Celebrate Good Times! - Happy Birthday To You... - Happy Birthday Lauren!

Hi!!!

Today's post is only a quick one as its a "birthday" post, but there's nothing wrong with "short and sweet" posts, is there?

This week is the week of one of my friend's birthdays, so this is kinda a post "for her".

Lauren is a lovely friend, who is funny, thoughtful and kind - we're lucky to have a friend like her.

Happy Birthday Lauren, loves you xxx
I hope you have a fabulous day and take some time to relax and enjoy yourself.

That's all for today then, thanks for reading. I hope you've enjoyed this post.

Is your birthday coming up soon? What is your favourite thing about birthdays? Do you have any comments or suggestions for future posts? Let me know in the comments.

I'll see you soon, lovely people!
 

I hope your day is completely and totally amazing!
 

GingerSnaps xxx

It's Showtime!!! - Theatre Review - The Importance of Being Earnest.

Hi!!!

It has been an incredibly long time since I've written a theatre review, but here I am. A few weeks ago now, my Mom and I took a trip out to Malvern to go and see The Importance of Being Earnest. My ever lovely Mom booked the tickets as a surprise and I am so glad she did as we really enjoyed it. I immediately thought, "let's go home and review this!" but obviously it was a bit late for all that carry on - so here I am now.

I have been a huge fan of Oscar Wilde and his writing since forever and I quote The Importance of Being Earnest all the time (even if people don't always pick up on the references...) so it was a great one to go and see.

Before I begin, I just want to say that it might seem like I think every show is brilliant and worth a viewing. However, this isn't the case. I would never tell you to go and see something that I didn't think was worth your time or hard earned cash. There will be times when I tell you not to go and see something, as well as times when I say you *have* to go and see something (like today). These reviews contain my 100% honest opinion and just because something isn't my thing, doesn't mean it won't be yours, these reviews are for advice only.

What's it about?

Two (fairly young) bachelor friends, Algernon Moncrieff and John Worthing, lead double lives to court the attentions of Gwendolyn Fairfax and Cecily Cardew. Throughout the play, the men must grapple with the (rather hilarious!) consequences of their ruse, as well as with the formidable Lady Bracknell.

 

What did I think?

I thought that this was wonderful!

I laughed so much the whole time and the way this was staged and acted brought Oscar Wilde's excellent, hilarious writing to the brightest form of life.

David Suchet played Lady Bracknell.
 It's an iconic role and a lot of pressure, and seeing Poirot in a dress was a pretty weird experience (!) but he did it so, so well. He was hilarious and everything he did was in character, from his speech to the way he stood which is exactly what I expected from him. Brilliant!

 

Emily Barber played Gwendolen Fairfax.
I really enjoyed watching Emily perform and she played Gwendolen really well. She was funny and she allowed her character to interact well with the other characters/actors on stage while still commanding the audience. Superb!

Michael Benz took on the role of John Worthing.
I think that he did a really good job of portraying John, he was very funny and his scenes with Philip Cumbus (read on for more on him) were so brilliant/side-splitting/well acted. He brought the character to a believable yet interesting and humorous life and that's great to watch. Awesome!

Philip Cumbus portrayed Algernon Moncrieff.
He was brilliant. His performance was very entertaining, funny, and, as I said before, his scenes with Michael Benz were some of the best. I think he really suited the character and he brought it to life in an excellent and humorous way. Fantastic!

Cecily Cardew was played by Imogen Doel.
Imogen was one of my stand outs from the play. Her portrayal of Cecily was amazing and truly hilarious. She conveyed the charming, funny, slightly dim nature of her character in the best way. I absolutely loved her performance. Wonderful!

Michele Dotrice was Miss Prism.
Michele's performance was really good and I was really entertained by her performance. She's a really good actress ("Some Mothers Do Ave ‘Em" anyone?) and she showcased that brilliantly in this play. Great!

Richard O’Callaghan was Reverend Canon Chasuble.
His work with Michele Dotrice was wonderful and he gave a very good performance. He is great (as we know from his previous work) and, like Dotrice, he really showed us all in the audience just how good he was. Excellent!

David Killick was Lane.
He made his role more than it could be in the best way possible and I think he did a great job and brought the entertainment factor up a notch. Fab!

Brendan Hooper played Merriman.
He was also very good and I think he really contributed to the entertainment value, similarly to the way David Killick did. Ace! 

The staging and all the additionals (costume/sets/etc.) were beautifully done. Thumbs up to all on Creative for this one.

I loved this performance, I found it so entertaining and laugh out loud. Big love for this one.

