The Foodie Post - A Healthy Chocolate, Banana and Strawberry Smoothie

Hello hello :)

Today I have another "Foodie Post" to share with you!

I literally just whipped up this smoothie about an hour ago, and it turned out rather well (if I do say so myself), so I figured I should document it before I forget the recipe! 

(Plus I had a punnet of fresh strawberries from the farmer's market and couldn't resist the opportunity to photograph them - strawberries are just so photogenic!)

I used almond milk for this recipe (I've been trying to eat a little less dairy lately) and it tasted great! I find almond milk works really well for smoothies and gives them a nice, slightly nutty flavour. I also used frozen bananas so the smoothie would be nice and thick without needing to add any yoghurt. 

The cacao powder adds a nice chocolatey-ness, but needs a bit of sweetening so I threw in two dates which worked perfectly. Obviously you can adjust to taste - this is just what I happened to use today.

Ingredients:

 (Serves 2)

*2 frozen bananas

*A handful of fresh or frozen strawberries

*2 teaspoons of cacao powder

*2 dates

*Approx 300ml almond milk (adjust depending on how thick you want your smoothie)

*Cinnamon to sprinkle on top

Blend together, sprinkle over a little cinnamon, and there you have a yummy, chocolatey fruit smoothie!

Hope you enjoy - let me know if you give it a try :)

Lots of Love

Lauren

xxx

PS: You could even turn this into a healthy version of ice-cream if you wanted to just pop it in the freezer for a while!

My Style Diary - Blue Skies and Winter Sunshine

Hello Hello :)

Today's photos were actually taken way back in June, on a lovely warm and sunny winter's day. I've said it so many times before, but we are incredibly lucky here in Perth with the amount of sunshine we get. 

Despite our relatively mild winters, I have to say I am definitely ready for spring. It's been very chilly (by my standards anyway) the past few weeks and the rainy, dark mornings have not been welcome when I'm dragging myself out the door on the way to work. I'm thinking some warmer weather and lighter days will help... just one more month until it's officially spring and it will hopefully start warming up!

This cold weather is one of the main reasons there hasn't been much happening here on the blog lately. I've just been very uninspired outfit-wise because all I want to wear when it's cold is a pair of jeans and the warmest jumper I can find.

I've actually been doing my own version of the Project 333 capsule wardrobe challenge over the past few months and it's actually been pretty easy so far. For anyone who doesn't know what it is, it's where you narrow down your wardrobe to 33 items and wear just these for the season (3 months). You can read all about it here if you're interested.

I haven't actually cut my wardrobe down to 33 items - being strict about the number isn't really what the challenge is about in my opinion, but I've definitely been simplifying things more than I ever have before and doing it in a way that feels right for me.

You would think that living with such a small wardrobe would be a bit restrictive, but I actually have a good range of options that I know I could put together a variety of outfits with. The only problem has been that I just haven't bothered! I'm going to put in a bit more effort for the rest of August though - I want to see how versatile this capsule wardrobe thing can be!

I'm planning on doing more posts on this topic, but I'll leave it at that for now - I'm off to continue watching The OC -  I'd forgotten how much I loved that show, and it's making me a little nostalgic for high school :)

Have a good Sunday night!

Lauren

xxx

Top - Country Road

Jeans - 7 For All Mankind

Scarf - Sportsgirl

Sunglasses - Ray Ban

Necklaces - Mimco

Watch - Thomas Sabo

Bag - Country Road

Melbourne Travel Diary - Day 3

As you can probably tell by now, Tom and I love our food (particularly breakfast food) and we tend to plan our days around where we're going to eat! 

We'd been recommended a place called Chez Dre in South Melbourne, so we caught a tram and headed off in search of this French-inspired patisserie/cafe. Located in a revamped warehouse, the setting was perfect and of course the food ended up being delicious! I definitely recommend the french toast if you visit! 

Once we'd stuffed ourselves with food, we had a look around the South Melbourne Markets, and then caught a tram to St Kilda where we enjoyed some sunshine while walking along the beach, before going in search of the famous Luna Park (admittedly just for the photo - we didn't actually end up going inside!)

Then it was off to Chapel Street for some shopping (at least that was the plan). I've already mentioned this in a previous post, but we ended up walking almost the full length of the street before finding the actually "shopping area", so by the time we actually reached this part we were exhausted! - It's a long street!

 It was really fun just strolling around exploring the area though and coming across cute little places we wouldn't have found if we'd just caught a tram. My favourite find was this little bookshop that reminded me so much of something out of Harry Potter. The bookshelves towered to the ceiling and were all higgledy piggledy, and there were cats just strolling around or curled up in a chair! 

We walked through the Botanic Gardens on our way back and it was such a beautiful place, although it was starting to get dark by this point  so we didn't get to fully explore it - we'll be back though!

We ended the day with dinner at Movida - a Spanish tapas bar. The food was seriously so good and I highly recommend it!

So that's it for our Melbourne trip! I didn't take many photos on our last day (but it was a pretty similar thing - lots of eating and walking around exploring!)

I've actually just bought tickets to see Taylor Swift in Melbourne in December so I'm excited to be going back in a few months (although still kinda annoyed that she's not coming to Perth!)

There's still so many things to see and do there, so if you have any suggestions for next time, I'd love to hear them! 

I actually "vlogged" some parts of the trip too and have been slowly putting the clips together  (my editing skills need a lot of work though), so I'm toying with the idea of putting that video up.

I love watching vlogs on YouTube so I am kinda tempted to give them a try myself... we'll see if that actually happens :)

Anyway, I hope you're having a fab day!

Lots of Love

Lauren

xxx