown. So when me and dad holidayed in Hawaii, the idea of skydiving was a must,

Skydiving is one of those things you always really want too do but never truly know how you'll feel till you're up in the air. I didn't really consider what we were doing until we got to the skydiving center and were being informed of potential death. Lets back track.

Located in Oahu, Skydive Hawaii is found as what is described as 'The Worlds Most Beautiful Drop Zone'. You can fall from either 20,000 or 14,000 or 12,000 ft with 'altitude guaranteed'. They ensure guaranteed enjoyment in safe hands as you drop, being able to see views of Diamond Head, Pearl Harbor, Kaena Point & the North Shore Coastline. Priced within the jump ranges, it varies between $150-175, but increases to a steep $998 if you want to go as high as 20,000 ft.

Me and my dad opted to go for 14,000 ft because you know we were only sacrificing our lives and jumping out of a plane, with a person on our backs of course. Before you jump, you're talked through all the musts and do not's, the true stomach churning part is when they talk about potential death, how to avoid it and what happens if you do die - ENCOURAGING.

Once 'reassured', you're strapped into harnesses, with belts fastened and buckles tightened in places I didn't know existed. You are then assigned a professional to jump with who talks you through how to land and stay relaxed, and most importantly, really enjoy it because it really is over in minutes. I rocked out my best kit for the day, a star wars shirt and red converse - which is the basis of any fashionista.

You don't truly know what nerves feel like until you are hunched back in a small plane as you go up and up with someone strapped on your back. You're given goggles to protect your eyes and advised 'to chill' - I mean can you really chill at 14,000ft? Before you know it you're plane door is opening and you're suddenly on the edge, in a matter of seconds about to drop. At this point there's no real turning back, unless you're red in the face and sweating tears from every pore and confident that you really can't jump. Within moments of sitting on the edge, before even thinking about what's about to happen, you drop.

Let me tell you, it is the best feeling. Not as nice as eating battenburg cake or just getting paid, but it's up there. You feel light as air when you drop, and it's only after you've prized you're eyes open that you see you're floating in the air. It did help that when we jumped we were in gorgeous Hawaii, but it's not at all what you expect. Everything is quiet and peaceful and before you know it you're edging near the ground to descend. Within moments all those nerves and fear of death are gone and you're on the ground, not quite believing what you've just done.

The guys at Skydive Hawaii are great, and really love what they do. They jump at all times of the day and never seem to get bored of it - why would you? I'd say the best part is later, when you're adrenaline is decreasing and it's only really just kicked in what you've done. Part of our package was that you got pictures/dvd/tshirt & a personal certificate - the real deal, because when you jump out of a plane, you sort of need to clarify you're pretty much up there with mission impossible.

This was one of many things crossed off my bucket list, I'd like to give it a go in Las Vegas to see different kinds of scenery, but one thing is for sure. The views coming down from the plane are amazing, I saw dolphins and a taco bell - now that's amazing.

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