Bon Bon Chocolatier

Do you know the worst part about getting your blogging mojo back? You never know when the mood is going to strike and for me it came at a moment when I wasn't exactly able to sit by the computer and type! My brain was exploding with all sorts of thoughts and ideas but I couldn't do anything about it because the last few days were just sooo busy! But finally, my body is catching up with my brain and I'm typing up posts that I've had in my head for months!

I thought I'd start today with something a little sweet, a small review of an afternoon well spent at Manchester's Bon Bon Chocolatier. I have a confession to make, remember those massive burgers Tomz and I had at Solita? Yeah we came straight here afterwards, and it felt so good to live in reckless abandon!  Lol.

This cute little chocolatier is on the corner of John Street in the Northern Quarter, just look at the charming entrance, how could we say no? Step inside and you're transported to a chocolate lover's heaven! There's so many different kinds and combinations to choose from, it is truly mind blasting! and although it's quite small inside, I think that just adds to its charm.

See what I mean? We even got this nice man to pose for a picture!

Okay, on to the fun part! What we ate! Haha, I'm such a foodie at heart it's a bit worrying. Obviously, having just finished some burgers we didn't go innnn! We just got a nice rich brownie and some natural flavoured frozen yoghurt in a waffle cone. Dee-licious!

I think it's safe to say that was a very good day in my life! Lol. If you're ever in Manchester make sure you pop down there to get a feel for some of this magic for yourself!

Reni xx

Guess Who's Back?

It's been a long time, I shouldn't have left... I even feel like a bit of a traitor and a massive let down for leaving you kind people for so long but so much has been happening in the last month both physically and mentally that I'm not too surprised that I took such a long hiatus!

To be perfectly honest with you guys, I don't even really know where to start, last time I was here I was in the depths of dissertation waters, all that is over now, my project was successfully handed in on time! I was even ready the night before and not rushing till the last minute like I usually do, thank God for small mercies! Lol. And now, almost a month later I'm here and a lot has changed and a lot has remained the same.

September was one of those months were my spirits weren't as high as they usually are, the end of my Masters brought with it a lot of questions on what my next step in life should be and really challenged me into finding something that I really would love to do as opposed to what the world expects me to do. At this stage it can be very difficult to reconcile both and although I'm not there yet, I know exactly what I don't want to do which I'd say is a pretty good start.

I also saw some of the darker sides of blogging, there are many people out there in the world and not all of them have your best intentions at heart, some of them may not even have bad intentions at all but their actions could still have consequences. To all my fellow bloggers out there, stay smart and cautious, never give away too much information about yourself or your whereabouts. The world is full of mad men! Anyways, this post is starting to feel a bit deep which was not really how I intended my first post back after such a lengthy hiatus to go so let's change the pace a little and turn to the brighter side of life!

Let's talk about all the reasons why September was an awesome month for me! I turned 22 which is officially ancient but I'm so grateful to be starting another year of my life, I can't wait to see what this year has in store for me.

I took my brother to York where he's starting university and my cousin, who is more like my sister, to Coventry where she's starting too! It was so weird watching them go off into first year, all fresh and excited and it filled me with so much love. I can't believe it was already 4 years ago when I was first stepping off the train into the city I now love so much.

I saw most of my maternal side family members at a family lunch we managed to put together at the very last minute and it was the most amazing afternoon, family really is the most important thing in the world to me. I'm so glad for mine, as loud and consuming as they can be!

I had the time to read two whole novels! "Pear Shaped" by Stella Newman and "The Secret Lives of Baba Segi's Wives" by Lola Shoneyin. Granted they are both quite short but having the time to lose myself in a book again was just pure bliss! I can't wait to see what my next choice would be, I have a massive list somewhere, I just need to choose one! Okay... There's a lot of exclamation marks in this section... Perhaps I got a bit overexcited. Lol.

All in all I'm happy to be alive and happy that my blogger's block seems to have vanished, although I must say I didn't do this all on my own. Special thanks to Mo of Within My Locket, Eeda of Eeda's Atelier and my lovely boyfriend A for reminding me time and time again how much I love blogging and why I should never ever stop!

I can't wait to catch up with everybody, I have about 200 unread posts waiting for me on Bloglovin and I'd be reading them all! Haha. If you have a blog and think I don't follow you then drop me a link. I have plenty of potential free time on my hands this month!

Reni J's back! Tell a friend to tell a friend! Haha

xx

I Miss You :(

This is probably going to be the shortest post I've ever ever written, it probably shouldn't even really be called a post tbh. But I just had to type something and let you know that I'm still alive and I miss you! This dissertation is trying to be the death of me but I'm not letting it! With my deadline in less than a week, times are rather difficult on this end... *sigh* Pray for me guys!

P.S. Don't you just love how August was meant to be my month of weekly goals and then I never posted anything at all? Gosh. To cut a long story short I've failed every single one of them except the water one! I think I've hit 1.5 litres daily for like 90% of this month and considering the circumstances I'm counting this one as a win! Lol. Oh oh, also the new hair regimen was going really well, but now my hair is in a full weave, sadly I can't even upload a picture because my phone USB has decided it no longer works when connected to the laptop. *sigh* All these things to sort out after next week is over!

