Apple Shaped Tips and Advice with Style Fruits

I was very kindly asked by Style Fruits to become their 'Apple Shaped' ambassador for the site for their new 'celebrate your style shape' campaign and write about some helpful advice, and offer tips and hints on how you can dress for your shape.

Being Apple Shaped is determined by your middle area is bigger than your shoulders and hips.  This is definitely the case with me and it does bring its own challenges.  Style Fruits have enlisted other bloggers to talk about other body shapes too.

Long time readers will know that I fully endorse wear and do what you want, however there are times and occasions that your body shape (especially as a fat person) can limit you, jeans anyone?! But on a more positive note things like peplum garments make you look AMAZING. So I rolled up my sleeves and gave the best advice I could.

You can read my full column here on the Style Fruits website. 

Bristol Marriott Hotel Review

I am sure that I say this a lot on this blog but it is rare for me to get five minutes to myself, let alone an entire 24 hours. So when the Bristol Marriott asked me and my husband if we would like to stay and review the hotel I practically bit off their hand at the chance.  No housework, no cooking, no answering emails, and a break from ten hour stints in the workshop (which is now practically a sauna) sounded heavenly. 

I haven't stayed at a Marriott before, but I have stayed in quite a few hotels in Bristol (before I moved here and me and my husband didn't want to stay with his parents) and I can honestly say that this was a pleasure.  Located next to Cabbot Circus and Quaker Friars, which is about as central to Bristol as you can get, the entrance was incredibly grand, we were only going to drop off our bags as we were early for our check in, but the Marriott already had our room ready.  We were given a family room on the tenth floor, as we were advised it had the best views, and they weren't lying.  You could see all of Castle Park, Cabbot Circus, and beyond. 

A Family room at the Marriott Bristol City Centre consists of two double beds, and a bathroom, with all the usual tea and coffee making facilities, towels, a wide screen TV, desk, arm chairs and a hairdryer.  If there wasn't anything we needed we were told we could call the front desk. 

Having been in Bristol now for coming up to three years(!) I thought it might be a good idea to eat in a few places I hadn't been before.  There are untold amount of amazing places to eat in Bristol, and if I am being honest despite being a London girl, the food here is more varied and better than what I have eaten in trendy Shoreditch or BBQ joints in Soho. If you don't know your way around Bristol then there is even a really awesome app called 'wriggle' which works with local Bristol food establishments to give you special offers and discounts and a chance to explore and eat at new places. 

I decided to try Bagel Boy near St Nicholas market, as it had been highly recommended by fellow Bristol Bloggers Hayley and Lily and I was not let down.  With weird cat tapestries on the walls, De la Soul on huge speakers, intimate booths, sofas, a long communal table, Bagel boy has an undeniable casual Bristol feel to it, and the bagels were out of this world.  I chose a ploughman's but swapped the ham out for salted beef.  

Feeling very full up, we walked off our lunch back through St Nicks Market (which if you are visiting, is filled with street food stalls and little independent shops) all the way back through Broadmead and Cabbot Circus, (Bristols shopping quarter) back to the Marriott. With all the high street shops and more high end shops like Harvey Nichols in Quakers Friars, Bristol is an ideal place to go shopping as it is all self contained, but still has an incredible amount of variety and character.  

When we returned back to the hotel there was a note and some chocolates from the front desk in our room that were so cute I wanted to cry.  Earlier in the week I had tweeted;

  

and some post cards with the Marriott 'things to do in Bristol' bucket list that included; The Banksy Walking Tour, Bristol Zoo, Walk around College Green, see the SS Great Britain, have a Pie Minister pie, and attend the Bristol Harbour Festival! 

Making a mental note to try a Pieminister pie, my next move was to try the swimming pool.  Friends outside and inside of the internet will know that my natural state is in the water, like a buoyant water baby fish, so I practically ran all the way to the terrace floor, where the restaurant and gym and leisure facilities are.  The pool provides towels for you and has large changing rooms with lockers, showers, hairdryers and even plastic bags for your wet kit.  

