It sounded like such a GREAT idea that I started fantasising of what I could do with a superpower like that (the power to instantly transform oneself into a temporary new situation but in the same spot). I thought of all the ways I could transport myself down the street to my front door. It was SO MUCH FUN! I even scripted a pretend-movie in my mind.

Anyway, at the end of August, I made a trip to Mayfield Lavender Farm after hearing about it from my friend, Jayna. It was the end of the season before they harvest the flowers.

I never even knew there was a lavender farm so close to London. All you do is take a train to West Croydon (you can use Oyster) and take connecting bus 166 which stops right outside the farm, which you simply cannot miss. The bus ride is rather long.. but it’s worth it. Entry to the farm is FREE!

The Stinging Nettle 

Not five minutes after we entered between the rows of lavender bushes, I (thought I) had the best idea. With much excitement, I exclaimed, “Let’s play HIDE N SEEK!!”

I made my friend Ryan count and went off to find the best hiding spot. I jumped over a few rows and stopped behind what I thought was the highest one, then crouched behind it. Still not satisfied, I decided I would LAY DOWN FLAT on the grass next to it, face down. In my short dress.

The moment my legs made contact with the grass, I felt a stinging, sharp pain on my right thigh. Thinking it was probably just an insect or a thorn, I ignored it (hey, I’m a tough girl). Unfazed, I wriggled myself even closer into the bush.

And then suddenly.. my whole right thigh felt like it was ON FIRE. It was a burning, cutting pain that reminded me of when I got stung by jellyfish during a sailing trip in 2010! Remembering that, I jumped to my feet…. just in time to see Ryan turn around to begin looking for me. Argh!!

A few minutes later, there was an explosion of red bumps all over the skin of my leg, cos obviously I had inadvertently rubbed myself into a stinging nettle plant while trying hide well. It was so GROSS and it continued to burn through the next 12 hours. But I think I was more upset that I failed at Hide n Seek.

The Lion 

After having a picnic of KFC – I’m very unglamorous, but I think you know that – I took out my lion costume! I bought this from Kigu Crew last year and I absolutely love it (I’m a Leo). If you don’t know what a kigurumi is, click here.

I’ve worn the lion up to the alps in New Zealand and taken it to a treehouse in a forest. I have to share photos of these adventures soon!

I had SO much fun running and jumping around.. and only took the costume off because it started to get too HOT – there were a lot of high and crazy jumps! I also tried ‘running’ on all fours – lion style – and jumping over a lavender bush row.. err it didn’t really work and I ended up bruising my knee.

I entered this photo (above) into a contest run by Animal Costumes Shop (another place you can buy kigus from) on their Facebook page. I won! The prize was an animal costume of my choice.. you’ll be seeing that one one soon 😉

There is a little shop and cafe at the entrance of the farm.The shop sells a variety of lavender products (you’ll be surprised how many things you can derive from lavender..) and the cafe offers tea and cakes/biscuits.

As you may (or may not) know.. I’m not really a ‘tea and cakes’ person. But I felt that since I was all the way there, I might as well try the lavender tea for £1. It was sort of like drinking a sweet old granny’s floral pillow. I didn’t hate it though.. it was just kind of weird.

I shall end this post with a ‘normal’ photo of myself…. 😉

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She was SO happy. Because the night before, we were both going on about how we ‘just wanna die‘ cos there were NO tickets left until September and she only had one week left in her London visit.

First, two pics of what I wore that day:

The closest train station to the studio is Watford Junction, which can be accessed via National Rail or the London Overground. There is a designated ‘Harry Potter Bus’ that goes from the station to studio twice an hour. You can’t miss it – as it has Harry’s and other characters’ faces plastered on it.. as well as the words HARRY POTTER STUDIO TOUR)

As you snake around the queue to enter the studio, one of the first sights you’ll see is Harry’s ‘bedroom under the stairs’. It’s cute! I would spend one night there.. just one..

All children are also given a little booklet on which you can collect cool stamps from specified checkpoints throughout the tour.. but if you want one even though you’re NOT a kid, you can request it from a member of staff.

