Revision Tips and Tricks!

Exam season is upon us and going by the numerous tweets I've read, everyone is very anxious about them. So I thought I would write a quick little post just about how I revise and any sites etc I like to use.

Plan

I write out how many days I need for each topic next to it on my CGP book, then organize it on a day by day plan for about 4 weeks before my exam. I also leave a few days before the exam to re go over things again that I'm unsure of.

CGP

Now these books are life savers. I mean it. I bring them (I have the Core and now Additional Science but you can get Biology/Chemistry/Physics specific) to every science lesson I have and it's so helpful just to look at even while the teacher is telling us it. I find it pretty hard to concentrate completely with 30 children in the same room to be honest. And they don't just have Science, they have all a ray of subjects, for different levels and they even have write in question books to go with the revision guides.

Read and Write

My main revision 'exercise' if you will is to simply read my CGP book and rewrite it. I find having to actually think about what I'm reading and rewrite in my own, shorter, words works so much better then just reading or definitions.

Bitesize

If in doubt, go on Bitesize. This BBC site has all the facts you'll need for every subject. I don't do all my revision a such from here as I find the text is quite small/crampt/a bit boring. However, if I need to find something out urgently I always go here.

Memrise

I was first introduced to this by my science teacher and now our whole class uses it! As you probably guessed  it's basically a memory site with lots of definitions/meanings arranged in different questions. There are different courses ie. B2.2 Organisms and Energy. I believe you can also do languages on there, and they also have a weekly/monthly/all time leader board  which contains everyone you follow on it so that should get you more motivated!  

Past Papers

You can find quite a few past papers on the internet which I highly recommend printing and timing yourself complete the last couple of weeks before your exam. I would just say don't get ones that are too old as the curriculum changes year to year so some things you wont have covered. 

Good Luck if you have any exams soon and I hope you've used the half term wisely, 

Love Vic x

Everyone has their own revision styles, comment below what you use 

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May Day Weekend - Starbucks, Scones and the Seaside

How amazing is the weather today?! I hope it stays like this and doesn't go back to how it did like a couple of weeks ago! 

In the next 2 weeks I have quite a few exams (boo) so won't have time for any really time consuming/long posts (double boo). So today will just be about what I've been up to this long weekend, and more interestingly, what I've been eating! Hope you enjoy.

Breakfast Saturday - Low fat natural yogurt and pineapple drizzled with golden syrup

Lunch - Starbucks sun dried tomato, mozzarella and pesto panini

Tea - I went to a cricket match to help with the food so dinner was mainly leftover pizza and pepper!

Dessert - Leftover fruit kebabs and scones! Sooo good

I didn't have any breakfast the next day as Saturday night I ate FAR to much, I don't think half a tub of Pringles has ever gone so quickly!

Lunch - Salad with mozzarella, crushed Parmesan crisp shortbread and sweet and sour aubergines

 Afternoon tea - half a square bake well slice and half a scone with clotted cream (I don't have afternoon tea as a regular thing by the way, I just wasn't quite sure what you'd call this!)

Tea - Vegetable quarter pounder sandwich/burger with one slice of granary and one slice of white bread. Served with more salad and new potatoes (forgot to take a picture woops)

Dessert - Apple and cinnamon square muffin with frozen yogurt and frozen berries

Brunch Monday - Mini caramel waffles from Starbucks with an apple and cup of tea

Lunch - Granary toast pizza (Granary bread with mozzarella, pepper and tomatoes) and salad

We were then meant to go rollerskating but it was shut so went to this miniature world thing instead. Of course, the crazy gold wasn't miniature. Although that would have been fun ...

Tea - Chips :) Being a vegetarian means no more fish and chips :(

Dessert (if you can call it that) - Cinnamon doughnut

This weekend has been fab and I hope everyone has a wonderful rest of the week

Love Vic x 

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Spring Flowers 2014!

I hope you've had a fab week back to school/work after a lovely long weekend.

The weather was lovely a few weeks ago so I had the opportunity to take a few pictures with the Sun out. I was planning on getting some more and posting this actually at the end of Spring but the weathers hasn't been amazing recently so I thought I'd just share what I got now!

