As predicted, the chocolate, prune and walnut brownies I made yesterday were divine. Seriously the best brownies I’ve ever made! And they were so easy, too. As you can see from the ingredients below, they’re not exactly healthy - but when they taste this good, who cares?! I’m looking forward to playing around with the recipe and making some moderations though. Wholewheat flour and agave nectar, anyone?

This is the recipe I used…

• 125g prunes
• 1 tbsp brandy or apple juice (I went for the brandy!)
• 125g butter
• 125g cocoa
• 2 large eggs
• 225g caster sugar
• 75g walnuts
• 1/4 vanilla extract
• 75g self raising flour

Step one – chop up the prunes and soak them in the brandy for 30 minutes

Step two – melt the butter, mix in the cocoa and set aside

Step three – whisk the eggs and stir in the sugar

Step four – add in the prunes, chopped nuts, cocoa mixture and vanilla extract

Step five – fold in the flour until evenly mixed (don’t over-stir!)

Step six – pour mixture into a 20cm x 20cm tin lined with baking paper

Step seven – bake at 180C for 30 minutes

And voila!

Best enjoyed with vanilla ice-cream and rose wine!

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This morning I reaquainted myself with my old friend, the gym. I thought I might as well start the week as I mean to go on! I did 21 kilometres in 50 minutes on the stationary bike, level 5. I was tired and sweaty at the end! I’m really loving cycling at the moment – it’s a great alternative to running and doesn’t affect my knees. I’m thinking about buying a road bike in the near future – has anyone got any tips or advice? I have no idea where to start looking!

Hope you’ve all had a lovely Monday

“Sun is in the sky, oh why, oh why would I wanna be anywhere else…”

Ahh the weather in the UK has been gorgeous all weekend. Spring has well and truly hit and I’ve been out and about making the most of it.

Yesterday I caught up with some old uni friends in London. We spent the afternoon browsing Portobello Market and the evening letting our hair down at Monarch Bar in Camden. If you need ideas for a night out in London, this place is great. Twice a month (including last night) they put on movie soundtrack nights. We had a blast dancing to tunes like Greased Lightning, Don’t Stop Believin’ and Gangsta’s Paradise. I’m all about the old-school sing-along classics!

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This afternon I went for a walk with my mum. We did 3.36 miles in 53.55 minutes according to the garmin. It was lovely being out in the sunshine and taking photos of all the springtime greenery. I live in a tiny little village and I’m really going to miss these kind of views when I move away.

We even met this little guy…

He loved posing for the camera!

I’m now enjoying a lazy sunday evening with a glass of wine and trashy TV. Oh, and as I speak there are some chocolate, prune and walnut brownies cooking in the oven. I’ll post pics and the recipe tomorrow – I have a feeling they’re going to be goooood!

I hope everyone had a good weekend! What did you get up to?

Thanks for all your lovely words in response to my last post – I appreciate each and every one of you who visits and comments on the blog! I’m pleased to report I was feeling much more like my usual self yesterday – It’s amazing what I bit of positive thinking can do. I put a lot of the tips into action, including wearing a nice colourful outfit. Fi asked to see a picture, so here you go…

Here’s a better look at the dress. I love anything with flowers on. I seriously must have about 15 flowery dresses. Unfortunately most of them aren’t suitable for work! Sorry for the lack of a full length photo, I totally forgot to take one until I was actually in my car.

I decided to keep the ‘bright and colourful’ theme going today, with this turquoise top.

 

When I was looking through my wardrobe I noticed how many grey and black clothes I have. I going to make a conscious effort to start buying more colourful things from now on – it really made a difference to my mood!

Have you tested this out yet? Send me a picture of you in a bright, colourful or feel-good outfit and I’ll post it on the blog!

Has anyone got any exciting plans for the weekend? I’m hoping to fit a quick run or a bike ride in tomorrow morning, and then I’m meeting up with some old university friends for the day and evening. Oh, and at some point I need to turn this into something that doesn’t resemble a junk yard…

But for now, it’s Friday evening and I have a glass of wine calling my name. Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Lately, I’ve been completely lacking motivation to do…well, anything. Work is pretty stressful at the moment (for reasons I can’t really go into on here), and I feel like that’s really affecting other areas of my life. I haven’t been eating well or exercising regularly (that terrible run at the weekend didn’t help!), I haven’t had much contact with friends, and I’ve just felt tired all the time. Oh, and I’ve felt completely uninspired with this blog, despite having only just started it!

In short, I’ve lost my glow.

One of my favourite quotes is “if you want different, do different”, so it’s time for some changes! I can’t change what’s going on at work, but I can try my hardest not to let it negatively impact the rest of my life. I miss smiling and having the energy to live my life!