I spent about two hours in the pool which was heated and moderately sized, even sitting here writing this I am wishing I was back in it.  The pool also has a sauna, however as an overly warm person on a good day, I refrained from going inside, however lots of other guests were switching between the sauna and the pool.  Andrew sat at the side and was able to read and relax on the pool furniture 

As we were super tired from swimming and it was now late on a Sunday, we decided to order room service and watch some TV and admire the Bristol view at night time. I ordered my Pieminister pie (with double mash because I love mash) and Andrew had a gourmet style burger.  I have had much room service in my time, and usually it is from frozen pre packaged, which is fine because it is large catering, however the food was amazing, and we got it within thirty minutes from ordering.  

Whenever I stay in a hotel I am always unexplainably tired, I suppose because you are fitting lots of things in the day time, and I was going to have a long bath and try out my new products in this months birch box but after eating we pretty much fell straight to sleep, and with no cats or other people around to wake us up, we slept straight through to our wake up call! 

We got showered and dressed for breakfast, which you can have in your room, but we decided to check out the terrace restaurant.  Breakfast was a buffet, and there was so much breakfast food (my favourite kind of food) on offer I was overjoyed.  I went for a full english rather than a continental, and there was even a fried egg station where a member of staff would cook you egg or pancakes to your specification.  For me (an egg enthusiast) this was the height of sophistication.  

We took our coffees (and soft drink for me) out on to the outside terrace area which was a sun trap even at 10am, to wind down before packing up to go back to the realities of home.  

My stay at the Marriott Bristol City Centre was nothing short of fantastic. The service was excellent, the rooms immaculate, and were filled with all the conveniences you would expect and more.  Little touches like this multi charger next to the bed for your phone, so you don't have to plug it in half way across the room, and fun personal things like this swan towel folding competition.  

I would like to say a huge thank you to Nicola and Liam and the rest of the staff at the Marriott Bristol City Centre.  Next time I need to stay in Bristol, the Marriott will be my absolute first choice. 

*My stay and breakfast and use of the facilities at the Hotel was paid for by the Marriott Bristol, however all views are my own, dinner and lunch were of my own expense, links to any websites on this post were also not required but were at my own behest* 

Sourz event at Bleach & Giveaway!

I have been a bad blogger! With moving house, Halloween, workshops, and then Christmas creeping up very quickly I have not had time to blog about much! However now I am a bit more settled I can go back to my Tuesday admin day which always includes blogging!

In October (yes I realise this is extremely late!) I was kindly invited to a Sourz event at the Bleach salon in Dalston.  Sourz kindly provided a barman to provide us with new shots and also surprisingly long drinks, which I hadn't had before and would almost definitely drink again.

We were then given the opportunity to make our own cocktails, using whatever combinations we liked, I mixed the cherry and apple flavour with some lemonade, I was expecting it to taste overly sugary like an alcohopop but it was really drinkable! As a person who can't really consume alcohol without it tasting very sweet, long drinks from the Sourz were really nice, especially when two flavours were mixed.

Then the Bleach girls very kindly did some hair chalking with their new hair crayon chalks, I bought my friend Chantelle with me, and her hair is really thick and dark, and the colours were still really vibrant on her and really easy to use.  In the past Chantelle and I have used pastels we have bought from art supply shops, but these didn't dry our hair out like those and also if you put in enough it lasted out two washes!

Massive thank you to a very old friend, Adele from Stripe Communications for inviting us to the event, huge apologies on the delay in getting this out for you!

For the giveaway I very luckily have been given...

x2 bottles of Sourz new toffee apple drink 

x1 pink Bleach London hair crayon

x1 red Bleach London hair crayon, 

x1 Black Heart Creatives necklace!  

You must be 18 or over to enter and you can enter the usual ways via rafflecoptor, winner will be announced on Friday 12th December at 9pm, hair crayons and necklace will be sent to the winner directly by me, and Sourz via Stripe Communications.


a Rafflecopter giveaway