I'm still alive, honestly..

Hey everyone!

So sorry that I have completely disappeared! I was in Berlin for a while, minus laptop or t'internet, then essays, class stuff, etc just piled up on top of me! To be perfectly honest, this post is going to just be a quick recap of what I've been up to, with many, many pictures. Brace yourselves.

1. Pancake Tuesday - Yes it has really been that long since I last posted. Myself & two of my housemates do Soup Run in the city on Tuesday nights, so afterwards we came home & treated ourselves to Nutella and pancakes.. Yum.

2. Tuxedo nails - Inspired by Zooey Deschanel at the Golden Globes, I knew the guys in my class planned on 'suiting up' for the airport on the way to Berlin. So I decided to join in. I used Barry M's Strawberry Ice Cream as the base, with a black Kiss nail art pen for details.

3. First German meal - And we went for Italian. Forget local cuisine, I honestly had more foreign food there than in the rest of my life. We landed, dumped our bags at the hotel & went in search of food. As usual, I opted for pasta, with cheese, tomato sauce, olives, veg, etc. It was such a small, sweet little restaurant!

4. Night view - Seeing as I study German Law, a lot of our trip was taken up with visits German houses of parliament, etc. We went to the Bundestag (parliament) and managed to get out onto a balcony, from which we saw the bright night lights of Berlin.. It was gorgeous. Love love love.

5. Asian food - See, I wasn't lying. We had loads of free time one day, and we were staying beside the main train station. In Germany, the station are also like shopping centres, so myself & a friend went to an Asian place for food. I got beef with veg & rice, for like €6.50 & we shared 5 spring rolls for just €2 - Brilliant price!

6. Nail polish - I couldn't go shopping in Germany without picking up some make up. The first four nail polishes were on sale for €1.95 each, & are gorgeous colours. The fifth was an Essence nail polish, which I just decided to try out. Reviews will most likely be up soon!

7. Me & my sisters - Two days after I came home, it was my sister's confirmation. There's quite a big age gap between me & those three, but we get on well. I wore a mullet-skirt dress from Awear & was delighted, because my sister asked me to sponsor her. We went for dinner & had a lovely day!

8. Naked palette - Okay, I KNOW I am late to the band wagon on this one. I have been lusting after the Naked palette since it first came out, but it tok me until last week to actually bite the bullet and buy it. What can I say? Match made in Heaven.

9. Chilli Con Carne - I went for dinner to Captain America's with my friend, as a break from my essay. €3 cocktails & I was tipsy before evening. I got chilli, which is MASSIVE. I really should've gotten a side salad, but without thinking, ordered chips. And there was rice. And tortilla chips. Needless to say, I didn't finish it.

10. Shorts - There's really no story behind this. We were strolling down Grafton Street, I took the opportunity to pop into River Island, & fell in love with these cuties. The pink ones are such a nice colour for summer, & the green just made me think of St Patrick's Day. Want!

11. Yum Thai - Same day as above, we finished college at two, grabbed food from Yum Thai & went to sit in St Stephen's Green. Again, I got beef & rice, which was SPICY! I didn't even have water with me.. But for €5, so worth it!

12. Black dress - Which does not belong to me. Boo. Last week, I had three nights out. My first as an over 18 singleton, so an amazing dress was needed! My housemate loaned me her gorgeous black body-con dress from River Island, which I am dying for... If it goes missing, I am not responsible.

So, that has been the last month of my life. Clearly, I have eaten a lot, & done not much more. I promise to be a better blogger, & post regularly! Hope everyone is keeping well & has a good weekend/ happy Mother's Day!

Chloe x

Dinner at Taste Restaurant

Hi!

Last night I went out for dinner with my boyfriend. We decided to just give each other a present under €10 for Valentine's, & go out together instead. Obviously most people who read this won't be near this restaurant, as it's in Wexford. But if you're around the area - I definitely recommend it.

We went to Taste, which serves 'Modern Irish Cuisine'. I'm a fan of foreign foods, but my boyfriend refuses to try anything more exotic than Chinese or Italian, so it was perfect. It's also quite inexpensive - A three course meal, or two courses and a glass of house wine, for €25. During February, they also provide a complimentary bottle of wine on Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday nights. While menus are subject to change, we were faced with a choice of the following:

I chose the crisp roll of chicken with brie & thyme, cracked pepper aioli & chilli oil as my starter, followed by penne pasta tossed with spinach, roasted vegetables and black olives in tomato & ginger sauce, parmesan & herb oil, and for dessert, I had the chocolate brownie, chocolate caramel & vanilla ice-cream. The house wine was a Spanish Pinot Grigio, which neither of us had.

