Happy 3rd Birthday A Yellow Brick Blog!!!

WOW!

I did not ever expect to be writing this....3!
My blog is officially 3 years old. (It was on Saturday but I've been sooo busy I've only just managed to sit down and celebrate! aka.... sit and watching Kardashians whilst drinking tea & typing!)
I mean for one.... 3 is my lucky number so that makes me super happy and two... 3 years of blogging!  How cool is that!
I'm so super proud too still be at this little hobby which has quite literally changed my life.

Balloons - Urban Outfitters

3 years ago I was unemployed (which alot of you probably didn't actually know).
 I had been a temp at Liz Earle for 6 months doing the Christmas shizzle but temp unfortunately meant that just because Christmas it was time to say goodbye.
Now... I'm not unemployable - I'm smart (ish) and friendly and I have great experience but being stuck on the IOW the market for jobs available was... slim!
 So for 6 painful months I was unemployed, living off savings and selling things on eBay - yup real life!

Fast forward to today. 2016. 
 I've just worked a 10 hour day from the comfort of my own home doing something I love! Since January I have been working in PR and Social Media and I know for a fact without my blog I would have never ever had the knowledge or confidence to get or even do this job!
And although it's taking up alot of my time and my blog has been a little slower than usual, I love it and I'm SO grateful for the journey I've been on over the last 3 years!

Anyway.... I thought it would be fun to take a step back and look over all the posts I've uploaded over the last 3 years and pick out some of my favourites!

Where it all began... 

 Awwww the first post I uploaded! I had actually started A Yellow Brick Blog back in 2010/2011 but ... that content is GONE so I like to think this is my official starting point!

The Weightloss Story 

Still to this day one of my most read posts! I like this one  mainly because I really got to write from the heart and be totally honest, I think I'll always struggle with my weight and image but looking back at this I can see how many great changes I've made!

The Travel Dairies 

SO many memories going through these posts..... although I never actually finished the series... opps! If you wanna see my America travels these are the ones the read!

Dress Like Disney 

These posts are some of the ones I am most proud of! They used to take me forever but I LOVED being so creative and making something so individual!

How I Make My Collages

 I get asked this question so much so I thought I'd make a step-by-step guide to help everyone, I've had such fab response from it, so I'm really glad it helped :)

Easy Ways To Put A Smile On Your Face

Sharing positivity and happiness is something I want to do so much more on here.

The Christmas Fund

I'm still SO proud of the blogging community for this one. £500 raised for Crisis UK last year.

A Few DisneyWorld Top Tips

I just love talking about Disney don't I........ roll on March 1st!

Easy Oatlicious Sugar & Dairy Free Banana, Fruit & Nut Bars

I have made these every single week since creating this posts.... and saved SO much money on snacks! (Plus they're healthy!)

The Stresses Of Being A Blogger

Real-life talk. 

4 Books To Help You Create A Positive & Healthy Lifestyle

The response on Bloglovin' for this was insane - was a proud moment!

Are there any posts I've done that really stick out in your memory? Let me know!

And once again.... thank you so much for all your support, love, likes, comments and follows over the last 3 years - BIG HUGS TO YOU ALL!

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Easy Oatilicious Sugar & Dairy-Free Banana, Fruit and Nut Bars

Why hello there lovely ladies and gents!

I've been baking - can you Adam and Eve it?!
 I literally don't know when the last time I baked was. I'm so pants in the kitchen I tend to avoid the mess and immense disappointment usually linked with my attempts.

With my current lifestyle-change mission in full swing  I have been loving creating healthy and EASY meals/snacks and these are something I randomly whipped up earlier this week - and to my surprise... were edible!

After creating my new fav pancakes, I realised.... 1.I can actually use my kitchen and 2. maybe I can make more yummy things from just eggs and bananas?! Avoiding all that nasty sugar and dairy I decided that these two ingredients would be perfect to create some form of easy peasy snack to help me curb those sugar cravings and I was right! 

For my Oatilicious Sugar & Dairy-Free Banana Fruit and Nut Bars I used just 3 main ingredients.