What did other people think?

The sound of laughter filled the room throughout the show, so clearly everyone was enjoying themselves!

I did a spot or two of eavesdropping (don't say I don't love you guys!) and people seemed to really enjoy the performance and they seemed to really appreciate the skill of the actors and actresses on stage.

Would I recommend it?

100% yes, if you hadn't already guessed.

I think that it is a very enjoyable show with a unique sense of humour to it and a great cast and creative.

Well, well worth going to see, you should go and see it if you can!

When can you go and see it?

While I went to see The Importance of Being Earnest in Malvern, it is going to be running at The Vaudeville Theatre on The Strand in London from the 24th June until the 7th November this year (2015), I believe.

The final notes...

• If you do go, enjoy it, dress smart casually (as I always say, out of respect for everyone involved).
• Be prepared to laugh until your belly hurts!
• Do what I did and take a big bar of chocolate in your clutch bag for the interval (and eat it alongside your tiny little ice-cream!) 



That's it for today, everyone. I really hope that you've enjoyed reading this today, especially since I haven't done a theatre review in donkeys.

Do you like Oscar Wilde's plays? What do you think about The Importance of Being Earnest as a play? Would you like to go and see this play when its season starts? Did you enjoy this post (even though I undeniably over-used the words "funny" and "hilarious")? Let me know in the comments below!
Thank you for joining me today, you lovely people.

 

Have the most utterly brilliant day!

 

GingerSnaps xxx



Do Re Mi Fa So La Ti Do! - Music - Let's Talk About... - The Kinks.

Hi!!!

I'm so glad that I'm back in the blogging seat, and I'm going to take advantage of the Bank Holiday weekend and try to write lots. Today, I wanted to do a bit of a spotlight post about The Kinks, because they are great and they have cropped up in my mind a lot lately. So, lets tear and share some thoughts, some favourites and some articles.
This is a whole new kind of post over here, so maybe this can become a series... Let me know what you think!

Let's Talk About The Kinks.

The Kinks hit the big time back in the 60s (an era which we love, don't we?).

The Kinks were comprised of the Davies brothers, Ray and Dave, as well as Mick Avory and Pete Quaife, a bunch of "misfit" boys from Muswell Hill with a whole load of talent.

The Kinks are one of the most important and influential bands and some of the best musicians ever and I love them.

Four of my favourite songs by The Kinks:

• This Time Tomorrow (LISTEN HERE).
• All Day and All of the Night (LISTEN HERE).
• Waterloo Sunset (LISTEN HERE).
• You Really Got Me (LISTEN HERE).

Three reasons to love The Kinks:

• Their music is iconic, amazing, very influential and will make your ears happy.
• The personalities of their band members. 
• Their effortless cool.

 Two of things I would like:

• Tickets to go see Sunny Afternoon (FIND IT HERE)
• A copy of Ray Davies : A Complicated Life, a biography by Johnny Rogan (FIND IT HERE)

One of my favourite interviews related to The Kinks:

• Johnny Rogan's interview with Ray Davies (READ IT OVER HERE)

That's a wrap! I truly hope that you have enjoyed this post today and found it interesting.

Do you like The Kinks? Have you discovered anything new in this post? Let me know in the comments below?

Enjoy the rest of your day.

Have a completely and totally wonderful day!

GingerSnaps xxx

Oh My Life! - Tales Of My Life and Times - Road Trip!, Disney Sing-a-Longs, Air Guitars, THE DAY OF THE DOCTOR, Gavin and Stacey Times and Mr Blue Sky!

Hi!!!

Today's post is a good'un! (I know, I'm so modest...) Alllll the way back in April, I went to the Doctor Who Experience in Cardiff with one of my favourites ever - of course, my ever fabulous best friend Elf Girl (find her tiny elf-self HERE) - and it was, as you can imagine, a pretty epic day.

From where we live, it takes about two and a half hours to get to Cardiff, but we know how to handle such road trips - with air guitars and rock songs and Disney soundtracks and selfies in traffic, which is just the best. Like, seriously, I had such a great time spending two and a half hours sat in a car!

When we got to Cardiff, we had something to eat before heading over to the giant blue thing that is the Doctor Who Experience.
We bought our tickets and then had a bit of a walk round, taking photos of the bits and bobs that are sat lining the queue.

Once you get inside, there's the Interactive Experience that gets you much more involved in it all. I don't want to spoil it for any of you Whovians out there, but it is awesome!
Do it the GingerSnaps and Elf Girl way and make sassy comments the whole way around, feel confused about why random people keep talking to you and always elbow your way to the front.

