Wednesday 16 April 2014

Trip to Scandinavia

Yesterday, I got back from a trip to Copenhagen in Denmark with my parents to celebrate my Dad's birthday. It was great - it was so nice to get away from my dissertation and all the other stress at home for a few days and spend time with the family!

We arrived late in the evening and went straight to the hotel, where we were on the 20th floor with some fantastic views of the city on one side, and on the other in the distance was the sea and Sweden!

We decided to just use the first day to explore the city, have a wander round and get our bearings so we could plan the next few days. Starting off in Norreport we found a wonderful food market called Un Mercato - everything looked so delicious!





We wandered back into the main town, taking in the sights before stumbling across the Lego Shop!

I'm a big kid at heart so definitely spent a little too long in there!


 Nyhavn built out of lego - very impressive!

Then we headed over to the real thing...


Unfortunately the weather wasn't that good that day, so it's not the best photo! But still, the buildings are painted in gorgeous colours, trust me!



Day 2 was my dad's birthday, and as a surprise we actually got the train over to a town called Malmo in Sweden for the day! It only takes about half an hour on the train from Copenhagen, mostly on a bridge crossing the sea. It was foggy again so the views weren't that great, but on a clear day you can see a big wind farm across the sea.

This day consisted mostly of looking round shops, since Malmo is more of an industrial town which doesn't really cater for tourists in the same way that Copenhagen does. The design there is fantastic though! Most of the shops we ended up looking in were interiors - we are all suckers for a bit of interior design and I spend the day pretty much planning my future home... just need some money please!



Loved this bit of street art painted on a wall. No idea what it has to do with paintbrushes but the message should certainly be remembered!


After spending the day looking round Malmo we headed back to Copenhagen for dinner and a night time stroll. Something Copenhagen has in the Kongens Nytorv area is the #HappyWall - pretty hard to explain but basically a load of flippy doors on hinges, one side black and the other in colour, so people can write messages, names etc.! Like this...
Pretty cool!

Nyhavn is gorgeous at night time, too



A lovely trip, all making for a smiley girl!



N x




Tuesday 8 April 2014

Procrastibaking

Wow, again, I've certainly been neglecting this blog for a while! It seems something happens each April to get me wanting to blog again... Well this time I'm starting out with the very best intentions so fingers crossed I'll stick to it this year!

In 44 days I finish University and enter the unknown with (at least for the moment) very few plans. I'm pretty nervous about that, and pretty upset to be leaving uni and most of what goes with it! I can't say I'll miss all the work that third year has brought with it though. I'm currently going through some sort of dissertation denial stage which unfortunately isn't too conducive to getting much of that done...

This term, then, has been very hectic. There's been a lot of work, obviously bringing with it the "need" for a lot of procrastinating. This has meant there's been a lot of baking going on. Because cake makes everything better, doesn't it?

I've even branched out and started baking bread too. Kneading is just a great way of destressing. Throw a bit of dough around the kitchen and any bad vibes from work or money or hangovers or just a general bad day (we all have those!) are banished. And you get a lovely smelling kitchen and a yummy loaf at the end of it!

So I just thought I'd add some photos of what I've been baking this term...particularly as I'm back on that pre-summer diet everyone seems to go on once April's here.


Vanilla sponge cupcakes with milk chocolate icing and white chocolate shavings
Very first pizzas from scratch! With tomato sauce, mozzerella, prosciutto ham,
sundried tomatoes, olive tapernade and topped with rocket.

Chocolate Malteaser cupcakes



First loaf of bread. Slightly mis-shaped but nice and fluffy!


Loaf number two!

Pineapple upside down cake

Sorry about the quality of the photos, I'm a bit of an instagram lover (you can follow me at niobe93), and I've currently only got my iPhone available. Hopefully going to get a nice new camera soon though! Any suggestions?

I'm going to Copenhagen tomorrow with my family for a nice break away from all this horrible work and to celebrate my Dad's birthday, which should be lovely! I'll blog about it once I'm back, I'm determined to keep this up this year!

Niobe xx
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