 

So, in an attempt to get out of this funk I’ve gotten myself into, I turned to my trusty friend Google. A quick search for “more energy” lead me to this post. There are some brilliant ideas here – definitely check it out if you’re feeling a bit down or unmotivated.

There were a lot of obvious tips, like eat more fruit and get more sleep, but lots of the suggestions I would never have thought of myself. Here are some of my favourite…

Wear brighter colors.

This trick is related to the mood you project to people, and the reciprocating mood they project towards you. If you wear dark, somber colors, you project a dark, somber attitude, and people will respond to you with a somber attitude. If you wear bright, happy colors, you’ll get that attitude projected towards you, which will boost your own mood and energy levels.

Sniff some citrus.

Citrus scents (like orange, lemon and lime) stimulate alertness. So lather on some of that lemon scented lotion.

Get your world organized.

When your world is organized, you don’t have to expend mental energy keeping track of a million things. (This is one of my main problems - my bedroom and work desk are both a tip! I feel a big tidying up session coming on soon. Oh, and the desk in the picture is definitely not mine, unfortunately!)

Dress up.

Feeling better about yourself has a magical way of giving you more energy. Put just a tad more effort into looking your best for work, and you’ll get compliments from coworkers that will make you feel better — and make you a perkier, more energetic worker bee. (Ok, I’m pretty sure I can’t wear this dress to work, but I like the idea!)

Take a walk outside.

Getting outside for some fresh air, a change of scenery, and a quick walk to get your blood going will do wonders for your mood and motivation. Seeing the sun is a signal to your body that it’s not bedtime yet.

Get on your toes.

Roll up and down on your toes. This stimulates your circulatory system, which will deliver much-needed oxygen and fuel (glucose) throughout your body. You’ll be more energized and sharper.

Amazingly, just writing this post has made me feel more positive! Plans for tomorrow:

- Go for a run/brisk walk before work

- Get out of the office at lunchtime, even if it’s just to walk to the supermarket

- Wear a nice, colourful outfit

- Eat plenty of fruit and whole foods

- Search my draws tonight in an attempt to find some citrus body lotion!

I’m seeing a friend tomorrow night, too. I think a nice social evening away from the house (and my laptop!) will do me good .

How do you ‘energise’ yourself when you’re feeling tired, rundown or unmotivated? Do you have any fail-safe tips?

In light of Friday’s announcement that I’ve decided to run the Regent’s Park 5K on 22nd May, I met up with a friend this morning for a training run. To say it was an epic fail would be putting it mildly. Remember I said I’ve been suffering with a knee injury? Well it would appear it’s still not healed. Almost as soon as I started running, I was in pain. I ended up walking most of the time (we did a three-mile loop) because I just couldn’t run without my knee hurting.

I’m so upset. I started having knee trouble about a year ago now, so I took a couple of months off running and it went away. I went on to run two 5Ks and an 8K without any problems and I honestly thought all this was behind me. Then I noticed it was playing up again a couple of months ago, and so I haven’t run much since (I’ve been biking and gyming instead). This was my first run in a while, and it literally couldn’t have gone worse.

So I don’t know what to do now. I’m going to go back to the doctor and try to get referred to a physio. As for the race, who knows? I’m going to just play it by ear, and see how things go. I’m hoping if I rest for a couple of weeks (i.e. stick to biking rather than cycling) it’ll hold up. I know better than to run through this kind of pain, so if I can’t run the race I’ll walk it instead.

I hate to feel sorry for myself, but I’ve been really down about this today. I feel like it’s so unfair I can’t do something I love. I do everything right - I ice, I stretch, I take things slowly - but my knee just doesn’t seem to want to co-operate. *Sigh*.

On a more positive note…My day out in London was fabulous. I looked round the area I’ll be moving to, and it seems lovely. Lots of pavement cafes, coffee shops and second-hand book shops – just my kind of place! I even found a couple a health stores, including one that sells these beauties!

Any UK food blogger will know this is a big deal! PB & Co isn’t readily available over here like it is in the US, so to say I was ridiculously excited would be an understatement. Is it sad one of the things I’m most looking forward to about moving out is being able to shop and cook for myself? I can’t wait to try (and post) loads of new recipes!

To any runners who’ve ever had knee problems, do you have any advice? I’m so fed up and just want to run!

Ya-hoo it’s the weekend! Even though I’ve only had a three-day week this week, it seemed to drag on forever and ever. But now I have two whole days of freedom ahead of me and, the best part is, summer seems to have finally arrived in the UK after months and months of miserableness (Now I’ve said that it’s going to rain all weekend, isn’t it?!)

