Rachel's Next Adventure

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Merry Christmas everyone! I hope Santa was good to you all and now you can spend a cosy day together with your loved ones.

The time has finally arrived! Pokémon GO has finally introduced PvP with the great addition of being able to battle your friends anywhere in the world - as long as you're best or ultra friend levels. After work today my fiancé and I decided to try out our first battle. We ended up picking pretty much the same Pokémon - we both used Slaking and Gengar. And of course, I won. The way PvP battles work is slightly different to the usual way you fight in raids and gym battles in the sense that you can't dodge!  instead they have a new system in which both trainers are given two Protect Shields to use in the battle, the game alerts you when a charged attack is incoming to give you the option to use one of your shields, but as you only get two, make sure you use them wisely! PvP battles are very button bashy - even more so than regular battles, you even have to tap to power up your charged move after filling up your charge! Overall it's pretty ...

Hi guys! It's been a while since I last posted here and i'm half way into the busiest month of the year at work, so I thought it'd just quickly post now while I have a chance - and hopefully i'll get more posts scheduled later this week, even if it is just video updates. Me, my fiancé and two of our friends recently visited Disneyland Paris for the Christmas season, and while we were there we experienced the first snow of the season and I knew I just had to share it with you. So here is the video i've put together. Doesn't it just get you into the Christmas spirit? It was super cold that day but it was beautiful! I just wish it had been a bit heavier so we could have made cute little Mickey snowmen like people did in Tokyo Disney Resort last winter. I'm currently uploading a new video every day to my YouTube channel , it's going to be mostly Disneyland Paris Christmas trip videos, but once they end I have my New ...

Have a fun and safe night everyone!

It's that time of year ago, the Christmas season is finally starting up properly. Yeah we've had the Fenwick and John Lewis Christmas floors for a while now but the main seasonal event starts tomorrow. That's right, the Fenwick Christmas Window is going to be unveiled tomorrow! We can't wait to see it this weekend, so until then we've got some videos of the previous years, feel free to check them out below. 2014 2015 2016 2017 Do you have any big traditions like this where you live? What signifies the start of Christmas to you?

Happy Halloween everybody! I hope you have a great night no matter what your plans are.

Our November box arrived on Friday, we got some pretty cute stuff this time around but I don't think i'm going to keep much of it. The chick hoodie dog is so cute though!

I'm not going to comment too much on this years event, we went on the third or fourth day it was open and several of the lights were off or partially broken already. Sunderland is getting worse, we're not even having a bonfire night firework display this year! So, here is our video of what was working anyway.

So, our last update was back in July , so I thought it was about time we update you with what we've been up to and what we've managed to get done. So, we still need to find an electrician to do some stuff outside for us, but we have had more plastering done! We've had the office plastered and fixed up, we bought the new fleece blanket I mentioned in the last update - along with a new Grinch blanket ready for Christmas. The top of the stairs has been prepped ready to be plastered when the plasterer next comes back. The plasterer mentioned we'll probably be able to get a cupboard put in under the stairs! Now, this might not seem like a big deal, but its a huge major deal! Our house basically only has one built in cupboard and the boiler is in it, so we'll finally - possibly - be able to have some storage space! I'm so excited about this! But, we do need the plasterer and a bricklayer to come in and check it over properly first as the space ...

If you've ever looked at planning a trip to Japan, you'll notice you see the word Konbini everywhere in blog posts, guides, money saving articles, these things are everywhere. You can stand on a street and see three or four all in a close location - some even the same company, there were two 7 elevens within a 3min walk from our hotel! Most of these posts and guides only show you a few items you can pick up there, with occasional price lists, so we decided on our trip earlier this year that we'd take a tour video in some of the main Konbini chains. There were a few we didn't get a chance to record in, like Daily Yamazaki and Sunkus but here are our tours of the main three - 7 Eleven, Lawson and Family Mart. Hopefully they'll be of help to some of you, the videos are a little rushed as those places can be really busy! Family Mart 7 Eleven Lawson Remember to subscribe to the YouTube channel , we have a Japan trip video going up every ...

So, the new Disney X Vans series released last week over at Vans , and of course, we just had to have something from the new line. I picked out two pairs of shoes, the white old skools, and the Mickey Mouse Club old skools, in the end I decided not to get the white pair as I can't imagine the Mickey hands would stay perfect for long, it looks like they'd come off pretty easy if you caught the side of your shoe on anything. And my fiancé picked out this pair. I love the little Mickey pants 'buttons' on the back of the shoe. At £15 less then the pairs I was looking at, the price tag isn't too bad at £60 either. It's even cheaper than the hoody! I also picked up this men's hoody, i'm hoping it's nice and baggy/oversized but if not I guess i'll just return it, I didn't want to order a huge size incase it completely swamped me. I'd have preferred a tshirt version but they only released them in kid sizes. ...

In August we watched this show FOUR times, it's absolutely amazing, I didn't think anything could beat Once Upon A Time, but wow, I was wrong. What did you think of it? What's your favourite Disney castle projection show?

I spend quite a bit of time on the Disneyland Paris planning groups helping out as many people as I can, and i've come across some really common questions with easy answers, so I thought i'd share them with you all so you know how to find the answers for yourselves or help out others if you're also in these groups. What's the weather like in X month? Use Accuweather, it'll show you the current forecast several months in advance AND let you travel back to that month last year to see the actual weather they had then. What's the top up for X restaurant? Boot Hill Blog has a handy supplement chart for each meal plan. Where is the best place to buy Euros? It depends where you live, use this comparison page to find out where has the best rate near you. What's the dates of X season? You can find the dates for all confirmed upcoming seasons here . Where can I see the menu for X Restaurant? You can ...