Upon leaving the interactive bit, we entered the Exhibition Hall which is where all of the sets and artefacts are.
We ran around like crazy people trying to see everything and take photos with everything and we did pretty bloomin well. We also had our photo taken in the TARDIS - twice - and saw lots of really interesting things. There is more up the stairs from here, from lots of more recent episodes, which is cool, and we had loads of fun being silly and trying to pose like we were "running away from the bad guys" which inevitably involved falling over! Ooops! 

 

We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring Mermaid Quay, which is right by the experience, entering the children's colouring competition at Starbucks - including a FRIENDS reference - and making it to the wall (!!!), and heading out to Barry to fangirl over Gavin & Stacey and to get ourselves on every kids arcade ride possible (including a rollercoaster simulator on which we nearly lost a purse!)

The way home included singing ELO (Electric Light Orchestra) and Queen at the very tip top of our lungs and lots of laughing.

So, thanks to Elf Girl for asking me to join her, I had such an absolutely brilliant time. Go and check out her excellent blog (HERE), and the posts she has done about our day (HERE) and (HERE), the latter includes captions of epic proportions for some of the photos seen here, and some of her own - should make you chuckle.

To find out more about the Doctor Who Experience, click (ME).

Thank you for reading, I hope that you have enjoyed this post, and that this was interesting - especially for the Whovians amongst you.

Have you been to the Doctor Who Experience? What did you think? Would you like to go? Do you have any comments or suggestions for future posts that you'd like to see? Let me know in the comments below.

See you all soon,

 

Have an superb day!

 

GingerSnaps xxx

 

"Let The Memory Live On" - The 70th Anniversary of VE Day

Hi!!!

So, normally, my first post of the month is my Summary of the previous month, but I haven't quite finished that yet and I really wanted to write this post. I will address my serious lack of posts in the Summary, but for now, lets talk VE Day.

Disclaimer - As with all posts concerning these sensitive issues, I am not here to blame etc. - I am here to remember and I think we can all agree that this is very important. xxx

On the 8th of May 1945, 70 years ago, the news that everyone had been waiting for finally came - the war in Europe was over.

VE stands for Victory in Europe and crowds and crowds of people celebrated this news.

Everyone and their dogs were celebrating - often literally, with some dogs sporting colourful bows! People wore the colours of the Union Jack - red, white and blue - as the sounds of celebratory bells ringing drifted across the UK, boats on the Thames sounded their horns, some airplanes even performed victory rolls across the sky.

People decorated their homes and their streets and celebrations, big and small, took place which reflect the joy that was felt by those in the UK.

VE Day is a day that we should celebrate still, and commemorate.

 I truly believe that the way the world changed at the end of the war should be remembered, and the joy that people felt should always be cherished.

VE Day was a joyful day, but also bittersweet for many and throughout the commemorative celebrations taking place for the anniversary, I feel that a part of us all should remember that.

 We should remember the terrible losses people experienced, as well as all of the joy and celebration - the Royal British Legion state that 382,700 members of the British Armed Forces and 67,100 civilians were killed during the war, and of course other countries experienced awful losses too.

There are loads of things going on over this weekend in London (as well as up and down the UK) to celebrate the 70th Anniversary of VE Day - some of which have already happened, like the service at the Cenotaph and the lighting of the beacons - and some are still yet to come, like the "A Party To Remember" concert (which will be broadcast on BBC One tomorrow if you can't be there in person, like me) and the ringing of church bells as well as the Service of Thanksgiving at Westminster on Sunday.

Even if you won't be going to any of these events, or won't be watching on telly, I do hope you spend time remembering the importance of this celebration in your own little way.

You could even have a little mini at home celebration if you wanted to.

I think I'll sport victory rolls in my hair and red, white and blue this weekend.

And there is of course the "Kiss for VE Day" hashtag to get involved with too.

Whatever you do, give it some thought over the next few days and reflect.

So, let's never forget the people that lost their lives during the Second World War, civilian or service personnel, no matter where they were from. Let's respect them all.

And let's also never forget the joy that was felt in the hearts of the people when the war finally ended. Let's always aim for peace.

And remember, we must never forget.

xxx

For more information about everything discussed, from VE Day itself, to info on the events taking place, to viewing stories and photographs from people who were there, head on over the ever wonderful Royal British Legion's VE Day 70 website, linked (HERE). You can also find a link to a donation page, should you wish to give the Royal British Legion a donation, at the bottom of the website linked.

