Book Review: The Casual Vacancy

This book isn't going to be to everyone's taste. But I really enjoyed it. The step when reading this book is to completely take J.K. Rowling out of your head. Because if you don't you'll just ruin it for yourself. Done that? Good!

The book is very character driven, not a huge amount of action. The book is building up slowly to a climax but it is more about the characters, their relationships and how they interact with each other. I really enjoyed this as I live in a small village and I find it interesting how people know each other from just being around the place and as I'm a bit nosy I often wonder about the secret lives of people and what goes on behind closed doors. This book is kinda like that.

I found myself wanted to read this after I had put it down to do something else. And if I had started to read it and just thought 'one more chapter', I'd actually end up finishing after 6 more chapters. That to me is a good sign, that I found myself wanting to read more and more. Though it's not necessarily a sign of a good book. I do think it is a good book though as I liked the characters (or loved to hate the nasty characters), I could identify with some, I could identify the characters as 'real life'.

The only downside I thought it had at first was when I didn't quite get the whole J.K. Rowling aspect out of my head and I found it very crude at first. The swearing, references to sex and drugs. At first I did wonder whether she was doing this just because she could, for the shock value and to try set herself apart from Harry Potter (I managed to go this far without mentioning HP!). There did seem to be a certain element of that. But once I managed to get the J.K. Rowling thing out of my head I did find that it fit into the story and it didn't bother me so much. Also it can be a dull in places as it isn’t so action filled.

Overall I would recommend the book, especially if you like character based stories. It’s a sturdy read and if you like J.K. Rowling’s ‘voice’ then you should like this.

25 Before 25: Take a Random Roadtrip

So ideally, this would have gone down something like this: boyfriend and I would decide to go somewhere to stay overnight without booking before hand, fill up on petrol and hit the road with no destination in sight. Though as I approach the deadline for this I realise it’s not going to happen (neither is visit a country I’ve never been to before unless I win the lotto or someone wants to pay for me to go abroad! *cough*).

So Saturday morning I had to drop my aunt off to the bus station early and I bought along my friend K who was staying with me for the weekend. We decided instead of heading straight back home we’d go on a drive, deciding where to stop along the way. Which lead to a mini tour of South and West Clare.

The first place we hit was Lissycasey, where we drove past this pub and then promptly turned around for some photo opportunities.

Next main place we hit was Kilrush, where we decided to visit the Vandeleur Gardens. Unfortunately, seeing as we were up so early, we were 2 hours too early to enter. Instead we went for a quick stroll in the woods.

And then off went again! Next we hit Kilkee so we decided to stop at the West Clare Railway at Moyasta. And would you believe it, it was also closed! (are you beginning to see a theme here?!). So I took this quick snapshot of the office and cafe.

From there we decided to head onto Loop Head Lighthouse. We looked up on K’s iPhone that it was open until early September. We weren’t sure if they would be open or not seeing as it is now mid-September! But we decided to take the gamble. And luckily it was open!

After we went for a quick walk around the cliff edges.

After our lovely walk, we continued on, deciding on a whim to stop in Doolin in the Tea Rooms. Unfortunately it was closed! Moving onto Quily we stopped at Seafield beach to look at Mutton Island.

We were then going to play some arcade games at Sugar Island Cafe but it wasn’t open yet! We figured that was the final sign to head on home and put our feet up!

Nails of the Week!

I was trying to use my striping tape to do some pink and mint green nails and it went a bit wrong. So I covered it up with black crackling polish. It reminds me of the 80s for some reason!

Rimmel Lycra Pro Professional Finish in Peppermint

Angelika Nail Polish in Sweetie Pie

W7 Crackle in Black

Nails of the Week!

I was so excited when I received my Dollish Polish in the post! I got ‘Heart of Glass’, named after the Blondie song and it’s just beautiful, so sparkly. I decided to use it over a black nail polish for a dramatic effect.

