First day back to TORTURE I mean school.....

Wednesday 29 August 2012

You're lookin' fine today.
So yesterday I awoke at 7:30AM to get ready for my first day back at school in 6th year. (Senior year for the USA)



It wasn't too bad to be honest because I got to see all my brilliant friends again and catch up with people I hadn't seen all summer. Also because I'm a prefect I spent a good chunk of the morning giving a tour to the new 1st years (sorry I don't know what grade that is in the US but you're about 12 in 1st year) around the school. I got a group of 5 1st years to show around and for the rest of the year I'll be their go to person if they have any questions or problems they need help with. Pretty neat huh?


So all in all it wasn't too bad starting back at school because I don't necessarily hate school I just dislike having to do stupid subjects I'll never use again for the rest of my life (I'm talking to you Religion). I'm not as bad, thank god, as some people who just moan and whine about school everyday, all day long. The way I see it it's a few years of your life you have to give up in order to have an awesome time for the rest of your time on earth. A good bargain if I do so say myself.

But after the first day was done and dusted we headed off to a friends house to celebrate being back to school and to eat away our sorrows. That is if  you call celebrating ordering 80 euro worth of pizza and munching on popcorn and chocolate whilst watching movies 'celebrating'. I just call it a regular Saturday night.

 It was a great night all together even if I do still have a massive food baby as a result. And I think we'll make it a monthly thing just to make myself even more unhealthy. Oh well I'm off to finish a 5 page essay I have to complete for tomorrow. God I love school!
Thanks for reading,
Ciara.

Take me to the Prom?

Monday 27 August 2012

What's up doc?
Do you remember my genius brother I talked about in my last blog? The one who got nearly full marks in his exams? Yeah that one. Well he went to his Debs last week which is like the Prom in America. Everyone goes to the Debs after they finish up with secondary school or high school and it's a very big occasion. All the girls buy expensive dresses and get their hair and make-up done for the day and of course the boys have it much easier because they just have to buy a suit and well, turn up for the day with a corsage. These are some of the pictures taken on the day, not expertly taken by me of course because I wasn't there but my dad stepped in for me.

My favourite dress is definitely the dusty blue waterfall number. Wonder if I can borrow it....

Hope you enjoyed that glimpse into the Irish Debs affair I'll be going next year and hopefully I get a gorgeous dress too.
Ciara.

Genius Brothers and Smashing Burritos

Thursday 23 August 2012

Howdie!
On Monday or was it Tuesday? I'm not sure but anyway on one of those days it was a very important day for all the Irish students who have left secondary school (that's high school for all you USA readers) and will be going to college in September. It was the day all the Leaving Certificate results came out and those results basically dictate your whole life because they decide whether you go to college or not. The Leaving Cert (LC for short) is the equivalent to the English A Levels or the French Baccalaureate and in Ireland it's based on two years of work in 7 subjects in which you do big exams in at the end of those 2 years.
           To cut this long story short you get given points for each grade you get and you have to get a certain amount of points to get into your college course. The highest amount of points you can get is 625 and my cheeky brother who received his on Mon/Tuesday got 615!!!!! Like what the hell? First my sister gets full marks when she did the LC, now my brother has to do basically that as well. It's not fair on me!
But anyhow I know how you guys don't like too much writing so here are some of the photos I took of the food at our delicious meal at Picadero's.
 Now I know it doesn't look too appetising but this burrito here ^ was amazing! I ate my entire one but my less hard core of a sister brought half of hers home which I ate the next day. A mixture of cheese, beef, peppers, creme cheese, salsa and guacamole that had my mouth watering.
 My veggie Dad's cod choice. I'm not the biggest fan of fish so I didn't try it but I'm sure it was nice.
And my mom tucked into her lamb before I could get a reasonable photo of it. I'm sure that just goes to show how tasty it was.
Sorry guys for the poor photo to word ratio I was a bit too excited by my food to take more photos of the churros I had for dessert, but they were goooooood.
Hopefully I'll do as well as my fellow siblings when I do the Leaving Cert next June. I'll talk to ya'll tomorrow,
Ciara.

Slutty Chocolate Brownies

Wednesday 22 August 2012

I just came to say, Hello!
So now that I'm searching for new things to blog about I have taken to going through older photos from the beginning of the Summer and I came across some from when my friend and I took on the challenge of being kick ass bakers. We got the lovely idea of baking gorgeous chocolate brownies with a recipe we got from another blog called The Londoner. It's such a brilliant blog which is written by the beautiful Rosie so check it out! But continuing on with our baking adventures here's the recipe:

Betty Crocker's Chocolate Brownie Mix
Betty Crocker's Chocolate Chip Mix
Betty Crocker's Chocolate Cake Paste
Water
4 Eggs (The amount of eggs will vary depending on what mixes you use so check the box)
2 packets of Oreos 
Love and Care
Butter ( for greasing up that baking dish!)


