Secret Garden Party 2012

Firstly let me apologise for the lack of blogging. I have been busy with trying to find new packaging for my brownies, house hunting (with no such luck) and I was at Secret Garden Party a couple of weekends ago. I have only just managed to get all of the mud out of my bag!

This was my first time going to Secret Garden Party Festival. I am more of a dance festival kind of girl and having been to Global Gathering, Outlook Festival in Croatia, Shakedown Festival, and going to Ibiza, I was a little bit apprehensive about what to expect.

First off was actually trying to get everything packed and in the car. Ha! My sister, house mate Jo and I were going in one car on the Thursday and well, as you can see we had quite a lot of stuff…. (the first photo was just all the stuff for me and Jo!)

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We arrived on Thursday afternoon and just as we started to drag our stuff to the camp site, the heavens decided to open on us. Joyous. Then came the lovely task of putting my tent up. The last time I used this tent was at V Festival but lucky me had a lovely set of male friends who decided to do this for me whilst I sat in the sun enjoying my cider. So, trying to put this up in the rain wasn’t fun. Plus it seems it’s like no other tent anyone else has ever seen!

I finally got it together with the help of my sister and dumped all my stuff in but the front entrance wasn’t quite right so I did spend all weekend having to dive in through a space fit for a small child however the blow up airbed made it all the better!

The rain didn’t really stop all Thursday and it was pretty bad on the Friday too which made the whole site a mud marsh and incredibly difficult to get around. Especially with my very pretty, but completely useless wellies which had no grip on them whatsoever. Thank you to everyone who I had to hold onto whilst walking up and down the slopes!

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But despite the rain and the mud (which turned into a lovely deep clay later on in the weekend) this was a great festival. There was so much to do and see and the site was absolutely amazing.

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There was everything from mud wrestling, paint fights, fireworks, trapeze artists and fire walking. Some of the artists and bands I saw, to name a few were Tim Minchin, Strobe Circus, Adam F (my favourite set), Orbital, Alabama Shakes, Little Dragon, True Tiger, Utah Saints and many more.

I have to talk about the food too as normally at festivals I always find the choice a bit lacking. It’s usually hot dogs, rubbish burgers and tasteless noodles. We did bring out own food and breakfast usually consisted of spaghetti and sausages or bacon sandwiches. But I did go and try some of the food from the stalls and had some delicious Japanese noodles, a great Jerk chicken wrap and a chocolate and banana toastie! I also bought some of my home made brownies with me as I knew we would have cravings for some sweet things.

All in all a very good weekend and I would definitely be interested in going back next year. Although a new tent and some new wellies will be in order!

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Brighton in May – Free Festival Fun!

So as most of you lovely Brightonians know (If you have lived here for more than a couple of years), May is the month in which we have the Fringe Festival, Brighton Festival, The Great Escape Festival, Lady Boys of Bangkok and all sorts of other wonderful pop up art or other shows appearing over the city centre.

There hasn’t been a day I haven’t walked through town to see some crazy dancers appearing on New Road, or gone to see some free (all be it not to be my taste) comedy at a number of pubs around town.

Although I didn’t purchase any tickets for the Great Escape Festival, my sister convinced my friend and I that we could go down to the Queens Hotel to see some free music as part of the “Alternative Great Escape”. We walked down the stairs, after some deliberation with the bouncer as to whether we were actually allowed in without wrist bands, to a dark carpeted room with a large stage in one corner and a small bar in another. After much faffing around with the band setting up, I was quite blown away by the sound that came from The October Game. Quite a rocky sort of sound and the main singer had an amazing powerful voice.

A couple of days later I was convinced by my house mate to go and check out some free comedy as part of the Fringe Festival at the Hobgoblin and then at the Caroline of Brunswick.

I wasn’t expecting much to be honest seeing as I have quite a dry (and dirty) sense of humour. I think I laughed hardest when a female in the audience (who had clearly had far too much to drink) started rattling on about her sheep dog and how she felt really bad that she had got it castrated……

However we did see some brilliant comedians at the Quadrant in town a few days later. It’s definitely worth making the most of the free comedy shows that appear all over town, there will be something to make everyone giggle.

Check the Brighton Fringe and the Brighton Festival website for details on what’s on for the rest of May x

Cake and Bake Festival Brighton

Hi All,  After my appearance running the Have Cake Stall in the Brighton Cake Festival, so many people asked me how I got on so I thought I would mention it on the HaveCake blog.  I ordered rustic environmentally friendly paper bags and made hundreds of bags of regular chocolate brownies with double chocolate, white chocolate chip, chocolate orange and peanut butter brownies.  All in either Gluten free, vegan, gluten free & Vegan as well as the usual contemporary brownies. These brownies are all flavours which are available to buy online on my website havecake.co.uk

I gave out free taster samples and completely sold out of the 300 Gluten Free and Vegan brownies within hours and I had to bake more to avoid disappointment for the next day.  I hadn’t appreciated so many people who were intolerant or avoided both dairy, eggs and wheat would be wandering through the Cake Festival.   Many compliments were received and people were buying bags of Chocolate Mini Egg brownies as something a little more different as Easter Gifts . My good friend  Jason Porter took samples over the local radio show Reverb for a broadcasted taste and review.  The broadcasting studio could be heard sampling and munching away and, considering one of the DJ’s did not even like peanut butter, seemed particularly delighted with the peanut butter brownie version, as did the crowds at the cake festival.

Listen to the radio Reverb link here

http://photography.juliaclaxton.net/cakesnbake/h318bdfa4#h318bdfa4

Watch this space and I will tell you where I will be appearing next………..

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