Good hiding Beth aha!

I hope the person who owns this house doesn't mind being on here! It was such a good photo opportunity how could I not.

How picturesque (big word I know). I can almost imaging a little fairy living in that trunk.

And what a fabulous view that fairy would have as this is directly opposite!

Pretty in pink.

"Buzzzzzzzzzzzz"

Cherry Blossom are one of my all time favourite flowers, they're so delicate and pretty!

Living in the coutry side has it's draw backs but all these beautiful flowers and nature make it a lovely place to walk through. I hardly edited these pictures at all as to keep it as close to what they really looked like.

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday,

Love Vic x

PS.  I won runner up in the competition I entered this muffin recipe into last week so I you HAVE to try it now!

PPS. I was so happy I ran upstairs and woke my Mum up to tell her!

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Healthy Raspberry, Banana and Chocolate Chip Muffins!

Raspberry, chocolate and banana muffins

This is a recipe I created for http://celeryandcupcakes.com/2014/04/07/healthy-baking-competition-for-all-you-baking-enthusiasts-out-there/ and I'm actually really pleased with them! 

They still taste delicious  but you can feel slightly better about them due to there reduced sugar, reduced fat and addition of raspberries, banana, wholemeal flour and even dark chocolate has been proven to have health benefits. If you want, you can add a handful of nuts, orange zest, shredded coconut - the choice is endless!

Makes 12 muffins or 14 squares as I baked mine in these tins.

175g/6oz margarine

170g/4oz caster sugar

1tbsp honey

2 medium ripe bananas

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

250g/9oz flour (1/2 whole wheat ½ plain flour)

1 level teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

2 eggs

1 egg white

75g/4oz raspberries

50g/2oz dark chocolate chips/chunks

Preheat oven to gas mark 3/160 deg C/fan 150 deg C/325 deg F.

1. Place the margarine, sugar and honey in a saucepan over low heat stirring to melt. Leave to cool. Mash banana.

2. Sift the flour with the bicarbonate of soda and stir in about 1/3 to the melted margarine and sugar with a wooden spoon.

3. Whisk the eggs and white together until paler and foamy. Add ½ the beaten eggs.

4. Add another 1/3 of the flour mixture.

5. Add the rest of the beaten eggs, along with the mashed bananas, orange juice, zest and chocolate.

6. Fold in the last 1/3 of flour, followed by the raspberries.

7. Scoop into greased muffin tin and bake until well risen and a skewer comes out clean of the muffin. Approximately 20 minutes.

Love Vic x

A Day With The Big Sis!

Hey guys, hope you've been enjoying the Sun today! I am so excited to really get into Spring, one of my favourite seasons.

So recently a lot of teachers in the UK went on strike meaning my school and my sisters collage had the day off. I'm not going to lie, it's lovely knowing you only have to work two days, then you get a day off, then you only go back for another two! 

This post will be mainly pictures because I haven't really got that much to say about the day, other then it was lovely!

We went into Blot to buy our younger sister a few rubbers for Easter.

Cheeky changing room selfie ;). I bought this top for £12 from Dorothy Perkins and absolutely love it, I can't wait to wear it as I think it's perfect for Spring. Lilac with white flower and a few diamantes - how very pretty 'ey!

After a few more shops we finished the day with a muffin (as it should always be) for lunch in BBs muffin. I had a skinny raspberry from their new 'skinny muffins' range with a chocolate milkshake. Where as Holly had ...

A big old Sticky Toffee Muffin! I felt quite proud that I stuck with my skinny raspberry, however, I will admit that they're Stick Toffee Muffin is the best I have ever had. And I mean it, the best muffin I have EVER had. So who can really blame her?!

The city was packed with students and although the weather a bit dreary at the start, the Sun soon came out walking back from the bus stop home. I really do love these days.

Love Vic x

Where Else To Find Me!

Now I'm not going to lie; this is a fairly lame post (I hope a used the semi colon right there). But never the less, I thought I'd write it!

