Gingerbread Hot Chocolate Recipe

Today marks the first day of Blogmas and I, along with almost 100 other amazing bloggers, will be taking part in the #TheBigBlogmasProject2014. Blogmas is a challenge, we have to write a post every single day in December about the chosen topic for the day, it's pretty hard work.

I wanted to kick off the first day of Blogmas with a very tasty (and festive) Gingerbread Hot Chocolate recipe. These days we have a whole host of different flavours we can add to our hot drinks and during the festive period, ginger is one of my favourites. A little fact for you all, I'm intolerant to cinnamon, which makes navigating festive foods and drinks a little tricky. Ginger is my cinnamon, it adds that kick most people get in their mince pies or mulled wine and it means I don't have to miss out on that Christmas spice. 

You can buy the gingerbread syrup from your local coffee shops or amazon, but you can get a similar effect by using the cheaper alternative, ground ginger. Ground ginger can be found in almost any supermarket and it's pretty cheap. So, if you want to make your own tasty Gingerbread Hot Chocolate, here's what you'll need:

Ingredients & Equipment

• A mug or latte glass 
• 3 tsp Chocolate drinking powder (ideally the kind you add milk to rather than water)
• 1/4 to 1/2 tsp Ground ginger (1/4 will give a very subtle ginger flavour, 1/2 will make it a little stronger)
• Milk (measure out in your chosen cup)
• Squirty cream
• Mini marshmallows
• Mini gingerbread men to decorate

Method

1. Measure out your milk into your chosen cup. Leave approx 1 inch for cream. 
2. Heat up the milk for 3 minutes in the microwave in either your cup, or in a heat proof jug.
3. Mix together your drinking chocolate and ground ginger so that the powders blend together. Then add to the hot milk and stir well. 
4. Transfer to your chosen cup (if you've heated it in a jug) then apply a generous amount of squirty cream.
5. Add marshmallows and gingerbread men for added tastiness. 
6. Sit back and enjoy your tasty Gingerbread Hot Chocolate. 

Don't forget to let me know if you try out this recipe and make sure you look up #TheBigBlogmasProject2014 for lots of other wintery posts. 

If you're also a fan of Vlogmas, I'll be doing weekly Vlogmas vlogs up until Christmas day, so make sure you're subscribed to my YouTube channel to keep up to date!

The Sunday Post: Graduation Photo Album

That's it, University has officially come to a close and graduation has come and gone. After all of that worrying and anxiousness it actually wasn't that bad. The air con was not working as had previously been stated in an email, but thankfully the ceilings in the auditorium were high enough to get the air circulating so it wasn't claustrophobic. 

It was nice to see all of my friends again and have a good catch up, but it went by so fast! It feels like I wasn't even there. We had to get to the University to pick up the tickets and gowns for 8am, something my parents were not particularly pleased about as they both enjoy a good lie in. We had to stand in a lot of queues for a long time, but eventually everything was sorted, pictures were taken and off we went. In true University of South Wales style, the tickets were sent to the venue instead of the Uni so the ceremony was delayed by 45 minutes, but everything was over fairly quickly. 

Afterwards I raced back to my campus to throw my robes back to the hire people, it was so hot on the day and that teamed with a big heavy robe and no air con made me hotter than I have ever been in my life! I saw people casually strolling around Cardiff still in their cap and gowns hours after the ceremony, I don't know how they managed it, I think I would've died if I'd had to stay in it any longer. 

We were in one of the posher hotels in Cardiff for the two nights we stayed and I have to say the complimentary use of the Jacuzzi was very much welcomed. We had a really amazing meal at the Yard in the Brewery in Cardiff city centre after the ceremony, they had the best chips I have ever tasted in my life! Then later on I met up with two of my friends for some catch up drinks whilst our families chilled out in their hotels. 

I don't think it's really hit me that it's all over yet, I still feel like Uni isn't really fully over. I suppose my brain just doesn't want to think of the vast expanse of unknown life I have in front of me. That's all for now though, I did it, it was fun and now it's all over and it's onwards and upwards from here! 

#SongOfTheWeek: Mononoke - Alice

(Image taken from Mononokeofficial Facebook page)

Mononoke is a London based singer who is so new and up-coming that I can find barely any information on her. All I know is I found her through a mix on SoundCloud and her voice is unbelievably soothing, and all three of her songs currently uploaded are beautiful.

If you love London Grammar then this is for you, it has a similar chilled out, slightly electronic sound that soothes and feels like it's massaging your brain (a strange thing to think about). Alice is a slow, stripped back melodic track that is slightly melancholy but has something uplifting about it. The vocals carry everything and they are well and truly on point. As soon as I heard this I started internet stalking her, I've now found her official Facebook page, which will hopefully keep me up to date with any releases. I also found her YouTube, it's only got the three music videos on there at the moment but I'm eagerly waiting for some more. 

So if you fancy a chill out session, grab a cup of tea, your best noise cancelling headphones and whack on a bit of Mononoke.

Media Monday: Godzilla (2014) Movie Review

(Image sourced from Google images)

I'm going to try very hard not to give any huge plot points away in this review, but just in case I fail I would just like to warn that this review may contain spoilers! 

Now we have all the disclaimer stuff out the way let's get down to it. I am a child of the 90's and therefore the image of Godzilla is one of a giant evil lizard stepping on camera men and being chased around New York by Matthew Broderick and a French guy. When I heard that they were out to make a more modern version I was extremely skeptical. Let's be honest the 90's version of Godzilla wasn't the best, but it was a feel good family movie which was moderately entertaining.

