Not so summery summer walks.

Hello and happy hump day! Fun fact: it wasn't until a year or 2 ago that I realised that hump day actually meant the middle of the working week and NOT a slightly saucy day. Mean girls makes way more sense now. 

Anyway, on with today's post. So this time last week we had some family friends down for the day and decided to go for a lovely walk at Westonbirt Arboretum. I have mentioned this place a couple of times in previous posts, but basically, the Arboretum is pretty close to where I live so we often take advantage of this and go on walks. However, British weather being as unreliable as it is, decided that despite it being summer, it was going to be rainy and a little chilly too. Typical.

However, we still had a lovely day and I enjoyed every minute of it. I took numerous amounts of pictures on our walk, with such photogenic surroundings its hard not to, and thought I would share some of my favourites for today's post.

We found these BEAUTIFUL flowers that I loved. Look how nice they are! Definitely made me feel all summery, despite the weather.

There are tonnes of trees (obviously) but this one was huge!

My sister and I with our matching rain coats. I am 1000% obsessed with my coat and was actually pretty happy that the rain gave me an excuse to wear it.

I am not entirely sure what this plant is but it looks pretty cool.

My phone was full of photographs like this because it is just such a beautiful place. Despite my numerous attempts, it was practically impossible to fully capture how gorgeous this place is.

One of my favourite pictures I took. 

On this particular day, they were doing a little family trail things that we took part in. It was a great idea to entertain the children (and the slightly older children like myself) and helped to give them some extra knowledge too with the quiz!

At the start of the trail, you got given a worksheet and a pencil. On one side of the sheet, there was a map that told you where the quiz answers were and little pictures that you had to find along the trail and tick off. There were little pictures (like shown above) that we had to keep an eye out for along our trail.

On the other side of the sheet, there was the quiz. There were about 9 questions in total to answer. Around the trail, there were bigger signs attached to the trees that gave you some information about trees. You then had to use this information to answer the given question. I thought this was a great idea to help the children gain more knowledge in a fun and entertaining way! The trail was aimed at children but I personally loved it!

My brother (Alfie) exploring the plants.

I am not entirely sure what I am doing here but I thought it was too funny not to include. I think it's the serious face that makes me laugh.

Here is my outfit that I wore for our walk. I wore my boyfriend jeans, stripey top, raincoat and trainers. It was a very comfy and practical outfit and I don't think it looked too bad at all.

Some of the trees were different colours which reminded me of Autumn! The arboretum is a great place to go in the autumn with all of the gorgeous colours.

Another fancy photo where I tried (and failed) to capture the beauty of this place.

We finished off our walk with a yummy hot chocolate from the cafe. Not your typical summer drink eh?

So that is all for today's post. I had an absolutely lovely time and hope you enjoyed the pictures too.

Have a lovely day!

Holly X

Summer BBQ's and oreo smores!

Now this post is a little delayed as this BBQ was actually about a month ago but I still wanted to share it. 

So this was around the time that England got pretty hot, so of course we wanted to make the most of it and had a little family BBQ. It was a really lovely evening full of DIY lemonade, oreo smores and lots of laughter. Therefore, I thought I would share a few snaps from the evening.

My brother (Alfie) on our DIY slip and slide.

It wouldn't be my brother if he didn't find some way to injure himself.

I decided to wear my floral maxi dress from Forever21 (from my NYC trip actually) with some very messy hair and no makeup this time.

My DIY super easy (and very pretty) lemonade - maybe I should write a post on this?

The food for the BBQ - it was very yummy!

Alfie and his pet bird, they are so cute!

Post-dinner marshmallow toasting.

There is always someone who drops their marshmallow.

So that is all for today's rather brief post, I had a lovely evening and can't wait for more summer evenings.

Thanks for reading!

Holly X

Adding a cushion to the collection

I am currently in the process of re-decorating my room, meaning that I now actually have an excuse for buying home decor products. As mentioned in previous posts, I recently went on a little shopping spree and when in Primark spotted this adorable cushion. 

I have recently become a little obsessed with decorative cushions for my bed as I feel that when my bed is made, my entire room looks better. So, when I came across the little gem at only £4, I fell in love. However, by the time I had reached the decor section of the shop, my basket was already pretty full and I had a budget to stick to. So, my lovely mum decided she was going to buy this cushion for me.

I am kind of in love with this cushion and it looks so cute in my room!

Holly X

My Baby Cactus

The other day, upon a little browsing in town, I stumbled upon these Cacti/Succulents in Wilkinsons and just had to buy them! I often see super cute room décor on Pinterest or Tumblr, full of desks and window sills with an adorable selection of little cactus. Despite my swooning over the cacti, I still never purchased any as I didn't really know where to get any and always thought they would be expensive. Yet, when I came across these little guys, I couldn't resist the temptation any longer.

The big succulent in the middle of the photograph above was £4 and the other small three cacti came together in a set of £4 also. I thought this was a very reasonable price and am so so very happy with this purchase.

I love my new little plants so much, I even decided to name them! The biggest one is called 'Carlos'. Then on the left (bottom pictures) is 'Judy', followed by 'Henry' and then 'Todd'. A little weird I know, but what can I say, it's love.

Holly X