What I got for Christmas 2014

Hi guys,

I'm a little bit sad, that the christmas holidays went by so fast. At the end of november I start to get excited for christmas, I visit christmas markets, bake christmas cookies, decorate my flat, listen to christmas songs, go christmas shopping, all such things that you do during advent season.
Me, I always think that I have much time and I start planning events, like meeting friends for christmas dinner, having christmas parties but suddenly, it's one week before christmas and you realise that time has passed by and you have had time for nothing. ;-) Do you know this feeling?
So anyhow, I'm always excited for the christmas days and I try to enjoy very single minute with my family. It's this special kind of festive, loved, cozy feeling for that you're waiting the whole year.

I'd love to show you the presents that I got for christmas.

Starting with my parents, I got a very, very cozy blanket with sleeves. That means you can sit on the sofa with a cup of tea or coffee, reading a book and when you want to grab your cup you don't have to freeze because your arm is out off the blanket - how cool is that. :-D

As second present I got the Urban Decay Cosmetics Naked 3 palette - oh yes !!! I wanted this palette for so so long. I love these rosegold colours so much. I did a review on it that you can read here.

My boyfriend's family gave me the new album of  Maroon 5 (V) and Cro (Melodie).  For those who don't live in Germany - Cro is a musician who combined pop music and rap music to 'RAOP'.

My boyfriends mother offered me the book 'The Glam Guide' from my favourite YouTuber +Fleur DeForce. It comes out the 12th of february and I still have to wait some while, but I'm OK with that.
A really nice and thoughtful present is a necklace chosen by his sister. It's a transparent medaillon, filled with real dandelions. I decided to take this amazing present as a talisman. Blowing dandelions in the wind means to me that you can give rein to your wishs.

My boyfriend offered me a calendar from Paperblanks. He gives me one every single year. Although I know before christmas that I will get a calendar it's still a surprise which cover he chooses and every single year I like it a lot and I'm happy with it. Another present I got are some warm and cozy bunny-slippers. I've seen some similar ones in the city before christmas which were so cute and I told him about them. Additionally I got a carrying bag with the Haribo logo and the new music album of Taylor Swift (1989). Since around two weeks I listen to her music every single day. I really like it, it's great for dancing and it makes a good mood. I still got something else that I will not mention here, you understand... ;-)

I also got some odds and ends like two bathbombs, an amazing hand cream from Rituals Cosmetics , a travelguide for New York and several gift coupons for Douglas. For those who don't know the store Douglas, it's comparable to Sephora.

What did you get for christmas 2014?

Kisses,
Van

The Cheeseburger Birthday Cake for my Boyfriend

Hey guys,

I'd like to share with you my idea for the birthday cake I've baked for my boyfriend last summer.

Yeah, you're right 'summer' is a while ago and we have 2015 right now, but hey, the idea is still great, so let's not pay attention to this. ;-)

So, since it was the 30th birthday of my boyfriend, I wanted to bake him something special. Until then I've just blowed some ideas like a cake with the logo of his favourite soccer club so I had to find a new one. Some blogs and YouTube videos inspired me to bake a cheeseburger cake. As he likes chesseburgers, I was sure he will love the cake. ;-)

I can tell you guys, this was so much fun to do.

The dough for the bottom and top of the burger is a lemon cake and for the burger meat I've chosen a receipe for chocolate brownies. 

Here are the single working steps:

1) I covered the bottom of the burger with marzipan. You can buy marzipan-covering especially for cakes. So you don't need to struggle with rolling out the marzipan. This is really no fun. ^^ 

2) Since it's a c-h-e-e-s-e-burger, we need some chesse. So that's easy to do. You buy some yellow food coloring and ... here comes the not so funny part... I'm sorry guys....we don't get out of rolling marzipan pieces out :-( ... we color the marzipan, yay. ;) This you do by kneading the marzipan as long until you are happy with its color. For rolling it out, I put some wrapping film around the marzipan. This helps you a lot because the marzipan doesn't stick on the rolling pin or the working surface. 

Then I've cut some cheese-shaped triangles and placed them beyond the edge of the cake bottom.

3) To replace the cucumber (the boyfriend hates them^^), I've decided to put also some green salad on the cheese, as known as green colored marzipan. I'm not sure if every cheeseburger is served with salad but hey, who cares ;)

I've used a cookie cutter that shape is the most similar to salad. Unfortunately you can hardly shape the marzipan by hand as you want to. It's not easy to work with marzipan, so I really respect all pastry cooks - you do a great job.

4) And now, ta da - well hello you yummi meat patty. Here in the picutre you see the bottom of my brownie cake but I really have to tell you... The receipe says that you should put additionally some chopped chocolate on top -  so the chocolate was still fluid in the middle of the brownie dough - that is the best thing - warm fluid chocolate - oh yes !