So what have I got planned for these sunshine-filled two days, I hear you ask? Well tomorrow I’m off to London to meet up with friends and explore the area I’m moving to in LESS THAN SIX WEEKS. I basically just want to find cool coffee shops, yummy restaurants and funky bars and prepare for what will hopefully be a non-stop fabulousa time.

And I need to run too! The most productive thing I did at work all day was convince (i.e. nag and nag until they gave in just to shut me up) two of my colleagues to run the Regent’s Park Race for Life 5k with me in May. I’ve run this race twice before in my hometown (it’s a nationwide thing with events all over the country) but never in London so I’m tres excited. Look how pretty the park is…

Seeing as I haven’t exactly done a lot of running lately (due to a mix of a knee injury and sheer laziness), I really need to up my game. The race is on 22nd May, which means I have six weeks to get my ass into gear and actually do some training. My time last time was about 29.22 (yeah, a hard-core runner I’m not) and I think I can easily beat that. I’m excited about having something to train for! There’s a 10K in July I’ve got my eye on too, so watch this space…

In the meantime, here’s a pic of my friend Emma and I at last year’s Race for Life. Yes, we wore tutus. We’re cool like that. I love the photo, we both look so happy (excuse the toilets in the background!)

Ahh so pumped for the next race. I just hope my knee behaves itself!

Any tips from the (many) seasoned runners out there? Any good training plans I should follow?

So my day at work was a break from the norm, thanks to a training course I went on called ‘Be a great communicator’. Verbal communication has never been one of my strong points (I mumble way too much, and my brain seems to work faster than my mouth which means I just end up chatting gibberish a lot of the time), so I signed up for the course in the hope that it’d give me some tips and advice on how to improve.

What I wasn’t expecting was being forced to make a speech to a room full of people, have them tell me all the things I did wrong, and then have the pleasure of presenting the same speech again. Fun it was not. Especially since the mere thought of public speaking results in me wanting to jump off the nearest bridge.

But, those five minutes of torture aside, the day was pretty useful. Here are some of the things I learned…

- Humans are born with only two fears – the fear of falling and the fear of loud noises. That’s it. All other fears are learned, which means they can be unlearned too. So I guess I’ve got no excuse for not overcoming this public speaking anxiety!

- If you want to be more confident, think of the most confident person you know. It could be a friend, a colleague or a celebrity. How do they behave? What is it about them that makes them come across so self-assured? Study them, and try to imitate their behaviours. In other words, fake it ’til you make it.

- Communication is 55% body language, 38% tone of voice and only 7% of it is the words you use. I’m really going to think about this next time I have to do any kind of public speaking – I tend to spend so much time stressing over what I want to say, when I should really be concentrating on how I say it!

- Public speaking is actually the number one fear among people – so if you’re completely bricking making a speech or doing a presentation, chances are everyone else is in the same boat.

What are your thoughts on public speaking? Do you enjoy it or does it completely terrify you? What tips would you give others looking to improve?

Hello one and all, and welcome to Snowflakes and Sunshine.

After being introduced to the huge wide world of blogs over the last year or so, I’ve decided to jump on the bandwagon and start one of my own. I started writing one about six months ago, but it fizzled out after a few weeks – mainly due to my laziness and lack of interesting things to talk about!

So why attempt #2? A few reasons… Firstly, I love reading blogs like Healthy Tipping Point, The Inner Workings of a College Graduate, MegaNerdRuns and Oh She Glows. These girls (and many others) have inspired me in so many different ways. I love the fact so many health and fitness bloggers seem to live their lives to the full and aren’t afraid to chase after their dreams.

I’m by no means an super athlete (I struggle to run 5k most of the time!), but I’ve made a lot of changes to my life over the last couple of years in terms of exercising and healthy eating. And I’ve got blogs to thank for a lot of that (trust me, I would never have come up with the idea of putting spinach in a smoothie myself!)

So while you won’t get to read marathon recaps or discover ground breaking new recipes on here just yet, I’d love to share my exploration of exercise, food and a balanced way of living. I’ve by no means figured it all out – but I’m doing my best. A lot of the people in my life have very different attitudes to such issues as I do, which is why I’m so keen to be part of this fantastic community of like-minded people who get as excited about the likes of peanut butter and workout clothes as I do!

On another note, I’m also moving from my little village to the big city of London in about six weeks.

I want to document as much of that exciting experience as possible, and I’m hoping this blog will help with that. I’ve got a good feeling that the next few months are going to be the best I’ve had for a while .

Oh, and expect to see lots of posts about another true love of mine – travelling. I’ve just gotten back from Singapore and Sydney, and I’m looking forward to sharing my thoughts on these two amazing places.

If you’ve made it this far without losing interest, I applaud you . I don’t really know what direction this blog is going to take yet, so you’ll have to come back and find out! 

To all the bloggers out there – what made you decide to start one?