My starter wasn't what I was expecting. It was basically chicken with a mixture of sauces, etc, in pastry. For whatever reasons, I was thinking of something like chicken nuggets (never say I'm not cultured!). But, it was lovely. I'm not the biggest fan of cheese, so as I came to the end of it, I scraped some off, but the chicken was melt-in-my-mouth and the pastry was nice and crispy.

My starter

(Once again, using Blackberry in low lighting.)

I'm a big fan of pasta, so had a little mental argument about whether to opt for the pasta without meat, or another main course, with meat. But it was definitely a brilliant choice. The roasted vegetables were so juicy, and the sauce was a little bit spicy. Although, like I said, I'm not a cheese fan, the melting cheese in this was much nicer than I expected. There's no way I could finish it, my dress was too tight to risk any explosions of my stomach!

My main course.

I'm a major chocolate lover, so I didn't really even look at the other desserts. The brownie had almonds and actually wasn't too heavy and chocolately, which was nice after a heavy meal. What more can I say? It was a nice end to the night!

Dessert.

Overall, I definitely recommend it. I'm pretty sure my boyfriend would too - He said the soup (potato & leek) was amazing, and his lamb (cooked to medium) was some of the nicest he's ever had. I didn't get pictures, because he thought I was an absolute freak for taking photos of my own food. Also, service was impeccable - discreet, but constantly helpful. Fair play!

Since it was a special night out, I dressed up (hence the tight dress & fear of bursting). I wore this Asos dress (on sale for €15.09) with the shoe boots from this post. I pretty much did usual make up:

The dreaded mirror pose.

Primer - Catrice Prime & Fine Smoothing Refiner

Foundation - Estee Lauder Double Wear in Shell

Concealer - Collection 200 Lasting Perfection Concealer

Powder - ELF Studio HD Powder

Blusher - Benefit Coralista

Highlighter - Benefit High Beam

Bronzer - NYC Sun 2 Sun Bronzing Powder

Eyeshadow - Benefit Silky Powder Eyeshadow in Bossy

Eyeliner - Mac Liquid Eyeliner

Mascara - Lancome Hypnose in Black

Lips - Yes to Carrots Lipbutter & DuWop lipstick in Private Red

Hope everyone has a lovely weekend!

Chloe x

V-Day Nails!

Hello there :)

Today, I just have a few pictures to show you of my nails today - As always, I'm behind the times, so they're essentially a Valentines' design, inspired by the brilliant CherrySue's post on Beaut.ie. I'm sure you've all seen her amazing tutorial on how to achieve this look, but if not, you can check it out here.

Since I'm so unoriginal, I basically copied her nails, but I switched the colours (Mostly due to my laziness - The thought of peeling silver glitter off my nails for a few hours did not appeal.)

So, I used Rimmel London's Lycra Pro nail polish in 325, Hot Gossip. It's a nice red that isn't too in-yo'-face, but one major complaint is that it takes FOREVER to dry. I had applied OPI's Spark de Triomphe, a silver glitter with a hint of gold, on my ring fingers three times by the time the Rimmel had dried. Maybe I just applied it too thickly, but if I hadn't had four hours with nothing to do, I would have ended up pretty impatient. For the cute little silver hearts, I made use of a Kiss Nail Art pen. I bought this is a pack of three (white, black & silver) but I'm not sure if it has a name. It can be found in Dunnes & Sam McCauley's as far as I know. It isn't exactly a pen, just a very thin brush, but it worked for me. If you don't have a nail art pen, CherrySue's paperclip method is really handy, and you can use a lot of stuff in place of a paper clip - I used a cable tie for the read hearts. (I'm not sure why I had one of these lying around, but I did.)

Rimmel 325 Hot Gossip OPI Spark de Triomphe

Kiss Silver Nail Art Pen

The original tutorial contains much more comprehensive instructions & tips than I could give you, so look to that for advice. All that's left is pictures. Sorry for the quality - A camera mishap last Thursday night leaves me with just a Blackberry for the moment. Boo.

My 'pictures', clearly I meant picture.

This one which looks like jam dripping

off a glitter explosion is the best one I took.

Which says a lot.

Did you guys have a good Valentine's? I spent the day in college, met a friend for crepes at Lemon (so, so good), then did the Soup Run around the city centre for SVP. Believe me, getting up at 7AM was a killer this morning!

Chloe x