5) As second last step I colored some marzipan red and designed some tomatoes. The most people thought the red marzipan is salami. Hello?! Who puts salami on a burger? Even though these red circles seem like salami, shouldn't it be clear that I want to have tomatoes on the burger? ;-) What do you think? Does it really not look like tomatoes? Be honest, don't worry. ;-) The green pieces is left over salad.^^

6) And now -  the top of the burger, citron cake covered with marzipan. :-D

7) And to make it more look like a birthday cake, I've written the holy '30' on it. ;)

And here is the happy birthday boy:

 

So you can say, one piece of cheeseburger cake is similar to three pieces of other cake

(you can also see that the chocolate is still a little bit fluid) ;-)

 And this is the leftover cake:

Seems like it was very tasting (without praising myself). :)

I was really excited to offer the cake to my boyfriend - and I was a little bit proud of myself that my baking directly suceeded. I hadn't time to try it before.

Even if baking with marzipan is hard work, you can create such great things with it. I also have to admit, that my baking utilities are not very professional and I had to improvise sometimes, but I think that makes the work much more fun sometimes. ;)

The next time I want to try some fudge instead of marzipan. Did you ever use fudge? Is it easy to work with it?

Do you like baking and being a little bit creative like this? 

If you have any pictures , I would be happy to see them. :-)

Kisses,

Van

New Job, Weekend-Relationship....?!

Hey you all,
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015! I hope you all had a good start in a great year!

How did you celebrate the beginning of 2015?
I've been in Berlin with my boyfriend and two amazing friends. We shared a flat all together which was really great. Every morning we had a cosy breakfast together before we went off to explore the city.

My boyfriend and I in Berlin (+)

Our yummi breakfast

We've been to Berlin several times before, so we knew all tourist attractions. Especially when you are in Berlin after the christmas holidays and before new years eve, the city is overloaded with people and you don't want to do all the tourist stuff. ;-)
But anyhow, a little bit of sightseeing is always intended.

On our way to the 'Reichstag', the plenary. (+)

The front view of the 'Reichstag'. (+)

The Brandenburg Gate (+)

Christmas decorations at the Sony Center.

The TV tower at Alexanderplatz.

On new years eve we had tickets for a location called 'Pier 13' near the Tempelhof harbour where we had some drinks and such a nice dinner. And later, to work out all the great food we had in the belly, there was a DJ playing very good dance music. ;-)

Frontview of Pier 13

The room with the dinner buffet and the dance floor. (+)

Only a small selection of the amazing food.

After midnight, the team of Pier 13 organised amazing fireworks, placed next to the harbour. By the way, it was a really romantic atmosphere, standing in the arms of your boyfriend, watching this great spectacle. I was really happy to celebrate in 2015 like we did.

Although it's not the best quality, a little impression of the fireworks. (+)

So here I am again, after such a long time without posting anything. I'm really sorry for that.
The reason is that I finished college and started a new job. This kind of lifestyle changing brought such a whirlwind in my life that I hardly had any time for myself, neither for all my private things to manage nor for my great hobby the cosmetics and my blog.
So please don't judge me for this.

During the week I live in a small flat-share in the city where I work and at the weekends I return to the flat that I share with my boyfriend. Yes, at the moment I have a weekend relationsship.
First, I was a little bit nervous how that lifestyle will change the relation to my boyfriend, but I've understood really fast that this brings also some advantages.
During the week, I have time for myself. Aside from focusing on work, I can organize my free time without making agreements. That means doing sports, meeting friends and colleagues, simply reading a book, watching movies my boyfriends doesn't like to watch (^^) and doing other girl-stuff.  So I "work off" the things during the week and at the weekend I focus on my relationship and spend the time together with my boyfriend.
Even though it sounds that I like this lifestyle and yes, there are some advantages, but I have to say that I'm really happy that it's limited. At the end of next year I'll move back to boyfriend and we'll move in a bigger flat. So, let's looking forward to this. :-)

What do you think about weekend-relationships and / or long-distance relationships? 
Do you think it's refreshing for your relationship when you see your partner only at the weekends or for example once a month or do you prefer having the opportunity to spend time with your love whenever you want to do?

Kisses,
Van

P.s. (+)Thanks to my friends for sharing the photos of our trip.