Obviously, I did this, and I HAD A GREAT TIME RUNNING UP TO ALL THE CHECKPOINTS TO GET MY BOOK STAMPED. Sometimes, I’d run faster on purpose just to beat actual kids to it and then they have to wait for me.. Haha!

The great dining hall. I thought it was rather TINY in real life…… damn those special effects.

Also, there were no bazillion floating lit candles to be seen near the ceiling.

A costume rail. The three on the left side are for Luna Lovegood – I think she’s probably my favourite character!

More costumes and Ron Weasley’s bed.

Some props really were SUPER AMAZING to see.. like you know that giant door with all those snakes on it. That is REAL it actually WORKS.

There were so many things there that were designed and crafted and mechanised just for the movie. Many things that I thought couldn’t be real functioning items.. but WERE.

Like this egg. It ACTUALLY opens up into a number of separate ‘petals’ to reveal.. something inside. I can’t remember.

Crazy cat office of Professor Umbridge

A table from Professor Snapes’ potions class.

One of my favourite sections was, predictably, a big wall display with all sorts of NAUGHTY SWEET TREATS AND FUN COLOURFUL THINGS in it.

I WISH I COULD OPEN MY OWN NAUGHTY THINGS SHOP!! 

I have lots of ideas for naughty things.. but obviously I can’t say them here in case someone STEALS them.

I wanted to have a go sitting inside this fancy-looking contraption, but these bozos were in there for so long taking turns in each and every position possible, that I lost patience and gave up.

The triple-decker Knight Bus. To be honest I didn’t really think this bus was cool..  It was like a giant rectangular eggplant with windows.

Outside No.4 Privet Drive.

Me jumping outside that bridge that connects the castle grounds to.. you know that place they go to have their first butter beers.. Ha haha

Me and my sister, Jane.

Diagon Alley

Towards the end of the tour, you will encounter a very detailed  and rather large model of Hogwarts Castle. Then you’ll be compelled to take a thousand photos of it, from every possible angle within 2m, because it is just so amazing and you wonder what kind of human beings are capable of creating such a thing.

Harry Potter doesn’t do magic.. it’s ALL THE PEOPLE working behind the movie who are magicians! They’re insane!

All the photos in this post reveal only a tiny FRACTION of what you can actually see in the studio. If you want be truly marvelled at human intelligence and creativity.. definitely GO to the Harry Potter Studio Tour.

Adult tickets cost £28 each and can be bought online here.

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Everyone met up in East London, where the car had to be collected. Surprisingly I was the first to arrive. Linda and I had no time for brekkie so the car made a detour to McDonalds. Looking back at road trips or day trips I’ve been on in the past.. I think it’s safe to say that possibly 90% have involved a McDonalds takeaway or drive-thru. It can’t be a real road trip without Maccas, right?

In the end I was glad we left early.. ish. It took freaking ages to arrive in Bournemouth!! It turns out the WHOLE WORLD wanted to visit Bournemouth beach and wanted to drive there USING THE SAME ROADS and AT THE SAME TIME. I wished we had taken the train instead. But then I guess I wanted my Maccas drive-thru experience so badly that I judged it to be worth the traffic jam.

We got to the beach at about 1pm. So here are some photos! It was only my second time in Bournemouth.

The square ones are obviously stolen from my Instagram, and the rest are from my ‘real camera’. The colours differed so much that I actually re-edited the Instagram ones to match the rest more closely… am I anal or what?? No. I just had a lot of time to spare tonight.

We parked on the upper road towards the East side of the coast. You can either walk down or take a lift for about £1. Obviously, we took the lift..

I had SUCH A GREAT TIME just lying there in a REAL beach (i.e. beach with sand).
The water was icy cold but I managed to brave it at least twice – because I needed to pee..

I’m the kind of person who can’t really sit or BE still for long.

I’m not one of those people who can relax on the beach with a book for hours or lay down and fall asleep intermittently. No, I can’t. I have to play!

