Birthday, Beauty and the Beast

Hi everyone, say hello to the new Rachel! She is a year older, a year wiser, and most importantly, an entire cake heavier! (well, not the entire cake, I shared with my partner, who bought the cake for me, thank you! [Also the cake lasted nearly an entire week, which, considering it was chocolate cake and absolutely delicious, must be birthday magic! {Also, are brackets inside brackets inside brackets allowed? Probably not. Bracket-ception..}]) For those who haven’t read the previous blog post, and haven’t caught on yet - this previous Sunday, I celebrated my birthday! Well, I’ve been sort of celebrating it for several days this week, and let me tell you why!

19th March, 8.20am I receive a text from my Mum wishing me a Happy Birthday! I am still asleep at this point in time, so I won’t read it until later, but she also tells me she’s off to run a 5K in the rain for charity! (Well done Mum!)

19th March, 10.30am

After a nice Sunday lie in, I woke up to a cup of tea, the birthday song sang to me by my lovely partner, and my presents from him and cards from him and my family, along with several texts and messages from friends. From there, my partner made my breakfast for me (another cup of tea, shock, and two slices of toast - one Marmite and one peanut butter) and we got ready for the day.

19th March, 12.00-3.00pm I arrived at work (I work part-time at Thorntons!) to discover a lovely gift bag from my co-workers, along with a card! I really wasn’t expecting this at all, as I had only mentioned the fact that it was my birthday the day before, and I have only worked there since Christmas. It’s also extremely busy there at the moment, seeing as both Mother’s Day and Easter are just around the corner. As such, I really didn’t think my little old birthday would have even been remembered, let alone this! 19th March, 3.30pm

I got home from work to another cuppa (if you’re spotting a theme here, it is because of two reasons. One, I am a caffeine addict and can’t get through the day without several cups of tea, and two, my partner makes the best tea known to humanity) and we decided to watch Finding Dory for the first time (I know, I know, I’m so late to the party, but one of my presents was the DVD and so I was suuuuuper excited to watch it) with a big, door-stop-worthy-wedge of chocolate cake! (Finding Dory is great and also I cried a lot but in a good way? If you’ve seen it, then you will know, if not, then you need to see it, it’s really very good and funny and not sad at all!)

March 19th, 6.30pm-ish (However long Finding Dory is plus the time it takes to make a new panad) I Facetimed my Mum, who was sitting with her feet up after running her 5K! After this, I then Facetimed my grandparents too, Nana and Pops and of course, the lovely Holly! March 19th, 7.30pm-ish (However long I was Facetiming for plus a small glass of wine) We had a little mini glass of wine and began to get ready to go out for dinner and (more) drinkies! March 19th, some time around 9pm? We went to our favourite place in town, a Morroccan bar that is all vegetarian, and do amaaazing pizzas and even more amaaaaaaaaazing mojitos! Mojito is by far my favourite and definite-go-to cocktail, or even drink really, and so we partook in mojito-ing and spent the evening there with our friend who came too. I don’t think I’ve celebrated a birthday since my 18th without at some point in the day enjoying a mojito!

March 19th, 2014 One year, during University, I (almost, despite best efforts) ate an entire red cabbage for dinner. A red cabbage with a side of mojito. (This sounds utterly wild, but fear not, it is me after all, and there was logic behind my cabbagey decisions - I bought the cabbage mainly because the best before date was my birthday , and that was exciting, and then realised on my birthday that the cabbage was going off, and so I had to eat it. I of course enlisted the help of my trusty housemates and so on my 19th birthday, we all ate cabbage and nothing else for dinner, followed quite promptly by a mojito each.) ANYWAY! Back to 2017… March 19th, dark outside, last orders, possibly some time around 11? We decided to head back to our friend’s house to round off the evening, before then heading back home and to bed ourselves! And that marked the end of my actual birthday. However, another one of my birthday treats was to go and watch the new live action Beauty and The Beast film in the cinema, and we weren’t going to see it until Tuesday, so I decided that my birthday was going to last until at least then! March 20th It was a beautiful sunny day, and my partner and I were both off (I was off from Thorntons, not Puffin Prints, but I’m pretty much never off from Puffin Prints so I only really count Thorntons in whether or not I’m ‘working’) and so we decided to head somewhere we’ve never been before! I’d researched interesting places to go and found a beautiful woodland park set on the side of a hill, meaning the views from the top were stunning and when in the bottom of the forest, it felt like you were completely secluded from the world because you were tucked under this towering hill. We went there and spent the afternoon wandering around and taking pictures, which was one of the main reasons I wanted to go - to play with my camera a bit. However, we arrived, and upon entering the park gates, and seeing a lovely view that would make a fab picture, I realised I’d forgotten the memory card for my camera!! So I had a bit of a sulk but took some photos on my phone instead, I soon forgot to sulk when we happened upon a very tame squirrel frolicking about the trees!

March 21st

Time to see Beauty and the Beast! I have been so so excited to see this film, since it was one of my absolute favourites as a child, and being a big Harry Potter fan, I was also excited to see how Emma Watson portrayed Belle in the film. I was also a little nervous since I loved it so much as a child that this live version could never live up...

However, I was pleasantly surprised, the film was as magical as the original and the songs were just as great, as well as a few extra bits and pieces they have added in. It was fantastic and well worth going to see if you’re interested! If you did enjoy the animated Disney version, then there are some scenes that have been added in to help create more of a backstory for Belle and her father, and unlike from what I remember of the original, we learn about the history of Belle’s mother! There is also a brand new song or two, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

And that marked the end of my birthday/s….. Or did it? Weeeeell... We have a family tradition that we always have what we call a mini ‘tea party,’ where myself, my Mum and my brother head over to my grandparents’ house for teapot tea and sometimes even more cake (it’s truly a medical marvel that I’m not clinically obese). I am heading home for a few days next week, for Mother’s Day, my Pops’ birthday and some more of my own birthday celebrating, and so I think I might attempt to stretch out my celebrating until then! I’ll let you know how long I manage to keep the birthday ball rolling in next week’s post, so I’ll catch you next time! Have a lovely week, Rachel x