Vegan Eats | Luxembourg: Ready?!

While studying abroad and especially living in an exciting and multi faceted (and really simply a paradise for vegans) place like Brighton is everything I've wanted to do since finishing school, it does mean that a lot of my time is, well, spent abroad rather than at home in Luxembourg. Clearly, I've had the most amazing experiences food-wise in Brighton, but giving the limited amount of time I get to spend in Luxembourg (particularly during the actual school year), I often miss out on new, exciting things going on in Luxembourg. 

Kindness: spread it like glitter

Today, I had my last day at work (I worked as waitress in a hotel restaurant) and while it was quite challenging and annoying at times, I definitely learned a couple of things. Not only have I gotten more open towards complete strangers or learned how to mix long drinks, but I've also had the time to experience different people (customers) and their attitude towards others. It might only seem like something small, but I really noticed how the kindness and sympathy a client showed towards me completely changed my view of them. Once more, something I like to keep in mind when I'm in a bad mood and hate everything and everyone around me, became more important to me: kindness is key. In all different kinds of situations in life. Especially when a person works at a place where they have to face strangers - customers - all day, be that in a restaurant or store, every single person can have a small impact on how that working person feels. Luckily, I had a lot of very lovely people sitting at my tables, some I even had proper long conversations with (and I did get a lot of great tips as well haha) but whenever I had unfriendly customers, I immediately felt just a tiny little bit.. pulled down. Even if the service is slower than usual - for what reason whatsoever - or someone who serves you makes a mistake, why would you make them feel even worse about it? A reassuring smile or a kind word can help in a lot of situations in life, so why would you not choose to spread kindness instead of a bad mood? 

Before this text gets too long and I start rambling, I guess the conclusion I'm trying to steer towards to is: kindness - starting at a smile or an entire conversation - can improve each and everyone's lives. Not only do you improve the person's experience you've been kind to, but (and this sounds very karma-related) it comes back to you! Be kind to others and they will (most likely) be kind to you. Not that hard, is it?

"The highest form of wisdom is kindness." - The Talmud

A new friend to join me on my travels

After reading about them on Not Your Standard, I decided that I was in need of an Olympus compact camera. For a while now, I'd been wishing to own a smaller and possibly lighter camera, something in between my DSLR camera and iPhone. Don't get me wrong, I love my DSLR camera and I've carried it around with me for hours on end (I had it with me in New York on most days for example) but while I love it to take outfit pictures and sometimes carry it with me when I'm on holiday in a new city, I often get tired of its size and weight when I always need to carry a bigger bag with me or end up with tired shoulders because I've been carrying it around all day. Especially now that I'm planning to go Interrailing with friends at the end of summer, I decided that it was time to finally take the plunge and get a smaller camera that still takes high quality pictures. Since I didn't want to spend too much money, I had a look around on Amazon and ended up buying an Olympus Pen for 200€. The pictures above are the first ones I took with it so far and I'm more than happy with the results! Now I don't have to decide whether to take my big, heavy camera or clog up my phone's memory space with hundreds of pictures when I leave the house for a longer time but want to have a camera to snap some pictures.

Easy, healthy and oh-so-tasty: Smoothie Bowls

If you're active on any kind of social media - Instagram and Tumblr in particular, you've most likely seen smoothie bowls appearing on all your news feeds and dashboards. I myself didn't get the hype around these bowls at first - I always liked smoothies (who doesn't, anyway?) but I never saw the appeal of... well, spooning a smoothie out of a bowl. Really, smoothie bowls are blended fruit topped with more fruit, it's basically a liquid fruit salad? But oh was I wrong, I didn't know what I was missing out on until I finally made my first smoothie bowl for breakfast one day. What's so lovely about them is that you can make the simplest base (the smoothie itself) and then go cray cray with toppings! Since I've been eating them almost every morning over the last couple of weeks, I thought I'd share my current favourite smoothie bowl with you today.

The last of Brighton

blouse: primark jeans, shoes: h&m bag: /

Given the gloomy, and surprisingly cold weather we've been having here in Luxembourg the past few days, these last outfit pictures I took with my housemate Céline in Brighton (*snif*) are fitting in two ways: first, they don't feature any bare legs or arms and I'm wearing some colour which is well needed to scare away the grey skies. Conveniently with the not-so-summery weather we've been having, I managed to catch a cold, so anything that does not include jeans, covered arms, cardigans and ideally socks, is making me shiver. Luckily, I've got about a week and a half of work left and I'm officially free of all (okay maybe not all) responsibilities until September when I start my last (!) year at Uni in Brighton and will obviously accordingly start philosophising about what the hell I'll be doing with my life after I finished my Bachelor's degree in June. Anyone want to join to worry-train? Life as an "adult" is tough.