My Autumn Fashion Haul

Hi guys,

first, I know, you have not heard from me quite long and I'm very sorry for that. There were a lot of things going on and I hardly found time to sit down and write. I promise, I'll be better. :-)

Last week I found some hours for a shopping tour. Honestly, I have to say that I hardly own sweaters and cardigans keeping me warm during cold days. So I ran into the city, checking out the stores and I finally found a ton of stuff (Now, I don't have to freeze anymore, thank you God for that! :-) )

Starting my trip, I went to @TomTailor... And then it happens... the guy there told me that they have 20% off on every knit clothes (what the heck? Let's go and buy the store up!!!)
I was in the store (and mainly in the dressing room ^^) for around two hours (a huge thank you to my boyfriend having these patience :-D) and decided to buy two sweaters, a henley and a shirt. You see the clothes in the following pictures.
The two sweaters are so comfy and casual. They fit perfectly to jeans or a denim skirt. The week after, I wore them to work (and yes, I didn't freeze - yaaay) and I felt so so so good in them.

Some months ago I bought the henley in denim blue and I like it so much that I definitely wanted another colour. I like this kind of bordeaux colour so much, because it fits to a ton of different colours. You can wear it in a casual way to jeans with a scarf or a cardiagan, or to black trousers in a much more elegant way. The Ohio-Shirt was a present from my boy because he liked it so much. Thank u =)

Having finished the first stage successfully, I went to @VeroModa. Oh my gosh... I couldn't decide what I should buy and what I (have to(?)) leave in the store. I found so much stuff, because they have such a great choice of clothes. Finally, I forced myself to buy not more than two pieces (yes, I don't want to be poor, I just don't want to freeze^^). I found two cardigans that you see in the picture. How do you like them? I feel so comfortable wearing them. First I was afraid if the tissue is scratching on the skin, but definitely it doesn't #happy.

 Concerning accessory I found a really nice headband, that looks really Christmassy. At the moment I'm quite in a Christmas mood, altough there a still six weeks to go. But hey, in two weeks starts the Christmas market, so I think it's adequate to start feeling Christmassy. :-) Are you in a Christmas mood at the moment or do you think it's still to early?

Not to forget the feet, I found two pair of shoes. One pair is from @Esprit. The style is very similar to the @UGGs one. I have to confess, I don't like the style very much. With the shoes you look a little bit like a eskimo buuuut, they keep the feet so warm you'll definitely survive with them in the winter (especially when you'll visit your friend the eskimo =) ). I personally, will bless them going to the football stadium and fore sure, the christmas market.

The second pair is from @GilPeterson. These boots are very casual and it looks like you wear cuffs on your legs (what I like a lot). They keep your feet warm, not as warm as the eskimo ones but it's enough for all day shoes.

And... a little bit of make up should not be forgotten (I'm a woman, I need this stuff :-) ). I found some great nail polish, perfect for the autumn and winter days. At the moment, I'm in the mood wearing dark colours so I think these two colours fit perfect in my collection.

The nail polish from @Catrice is quite shimmery and beside using it as a nail polish you can use it as a top coat. I tried it as top coat with a nearly black nail polish and it looked amazing.
The nail polish from @Manhattan is a great dark red colour and I love it so much. I bought nearly the same colour last winter (and it's used up - so you see, I loved the colour :-)). I like the @Manhattan nail polish, because it's really easy to apply on your nails and it doesn't chip nearly a week (provided you use a top coat). I can say, nearly the main party of my nail polish collection is from @Manhattan.

Which nail colours do you prefer during the cold days?

♥ Van ♥

SLEEP-IN ROLLERS BRUSH

Hey guys,

there are a lot of blog posts concerning makeup and stuff but don't forget your hair! I like having voluminous, shiny hair but after blow-drying my hair with my circular brush from a drugstore my volume gets lost as soon as possible. =(
After checking out different brushes at feelunique.com I decided to order the SLEEP-IN ROLLERS brush. It's a big circular brush with a diameter of around 10 cm and it was delivered in a nice pink bag.

Because of its big diameter I had first to get used to rolling up my hair for blow-drying. I really like the large area on which my strands of hair can lie so that a fast drying of the hair is warranted. The distance between the single bristles is so big that you don't get any tangling hair.

My hair has so much more volume after using the brush.
For heat protection I use the L'Oréal heat protection spary which gives the hair extra volume up to three days, like the packaging says. Concerning the volume effect of the spray I can't give any review, because I wash my hair every other day. Concerning the heat protection - I like the spray really much and I'll buy it again.
To fix the volume I use a volume hairspray from got2b which I really recommend.

You can see both products in the following picture:

How do you get volumonous hair?

♥ Van ♥

Fragrance PRADA CANDY

Hey guys,

today I want to write a little bit about my absolutely favourite perfume Prada Candy.
I got a tester last year before christmas at Douglas and I directy fell in love with the scent.
Since then I ran everytime when I was in the city to the tester, smelling this incredible fragrance.
Finally, at my birthday this year, my best boy offered me the perfume and my life was safed! :-))
It is a combination box with the 50 ml bottle of perfume and a body lotion what is packaged in a pink box like you see in the following picture:

It's a perfect box that represents the sweet, oriental flavour of the perfume. You open the box by lifting the top and tadaaa -  here it is - the fragrance and the body lotion.

