English Tea Shop: Detox Me

Happy Sunday morning!

I don't know about you but we love tea, all types and flavours and we love trying new ones even more.

I've always been a big fan of TK Maxx and Home Sense but recently I've found myself going there more often and particularly to the food and book section. You can never go wrong with buying books and tea right? It's like they are made for each other!

I've seen the English Tea Shop brand quite a lot and so decided to give some of their blended teas a try. Today's post is about their Organic Detox Me tea, but rest assured I also have 2 other flavours to tell you all about - I just can't help myself and keep going back!

The Detox Me tea contains Peppermint, Spearmint, Elderflowers, Fenugreek and Rosemary, and the box contains 16 pyramid style tea bags.

I've been loving trying loose leaf teas recently but sometimes it's great to be able to ust grab the tea bag and let it infuse without messing around with measuring it out.

This tea you simply need to add to boiling water water and infuse for 2/3 minutes, and then maybe add some sugar if you think it is necessary. I didn't need to add any sugar at all and I really liked the refreshing taste.



Sometimes the detox type teas can smell and taste a bit vile, or contain a large amount of licorice and green tea, or even give you some undignified side effects (we've all tried those teas by now I'm sure!).

I didn't find I had any of those with this tea and found it quite refreshing due to the mint. You can see the colour of the tea in the image below, served in one of my favourite Alice in Wonderland mugs from Whittards. I have the full set of these mugs thanks to some lush relatives, definitely have the tea pot on my list for Christmas though as it is also gorgeous (it's not too early for the C word right?!)

I have quite a few teas in my collection now as you can see by my shrine in the image above- maybe you think I'm obsessive but I just love trying out different types!

This particular tea cost me around £2.50 from Home Sense, but is available from Amazon for £5.82 at the time of posting. They aren't cheap but really worth it for the quality of the taste and the blends. They have quite a few I would love to try and the Peppermint Loose Leaf tea is a firm favourite of mine anyway - it lives on my wishlist for future repurchasing!

Have you tried anything from the English Tea Shop? Do you have any flavour recommendations?

Are you a loose leaf or a bag fan?? I think each have their time and place!

L xxx

Things to do in Hay-on-Wye

Hey All

A few weeks ago I wrote about C and I's stay at Cosy under Canvas, this week I thought I'd share what we got up to in Hay-On-Wye and what there is to do and explore in the surrounding area if you take a trip and fancy some adventures.

Explore Hay-On-Wye

Hay-on-Wye is a little market town which is great for a explore around. It's got lots of shop to pop in to especially book shops. We enjoyed browsing around the shop and popping in to cafes for a cup of tea here! I don't have photos of Hay-On-Wye as it absolutely tipped it down as we were here!

Canoeing 

I was sceptical about going canoeing as I'd gone once when I was in school and was awful but this was really good! We opted for the short route which I think is a five mile trip. You canoe down, call the company and they come and pick you up. It was great to be out on the river and nice to relax. It's a really easy canoe ride too so great if you're a beginner! We went with Wye Valley Canoes and couldn't fault them. As it was October when we went we didn't need to book but if there are large groups or it's peak seasons I'd recommend booking. At Wye Valley Canoes there is also an amazing accommodation including a slide to get down stairs! C and I loved it and would love to go back with a big group of friends or on stag/hen dos!

Cafes

Next to Wye Valley Canoes is the River Cafe. We visited this cafe three times and we were only there 5 days! We loved it, amazing cakes, great coffee and really nice surroundings. We only samples a variety of cakes and didn't try the food but that looked great too!

Clay pigeon shooting and archery

Lastly we decided to go and do something we wouldn't normally do. After a quick google and emailing various companies Black Mountain Adventures got back to me. We weren't sure what we wanted to do and they offered loads of different activites we could do and in the end we decided on Clay pigeon shooting and archery. Both of which are half day activities so we combined them to have a full day. Black mountain offer lots from high ropes courses, bike riding and canoeing. 

