Month: February 2025

Valentines weekend away Sheffield 2025

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For this Valentine’s Day me and my wonderful boyfriend Aaron travelled to Sheffield for a romantic weekend away. This blog post is a description of our travels, with accompanying photography, hope you enjoy! ❤️❤️

We travelled by train and arrived at our hotel, Wilson Carlile Centre on Cavendish Street, in central Sheffield, check in 2pm. At first I thought we’d gone to the wrong place, as did not appear much like a hotel, and the accommodation was around the corner in a separate building to the reception. It was a small room, with only a continental basic breakfast in the morning. It didn’t matter so much as we’re both vegetarians anyway. Good location. Cheap and relatively cheerful I’d say…

We exchanged Valentine’s Day gifts at the hotel 🥰

We arrived at 5pm at the El Paso restaurant for a romantic Valentine’s Day meal. It is both an Italian and a Tex Mex. We shared a cheesy garlic bread, Aaron had a veggie Chimichanga and I had veggie enchiladas 😋 The DJ played love songs, and Unchained Melody came on, one of my mum’s favourite songs 😢 (She has passed away). The meal was beautiful 🥰

After El Paso, we went to an adult themed crazy golf ⛳️ called Golf Fang, it was mint 🥰 An 18 hole course, with bespoke art adorning every wall. A massive amount of geeky stuff from films and popular culture etc, amazingly and uniquely designed, each hole; glow in the dark, exotic themes, etc, really cool and immersive. We also drank a lot of the Valentine’s Day special cocktails 🍸😉

Afterwards, we went drinking on West Street, I got very drunk 🤪 We ventured to West Street Live, but mainly we danced like loons in the Irish Bar 😜 The music was fantastic! Grabbed a margarita pizza 🍕 on the way back…

I felt so rough Saturday morning, we’d hardly had any sleep and had to check out at 10am 😭

We had a stroll around the city centre, the Peace Gardens, Millennium gallery, and did a little bit of shopping 🛍

My feet were killing me, my platform doc martens from the night before completely gave me blisters, I kept having to put new plasters on, even got blood on the bed sheets!

😲 So apart from that, it was nice having a little mooch. Aaron bought me a orange/black checked cardigan from Blue Banana 🥰 He bought a pink tie too for our friends upcoming wedding, we wandered around the indoor market, and we also had a McDonald’s and then a MASSIVE pancake each, with creamy lattes… then it was time to pick up our stored luggage, and grab an uber back to Sheffield train station… homeward bound! 🥰🥰

Overall, it was a brilliant little getaway, had so much fun 😍😍

My next blog posts will probably be diamond arts 💎🎨 or amateur portraits (fundraising for Alzheimer’s Research) or an Easter bunny 🐰 pub painting

Thank you so much as ever for reading/viewing.. Lots of love, Lauren xx

https://www.elpasorestaurant.co.uk/ [Accessed 16th February 2025]

https://golffang.co.uk/sheffield/ [Accessed 16th February 2025]

© 2025 Lauren Parr / https://unicornpostbox.com

Valentine’s Day amateur couple portrait

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Hi everyone! My latest UnicornPostbox blog post is progression photos of an amateur portrait of me and my boyfriend Aaron, as a surprise gift to him for Valentine’s Day.. hope you like! ❤️❤️

I used a light box (cheat lol) to outline me and Aaron. I drew with Derwent professional sketching pencils, mainly HB and 2B. To keep with the Valentines theme, I incorporated red love hearts, made bold with a black promarker pen, I also drew a black line around me and Aaron, to make the images ‘pop’ (I’m a big fan of pop art). To finish, a professional blue colour marker pen coloured the entire background. I also purchased a lovely red frame to display…And here is the end result:

I took me a few days to complete, which isn’t too bad to be fair ❤️❤️

I am advertising if anyone else would like an amateur couple portrait, to put towards my fundraising for Alzheimer’s Research (I am doing a Tough Mudder in the summer in memory of my beautiful mum who sadly lost her long battle with this awful disease) 😢

My next blog post is a travel blog of mine and Aaron’s first Valentine’s weekend in Sheffield 💕💕

There is a new Easter bunny themed pub painting in March, and no doubt I’ll soon be on with another diamond art 💎🎨

Thank you as ever for viewing/reading. Much love, Lauren xx

© 2025 Lauren Parr/ https://unicornpostbox.com

Cubist Picasso inspired amateur ‘Paint Your Pal’ Pub Painting

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Hi everyone! My latest UnicornPostbox blog post is progression photos of a Cubist Picasso inspired amateur ‘Paint Your Pal’ pub painting.. hope you like!

One of the most influential styles of the 20th century was Cubism. Pablo Picasso co-founded the cubist movement in 1907-8, Paris, with Georges Braque. Essentially it involves abstract forms which are depicted in many different viewpoints, with multiple perspectives and fragmented angles, like looking through a kaleidoscope.

My amateur Picasso inspired ‘Paint Your Pal’ painting has elements of this I believe, such as within the face. In hindsight however, I believe the background is more reminiscent of Piet Mondrian’s work, which was inspired by Cubism. Mondrian is the pioneer of abstract art, with his grid structures and use of geometric forms.

Nevertheless, this was a very enjoyable exercise 😁😁 Usually in pub painting, we are guided step-by-step by our art teacher Becca. Whereas with this painting, we were encouraged to experiment and use our own imagination. Some people tried a more realistic approach painting their pal/partner, but me and Denise were decisive we were definitely going to go all abstract! With bold colours and bold black lines to distinguish the shapes 🥰

We could use any colours we wanted and design it any way we wanted..so very free, and explorative.. great fun! 😁😁 It does still resemble Denise however I think, with her curly gingery hair, ha! 🤣🤣 Denise’s portait of me is very cubist!

For the next pub painting it is an Easter bunny 🐰 themed one in March… I have so many diamond arts to be getting on with 💎🎨 but I am also on with a pencil portrait drawing…so watch this space!

Many thanks as ever for reading/viewing.. Much love, Lauren xx

© 2025 Lauren Parr/ https://unicornpostbox.com

Sentimental ‘Those We Love’ diamond art

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Hi everyone! My latest UnicornPostbox blog post is progression photos of a sentimental ‘Those We Love’ diamond art 💎🎨.. hope you enjoy!

This one is really special because I am going to frame it with a pink frame and leave by my mum’s gravestone.. she unfortunately passed away last year after a long battle with early onset Alzheimer’s 🩷🩷

I think it is really pretty, with gorgeous flowers and beautiful butterflies 💐🦋

I have so many diamond arts to do! I was bought loads for Christmas 🎄 A colourful eye one, an ‘Alice in Wonderland’ a unicorn, a moon/night sky, a personalised one of me and my boyfriend, etc..

Next on the agenda however, I am at pub painting tomorrow with my lovely friend Denise. It is a Valentines day special, ‘paint your pal or partner’ 🩷🩷 Obviously we are doing paint your pal lol..

I think it will be really fun as it’s not the normal format with Becca the art teacher guiding us step by step.. it is more of a do what you want go wild exercise 🤣🤣

We are going to go all abstract and have fun with it!  I can’t wait! 😁😁

So yes, look out for the next blog post coming very soon…

As ever, thank you for reading/ viewing, all the best, Lauren xx

© 2025 Lauren Parr/ https://unicornpostbox.com