Creating your Perfect Gym Playlist | MUSIC

 

Hello my lovelies,  so for my first post I thought I would write about something that I love doing. That's right, creating a gym playlist.

For me personally a playlist can either make or break a good workout . I can't tell you how many times I've been halfway through a strong run on the treadmill and all of a sudden I lose my pace because I have to change songs.
Everyone's preference to music is different. So to begin with you need to decide what genre of music motivates you the most. For me it has to be rock, I like music that is fast paced, fun and makes me feel bad ass . When I workout I want my music to make me feel like I'm in an action film.
The gym I currently train at puts on pop music and dance, from what I can see it's a very popular option. And I can see why. I often take out my earphones whilst on the weights to to change things up every now and again. So don't be afraid to mix up your playlist with different genres.

So once you've figured out the genres you want to listen to, you need to pick the songs carefully. Time to get your favourite CD's out.

Just a few of mine, throwing The Hoosiers in there just to mix it up a little.

Now you need to pick songs that you know you're not going to get tired of because that's when a playlist can slip. One of my favorite tracks to run to is AC/DC Thunderstruck, that is a song that can motivate me over and over again. I also love Kings and Queens and Closer To The Edge by 30 Seconds to mars. These are the type of songs that make me feel empowered. And that is the emotion you need when working out.

Then, after you've picked your favorite songs, you need to put them in order... this is key !
When I'm on the treadmill running I start my playlist with 3 fast and powerful songs. This motivates me to run and also lasts until my cool down. So by the time I start walking the playlist has slowed down ever so slightly. There's nothing worse than listening to a great running track and having to walk. 
My best piece of advice is working out the times of each song so they match your work out routine. It may take a while to perfect, but once you have your perfect playlist it will be worth the time.

12 Personal Questions | TAG TUESDAY

Welcome to our first 'Tag Tuesday' and what better way to start off than with 12 personal questions!

12 Personal Questions 

1. What do you order at Starbucks?

L: Chocolate Frappacino

S: White Chocolate Mocha

2. What's the one thing in your closet you couldn't live without?

L: My DR Martens 

S: My black leather jacket

3. What's the one thing most people don't know about you?

L: I LOVE finding out about true horror stories

S: When I was younger I had a long haired guinea pig called Bruiser (yes he was named after the dog in Legally Blonde!)

4. What is the one thing you want to do before you die?

L: Meet David Bowie

S: Go to the Coachella music festival in the Californian desert.

5. What is one food you can't live without?

L: Cheese

S: CHIPS!  

6. What is one quote that you live your life by?

L: "Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly."

S: "  Work hard and be nice to people."

7. What is your number 1 song on your iPod/iTunes?

L: David Bowie - Strangers When We Meet

S: The 1975 - Settle Down

8. What kind of style would you describe yourself as having?

L: 90's goth/grunge

S: Mainly girly, but with a bit of an edge

9. Favourite number?

L: 9

S: 3

10. Two hobbies?

L: Sewing and reading

S: Playing guitar and taking photographs

11. Two pet-peeves?

L: Bad breath and having my stomach touched.

S: Rude people, and people standing far too close to me, espeically in a queue.     

12. Your guilty pleasure?

L: Miley Cyrus

S: One Direction (thanks Laura and Ella ;))       

We hope you enjoyed reading our answers to this tag, we now tag anyone reading this to do it on their own blog! Let us know if you do because we would love to read your answers. We'll be posting another tag next Tuesday. Thanks for reading!

Lemon Shortcake | RECIPE

Oooh my first proper post on here, how exciting! I'm really into baking at the moment so for my first post I thought I would share with you a recipe I very recently tried out after inheriting a baking book from my great Auntie last week. The book was published in the 70's and I find these types of books a bit more fun and challenging, especially as a very amateur baker, as the instructions aren't as clear as many of the recipes I see online. I decided to go for one of the more simpler recipes to begin with, but also something that I knew I would love - lemon shortcake. 

Firstly the ingredients, you will need:

225g of flour (the book says plain flour, however I used self-raising as I didn't have enough plain flour and it still turned out ok)

75g of caster sugar

75g of butter

1 lemon

1 egg

A pinch of salt

Begin by greasing a round baking tin, approximately 20cm (8 inches) and pre-heating the oven to 190°C or 375°F/Gas 5 depending on your oven. 

Next take the lemon and grate the rind (the yellow, outer skin) off and onto a plate. Once you have done this cut the lemon in half and then squeeze the juice out of each half into a glass, making sure to remove any seeds that fall into the glass in the process. One lemon should produce about 2 tablespoons of juice.

Place the flour, salt and sugar in a mixing bowl and mix together before stirring in the egg, the lemon rind, 2 tablespoons of lemon juice and melted butter. To melt the butter I placed it in the microwave for a minute so it was soft enough to stir into the mixture easily. When stirring the mixture should start to combine quite quickly, so then you can take out the spoon and knead the now dough with your hands. 

Knead the dough together lightly and then shape it into a ball. When the dough is smooth it can be rolled out onto a floured surface, maintaining a circular shape to fit into the baking tin. 

When in the baking tray, prick the dough with a fork all over so that any steam can escape from the shortcake as it cooks. Also lightly sprinkle some caster sugar over the top of the dough before placing in the oven if you wish to have a sweeter shortcake. Overall this shortcake takes approximately 20 minutes to cook, when it's done the top should be a gold brown colour, however if you feel the top is colouring too quickly but it is not cooked inside, you can place a sheet of grease proof paper over the top of the baking tin to stop the top of the shortcake burning. To check the shortcake has cooked you can place a skewer into the middle of the tin, if it comes out clean the shortcake is ready. 

Leave the shortcake to cool in the baking tin. When it is cool you can cut a slice, make a cup of tea and enjoy! 

I hope you liked this recipe and  let me know if you give it a try!

A Quick Introduction | VELVET HONEY

Welcome to Velvet Honey! A new blog created by us, Lucy and Shannon. By setting up this blog we hope to offer a lifestyle blog with cool tips, tricks and tutorials as well as a friendly online atmosphere to celebrate and admire the positive and inspiring actions of others.

Without wanting to write a long, wordy and quite possibly severely boring introduction post, we do want to give you a quick heads up the type of content you can expect to be seeing from us over the next few months. 

At the beginning of each week we aim to post material created individually with a post we have worked on together following towards the end of the week and Tuesdays are ‘Tag Tuesdays’, where we answer the questions on a different tag each week and post the results. We hope this feature will help you get to know us better!

So if you like what you have just read, please be sure to keep checking back for new content every week that we both hope that you will enjoy!