Bucket List: Films I need to watch

You probably have been in a situation where a friend has asked you “have you seen [insert classic film title here]” and of course you have, because who hasn’t!

Well… this happens to me A LOT and honestly, I haven’t seen many of the ‘classics’ so here is my conscious effort to watch them!

Because I am more than a little bit addicted to Pinterest I pinned all the films I need to see on one board.

So here is the list:

Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Notting Hill
When Harry met Sally
Goodfellas
A Clockwork Orange
The Usual Suspects
Dallas Buyers Club
Kill Bill
Inglorious Bastards
The Godfather
The Silence of the Lambs
The Breakfast Club
Trainspotting
Pulp Fiction
Reservoir Dogs
Casablanca
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
Alien
Scarface
The Terminator
Fight Club
The Breakfast Club
Slumdog Millionaire
We Need To Talk About Kevin
American Psycho
Psycho
Lost In Translation
Brokeback Mountain
12 Years A Slave
Rosemary’s Baby
Frankenstein
It’s A Wonderful Life
Enter The Dragon
The Graduate

This list is going to keep on growing I can tell!

Dublin: Photo Gallery

My recent trip to Dublin in photo form!

Dublin Castle

Dublin Castle

Selfie in the castle

Sampling the local delicacy

Jameson Factory Tour

Family + Whiskey = great day out

Trinity College Library

Inside Trinity College Library

Kilmainham Jail

Bucket List: Attend a Cocktail Master class

Being the great friend I am, for my best friend’s birthday I decided to treat her to a cocktail master class! We both love to drink and what better way to celebrate her day of birth than by having a girly day and learning to make some cool drinks!

Preparation is the key, so before we headed to our class we stopped by The Alchemist in Trinity for a cheeky drink! I opted for a passion fruit daiquiri, and Katie chose the bubble gum!

Passion and bubbles!

We headed on down to Bibi’s, an Italian restaurant isn’t your obvious choice for a cocktail master class, most of the other options in Leeds require a party of at least 6 people.

Being sensible and lining our stomachs before the class, we decided to sample some Italian cuisine. I opted for the spaghetti alla pescatora, I am a massive seafood fan!

I love the novelty plate!

Now for the important bit, the cocktails! I requested rum based cocktails as Katie loves Malibu, we started with an Airmail, rum and honey topped with Prosecco.

Then we watched our teacher for the evening Tom make a Mai Tai, there’s so many different ways to make them! After the demonstration we each took it in turns to make our own. Mine was apparently closer to the original recipe but Katie’s was boozier so she won!

Our mai tai’s!

Next was a classic Pina Colada…

The class was great and as there was only us Tom let us take a few pictures behind the bar, plus we got to share the example cocktails!

Look at all that rum!

Even though we had all that alcohol we couldn’t resist one more!

See the rest of my bucket list

 

 

Bucket List: Watch a Broadway Show

On my recent trip to New York, seeing a Broadway show wasn’t at the top of my bucket list of things to do. I love going to the West End in London, but for the price of tickets in New York, there were so many other things I would rather do.

When we were visiting Times Square we decided why not just see if we could get some cheap on the day tickets, we all wanted to see something that we wouldn’t get to see in London and being a Disney-obsessed family, Aladdin was the obvious choice!

We managed to get some amazing seats, four rows back from the front and all for a really reasonable price. I literally couldn’t wait for the evening to come.

Traffic in New York is horrendous, we learnt this the hard way. After waiting for 20 minutes to get a taxi to stop for us, we sat in so much traffic towards Times Square, we ended up getting out of the taxi about 5 minutes away from the theatre and ran across Times Square! We were 15 minutes late to the performance, we missed two songs, but the show was still amazing!

During the interval we realised that the actor playing Jafar, Jonathan Freeman, actually voiced him in the Disney movie! James Monroe Iglehart, who plays the Genie really stole the show! I came away from the show aching from laughing so much and obviously had that happy glow that any Disney film or show gives you!