If there are pebbles, I’ll pick them and hurl them into the sea. I’ll collect seashells and bird feathers and washed up seaweed. I’ll draw on the sand using a twig or a stick. I’ll dig holes in the ground and see how deep I can go. Using a combination of digging holes/drawing shapes, I’ll make up a game that I can play with whoever I’m with. If I’ve brought it with me, I’ll blow bubbles into the wind. I just have to DO something.

On this occasion, after feeling gutted that we didn’t have any plastic beach toys with us, I managed to find two plastic beer cups left behind by some LITTERBUG and so we used it to make a rubbish sandcastle!

I skulked around and collected what I deemed ‘the best feathers on the beach’.

After the completion of ‘Feather Fortress’, I laid down to admire our work for a bit.

On the way back to the car hours later, we saw this cute brother-sister pair prancing naked by the sidewalk. They were giggling and chasing each other and seemed something out of a cartoon!

Later on, I saw this family walking ahead of us carrying two bodyboards and I thought DAMN, THAT’S WHAT I SHOULD HAVE GOT!

I love bodyboarding!

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On the Friday, I did some (lots of) research and booked a room at a B&B plus train tickets to… Peaslake. I hadn’t even HEARD of this place before. I then learnt that this tiny village had a population of less than 1500. It has one resident-run school, one shop, and no public transport. How perfect!

Situated between Guildford and Woking (south-west London), the nearest train station was Gomshall. Upon arriving at the station on Saturday afternoon, I also learnt that there were no cab companies there to take us to Peaslake and the buses only run once every 1-2 hours. Was still in high spirits though, and laughed so much while goofing around the ONE street that pretty much made up Gomshall.

It’s true that people in small towns are simply more friendly and helpful – we were in the local pub enquiring about cabs when a lady there got up and firmly said “I’ll drive you, it’ll only take me about five minutes”. Thank you Fionna from The Compassess Inn, it was much, much appreciated!

There is only one place to stay at Peaslake, which is The Hurtwood Inn Hotel.

I LOVED that hotel.. It’s so cute and cosy and warm and pretty! Got the best room (because all the cheaper ones were fully booked, haha) – front-facing and on the first floor.

The first day was so much fun in anticipation of the snow.

The temperature was low and the air was icy cold and crisp. Took a walk up to the forest nearby. The area is popular amongst cyclists/mountain bikers so we saw many of them there.

Found a pond and guess what! It was frozen SOLID. That got me so ridiculously excited that I jumped on and did some tap-dancing on it. I was getting more and more certain that snow was on its way.. it was only a matter of time, yessssssss.

At sunset, we paid the local store a visit and bought banana cake, a chocolate slice, some cheese, and a bottle of wine to keep in the room.

Walking back into the hotel.. it began to snow. I was SO HAPPY and spent the next hour in the room observing the growing whiteness outside, willing and encouraging the snowfall with my mind.

 

Dinner was had at the hotel restaurant downstairs, which was excellent.
Had salmon fishcakes, some shredded duck.. thing (crap, I forgot.. probably because this was the most tasty thing we ordered and all I could think of was to eat it), pasta, and a roast.

Our waiter was a Polish guy called Peter, who so kindly gave us a lift back to the station the next evening – Thank you so much Peter!!

As we were having dinner…… it really began to pelt down outside. Thick flakes were furiously falling to the ground. I watched smugly through the window like a proud evil villain whose plan to take over the world was materialising.

I ate quickly, because I was dying to go out and PLAY! I could already hear kids’ voices outside.. *impatient*

THE NEXT DAY

I was so PLEASED.
Had a quick breakfast in the dining room – smoked salmon and scrambled eggs – and then it was time for a day out in the snowwwwwww

 

 

So that was my snow weekend (a big WIN)

I definitely recommend Peaslake for a quick getaway from London if you want one. It’s only a 40+ min train ride from Waterloo and it has a big, beautiful forest and lots of open space.

Stay at The Hurtwood Inn Hotel (you don’t have much of a choice, but really it’s great!) from £59 per night.