This new Godzilla pays homage to the original Japanese movies, in which the plot consisted of Godzilla coming in, destroying cities but ultimately fighting another, less interesting monster. In fact the whole premise of the new movie is exactly that, Godzilla kicking some serious giant bug creature butt.

The positives

The special effects are the best I've ever seen in a movie. The design and look of Godzilla is spot on and he actually looks kind of cute, in a big scary lizard kind of way. The action is on form and really does keep you hooked throughout the entire 123 minutes and surprisingly Aaron Taylor Johnson does serious action pretty convincingly. The fighting between the monsters is also amazing, partially to the effects but once you get into the big, final battle you can't take your eyes off of it. 

The negatives

I have to say there are a few. The first one that most of the people in our cinema screen noticed was that logic doesn't seem to exist in this films world. For example, would you really need binoculars to see a giant bug making it's way towards Las Vegas? I don't think you would, but apparently the army and the people of Vegas can't see 3 feet in front of them. The other major problem with this film? The story. We all agreed that there isn't much story you can actually get out of a monster movie and this film proved us right. It's basically a typical action, end of the world plot, man has a family, man has to leave family to save the world etc. etc. If anything the humans actually got in the way and didn't seem very necessary, if they had just let Godzilla get on with it everything would have been solved a lot faster.  One more thing is that some of the characters felt obsolete. The character of the wife played by Elizabeth Olsen didn't bring anything to the story and none of her scenes seemed to move anything along, she was basically a filler for when Godzilla was having a nap. I honestly love Elizabeth Olsen, I think she is a great actress with a promising future but in this she didn't really do anything. If they were giving away Oscars for standing around and looking terrified and worried, she would win hands down.

So is it worth a watch? 

Yes! The story may be overly predictable and silly at times but let's be honest; none of us want to watch a film like Godzilla for the human relationships and interactions. I wanted to see Godzilla beat the shiz out of other monsters and that is what I got, in spectacular visual fashion. It's an entertaining action film filled with amazing explosions and monster mashing, just don't think too much about what's actually going on. 

Have you seen Godzilla yet? What did you think, excellent and fun or lame and boring?

Feel Good Friday: Blog Love #1

In the last couple of days I've been having a blog sort out. I now have sheets and sheets of paper with blog and video ideas, not to mention various notes on my iPhone. You may have also noticed that I've had a bit of a design change, nothing too drastic but I prefer the more minimalist design. To aid me in these creative thinking times, I have been powering through my bloglovin feed searching far and wide for blogspiration. So many beautiful designs, so many interesting posts, I had to write a post about the ones that stood out and really got the creativity in me flowing. So take a look at these lovely ladies and let them inspire the blogger in you. 

Amy Valentine is one of my favourite fashion bloggers. Her style is grungy, edgy but always with a feminine twist. Thanks to Amy I've had to create hundreds of wishlist boards on Pinterest for all of the pieces she has made me covet, not to mention my bank balance has decreased considerably because of all the new online shops she has introduced me to. If you love fashion but are not particularly a frills and lace kind of girl, give Amy a whirl.

The Lovecats Inc is a gorgeous beauty/fashion blog written by the lovely Helen. Her blog is super clean and easy to navigate with beautiful clear crisp images. If you are new to blogging, why not check out her 'blogging tips' series. Her tips and tricks for all aspects of blogging are extremely helpful and inspiring. Not to mention that I love her style, I would call her causal but classy.

Like Neon Love is also a beauty and fashion blog with the odd lifestyle post thrown in. Tenneil is an Australian blogger whose blog has become a great source of inspiration for me, both for content and for style. Her posts are concise and easy to read with clean and bright photographs showing all the products clearly and beautifully.  The variety of types of posts keep things fresh and interesting and reading her blog has become apart of my chilled out evening ritual.  

A super stylish blog which looks as though it should be encased in the sleek covers of Vogue, Yara knows what she is talking about when it comes to fashion and blogging. Her calm and cool style oozes from her writing and her images are always well conceptualized. Not to mention her LA diaries make me very jealous to not be there! Not to mention she is a source of pure blogging knowledge, her 'Blog Class' posts are a must read for any up and coming blogger.

Have you checked out any of these blogs before? What blogs have you been loving this month? 

Goodbye Cheshire Cat, Hello LilacGhosts! ✌

I've been debating for a very, very long time about my blog and YouTube name. Yes Cheshire Cat made perfect sense, I'm from Cheshire and my name is Cat (well sort of) but because it is also the name of a very well known literary character, it just didn't feel unique and special to me. I will admit I was also a little worried about copyright. So here I sat, on my very comfy sofa jotting down hundreds of potential blog names, scribbling them out and getting extremely, and unnecessarily, frustrated. Finally after much deliberation I settled on LilacGhosts, something delicate but not overly girly. I had a quick google to make sure there wasn't anyone using the name for commercial use (there isn't as far as I can see) then went ahead to changing my many social media pages, including my YouTube name. 

I'm not going to pretend like the name has any hidden personal meaning, it's not the name of a dead dog or part of my favourite poem. I like how LilacGhosts just rolls off the tongue, it feels wispy, unique and beautiful. Not to mention it's short and sweet and hopefully memorable! 

I suppose it is part of the whole mind-set of 'New Year, New Me', not that I intended it to be. But it just feels like my blog is moving forward and it's name just wasn't helping it to do so. I hope you all warm to the new name, I know it's going to take time for me to really get used to it!