may day bank holiday round up

 I think it's about time I started really getting into the world of blogging. I'm loving reading other people's inspiring and entertaining posts. It seems pretty often what I enjoy most is reading what others with similar interests to myself are up to - be it those in the design world, beauty and fitness (keep your eyes open for more of that on The Smuggler), cooking, fashion or gardening. I'm really enjoying vlogs (video blogs if you didn't know), monthly favourites, recipe posts etc etc and thought I might give it a go myself. You'll still be able to find regular news on my Islington Lifestyle Store SMUG, Interviews with Designers, Area Guides and more on The Smuggler but I thought I'd try to give readers a bit of an idea of what I'm doing 'in-between'. Bear with me as I learn the art of making my funny old life bloggable. Hopefully along the way you'll find something interesting. So, the  M A Y  D A Y  B A N K  H O L I D A Y  R O U N D  U P  is blog post number one in this new vein of form. (I quite like it when people do that caps and spacing thing. That was my first time. Such a novice!) Anyway… I thought as we (me and my husband Daniel who'll probably come up a fair bit in these blog posts, much to his dismay) had a fairly jam-packed weekend planned for the May Day bank holiday, maybe I'd share it with you.  S A T U R D A Y :The first bank holiday weekend in May happens to be our wedding anniversary. Well Star Wars Day, May the 4th, is the exact day so we try to take it off work. We are big Borough Market lovers so popped over to London Bridge on the bus for lunch.We each had sausage rolls caked in tomato ketchup (a bit of a tradition), I then moved on to a fresh juice. I'm really getting into juices and smoothies at the mo and am having them for breakfast often. I've been inspired by Deliciously Ella (as have lots of you I'm sure) and have been making them at home on the regs. I picked up a Passionfruit, Banana and Orange juice from Total Organics which was delicious! Here's a similar recipe if you fancy making one yourself. Danny then chowed down on a Pork Belly Sandwich from Roast - a firm favourite in the Evans Gleadall household. After purchasing some Parmesan cheese, chocolate covered banana and honey cashews we hopped on the bus back North.I had to go in to work briefly to cover lunch breaks and was delighted to be greeted with the news that our recent HAY order had arrived. I've been looking forward to the Marble Erasers arriving in particular. The lovely Sarah Strang popped by to see me and we had a juice downstairs in the yard at CAFE SMUG. After a quick catch up it was time to meet up with Danny and get to the framers. For our first wedding anniversary a year ago we bought ourselves a print at Pick Me Up which we still hadn't framed so decided to try a framers we'd noticed on Stoke Newington Highstreet. I'm planning a blog post on framing and framers so keep your eyes open for that. Drinks at the Clapton Hart for Eleonora's birthday and a 'Leviticus' Curry at my brother's house finished off day one nicely.  S U N D A Y :Sunday was full of meeting up with friends and eating food. The perfect combo. We started the day with a delicious brunch to celebrate our friends' Linus and Tehila's engagement at the Zetter Hotel in St. John's Square. Their restaurant which is great for breakfast/brunch is now called Grain Store Unleashed which is a bit of a weird name but the food and service continue to be solid. I had a fruit salad followed by American pancakes with maple syrup and bacon. You can see the full menu here.We then nipped along to meet other friends Lydia and Krystle (or Birdie and Power Nap as we like to call them) at Pick Me Up in Somerset House. Peter Judson and Hattie Newman were favourites. No purchases made this year but a nice time was had by all. After Toblerone and Salted Caramel Cupcakes at Primrose Bakery, we made our way to Shepherd's Bush for dinner at Ben and Knomes's house. (I told you there was a lot of eating). A superbly cooked salmon and asparagus carbonara was followed by freshly baked Vanilla Madeleines - all by Knomes who is a super duper chef and professional baker. With full bellies and happy hearts we headed home for some eps of Entourage and bed.  M O N D A Y :Our actually anniversary started with a big old lie in, followed by an epic and beautiful walk, a nap (my favourite thing to do on a day off) topped off with a wonderful dinner at one of our favourite restaurants Trullo. I'd really recommend the walk which we started at Gillespie Nature Reserve very near Arsenal tube and took through Finsbury Park and along to Highgate Wood. It's called the Parkland Walk and you can take it all the way to Alexandra Palace if you fancy it. Lovely walk. We bussed it home. Obvs. Bit much to do both ways. Clissold Park, where we live, is currently home to a fun fair which means - ice cream vans! I had a 'Bunnies' (Mr Whippy with two flakes - who knew?!) Lovely day. Lovely dinner. Lovely weekend. Thanks for reading.