White, Denim and Tan

skirt: topshop blouse: hand me down shoes: mang bag: hand me down sunglasses: sixx

Ever since I first saw Emilie in these gorgeous lace up sandals, I'd been playing with the thought of getting them for myself. I find sandals to be a type of shoe I don't find as easily, as I tend to be pretty particular with what I'd like them to look like. These, however, hit the spot. The lace up style immediately makes whatever outfit you're wearing that much more interesting and it's nice to add a brown pair of shoes to my collection, instead of another black one. Even when I had only ordered the sandals, I already knew that I'd have to wear them with my denim skirt - one of my favourite items in my wardrobe at the moment - and with white clothes in general. So yesterday, I thought I'd go all out and combine the three of them in one look, because can you ever go wrong with white, denim and tan?! This bag I got handed down from my mum a while ago gave the whole look that little extra touch and easily makes it one of my favourites so far! 

A Summer Romance: Espadrilles

Those of you that have been following me on here for about a year now, have probably noticed how my love for espadrilles has grown. Ever since I found them in all kinds of colours for less than 4€ (at a shop called Pronti for those of you who are interested and in Luxembourg), they've been my go to shoes to wear in Summer (well, and Spring and Autumn, haha). Lately, the Chanel espadrilles have been getting a lot of attention too, and while I'm not exactly looking to buy some myself, I have been on the lookout for espadrilles with thicker soles, or even a slight plateau. Especially the bi-coloured espadrilles with a differently coloured "nose" are the ones I've been liking most. So far I haven't found any I really like - do you have any recommendations on where I should look to find Chanel lookalike espadrilles? Do you have a specific kind of shoe that you see as the ultimate Summer shoe?

When in New York...

All grey

skirt: primark tshirt, shoes: h&m divided

Even though I didn't do a whole lot of shopping in New York, the few things I bought I all love. One of the things I bought is the pair of silver Birkenstock style sandals I'm wearing in these pictures. Yes, I finally jumped onto the ugly shoes bandwagon. I've been eyeing different variations of this kind of shoe for a while now but was always either unsure about actually getting them or didn't find any I really liked. When I saw these funky silver ones, I knew that they'd be perfect for my first pair of Birkenstock lookalikes! And yes, I said first pair because I'm already thinking about getting the same shoe in black as well because I just love them so much. I haven't been able to wear them too much so far (I'd rather not wear them for 8 hours straight filled with standing around and walking, to be honest), but one of my favourite combination I've come up with to wear them, is this all grey outfit. I'm all for all black and I find all white super stunning too, but all grey just has this... easy feel to it, don't you think?

Vegan Eats | New York: Bliss Café

During my stay in New York, I ate a huge variety of vegan foods, including food that would rather be categorised as "junk food" than the food I usually eat. While I loved discovering vegan versions of ice cream, cupcakes, pancakes and other delicious foods, I started craving vegetables like crazy at some point. Now, you can call me crazy here but I just need my veggies! And by that I don't mean some vegetables on a pizza or a side salad with my pancake "bacon" brunch, but simple, steamed or cooked vegetables. I really do feel the difference when I eat more processed and "junk food" categorised foods, which I take as a good thing, as my body is aware of what I'm eating. That being said, I (and my friend too!) was more than happy to discover Bliss Café, a cute little restaurant/café where they serve everything from sandwiches and wraps to big bowls of fresh, healthy goodness and tasty desserts. Bliss Café is located in Williamsburg, one of my favourite neighbourhoods in New York and we loved it so much there that we even went back for a second time. This place is definitely one I would recommend to anyone who needs a change from more processed foods, while still having a delicious meal!

Bliss Café

191 Bedford Avenue

Brooklyn

NY 11211

Simplicity

shirt: primark jeans: topshop

Even though I still have a few NYC related posts I want to write up over the next couple of days, I thought that I'd take advantage of the few outfits I shot with my housemate back in England to post something a little bit different and give you a small life update. 

As you might've noticed if you follow my Instagram/Twitter/Snapchat, I've been back home in Luxembourg for a couple of days now. After long goodbye hugs from my housemates and a 3 hour delayed flight, I finally made it home for the summer. I won't be spending my entire summer here as I'll be travelling as well, but for now I'm working a summer job to earn some money to finance these (and future) travels. I started my first day of work yesterday, where I'll be a waitress in a hotel/restaurant for a month. I'm slowly overcoming the fears of being a newbie, including being afraid of dropping just about everything or completely forgetting certain orders. I'm still getting used to the new challenges but it's really nice to do something different from making photocopies and filing documents, which I did the past two summers. Since I have a bit of material for the blog to publish here and there, I'll try my best to post regularly, but if I go missing for a little bit, know that I'm probably too busy working or too lazy to do anything but watch TV shows after finishing work!