I can't wait to be officially free with nothing but time on my hands and hopefully I'd be back to blogging again! Actually, not hopefully, I definitely will be! Lol. Yeah anyways, my rant's over and so is my break... I need to save my fingers for typing on far less interesting things :(

Miss you and a big big thank you to everyone who still drops by once in a while, I'm sorry there's been nothing new!

Wish me luck guys!

Reni x

Solita: Living In The Moment.

Hey guys,

I know, I know, I left again... And this time it's not even because I've been busy writing material for The Naked Convos. It's because it's dissertation crunch time now! I can't believe that in a mere 3 weeks me 3 months worth of work will be handed in waiting for grading and I'd be done with university and school in general for the rest of my life! (No PhD's for this girl!) lol.

But today work is going quite well so far so I don't feel so bad sitting at my laptop to type a blog post instead of my project. And so today's post is going to be on one of my favourite topics... FOOD! Haha. I've recently added a couple more blogs to my reading list and most of them have been of foodies like myself in Manchester, so when Tomi & I were looking for somewhere to chow one fine afternoon we immediately jumped at the chance to go SoLita for some of their mouth watering burgers!

It's a cute little restaurant on the corner of Turner Street in the Northern Quarter with tables and chairs for outside diners.

As a rule though, I almost never eat outside. My fear of pigeons is so real that if I even so much as saw one approaching my table aimlessly, I'm sure I'd lose my appetite immediately. So inside we skipped to enjoy our lunch date. We were greeted by a huge brightly coloured chalk board of all their specials which also explained their famous "Inka" oven. One of the secrets of their very flavourful burgers! There's also a very cool comic strip on another of their walls and a cute little bar in the corner.

Luckily for us, we don't eat lunch at the same time as 'normal' people so getting there at about 3.30 on a Tuesday afternoon meant we had the place practically to ourselves. It took us forever to decide which of their burgers we wanted to try! The Big Manc looked amazing with two 6 ounce steak patties but seeing as we were both trying to to eat our weight in food, we went for some of the more moderate burgers.

I ended up having the "Manc-Hattan", admittedly only because of the name! Plus you rarely go wrong with recommended burgers.

And Tomi had the "Once In A Lifetime" with sweet potato fries.

Don't they just look amazing and full of flavour? The melted cheese is making my mouth water all over again. I'm going to need to find a nice healthy lunch before I give in to another of these bad boys! The melted Lancanshire cheese had this perfect creamy texture that made it feel more like a thick sauce than a slab of cheese and the bun was nice and soft. Kind of like brioche but slightly firmer so it didn't completely fall apart in my hands. I could go on forever about the tastes and textures but I don't want to make you too jealous.. Haha. While they weren't the best burgers we had tasted in Manchester (and believe me, we've tried a lot!) they were definitely in the top 5 of my list.

Of course by the end of the meal we were very very full but we just had to try desert! There are some times in life, where you just have to live in the moment and damn the consequences! Tomi had a slice of their pecan pie with vanilla ice cream.

And I had a peanut butter brownie with oreo cookie ice cream.

Like I said, it's best to live in the moment! Hope everyone's week is going great!

P.S Good luck tomorrow to all my A-Level readers! I hope you all get into the schools of your choice!

P.P.S I know I didn't update on my goals the last time, I've carried on those same goals into this week and would do an update on the last 2 weeks instead.

Okay now I'm actually done. 

Reni x

July Review And August Goals

Uh oh... It's that time of the month for me again where I confess to you all whether I've been good or bad and made it through the months goals. Writing down my goals really helps to keep me focused on trying to achieve them actually but last month was horrific in terms of goals, I don't think I have a single success :(  I know I didn't set too many goals in the first place but I still failed the ones I did bother making! So I'd run through them quickly and see what needs changing and how I can eventually make it better. 

Mankofit's Eat Clean, Train Dirty challenge
This 30 day challenge really got the better of me and I completely flunked out from like day 6! I just found eating as clean as her a little bit too challenging and only lasted about 5/6 days! Lol. I have tried to implement some of the things in my usual diet though like no fizzy drinks/sweets and eating more fish as well. The training dirty part wasn't too bad and I enjoyed most of her workouts but then I fell ill the day before Race for Life (imagine that!!) and completely fell off the wagon, both eating and working out!

Race for Life
It kills me to say that I did NOT complete Cancer Research UK's Race for Life. Literally the day before or 2 days before I fell really quite ill and couldn't make it on the last train to London on the Saturday before the race and there were no early enough trains on the day even though I was feeling better which really sucked. But thank you to everyone that donated and I'm sorry I disappointed you :(

Hair
I finally posted my most recent hair regimen and I'm so glad I did! Special thank you to Ibiyemi, Candice (Healthy Hair Diary) and Mo (Within My Locket) for their amazing advice, it's so lovely to be able to share with other people on the same journey as you, especially when the road gets tough! Thanks ladies I will definitely be implementing some of the advice I got and soon too!