Instagram - vicsvortex

Twitter - VicsVortex

Pinterest - VicsVortex

Bloglovin - VicsVortex

As I still do 99% of my posts on my iPod I haven't quite figured how to put this information at the bottom of each post yet, but hey ho - I'll learn eventually.

Have a fab Friday! 

Love Vic x

Jamies Italian Norwich Review!

During the half term me and my dearest friend Ellie went up to Jamie Oliver's Italian restaurant as we are both massive fans of Jamies and were desperate to go, after much anticipation: here's what I thought!

When we arrived (after a bit of carfuffle over where to enter embarrassingly!) we had to wait a few minutes at the desk thing without anyone there and were then seated. I had booked for two but for some reason they had it down for 4. 

I also didn't quite release how many seats they had! Their upstairs seating was really big as well so luckily we got seated with no problems anyway.

Our waitress was lovely and I had my Gold Card out on the table so she immediately popped that in her little machine thing and told us what the offer for that month was. For those who don't know if you go on the Jamies website you can sign up for this card and regular emails telling you what the latest deals are etc and I would definitely recommend getting one.

I orderd elderflower cordial and Ellie got pomergranate.

Because I had a Gold Card we both got a free appetiser (is that what it's called?!). Ellie got a meatball in a little sauce on a piece of bread (from what I can remember so don't quote me on it) and I got, being a vegetarian, a tomato nicely spiced salsa with olives and a poppadom. I have to say, even though I hate olives and the dip did taste slightly of them, I still loved it! 

Next we ordered an Italian Bread selection to share which again I adored. It was so big as well! Especially for just £3.65 which works out about £1.83 each! It was packed full of breadsticks, sour dough, focassia and all other gorgeous breads with a little oil and balsamic vinegar as well. The only annoying thing was that it is really hard to actually get to the vinegar before using up a lot of the oils because it all sinks to the bottom :(.

For mains I ordered the smaller £5.95   dish purely because it was cheaper but considering the free appetiser and how much fabulous bread you get you honestly wouldn't want anymore. Ellie ordered crab linguine which personally I really can't speak about because I obviously didn't eat any but visually it looked nice.

Mine didn't quite come out as expected to be honest, I thought it would be more of a pasta bake oozing with mozeralla with a crispy bread crumbed topping. It tasted nice don't get me wrong although the cheese did have a slightly barbeque like flavour and the tomato sauce didn't quite have the zing I expected to be honest but it was still definitely worth the money!

As a side we shared some polenta chips as I've heard they are kind of his signature thing and they weren't quite what I expected! I would probably re-name them crispy polenta cubes or something like that. They were also lovely and I love the creamy Parmesan against the crispy outer layer, however, next time I would definitely try the other two chips on the menu (funky chips and posh chips).

Now for dessert they had a lovely selection including tiramisu, pavlova, brownies etc all of which at £4.95 and sounded so fabulous I was struggling to decide. The waitress then told us that they had a new dish, a quin if you will of miniature desserts. Being notoriously bad at making decisions, I HAD to go for this one. I loved the way everything was presented slightly differently, it looked amazing. Now I don't like coffee so the tiramisu tasted a bit to much of, well, coffee for me! I also found quite wet but for coffee lovers (like Ellie) I'm sure it was great. The profiteroles was also filled with a slightly coffee flavoured cream but I still ate it all up! The flavours of the pavlova was so good although if I was being really picky I'd say that there was slightly to much cream and less meringue.

Undoubtedly my favourite 2 were the crumble and brownie. The crumble is a firm favourite in my house hold and I have to say, this was up there with my Dad's. I love the slightly spiced warm pair with the oaty topping and cool icecream. Mm mm mmmm! Now I love anything chocolate so this really couldn't fail but it was so fudgey and decadent. Just truly delicious!

Overall I can't wait to go back and if you decide to go I would highly recommend a) get a gold card which also gets you £10 of if you spend £30+ and use it within 28 day b) try the Italian Bread selection and c) try the chocolate brownie or crumble if chocolates not your thing.

A fairly long post I know but have a great Sunday,

Love Vic x