The Hill Garden and Pergola at Hempstead

I love finding beautiful spaces that are hidden away, London’s secret gems. I recently visited the Hampstead Hill Garden and Pergola, which is a beautiful garden with a walk-through pergola that looks really enchanting. Now that it has hit summer, the garden is blooming with lots of greenery and pretty flowers, and it’s a great place to walk through and enjoy.

Here are a few snaps from my last visit, which was a really enjoyable afternoon. We went during a weekday so it was pretty quiet – perfect for a few isolated shots of a beautful vista!

I’d recommend a visit if you’re ever near the area – it really feels like a secret, hidden away garden, and it’s lovely no matter which time of the year! I visited last year in autumn as well, and the shades of colours look amazing, so don’t worry if you think you can’t see it in the summer season : )

That Time I Brunched at Home with Friends

The heatwave has arrived in London, so I’ve been making the most of the weather, with ice-cool drinks, random visits to pretty cafes, relaxing in the park and meeting up with friends now that we all have a little free time.

I’m sure you’ve all noticed the popular rise of Brunching – it’s fashionable, instagrammable and usually healthier than a standard fry-up.

When I go out with friends, we usually opt for brunch – it’s sometimes cheaper than lunch, looks more photogenic and we usually feel pretty satisfied with a decent meal. Having said that, I can see that these days it is easy to get caught up in the brunching/afternoon-tea-ing/girl-about-town lifestyle, which means spending a bucket-load of money to feel like you had an ‘experience’ worth showing off to others.

A friend and I were talking about how it is easy to have this lifestyle and mentality become normalised – there is nothing wrong with going out with friends to eat, but it can be easy to spend more than you intend to, or indulge in too much unhealthy food because of the whole ‘FOMO’ fear behind the ‘Instagrammable’ life. So we decided to opt for the best of both worlds – pretty, photogenic food but the comfort of our home, with healthy(ish) food which didn’t cost much – below you can see the results!

I’m not sure we’ll always be able to manage brunch (or afternoon teas, gourmet dinners and so on) at home, especially with the busy lives we lead. Not to mention the fact that sometimes it can cost the same to buy all the pretty food we want, even if we’re just going to have it at home! Having said that, it’s nice to have something cosy at home, with lots of banter and gossip, and a chance to kick off your shoes and relax : )

Eid-al-Fitr 2018/1439

Happy Eid everyone!

It’s been both a long and a short month (is that possible??) of fasting – on the one hand, the days seemed long, hot and all I thought about was what to cook that day. On the other hand, it really feels like the days just sped by and 30 days of fasting were gone already!

We had a lovely long weekend of celebrating with family, full of dinners (where everyone’s stomach still feel shrunken so we are all getting full very quickly!)

Here’s a peek at our Eid, which we spend at my mum’s, my sister’s, my brother’s and at my aunt’s for meals. I love that even though we don’t have a huge family in the UK, we still have lots of family around us to celebrate with and it always feels like we aren’t short of dinner invitations. I’ve always said to my husband that I can do without a new outfit (even though I buy a new one every Eid) and the bling, but it’s the memories with family which make it Eid.

Hope you all enjoyed the celebrations and had a lovely Eid – I feel a bit sad I didn’t have time to put mehndi on this time around, but I’ll see if there are any mehndi cones lying around!

I’ll leave you with a short story of my little nieces and young cousin, whom I found in my sister’s garden – one niece was lying down while the other two were poking her. When I asked them what they were doing, their response was that they were playing ‘the dead bee game’. My sister wandered out a little while later to find that they had switched places and another niece was playing the dead bee!

Kids!

Floral Cabanas at Coppa Club

I’ve been hearing (and seeing) a lot about the Coppa Club beautiful cabanas (especially after they had some very cosy igloos in the wintertime for customers!), and took the chance to go there recently with a couple of friends to try some lunch there on a warm day. The restaurant is situated next to Tower Hill, and has a perfect view of the River Thames and its various buildings, so unsurprisingly, it was extremely busy and most of the tables were taken!

We didn’t get to spend long in the cabanas as they were all booked up, but the staff did let us sit in one for a short while, until we were moved to our proper table. The hanging flowers looked beautiful, and made us feel like we were in a secret garden – a really lovely atmosphere.

As for the food, we ordered some light lunch – a salmon and cress toast, a watermelon salad and a fruity trifle with some mocktail drinks. The food was not bad, but I did think it was slightly pricey for what we got – I imagine this is due to the prime location of the restaurant. The salmon was pretty standard, but the dessert was nice – the only thing I was a little disappointed with were the drinks, which didn’t have anything special about them.

I’ve been meaning to go Coppa Club for a while now since they’ve had the cabanas, and it was lovely to sit and enjoy the view. However I will say that it was very, very busy which definitely affected the customer service – we asked the staff several times for a few things and they just never came back to us, or said they would speak to the manager and then didn’t give us an answer. One of the things we wanted was to change our tables, as we were seated in a very uncomfortable spot under a very hot sun, but despite asking for over 45 mins if we could change, we never got another table and eventually just left after we ate. For me, this affected the experience pretty negatively, which made me feel like the hype wasn’t enough for the quality of food and customer service you get.

