Breakfast Granola | Recipe

Hello,
It's exam season at the moment, which means everyone I know and I are completely snowed under with revision. There aren't many things more depressing than cutting a lovely pub trip short because you know you've got to be up at 7 if you have any hope of getting a space in the library!

So because of this I've become a little bit obsessed with breakfast recently. It started with an unnatural addiction to cereal and then quickly progressed into a need to make my own granola. I looked up loads of recipes online but loads included honey (yuck), weird nectar substances or a thousand different types of nuts.

 I decided this was all too much. I made up my own granola recipe and it was so delicious that I've since worked my way through two big batches of it. Thought I'd share the recipe because it was just too good to keep to myself.

So first, I put 125g of butter and 100g of brown sugar in a pan. I melted them together until I had a nice caramel-y syrup.
Then I took that off the heat and stirred in about 250g of porridge oats, give or take a few handfuls
Once all the porridge oats were coated in the syrup mixture I added a few decent handfuls of raisins. You can add as many or few as you liked but I added quite a lot because I love them!
I also stirred in a few mixed, dried fruits and nuts. I bought them in a pack that said "breakfast mix" on it but really you can add whatever you like (I bet dried apricots would be really nice!)
Then I smushed all the porridge mix into a oven dish, I pressed it down quite hard so that the oats would bind together.
I put the dish in the oven at 200 degrees for about 15-20 minutes, every 5 minutes or so I stirred the mix around in the dish so that the oats at the bottom would get the same amount of bake as the ones at the top.
And there you go, wait for it to cool, pour some milk over and enjoy!

Cup of tea is mandatory.

This granola is so, so delicious! It fills you up for the whole morning because of the porridge oats and the dried fruit makes it super tasty. As well as this I think it's really cheap, much cheaper than buying boxed granola. I really don't think this cost me more than £3 to make and it lasted ages.

Give it a go, tell me if you like it. Or do you have a different recipe? Let me know and I can add it to my cereal obsession!
See you soon, Maisie x

Life's a Bleach | DIY Bleached Tie Dye

Hiyaaaa,

Ok don't know if I'm the only person who has this problem but I absolutely hate it when something is in season that I know I could do at home for a fraction of the price! I'll be shopping and see a lovely tie dyed pair of leggings (for example) but my brain just won't let me buy them! NO TOPSHOP I WILL NOT FALL FOR YOUR FAUX-FESTIVAL MARKETING!!

Anyway, tie dye is totes all the rage at the mo. This is something I used to do loads when I was little, like my wardrobe was just full of tie dyed items so why not do it now? My lovely friend Jennie made a tutorial to remind us how to do it which you can read here (it'll be much better than mine)...or you can read mine

So you'll need just a normal t-shirt. I bought this one from Primark for like £3. I think they call it 'The Boyfriend T Shirt' because it's oversized and you can wear it with leggings woohoo! (This photo just shows how much I need to start ironing...)

Lightly dampen your t shirt using a sponge or a spritz bottle or whatever you have to hand...

Take your t shirt in one corner and twist it into a spiral thing. Keep twisting til all the material is twisted up...

Something like this...but keep twisting. I found this bit the most difficult because I am unbelievably heavy handed so don't worry about being too precious about it. 

Secure it all with elastic bands or string. You can fold it over whilst you do this, it doesn't have to stay in the spiral

Then cover your t shirt in bleach. You're probably going to want to put it in a bowl because, remember, bleach will bleach EVERYTHING! I managed to bleach my garden table whilst doing this...

And leave it for about half an hour...

Ta dahhh! Yeah...I wasn't expecting it to turn orange either haha! 

Hang it up to dry! It'll probably change a bit because it's still got the bleach on it working away so if you're not happy with it you can leave it and if you're dead happy then rinse it off straight away...

So I left mine overnight to bleach more and it looks like this now...a bit odd but I kinda liiiiike it! Wear it with pride and you can look super indie hippy everywhere you go (plus leave the faint smell of bleach yummm) 

So you gonna give it a go? If you do, put them on instagram and tag me (@maisiemaizz) so I can see if your's worked out better than mine (it definitely will...)

Caramel Apple Muffins | Recipe

Hello there, 

So my relationship with my dad is basically a life long episode of Great British Bake Off! We are constantly trying to out-bake eachother with our amazing creations. So what better occasion to show off my baking prowess than Father's Day? I concocted a recipe for Caramel Apple Muffins using an Edd Kimber recipe for Apple Pie Cake and a basic muffin recipe and the results were awesome...so here ya go

Read more »

Carrot and Meringue Cake | Recipe

I always like to make a cake whenever we have a family gathering. My family isn't very big so I always have loads left over and never know what to do with it - this occasion was no different! For Easter I decided to make a lovely carrot cake with meringue icing and thought I'd share the recipe with you! It looks amazing and is dead easy so definitely worth a shot!

Read more »

DIY Stencil Nails

I really like changing up my nails and having cute little designs on them so when I saw a tutorial video of how to do stenciled nails on Michelle Phan's YouTube I knew I had to give it a go...

For this look you will need some plasters, 2 colours of nail varnish (1 will be the base and one will be the design colour and a top coat)

Firstly paint your base coat colour. This can be whatever colour and arrangement you want. I chose to put the white accent on my ring finger because this was the one I was going to have the design on but if you're planning on putting the design on all your fingers you'll need to paint your nails accordingly... Then apply a top coat

Read more »

DIY Lace/Dabbed Nails

So I recently saw a tutorial for this on YouTube...I'm not totally sure if I like the effect. Right now I think it looks a bit messy and I kinda wish I'd chosen different colours but you live and learn eh? The idea of these is it's meant to make your nails look like there's lace on them or that they've been dabbed in a vaguely impressionism-esque way. So here's how I did it...(I am aware that these photos are shocking quality - sorry)

Read more »

DIY Ombré Nails!

Ombré has been THE trend this summer. Everything from leggings to hair has been sporting the design and to be honest I can't decide how I feel about it! Whilst I really like the pattern, as a child who was forced to spend most of my childhood in hand-me-down tie dye, I do take slight umbrage with it suddenly being the super cool hipster pattern!
But ignoring my personal issue with ombré, I do think it looks good on nails so here's my DIY

Read more »

DIY - Cut neck T-shirt

Firstly I'd like to apologise for the awful quality of photos used in this blog. I don't have the best camera and taking photos of black/fluorescent material is never easy. So you'll just have to use your imagination a little bit!

Anyway, I've been watching a few videos on YouTube about DIY t-shirt cutting and decided to try it myself.

Read more »