So what we did was make up the cookie mix first and lay it down as the first layer in the baking dish and then continued to place out the next layer which were the oreos. Two packets should leave a few left over which we snacked on to keep our energy up.

 Next make up the brownie mix and pour it all over the oreos making sure to cover all the little spaces and corners.



Leave in the oven at about 190 Degrees Centigrade for 35- 40 minutes and if you can resist temptation for long enough, leave to cool.

If you want to make these brownies extra slutty (which we did) you can paste on some delicious Betty Crocker's Chocolate Cake Paste.

Simply scrumptious!!

I have to say one brownie would have sufficed for the evening but my complete lack of will power urged me on to have a second. They were just too good to resist. Thanks to Rosie and her blog The Londoner for providing my friend and I with this great recipe and thank you for reading.
More soon,
Ciara.

Welcoming Home A Hero.

Tuesday 21 August 2012

Hello sunshines!
So as you  know the Olympics finished up in London a few weeks ago and they were a great success all round. I was actually in London during the Olympics attending a course in the London College Of Fashion but unfortunately because I'm so unlucky I never made it into the Olympic Park. But even being in London itself during those few days was amazing because everyone was on such a high. Of course I was sickened by the amount of medals Team GB took away from the games but they did compete with over 600 athletes so that's to be expected. Ireland on the other hand..... Well we had 65 athletes and won 5 medals in total. Not bad if I do say so myself. Of the 5 medals we won there was one gold achieved by the amazing female boxer Katie Taylor, Ireland's pride and glory, our Golden Girl quite literally. So the Monday after the closing ceremony there was a massive welcoming home gathering thrown for Katie in her home town of Bray and of course I went along to show my support.

 We Irish go all out for our celebrities. Blimps and all!
 Bray is actually one of the more beautiful towns in Ireland. I would fully recommend a trip out to the beach in nice weather.





 This is my friend with her 'cold pop' inspired by Ms.Sweet Brown.
 I chose a healthy and yummy smoothie for myself, little did I know it would co-ordinate with my nails.
This band is called Genuine Draft and played really awesome covers of U2, Coldpaly, Mumford and Sons, The Kings Of Leon and much more.


This guy's Adam Nolan who is also a boxer for Ireland but sadly didn't take home any medals. But well done to him for getting so far!


 I can't remember these two's names but they will be competing in the Special Olympics for Ireland and I wish them the best of luck!

 Katie Taylor in all her glory.



So yeah that's all the photos I have for you, that is if you want some more very badly framed shots of Katie and the team featuring a few fingers or bald heads around the edges of the frame. But it was a beautiful day for the event and I'm so glad I got a chance to go and experience a piece of Irish boxing history. More from me soon and thanks for reading.
Ciara.

France, Monaco and the end.

Monday 20 August 2012

What's up my hommie?

Ok so I'm not going to lie with you but today I feel like crap so I will excuse myself in advance for the quality of this blog. But today we do have something to celebrate because it's my last blog about France! Finally, even I was getting sick of it. So on my final day in France me and a couple of others went to Monaco on the train. The train ride only took us about 20 minutes because Nice is so close to everything it's unbelievable. I found out that you could get to Italy for under 20 euro return, I have to say I would have loved to have gone to Italy even just to taste some pizza or pasta. Italy or not we arrived in Monaco and spent a lovely evening there walking about and having a meal afterwards.




This is the famous casino in Monaco in front of which were a lot of fine looking cars and one quite out of place Smart Car.








 I'm not sure if I'm completely right but I think this chapel is famous for some royal wedding.

Then after dinner we went to do a spot of shopping at the local boutiques. That is if you call shopping drooling!




So yeah that's the last of my adventures in France I hope you enjoyed them. Again sorry for the lack of quality but I'll be back to normal tomorrow don't you worry. 

Thanks for reading,
Ciara.

France, MAMAC modern art.

Sunday 19 August 2012

Bonjour mes petits chats!
So in the second week of France we went to this modern art museum called the MAMAC which stands for something about modern art I can't remember in french. We spent quite some time walking around the three floors and I gotta say I'm not a big art fan but it was interesting. I had no idea what all the stuff was supposed to represent but you know someone's gotta make art and why not create something that looks weird and has no obvious meaning while you're at it? Anyway enough from me and my uneducated thoughts here are some of the many photos I took.



 This is not at all morbid looking.










 You'd hardly notice the mirror would you?

 'There is not a solution because there is not a problem.'

So if you haven't noticed this is a short enough blog because I thought all that deep arty meaningful stuff migt have been a bit heavy going for some of you. But tomorrow I'm talking about Moncao and it's my last blog about France so new types of blog posts are coming after that.
Thanks for reading,
          Ciara.
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