London part 2: Omigod you guys!

Day two in London was shopping day!
You can shop around all day in Oxford and Regent street so that's exactly what we did. First stop was Primark which was a good idea because already a few minutes after we arrived, the store started to fill up with customers, a little to packed for us.
So after finding some fun, cheap things we moved on to Topshop, Forever 21, New Look, French Connection, Jane Norman, Aldo, Next, Zara, River Island, Uniqlo and many, many more.

These are just a few cute things we bought.

In between we went to Leicester Square to see if we could get tickets for a musical for the same night, there were still several musicals available but the choice wasn't too hard: Legally Blonde!
After getting our tickets we realised it was also time to begin looking for a place to lunch, we ended up at The Long Acre where I had a beef burger and my sister a BLT sandwich.

After lunch we got back to Oxford street to shop where later we took a short break at Joe & The Juice

We continued shopping until we had to carry on towards the Savoy Theatre for Legally Blonde.
The musical was a great spin-off of the orginal first movie, just as fun a version but with more music and dance but still with our little friends Bruiser and Rufus (Paulette's dog).
Unfortunately I couldn't find any good quality videos of the musical with the cast we had, but still OMIGOD you guys!



The next day we had lunch planned at Jamie's Italian at Convent Garden, so after a goodbye visit to Hummingbird Bakery we took the underground there.

This time I chose a black bottom cupcake and coffee to go and since it was still a quiet morning, we could still make some pictures of the bakery and talk to the staff. I miss you already Hummingbird!

Naturally we did some more shopping around Covent Garden since it wasn't by far time for lunch yet, but then we ran into a dear friend.

If you suddenly see this kind of friend you can't just pass by and ignore, so we had some tea and macarons (praline and caramel).

After a while we headed to the location of the restaurant and luckily, there's no way to miss it.

We had a table in the corner of the restaurant, at the window, so there's always something to see and the style of the restaurant was exactly right for Jamie Oliver.
We started with some anipasta followed by panzerotti and risotto, sooo good!

Basically these meals would be more than enough for lunch but there is just no way you can leave Jamie's Italian or even London itself without having a taste of one of the deserts.
Good thing we chose to share a tiramisu because never in my life have I seen such a enormous piece, but it was certainly delicious. Almost like Pim's (small cookies with chocolate and orange) because of the orange zest on top!

After our amazing lunch we had to be on our way to catch a train back to the Airport to be in time. Time went by way to fast so I was sad to leave but since I love London even more now, I'll be back soon.

Love x,
Noes

Paris, je t'aime

Me and my sisters just got back from a weekend in Paris.
This is our holiday report.

Paris, Friday May 13th 2011

We arrived in Paris, Gare du Nord, around 10.30 in the morning after a short journey with the Thalys train. We dropped of our bags at the Hotel and started the actual weekend, first stop: Le Tour Eiffel!
We started with the park around it to make a few pictures and continued to the elevators of the actual tower.
The view from the tower was amazing since the weather was perfect for the visit: blue sky and sunshine.

We also took a little Tour Eiffel home with us.

When we got hungry we discovered a bakery/patisserie called 'Paul'. They sell delicious sandwiches and baguettes but also pastries, croissants and *drum ruffle* macarons!

We continued to Champs-Elysées for some shopping and Arc de Triomphe.
We spotted an affordable clothing store with all kinds of floral prints and cute designs called 'Promod' but also an enormous Louis Vuitton megastore, Sephora, Virigin megastore, show rooms for several cars and even cinemas.

Next was Boulevard Haussman, we were especially excited for Galeries Lafayette and Les Printemps.
Galeries Lafayette is all about luxurious fashion, make-up and jewelry brands so we found the famous Yves Saint Laurent rings, Balenciaga bags, Mac make-up and much more fabulous products as far as the eye can see.
Since I like the idea of modern charms so much lately I was happy to find a jewelry stand for Thomas Sabo with all kinds of cute charms too.

As we continued to other stores we suddenly spotted something in the window pane of Les Printemps that I was set on finding in Paris: Ladurée.
Stepping into the 'Grands Magasin' was entering According To Noes heaven. The cute corner of the 'Fabricant de Douceurs & Gourmandises' sold pastries, cupcakes and of course... macarons in all colors and flavors.
You understand we couldn't leave the department store without a bag in my hand.
I bought the flavors blackcurrant violet, pistachio, chocolate, lemon, raspberry and orange blossom.

The website is really cute too, take a look!
Ladurée

All the sight-seeing and shopping wore us out so we decided to return to the hotel at Place d'Italie to relax for a minute and then have dinner at an Italian restaurant.

Paris, Saturday May 14th 2011

Ah bonjour!
We had a typical French petit-dejeuner with croissants, tartine, jus d'orange, tea and coffee at a bistro near the hotel to start of the second day. Then we took the metro to one of the most famous museums in the world: The Louvre.

We spend most of the morning there admiring old Egyptian and Roman statues including the Venus of Milo and a giant Sphinx but also famous paintings including many Dutch painters, Davinci and not to forget our dear friend Mona.

After all that culture, history and art it was time for some more sightseeing and shopping, this time in the area of the 'Forum les Halles'.
This area was with more familiar stores like H&M, Bershka, New Look and Zara but nonetheless fun to go. During this shopping spree we had some lunch to regain our strengths, including French fries.
We took a train to another part of town where Muji was, a store we heard of was cool but unfortunately that one was a bit of a downer.
Luckily we were now in the area of the famous Notre Dame so found our way there while looking at several shops.
We met my new best friend 'Paul' again where I used the few French words I knew: "Je voudrais un Macaron au Chocolat s'il vous plait. Merci, au revoir!"
You may think this isn't worthy to be told but this was no regular Macaron.
Meet Macaron-zilla!

Apparently this (about 6 cm) is a regular size macarons and the others are minis. Who knew! But this big baby was delicious, tasting like a mix of macaron and brownie and big enough to be a whole meal. Paul, Je t'aime!
Finally me, my macaron and my sisters arrived at Le Notre Dame.
Unfortunately the waiting lines were way too long to get inside but the outside was gorgeous enough already.

A short walk from Le Notre Dame are several shops of Berthillon. From what we've heard the French are not particularly fan of ice-cream but with the exception of this brand. We had peach and chocolate sorbets and ate them along the Seine in the sunshine.

On our walk back towards the Hotel we visited some more stores and shops. A cute little shop with notebooks, postcards etc. even had Ladurée merchandise! Pens, notebooks and key chains all with the famous macarons but unfortunately the prices of the merchandise were not as fun as the items themselves.
The last department store we visited was BHV, Bazaar de l'Hotel de Ville with an assortment comparable to Lafayette but another brand of cute charms called Agatha. I brought little brochures of all the brands home with me.

A little while after we took the Thalys back home to The Netherlands.
Of course there is much more to do and see in Paris than we decided to do but we enjoyed our trip a lot the way it was.
Our French isn't perfect but almost everyone was nice enough to help us out with a conversation in English if neccesary, so don't believe what you hear right away, our experience was that most French are very nice!
Apart from that the weather was gorgeous, the food delicious and the architecture beautiful.

Paris, Je t'aime.
We will be back...

Amour et bisous,
Noes