 I still cannot believe that I'm really the owner of this stuff, but yes, I am and I appreciate it so so much! Thank you JP for this amazing gift!

The official description describes the smell as caramel. The first time smelling it, I thought at cotton candy from the fun park. Like this is sugar... yes I can certify the caramel smell.
The scent lasts nearly half a day until I have to refresh it. Honestly, I expected it to lasts a little longer because of the high price.
The body lotion is creamy and I like having it on my skin, smelling like I was the cotton candy myself. :-)

In general, I love the product and aside from the fact that you have to refresh the smell once per day, you get with the fragrance an amazing product. It's a fragrance you can use on special occasions like christmas, birthdays, holidays in general... The last time I used it for the wedding day of friends and the smell makes you and your outfit completely individual.

So, for the case you'll buy it... Have fun! =)

Do you know the scent? How do you like it? Do you recommend other fragrances?

♥ Van ♥

My Amsterdam Haul

Hey guys,

as I mentioned in my last post, I like to show you what I bought during my holidays in Amsterdam.

Souvenirs:

Perhaps some of you can imagine what's the first thing I bought.... It's a souvenir cup from Starbucks. I really love Starbucks. There's nothing like a coffee of it and everytime I vistit a city I HAVE TO GO THERE and buy a cup with the towns name on it. I like them so much because every cup shows the significant attractions of the city like in this case the high, small houses, the sewers and of course the bikes.

As second souvenir of the town I bought a magnet. I have several magnet boards at home and I always have too little magnets to hold all my stuff. I'm always happy getting a new one. I like organizing special notes, postcards or photos like a collage on the boards so, like the Starbucks cups, during every holiday I buy a magnet as souvenir for my boards.
This time it's a cow on a bike with tulips in the bicycle basket. Like I told you, there are so many bicycle riders in the town what's very caracteristic for Amsterdam, just as the flowers. The Netherlands in general are known for having so beautiful tulips ( Did I mention that there is a flower market built up on a sewer?) and whereever you go, you see so many cows. They rest directly on the meadows nex to to the streets, ignoring the traffic around them. In Germany you won't find that...
The sunglasses and the bikini are just for fun I think. :-)

Living accesoires:

My next stop was in the Yankee Candle Shop. I think Yankee Candle is not so well-known as the candles from Bath and Body Works, but the brand is quite international. They had so good-smelling candles, especially with autumn-smells that I couldn't decide which one to buy. The decision has fallen as I recognized the special offer of getting four Samplers for 10 €. I took Salted Caramel, Vanilla Chai, Red Velvet and Strawberry Buttercream. My absolutely favourite is the Salted Caramel (Oh, by the way, today I've ordered a Salted Caramel Mocha at Starbucks and it was so tasty.... Oh my gosh.... :-D), it's perfect for cold days when you prefer relaxing at home with a hot tea or a hot chocolat under a blanket... fantastic... =)

Food:

For food specialities I bought - guess - cheese -  yes ;) There are a lot of stores where you can taste the different kinds of cheese. They have natural ones, cheese with herbs, cheese with cumin, green pesto, red pesto, cheese from goats... everything you want. I decided to pick a natural one which is really tasty.

Makeup and jewelry:

Not to forget the makeup... I bought my first MAC lipstick ever in the colour Candy-Yum-Yum.
Oh my gosh, I love this colour so much. At first I was unsure if the pink is not to intensiv for me but after looking in the mirror I was quite sure that I NEED this colour in my lipstick collection! Because it's the most expensive lipstick I've ever own in my life, I really appreciate it. I like the creamy formula very much and its really long lasting - it's definitely worth the money! =)

The ring I bought is from Brandy Melville. I heard a lot of this brand from YouTubers like @beautybaby44 or +missglamorazzi and was really happy to find a store in Amsterdam. The clothes they have are amazing. At last I decided to buy this ring which is golden and has a small white stone in it. For me it fits perfect on my ring finger. It's not a every-day ring, I prefer to wear it with glamorous clothes what, in my opinion, makes the ring more special. =)

Clothes:

Last but not least I bought... what every women buy... clothes, yes ! =)
I found two T-Shirts at Vero Moda. They are both from ONLY and they are casual, comfy shirts for every day. You can wear them with jeans, pants or a skirt. I like the prints on it that give the shirts its casual character. OK, I could have buy them in the german Vero Moda but I saw the shirts, liked them and ... bought them -  why wait? =)

So, that is my Amsterdam Haul! I hope you enjoyed it!  What do you buy as souvenirs when you are on holidays?

 ♥ Van ♥