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But first here is a photo summary of my little trip down to Brighton with Aysha last weekend

Lucky us, it was so sunshiney bright that day

Although the air was actually mostly chilly..
But English people are really strange, they think 16 degrees = time to bring out the shorts + t shirts!

The last time I visited Brighton Pier was in 2007 in the height of summer
I love all the lame rides and the sounds they make
The colours of the tacky signs
Shoes and sandals scuffing along the wooden planks
And ESPECIALLY the big fat seagulls that circle the sky

Me with ice cream – there is excellent soft-serve there
Our photographer of the day
And a funky redhead that A spotted

The NEATEST chalk hopscotch I’ve ever seen in my life

We bought fish n chips and sat on the pebbly beach eating away
Lazing away
Rotting away
The best way

I think we spent most of the day laughing till our sides hurt and taking silly photos
Two things I loooooove

 Towards the end of the day we needed a place to rest/pass the time/have a drink and we passed this particular bar again.“Hey let’s just go in here”

“Nah let’s not.. it looks dodgy cos it seems to be full of men only”

So, we went in
Turned out there were lots of men in there because it was a gay bar (duh)
And somehow it made us giggle (since we felt stupid) and decide we would be fake lesbians while in there.

Felt like school again!

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But first here’s what I wore
I believe it’s the first time my legs have seen the outside world since ..last year
It’s like coming out of a cave
Luckily I had a quick wax before going out, ha ha!

Dress New Look
Belt vintage
Cropped cardi River Island
Bag River Island
Socks/Shoes Topshop

Nail colour by Barry M!

My neighbours car hehe. I wrote ‘Welcome to YOUR CAR!’ in front of the door 😉
And a puff of smoke at the back

Lots of people by the river bank

I miss painting!
I must get my paints and brushes out .. umm someday..

At times I felt like I had just come out of school -_-

Looking at this photo is making me so thirsty!
Pimms.. I love it

It was a weird day because I had just dreamt the night before that I had this huge addiction to beer (when in fact I don’t like it much) and was drawing myself a beer bath and everything. So the Mr bought a strawberry beer for us and it was yum! I also later weirdly craved and had seafood pasta – I don’t like seafood normally.
I LIKE THIS!

Didn’t manage to have any ice cream >.<

Richmond is so beautiful

Thought the bottom pics were goofy
Kinda look like a cartoon!

Does anyone remember what this flower’s called
Something HEART
Heart drops or heart ..something..

Bumped into this neighbourhood cat on the way home
It was sitting quietly on the window sill
I called out to it
And it RAN towards me and rolled around demanding attention!

Had half a mind to kidnap it for a day 😉

The post A Sunny Day in Richmond appeared first on SMALLCRAZY.

Some of the best plums ever!
They’re Reeves (whatever)

It was a beautiful day

There were rows and rows of plum trees
Got a few raspberries and blackberries too!

Clacton Beach

Clacton Pier

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Anyway it turned out Southampton is kind of a boring place
There was hardly anything to do there

So we took the train farther to New Forest and went cycling!

At the end of it all (4 hours of it) my bum hurt and my legs were burning but it was such a fab day it didn’t matter

The bumpy path

Red tights!

I initially wore these red tights to do a lazy walk but when it was decided we’d get a bike instead I had to pull on my overworn, trusty houndstooth leggings Ha ha ha
I pulled them over the tights cos I was afraid of cold

There were HORSES just wandering about like stray dogs!
It was so strange but cool

There were a few more.. not in this photo

I’m so tall

We had a quick lunch here by this stream

Err merry christmas

LOVED the scenery

Pretend-abandoned bike

On this path we did something really silly
As we were pedalling along we wondered.. ‘hmm, how cool would it be to have a video of us cycling together in this cool place’

So we stopped, ran ahead maybe 25m, placed the video cam on the ground, pressed record, ran back to the bikes, got on them and rode them towards and past the camera ‘naturally’.

Ice cream stop!

Me!

I only have one more post to go to wrap up Norway

In other news, I’m going to Milan next month!

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