 

Budapest: Photo Gallery

My recent trip to Budapest in photo form!

Under the Chain Bridge

Hungarian Parliament

The Hungarian Parliament

Buda Castle

Fisherman’s Bastion

Budapest at night

St Stephen’s Bascilla

Hero Square

Chimney Cake being made

Chimney Cake

Wedding at the Bastion

Reflection of the Bastion

Looking down on Budapest

Statue of Liberty

You can see my more professional photography on my website

Thursday Motivation

Because motivation is needed every day of the week… not just Monday!

This week I did something I have never done before, I bought my first Christmas present. In October. I was shocked too, I made the decision to get started early this year, mainly so I don’t use all my November wage on presents!

I started back at the gym again this week, I was working really hard and doing the 5:2 diet before I went away to Dublin and New York. Since I have been back I just couldn’t get back into healthy eating and exercising, despite putting the half a stone I lost back on! Realising it is only 11 weeks until Christmas, I know I need to put in some hard work to shift the weight before the holiday season filled with drinking and chocolate begins!

I’m starting this week by going to a few classes at the gym to ease back into the exercise, I’ve already done Pilates and Zumba! Next week I’m starting back on the 5:2 diet!

Wish me luck!

Bucket List: Visit the ‘Friends’ building

I am a MASSIVE fan of Friends, the TV show. I remember sobbing my heart out watching the last episode, (live on TV not the repeats!)

The building that is used in  Friends

I was only 11 and I was hooked to the show, albeit I probably didn’t get half the jokes like I do now!

On my recent visit to New York, I had to go visit the Friends building. We took the subway especially to Bedford Street just so I could see it in person.

Two girls were stood on the corner opposite taking selfies and I knew I was finally there! I was too young to actually go see the show, so this real part of it was great to see!

Of course me and my brother had to take a selfie!

Bucket List: Go to the top of the Statue of Liberty

The Statue of Liberty, you imagine it as you see it in the movies, towering over the skyline of New York, standing tall. In reality, it is so much smaller than you see on the big screen!

It always looks bigger on the films!

 

As part of my dad’s 50th celebrations we went to New York (and Dublin too, lucky him!) me and my brother decided whilst we were there we would go to the top of Lady Liberty.

We didn’t realise but the waiting list to do this is month’s long! We decided back in March when we booked the trip and got tickets for about £20.

There are restrictions on going up to the top as the stairs are very narrow and steep, both my parents decided it wasn’t for them.

The stairs up to the crown – half of them!

The temperature is 10 degrees hotter than that outside, it was 30 the day we went! Even though I had water I was a red, sweaty mess by the time I reached the top. It is only 354 stairs from the bottom of the pedestal to the top of the crown and thankfully there are plenty of places to rest.

It hardly took any time to get to the top of the crown, to be honest the view isn’t that great as the windows are quite small! It was worth it though to say I have done it!

At the top of the crown

Check out the rest of my bucket list!

Bucket List: Drink Guinness in Dublin

What is a visit to Dublin without a try of the local delicacy!

Everyone at home told me that it tastes so much better in Ireland than it does at home (I’ve never tried it at home before)

Drinking the good stuff!

We went over to Dublin to celebrate my Dad’s 50th birthday so after a lovely meal we headed over to The Temple Bar, the area is renowned for it’s tourist nightlife (and high prices!) but the six euros was worth it!

The Temple Bar is actually really pretty from outside!

See the rest of my bucket list here

Bucket List: Go to a rodeo

During my summer working at an American Summer Camp last year, I got to go to a real Rodeo!

If i’m being honest it isn’t something that I would be like OMG I need to go to this, but living in America I decided to embrace the culture.

It was pretty intense to watch, but soon we really got into it, it’s a fine balance of wanting the rider to stay on as long as possible and also wanting a dramatic throw off from the bull!