So those were my three July goals... All failed...*sigh* Actually no, i posted my regimen before the month ran out so that counts as a success! Yay! *happy dance* For August I've decided to try something a little different and do weekly goals instead of monthly, I got the idea from Candice and I think it's a great idea to keep goals bite size and make them easier to achieve! So.. My goals for the week (until the 9th of August) are...

• Try out a new hair regimen with more moisture and see how it works
• Drink 1.5 litres of water a day
• Workout 4 or more times a week
• Start typing my literature review (dissertation chapter 1)

What are some of your goals for the week/month? Drop me a link in the comments box, I'd love to read them!

Reni x

Research is Key!: Length Check Number 2

Would you believe me if I told you I've been trying to post this since Monday? My laptop has had soo many tabs open and so many e-books due to all the dissertation research that it just refused to upload any pictures on to blogger but I couldn't shut it down and have to open all those tabs again and I couldn't do any blog posts without pictures either... *sigh* I was between a rock and a hard place until now, finally I closed everything and gave the lappie a much needed reboot and it's working perfectly again, well nearly. Lol. So I was going through my blog the other day and realised it has been a while since I did a hair related post and I've been harping on about how I will write my regimen down as well, which to be fair is probably more for my benefit than yours (I can be so forgetful!) But I did a length check the other day, the second one of the year and thought this would be a perfect time to share with you again.

I think my current regimen would be a good place to start otherwise I might forget to write it down all over again! Haha. So here goes... Actually I'm realising that this is kind of a boring post to write! Especially considering the fact that I have three yummy food posts in the works! Haha. I love blogging about food, there's just something so satisfying about reliving those moments where I bit into an amazing burger! Okay, back to hair.

I think the reason I don't really feel like writing this post is because I'm disappointed with the menial length of hair I retained this quarter of the year. I know I should be more focused on health and not length but sometimes it's so hard not to grow impatient, just the other day I was thinking of chopping it all off again and going natural, but I'm trying to be patient and give it till the end of the year at least! I've only been on this journey for 7 months you see, but hair envy is real! Lol. I just want my locks to flow already, or at least look thicker! Here's what I've been doing to my hair:

Monday's are wash days and I:
Shampoo with Elasta QP Creme Conditioning Shampoo. (I clarify once a month with ORS Creamy Aloe Shampoo).
Do a green tea rinse to combat shedding.
Apply ORS Hair Mayonnaise for 20 minutes because my hair loves the stuff!
Condition with ORS Replenishing Conditioner for 45mins to an hour.
Air dry my hair in a cotton t-shirt for 60 minutes
Apply my leave-in; I recently switched from Motions Nourish Leave in Conditioner to Dr Miracles Leave in Conditioner, I've been searching everywhere for Cantu Shea Butter leave-in but all the stores near me are permanently put of stock! I'm in need of a really awesome leave in.
Allow my hair to finish drying without the t-shirt.
And then depending on what time it is as I usually wash in the evenings, I either moisturise with ORS Carrot Oil and seal with Sweet Almond oil or I just tie my hair up and moisturise and seal the next morning.

This has been my regimen from the beginning of the year, the only addition being green tea rinses and also switching from ORS Carrot Oil to Kids Organics Shea Butter Detangling Moisturising Hair Lotion (goodness that name is such a mouth full!) at about 12 weeks post when my new growth needs some TLC to stop it from drying out so easily! So on to some pictures:

I'm definitely claiming proper shoulder length now! Next stop is collar bone length which looks about an inch or two away, sadly! OMG can I just stress the importance of reading up on stuff before you try it right now? So I was looking at my regimen as I wrote it down and trying to see what differences I've made between January and March where my hair grew quite a bit and March and now where it hasn't really grown at all and the only major difference was doing tea rinses. So I went to my best friend, google, for help to see the negative impacts of tea rinses and the very first thing that came up was an article from curlynikki.com, here saying that tea rinses can STUNT growth! Now I was like hold up, say what?! But as I read more I realised I had been doing some fundamental things wrong, for instance I never took the tea bags out of the bowl until I was ready to use it, which was hours sometimes, when really you're only meant to leave in the tea bag for a minute or two to get a weak brew! Lack of knowledge is no excuse as my hair showed me these last three months, but now that I've identified the problem (I think) at least I can try and correct it and see how I do in the third quarter of the year.

Hmmm, hair posts aren't that bad! I'm washing my hair right now and going to try a roller set tonight, I'd do a post on the outcome later on if it turns out nice, or even fairly acceptable. :)

Ciao ladies!
Reni x

P.S. I really need to do something about the middle of my hair, the breakage is disastrous! Look how much shorter it is! Any tips? Also I made a length check post so you can see all of my progress pictures from the beginning of the year here: Length Check Progress Pictures

Length Check, Progress Pictures

Decided to d a little post which I will update whenever I do a length check to track the growth of my hair.

December 2012, before my cut/trim:

January 2013, the start of the journey!

March 2013, length check numero uno

July 2013: Length check 2