Black base- Catrice I Wear My Sunglasses At Night (with flash)

I couldn’t capture it properly but the black has very subtle pieces of dark glitter through it.

Look at how pretty it is!

No flash

With flash

Blurry picture but it shows the colours the sparkles give off

I love this polish, it has 3 elements to it. The big chunks of glitter, which to me remind me of broken CDs or something (also reminds me of the bits in the Essence The Huntsman polish), the sparkly strands and then the holographic pigment that coats all the nail, making the base colour holographic. It’s so beautiful, I got lots of compliments on my nails, even from my boyfriend!

Bakewell Cupcakes

I fell in love with Lilly Higgins’ Make, Bake, Love the first time I saw it. It’s so charming and fun, packed with lots of great recipes. The Cherry Bakewell Cupcakes stood out though and I couldn’t wait to make them. I love cherry bakewells though I rarely eat them for some reason. I need to rectify this!

Bakewell Cupcakes

Adapted from Make, Bake, Love by Lilly Higgins

Ingredients

220g caster sugar

100g butter,softened

2 eggs

160g plain flour

100g ground almonds

1 and half tsp baking powder

150ml milk

1 tsp vanilla essence

6 tbsp raspberry jam (I prefer seedless)

6 glace cherries, halved

100g icing sugar

1 tbsp boiling water

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F) and line cupcake tin.

2. Cream the sugar and butter together until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

3. Sieve the flour, ground almonds and baking powder into a bowl, then carefully fold in the egg mixture. Add the vanilla essence and milk and stir until just combined.

4. Add batter into the cupcake cases, filling only half way. Add a teaspoon of jam to each cake case and top with the remaining mixture. Bake for 20-25 minutes until cakes are golden.

5. Leave to cool fully on a rack. To make the icing, combine the icing sugar with the water and beating until the icing is smooth and thick enough to coat the back of the spoon. If it was too thin, add more icing sugar, if it is too think, add a small bit of water.

6. Once the cupcakes are completely cooled, ice them with the icing and top with a half a glace cherry.

The first time I made these I used jam with seeds in it but I didn’t really like it so I used seedless jam the second time around. I love the addition of the ground almond, it gives it an interesting texture.

YouTube Pick of the Week!

Another round of YouTube picks!

I had heard about The Marshmallow Test. The idea was to give a child a marshmallow, tell them they can eat it right away or if they wait 5 minutes without eating it they would get a second one. The children’s reactions was filmed and it’s very funny seeing them antagonize over whether or not to eat it!

Sminky Shorts are a delightful piece of Irish humour. I chose this one as I love the Cork accent!

This song from Korean rapper PSY is as catchy as the flu and the video is so bizarre you’ll want to watch it again and again!

I’m a sucker for puns and this video is just pun after pun!

I had heard of VSauce before, I was even told by my boyfriend I’d enjoy it. Of course I didn’t listen to him and only started watching it this week. I’M HOOKED! The show has some simple but fascinating sciencey videos as well as DONGs (stuff to Do Online Now, Guys) as well as videos for funny images and quirky things to buy. I can’t get enough!

I posted this video the other day when I wrote my Childs Play post but it’s worth posting again in case you missed it.

Simple Bird Magnets

I’ve wanted to try this for ages since I first pinned it on Pinterest (unfortunately I can’t find the original source for that pin, if you know it please let me know!). I pinned it, collected some rocks and then completely forgot about it! Until one day I was feeling crafty and I decided I’d give it a go. I decided to turn them into magnets as I badly needed some new ones!

Making them was easy, just paint on your base colour of choice until it is opaque. Wait until dry. Then using a smaller brush, paint on your designs. Once dry, cover with a coat of varnish (if you want) and then attach the magnets (make sure you attach them correctly, that the side you have facing out will attach to your fridge properly) with a hot glue gun. Once dry you are free to use them! You can of course paint on different animals, I just really like owls.

These are my favourites!