Way back, years ago, as a poor poor student, I used to use SwagBucks  it's basically just another one of those survey websites, but they have an app too, so it's ideal for earning a few pennies during your work commute. They have other ways to earn too by watching videos/adverts, answering the daily poll, and playing some of their games. They also have a cashback aspect to it where you can earn points or cashback by clicking through the website before you shop. They give you a daily goal of 30points to hit, and once you do you'll get an extra 3 points, if you hit it for 7 days in a row you'll get a 25point bonus, 14 days gets you a 100 point bonus, 21 gets you 200 and 31 days gets you a 300 point bonus. I just thought i'd share as it's now officially October and people will be looking for ways to make a little extra cash to go towards Christmas, you can redeem your points as gift cards for PayPal, Amazon, Starbucks, Caffe Nero, M&S, iTunes...

What can I say other than WOW, this parade! Sadly, the parade was cancelled due to high winds the first two days of our three day trip so we only managed to see it once, i'm so glad we got to see it though! I just love how they have 'rarer'* characters like Max Goof in the parade along side a huge Big Hero 6 float, and a flying Peter and Wendy. * Max isn't rare in Japan, but he is rare elsewhere in the world. If you ever get the chance to visit Tokyo Disney Resort before this parade ends, definitely make sure you give it a watch, I think it may have been the best Disney day time parade we've ever seen, even better than Mickey's Soundsational. Here is our video of the parade

You may have already seen our review from our stay in a Donald Duck room back in 2016, this time round we decided to stay in one of the Chip n Dale rooms, it was a tough decision between this and the new Stitch rooms but we just couldn't say no to these cheeky chipmunks. At around £500 per night just for the room - no tickets, no breakfast, and the early entry perk consisting of a total of 15 minutes you could easily see why people would look for something offsite, like the MyStays or the DreamGate, but honestly, we've stayed at the MyStays and the Ambassador twice each now, and while the MyStays isn't terrible, we definitely prefer the Ambassador. The theming is incredible, the amount of free gifts you get to take home is insane, they make the perfect souvenirs, I also love how they have hotel exclusive items in the gift shop - and the fact you have to prove you're a hotel guest to purchase them. The bathroom doors were super cute too! When y...

It only took three trips to Japan, but we finally made our way over to Yokohama to experience Pikachu Outbreak! We watched the parade three times, picked up a couple of souvenirs, had an amazing lunch at Shake Shack, and spent way too much in SnoopyTown before deciding to head back to Tokyo. We did want to see the night parade but as we'd have 6 hours to wait and we had to be up super early the next morning to move over to Tokyo Disney Resort we decided to skip it. Here is our Pikachu parade video, I can't wait to start showing you all the Tokyo Disney Resort videos we took soon too!

Another relatively slow month house wise! The first week of July we had our joiner/electrician back for three days. He built us a new - I don't know the word, basically the sloped board thats above the stairs - and fitted that for us as the old one needed removing. He also flipped the office door for us so it doesn't open into a wall anymore, and moved the light switch to the other wall. We also had two more light fittings changed - now we just need the kitchen and extension lights changing, but those can wait for now. We got a few more boxes from Wilko and managed to put a few more Halloween, Easter and Christmas bits away that we'd found in the back room. We also ended up buying a few more bits in the PoundWorld closing down sale so we still need to put those away. We also picked up a nice storage box from the PoundWorld sale, and some black car spray paint from Poundland to repaint it to it'll match our living room. Now I just want the new ...

The final update. We've finally bought and received our Green car Japan Rail Passes - we bought them from JTB . We decided to go with Green again as we'll be travelling during the busy August period and in Green Car you have enough space between you and the seat in front to store your suitcase.  We've bought a new hand held fan to help us tackle the 39ºC temperatures we're going to be standing in at Disneyland and DisneySea. I've tested it out and it's amazing! It has three speeds/strengths and is better than the mains one I use at home! This is the one we bought. I've finally sorted a new hand luggage bag as my camera bag isn't big enough now that I need to take medication, prescriptions etc with me. I've decided to use this one I bought in Walt Disney World last year as it has the side bottle pockets. Really not impressed with the quality though so i'm hoping it doesn't jam up or fall apart on the flight....

The August box finally arrived while I was in London, so here it is. A little late but super cute! There are 12 days left to order this box If you use this link you'll get $5 your first box!

After work on Saturday I rushed down to the seafront with my fiancé where we managed to catch the end of the parade of sail and the Summer Streets Festival.

The tall ships races event started in Sunderland on Tuesday, and on Wednesday they had a firework display - just after the World Cup match ended - perfect timing, eh?. I recorded the fireworks so feel free to check out the video below. They'll have another firework display tonight at 9:30.

With the summer holiday season finally here the shops are all filled with cute, practical and affordable clothing, accessories and other items you may need on your upcoming holiday - or even just want for general day to day use! So I thought I would take this opportunity to show you all some of the things i've picked up over the last couple of months ready for our upcoming Japan trip, and, not gonna lie, this is pretty much all from Primark. [excuse the creases, these tshirts are living in a Primark bag until i'm ready to pack!] Mickey t-shirt £8 My first purchase for the summer season, I just love the design. Stitch t-shirt (lost price! £8?) I bought this because it was really big and baggy and in the summer heat in Japan it'll be ideal, but I'm not too sure, when I wear it it looks/feels like a hospital gown. Stitch t-shirt £8 It's a simple design and nice and baggy so it should be comfortable in the su...