3 x medium bananas

2 x large eggs

Porridge oats

I mashed the bananas together with a fork (that's hard work you know!) then popped the eggs into the mixture and whisked together until it resembled some form of even, runny mess.

I then tipped in the oats. Right, I know all you baking gods out there are going to hate me but yes, I just guess-timated the amount! I popped in what I thought was enough to create a 'flapjack' type consistency! (and it was fine - who needs scales?!)

So for the main mixture.... that's it! Literally that easy.

I then added in raisins, chopped almonds and dried cranberries to give it a bit of fun! (I think next time I might try a bit of peanut butter and maybe even some dark chocolate chips if I'm feeling a bit naughty..... although then they wouldn't really be sugar free would they?)

You can literally add in anything you bloomin' well please! Go crazy - I'm looking froward to trying all different kinds!

I popped the mixture into my baking tin, whacked the oven to about 180 degrees and left it for about 15-20 mins! (I started with 12 mins but they just weren't done so it was more like 20.)
Once the top had started to golden and the mixture was no longer a gooey mess, I took it out the oven and left to cool. (I'll warn you though are still moist  - ew I literally HATE that word - but they are still pretty squidgy once they are done... all that banana I think, don't panic!)

A short while later I was chopping them into bar sizes and displaying them on a plate to obviously Instagram away..... don't judge me.

Now... don't get me wrong, this isn't no rocky road or millionaires shortbread - but that's kind of the point! You can still get your sweet fix without actually having anything bad in it - totally GUILT-FREE (even when you eat 4!)!
 It's literally only bananas, eggs and oats after all - where's the harm in that?

Let me know what you think of these short but sweet recipes I've been popping up. I'm really loving this new mission I'm on and I find it so fun creating blog content from it too!

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3 Ingredient Gluten Free Chocolate Protein Pancakes

Finally! Back to the writing, it's been a week since my last blog post and it feels like forever - how I used to blog everyday is beyond me?!
 As I had mentioned in my previous post, it's time for my blog to have a bit of a content make-over..... so, here we go......

As you may have seen and read over my social media channels (Twitter/Instagram) I'm on a major health and fitness mission. 
No more late night biscuit scoffing sessions and squat avoidance, it's time to finally get myself looking and feeling the best I can, inside and out.

I've been eating clean and LOVING it! I feel fab and I'm loving my new routine of eating well and exercising. (Although HIIT class definitely killed me the other night!)

I've been looking at creating EASY and fun recipes for all meals (hello world of food Pinterest), and with my lack of knowledge in the kitchen and busy schedule I like to be able to make meals quickly and without the 'faff' of 57 different ingredients and scattered cooking times.

These pancakes are SO easy, with only 3 ingredients and taking only a matter of minutes these really are a fantastic start to the day (or snack!) and they taste great too!

All I use to create the mixture is :

1 x medium banana (ripe, not green)

2 x large eggs

2 x scoops of protein world chocolate slender blend (you can obviously do this with any protein powder/slender blend flavour, or maybe even a rice flour!)

Firstly I mash up the banana, which takes me straight back to having braces and living off soft foods every time they were tightened! (Mashed bananas and skips were diet staples.)
I then add in the eggs and whisk it all together.
Last but not least I pop in the 2 scoops of Slender Blend powder (I have chocolate but have just ordered vanilla too!) and mix it all up until it's even. I was a little worried at first that I hadn't mashed my banana up enough as it was a little lumpy but once you pop it onto the pan it really isn't a problem!

Just a couple of minutes or so on each side and you're done! Time to plate it up and add your favourite toppings!
 Photoed I went for raspberries, blueberries and a light drizzle of clear honey. The pancakes can be a little drier than you're usual everyday pancakes but with the added healthy toppings it's hardly noticeable! 
I think next time I going to go for a bit of peanut butter - I'm loving the Meridian's crunchy peanut butter at the moment which is 100% peanuts - no palm oil!

The best thing is that these are SO filling - no mid-morning snacks for me, these keep me full until lunch time!

With this mixture I made 1 large pancake but I think next I'll use it to create 2 or 3 smaller pancakes to stack... that's always more fun right?

What do you think? Are you a fan of quick and easy recipes too?

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