Also, I would highly recommend checking out (THIS) whimsical and informative video from the Royal British Legion about VE Day, its well worth a watch - and while you're there, give it a big thumbs up ("like it"), because its very deserving of it.

That will be all for today then, guys. I hope you all have a lovely weekend and that I will see you back here soon to read up on what I got up to in April - it was pretty cool!

Will you be going to any VE Day celebrations? Or watching them on telly? Do you have any comments or suggestions for future posts? Let me know in the comments.

See you lovely people soon!

Have a splendid day!

GingerSnaps xxx 

Have A Hoppy Time! - Happy Easter 2015...

Hi!!!

Happy Easter! Yes, that's right folks, if you hadn't already caught on it is Easter Sunday today. I like Easter a lot and it is always something I look forward to.

Easter is a time for lots of celebration.

Going on an Easter Egg hunt, going to church, going to see family and friends - whatever you do, I can almost guarantee it will be loads of fun! We even decorated our house this year with daffodils in a jam jar, some little cards, sparkly Easter eggs on branches, we kinda went all out and our coffee table and fireplace look ace!

Happy Easter! I hope you have the most amazing time and that your day is happy, peaceful and that you get to celebrate in all of the ways that you want to. 

Remember that Easter is a really good time to appreciate what you have in your life, and a great time to try and spread little happiness to others.

xxx

That's all for today, I hope you enjoyed and that you've been having a lovely day.

What are you doing today? Do you celebrate Easter? If you do, how? What are you most looking forward to? How many Easter Eggs have you eaten? Do you have any suggestions for upcoming posts? Let me know in the comments below!

Adios, you lovely people!

Have a totally wonderful time!

GingerSnaps xxx

So, To Sum It All Up - March Summary.

Hi!!!

How are we all? It is somehow April already and this is all very exciting as April means Easter, going on a family holiday, eating Crème Eggs, sunshine and flowers. April also means a March Summary, which is what this is. I hope you enjoy...

What happened in March...

Comic Relief Fun Times...

Red Nose Day happened in March and it was awesome.
There were lots of very funny sketches and while I did get a bit teary or sad at one or two of the clips they showed us of families struggling, it was a great night all in all.
Highlights included: Monkey's Monumental Mission, Steven Hawking as a Transformer (robot in disguise...), getting very over excited about the fact that we got to see parts of Peter Kay's Live version of Phoenix Nights, No Direction, the Four Fundraisers and Liam Gallagher being a National Treasure...

Find the Red Nose Day website (HERE)

Find my post about it (HERE)

Find the Red Nose Day YouTube channel (HERE) to watch the clips that I mentioned above - i.e Monkey's Monumental Mission is (HERE).

Celebrating Mother's Day!

I went out for Mother's Day with my fabulous mother for a spot of shopping and some tea and cakes and we also called round to see my Auntie S.

I had a really nice day and I hope my Mom did too and that she liked her card and her gift. I know I am very fortunate to have such a wonderful mother and I love her very much.

To see the post I did about Mother's Day, click (ME)

Appreciating the Little Things.

I have a post that'll be up within the next few days about the little things that have made me smile recently, so more on that soon, but I thought I'd mention it now because they really do put a smile on my face and they make my day a bit brighter.

Excitement for my holiday!

I'm going on a family holiday in April, and so I have spent a lot of March being very, very over excited to go away.

I love travelling, I love the place we are going to and I love spending time with my family so it should be great.

My Favourite Blog Post of March.

Yeah, that's right, I'm back to choosing just the one and here it is...

"Hello March - a note" on A Rosie Outlook", (HERE)

I liked the upbeat nature of this post and I liked seeing what Rosie was looking forward to for March is looking forward to for the Spring.

It is a pretty, well written post and I likes it.

Other blogs that I like can be found in my Blogger Profile which can be found on the right...

My Favourite Song of March.

"FourFiveSeconds" by Rihanna and Kanye West and Paul McCartney, (HERE).

This song is so, so good and I am a bit in love with it. You should deffo listen. I love the music, lyrics, vocals and the simplicity of it. I find it relaxed, effortlessly cool and just awesome. Love, love, love - its on the list of favourites from now on.

That will be all for now then you guys, Happy April, and I will speak to you all very soon.

What did you get up to in April? What do you think of what I did? What do you think of my favourite blog post from March or my favourite song from March? Any comments or suggestions for future posts? Let me know in the comments below.

Thanks for reading, you lovely bunch of people.

I hope your day is totally fabulous!

GingerSnaps xxx