We loved doing this day as it wasn't something we'd have booked to do if we weren't away for a break. These would be great for team bonding or trips with friends too!

Walking

One thing we didn't get to do when we were there was walks or hikes. Hay-On-Wye is a great base for some great hikes and walks but at the time I was still recovering from a badly sprain ankle so we thought we'd give it a miss. It's perfectly situated to take the Offa's Dyke path and this is something we want to go back to do.

So that was our whirlwind little trip. We spent all of our evenings in our dome and cooked all of our meals. We had planned to eat out but decided we preferred to relax on the site as it meant we could both enjoy a drink and then go in our hot tub!

Have you been to the Hay-On-Wye area? Do you enjoy a few adventure activities?

Love M

xxx

Dermalogica Daily Microfoliant Review

Hey All

I'm a big skin care fan and until recently Dermalogica wasn't a brand I had used much except for the odd facial I've had done. After seeing the Daily Microfoliant for sale in a blogsale I couldn't resist. I have oily combination skin that is playing up at the moment and I'm still missing the Murad AHA/BHA exfoliating cleaner (review here) as it was a gentle exfoliator but my bank account says no to that atm! I'm aware that over exfoliation can worsen oil skin so I wanted someone less abrasive than a normal exfoliator and this sounded perfect.

I immediately loved this and I can see me using it all the time. It's a really fine powder that you shake out into the hands and then add water to make a paste before putting onto the skin. It dissolves into the skin so it's not overly abrasive making it suitable for most skin types.
It's formulated from a rise based powder which also has salicylic acid in it. The combination of this and the rice enzymes work together to exfoliate dead skin cells. I love that this doesn't really have a scent as I know it's not packed with perfumes that may irritate my skin. 
This is a great product that I'll definitely be repurchasing for my go to exfoliant (you can find it here). I love that it's gentle enough to use daily and it's really been helping my skin break outs and overall condition.
What's your current favourite exfoliator? Have you used dermalogica?
Love M
xxx

Birthday Time!

Hi all!

It was my birthday last weekend so posts the last week have been a little thin on the ground...it was lovely to have a long weekend for it and I had something planned every day which was really nice.

It was overall quite a quiet weekend but to be honest I'm getting to the age where using a long weekend to see friends and catch up on sleep and good food is the best kind of weekend!

First me and M had an afternoon tea session at Celtic Manor which was amazing as you would expect. It was the Chocolate Afternoon Tea which is available until the 19th of June - we will definitely be writing a full post on this as it is beautiful! Here's a few snaps to show you how amazing:

After that we just about made it through the front door, and had a girly evening in with face masks, tan and some prosecco to celebrate! It was a lovely evening, and M even made some Captain America cookies for me, how cute and clever are these??

After this we had a very civilised night out with yummy cocktails and a cheeky McDonalds which was really nice as we haven't been out for a while.

I also had a lovely meal with my family at Wahaca, me and my dad shared the Wahaca Selection which was lush to try so many different things and I washed it down with a Mexican hot chocolate which is dairy free. It was an interesting taste and I'd order it again but it's quite bitter so hard to finish the whole thing.

I had some amazing gifts from friends and family. My brother bought me a sushi making kit which I can't wait to try out and also a selection box from T2 tea who have some crazy loose leaf tea flavours such as Caramel Brownie and Choc Chip Chai.

M got me a lush Origins set with my favourite products in and a pre order of the Harry Potter and the Cursed child - who isn't excited for that!!
I also had another Barnes and Noble classic book to add to my book shelf. I'm getting quite a collection together now and can't wait to get as many as I can!

I also had some vouchers so I went shopping on the weekend and bought the Naked 2 palette which I have wanted for ages and also some stuff from Lush too!

It was a really nice weekend and it was a shock to go back to work last week!

I've been struggling ever since and now I'm away with work so am feeling all over the place, looking forward to getting back to normality and joining my new gym permanently when I get back.

What have you been up to lately? I have so many posts to catch up on and so much to share with you!

L xxx