One of the things which is on the rise is beautiful looking food, flat-lays and pretty restaurants, especially with food bloggers and Instagram making everything look so appealing. My experience here has warned me not to always believe the hype – it may look pretty in the pictures but sometimes it might not be as amazing as it looks!

EVALUATION:
HALAL : NO
VEGETARIAN & VEGAN OPTIONS AVAILABLE: YES
PRICE : £10 UPWARDS FOR light lunch, £15-30 FOR LUNCH
RATING OUT OF 10: 4
LOCATION: 3 Three Quays Walk, Lower Thames St, London EC3R 6AH

Lilac Views and Perfume Smells at the Lavender Fields

My sister and I have been planning to visit a lavender field for quite some time now, and were counting down the months that the lavender fields would be ready – the best time being July and August.

We finally found time to visit the beautiful Mayfield Lavender Farm last weekend, which we visited on a lovely sunny day, and were not disappointed!

One of the first things which struck us when walking up to the fields was how beautiful it all smells – the smell of fresh lavender is in the air all around us and it smells like a perfumerie. These field were pretty big, and we mananged to walk all around and explore the beautiful flowers.

The lavender fields have become pretty popular these days – there were lots of other photographers, bloggers, vloggers and general tourists making the most of the fields, so although you can’t tell in the photos, it was pretty busy! The lavender farm had plenty of pretty spots – a red telephone box, a pretty folly to sit and relax, and lots of hidden seating areas (like one we found with grape vines!)

One of the other things we soon noticed was the amount of bees flitting from flower to flower – there were hundreds of them all keeping busy and buzzing around.

There was a lovely gift store which we could buy all things lavender – including bunches of dried lavender which smelled heavenly. We bought a few bunches to take home and give to our mum and sister, and our bags smelled of lavender all the way home!

At one point while we were choosing our bunches, a bird calmly flew into the middle of the flowers and watched us for a while – although it flew away soon after!

We also bought some lavender chocolate and lavender soap – there was a huge range of lavender products – from tea, oils, fudge, chocolate and skin products to drawer liners, candles, pouches and even cushions!

By the time we left the Lavender Fields it was getting pretty busy, and the day was getting even warmer. I love that these beautiful fields are so close to London, especially as when we were in the fields it felt like another part of England entirely.

One of the things I’d warn anyone about when visiting is to try and visit early to avoid the crowd, it can be hard to take pretty photos when there’s a queue for the right shot! We had a lovely day at the lavender farm, although our feet were pretty tired by the end of it, and after a few hours of smelling non-stop lavender, we did need a break from it!

Weekend Pretty….Buzzing Around

I managed to catch a busy bee today among the flowers – a reminder to work hard, play hard and stay bumble : )

Eid Mubarak…! Eid-al-Fitr 2017/1438

I’m a bit late in posting this but a belated Eid Mubarak! It’s was a lovely day for us, with colourful cupcakes, delicious food, and an overload of cheeky toddlers, mehndi on hands, presents and sweets.

Here’s wishing you all a blessed celebration, and hope the samosay were spicy enough, the chocolate was sweet enough and the presents were many!

Pink Blossoms and Floral Dresses

My sister and I made the most of the 25° scorching sun yesterday and took a trip to the local park (it was packed, so clearly we weren’t the only one with this idea), and both of us being photography enthusiasts, took the opportunity to take pictures of the beautiful scenes. I managed to get a few pretty photos (some of them were a bit bright from the sun!) and also took a good walk around to soak up the scenery.

It was a pretty lovely afternoon out, the park we went to is a pretty huge one with plenty of gardens with flowers, a lake with boats, a play ground area, and also leads to the local mansion if you walk far enough!

We also found some small hidden areas sectioned around the lake which looked beautiful, especially when we were walking through them which had a very private, ethereal feel to them.

One of the things I love seeing in spring are blossoms, it feels like they all fall off too quickly! I’ve been seeing lots of these this spring, thankfully, and love how pretty they look.

We also saw lots of people hiring boats to paddle on the lake, which looked pretty fun, and made for a nice adventure for a lot of the families – I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of this over summer, especially if the weather stays this nice!

All in all, it was a really lovely day out to the park, finished off with yummy cold slushies. I even managed to wear my pretty floral dressed which I had tailored for summer – perfect for matching with blossom trees!

View From My Window: Blue Skies and Concrete Jungles

We’ve been enjoying some late summer weather recently (although we haven’t been enjoying the humidity!), so I thought I’d post the view from my office window. There’s plenty of buses, trains and pedestrians below (there’s a train station and a bus station nearby) but I thought I’d crop out the hustle and bustle and focus on the serene, beautiful blue clouds : )

Weekend Pretty…Butterflies and Bees

Caught a little wildlife this morning, which I was lucky enough to find in my back garden – plenty of flittering butterflies floating in and out and lots of bumblebees as well. I didn’t managed to get many pictures of the butterflies because they were a little too quick for me, but here are two of my favourite shots : )