My Spanish Vida

Money saving ideas We all have different things going on in our lives. We're all busy. We're all creating a future for us and our little families. One thing I'm sure we have in common is that we're all trying to save some money somewhere. Whether it's for a holiday, a car, university or simply for a rainy day. We're all constantly thinking of some money saving ideas. Ours at the moment is for our house. The purchase is imminent and we are having massive alterations done to the property. It's all so exciting as we are literally creating our forever home, but it's scary too as it's gonna cost so much money. So somethings got to give. Money doesn't grow on trees unfortunately and we only have the one income, so we really need to look at our finances and strip everything back to see where we can save money from. A few years ago I wrote a post on the blog with some money saving ideas just  here .  All still relevant f

- a collaboration post / may contain affiliate links - If your anything like me I'm always thinking of ways to spruce up the home. Especially with our new house purchase on the horizon which is a mega doer-upper I'm obsessed with everything home at the moment. Do you ever look at the rooms in your house and think actually you're making me feel tired rather than energised? Is everything starting to seem a little dull and flat especially in the summer? I always think I'm lacking a bit of vibrancy and oomph when it comes to home furnishings, especially in my bedroom and dressing room . If this sounds like you as well then I think we all could do with a summer bedroom makeover and inject some life back into our decor. To do this it really doesn't have to be complicated or expensive. Here's some really easy ideas that you can do to freshen up your bedroom (or any room actually) for summer. Let There Be Light  Letting in the light and

Summer is finally upon us and it's probably a time when we're out and about more then ever. Meeting up with friends, enjoying the great outdoors and our skin is lapping up that vitamin D.  I love the summer and living in Spain we are blessed with the sunny weather for longer. Which means I'm more mindful of making sure my skin is protected from harmful rays.  Over the years my daily skin routine has completely changed. It's gone from having tons of products to just a few. These days, especially in the summer I hardly wear any make-up whatsoever. Maybe a slick of mascara and a dusting of highlighter in the evening if we go out, but even then that feels too much. It's just far too warm. Also, it takes up too much time as well. Especially when away on vacation, who really wants to spend an hour putting a full face of make-up on? These days my daily summer skin routine is super simple. The way I like it. I also think my skin is starting to l

Lately I've been seeing a lot on social media about the treatment of animals for dairy and meat. I'll be honest I am a meat eater and I do love a burger, a steak, a fry up etc etc.  But, when I see these images I feel terrible. It's absolutely shocking and quite horrific to see and I really don't want it popping up in my feeds, but I do get why it's shared. To raise awareness. Letting us know where our meat, fish and dairy really comes from. Mark and I always say we're meat eating vegetarians. Bad isn't it. We love animals and hate the cruelty they go through, it feels all so unnecessary. I would love to be vegetarian, even vegan one day, but it is hard making that switch. Mainly because I just don't know what to replace meat with, as I'm not a huge fruit and veg fan. If we have a curry or pasta sauce at home we won't have chicken we'll have mushrooms with it instead. Which you really can't tell the difference as it'

There's been a few posts over the years on My Spanish Vida about my ever evolving dressing room .  I literally love my dressing room and feel so lucky and blessed that we've had the space to be able to allocate a room all for me! You may or may not know that we are in the process of buying a new house (a renovation project) and we will be moving from our current home in a few months time. The new house is a three bed so we are downsizing in a way, but up-sizing on the overall plot. So basically there will be no 'dressing room' for moi in the new house.  Which is absolutely fine as to be honest, even though I have loved my little room so much, my priorities and wants have changed in a house. I'm more focused now on the whole living space for me, Mark and of course the fur-babies. My compromise was to have double sinks in the new en-suite though, so I've got space for all my make-up and my lotions and potions. So I thought I'd show you the lates

Leading on from my previous post  Our first month in Leipzig   and catching up with the blog as I've been super behind,   here's how we spent another one of the many bank holidays Germany has! May Day in Leipzig. 1st May 2019 May Day bank holiday for us in Europe was on the actual day, whereas the UK very nicely tags it onto the weekend! Which ever way it falls, bank holidays are always such a fun bonus day off. As we were in Germany we thought we’d head back into Leipzig for lunch and a mooch. We decided not to hit the beers like we did on the last bank holiday, read here , not that we had a session or anything, grand total of two pints, it still gave us a fuzzy head lol, I think it’s day drinking not agreeing with us anymore, getting old! First of all we had a little wonder around taking in the beautiful architecture and amazed with the detail of the buildings on every corner of the city. With the shops being shut and it being sli