The Days Gone By| Feb to March

It feels like forever since I wrote one of these posts, so I thought I would let you all know what I’ve been up to over the past month.

 

Valentine's Dinner- As you will know from my Valentines Day post, this year Matt and I decided to stay in and have an evening to ourselves. To make it special I cooked dinner (seems I never cook), and I’m happy to say I never gave him food poisoning so I would say it was a success.

Hart of Dixie- I am a little bit obsessed with this programme, and I know a few of you are also. If you loved Rachel Bilson in the OC you will love her even more in this…She is my girl crush!

Ebaying- I have been going mad on ebay this past month. I have so far sold about 40 items of clothing and made about £200. I think the people at the Post Office are sick of the sight of me, but it's great to get rid of my fat clothes and get some money for some new ones!

Theme Hospital- After seeing all the talk of the relaunch of SimCity, it had me wishing that Theme Hospital would be relauched also. So after a long search online I found out how to get the game to work on newer operating systems. You can see more info here if you are interested.

My New Apartment- Matt and I have signed for a new apartment and I am so so so excited! We will finally be living together again after 9 months of long distance, and we will be living in a building I have had my heart set on so I couldn’t be happier! Expect lots of posts about interiors, furniture and pictures of my new apartment in the coming months!

Confused.com- This past week, thanks to my blogger friend Jamie, who writes the Zombie Fitness Blog, I was featured on Confused.com. The article was about their top fitness tips from favourite fitness bloggers, so I was honoured to be featured.

Personal Fitspiration- As I was sorting through my pictures on my laptop this past week (blogger problems) I came across some bikini pictures of me from 5 years ago and was amazed at my flat stomach! I think I’m going to print out the picture and put it by my treadmill as some fitspiration!

Matts Birthday- My boy turned 27 last week so we were obviously out celebrating. We went for some food and plenty of drinks in Leeds last weekend, and I definitely paid for it the next day!

Hangover Breakfast- The second hangover of the month, this time from meeting up with my friend whom I moved to France with. We haven’t met up in about 6 months, so we went out for a few quiet drinks in Jesmond, Newcastle, which turned into playing drunken darts at my friends house till 2 in the morning. It is safe to say I was very thankful for this breakfast in the morning.

Fitness Clothes Haul- I finally went and bought some new workout clothes! My road running trainers are a little tired and have given me a sore foot this past week, so I went and bought these gorgeous new pink ones, along with new leggings and bras!

Mothers Day Afternoon Tea- As today is Mothers Day I have spent the day with my gorgeous Mother Bar. We went for a run on the fells this morning, had some laugh when trying to complete some hill sprints, and treated ourselves with homemade afternoon tea.

Froggy’s- The pond in my mum’s garden is currently home to hundreds of little frogs! We went up this afternoon to watch them all.

 

Do you love Hart of Dixie as much as I do? Have you ever made money from Ebay? What have you been up to over the past month? Anything exciting?

Snow Day| A Winter Walk

 

So if you haven’t noticed…. I’m pretty sure you have seems you have eyes and everyone keeps going on about it… it snowed!! I love snow! Loads! I turn to an infant state of mind as soon as the first snow flake lands on the ground. However I have been sulking over the past couple of days as you southerners have been steeling all the snow! We haven't seen any over the past couple of days in the Lake District. The snow you can see in the pictures above is the remnants of the snow we had at the beginning of the week. So we don't have lots of fresh powder, just a lot of icy crunchy snow; still enough to take pretty pictures and to go sledging.

Matt and I went for a nice long walk with my two daft dogs this morning. The dogs love it! They spent most of the time rolling around in it, eating it and chasing snowballs or kids that were sledging. As I mentioned it was very icy, so much so that Matt managed to slip and fall down a hill which was very funny.. not to him, but for me it was.

I’m hoping that it will snow some more tonight then we can go sledging tomorrow! So I will be sleeping with my fingers crossed and one eye peeping out the window waiting on that first snowflake!

I hope you made the most of the snow, if you were lucky enough to get some. Has anyone gone sledging or made some snowmen over the past couple of days?

Happy New Year| 2012 In Pictures

 

Happy New Year everyone! I am writing this post nursing a tiny hangover after drinking too much champagne last night, while cuddled up on the sofa...I assume that I’m not the only one currently in this state! I had a lovely evening despite not being the biggest fan of New Years Eve as I think it is very overrated but I do like to take the time to reflect upon the year I’ve had and plan the year ahead. I decided to celebrate 2012 by sharing with you my favourite pictures from the year, you can see them above.

2012 has been one of the best years of my life, I graduated with a great degree, I gained a job straight out of university, I celebrated 5 years with my boyfriend, I was Chief Bridesmaid at my mum’s wedding, I got to travel new countries with my close friends and I saw my blog become a finalist in the Cosmopolitan Blog Awards.

There have been some low points in the year that have affected those I love, with cancer raising its ugly head in my family again (thankfully my Grandma won her battle), and my best friend’s marriage also broke down. But as I said the worst is over, and with 2013 being a New Year it’s a chance to put a line underneath all the negatives and focus on the positives.

As with every year I always like to set goals to achieve... much more attainable than vague resolutions. So to make sure I actually attempt to do them I thought I would write them down and share them with you.

Health

• Complete the 365 miles in 365 days challenge. Yes its only a mile a day to run, so not too difficult, but I hope by taking part in a challenge it will ensure that I keep up with my fitness streak.
• Continue to lose weight and inches, and become healthier. As I mentioned in previous posts I don’t believe in scales, so don’t have a goal weight, just an idea on what I want my body to look like.
• Complete a competitive run, be it 3/5/10k
• Learn to cook. I have zero flair in the kitchen, so aim to put my food and nutrition knowledge into good use by actually cooking my own meals!

General

• Learn to drive!! I need to do this!
• Buy a car... just a cheap one to go from A to Z
• Continue to develop and grow my career through both my performance at work, and through my blog and independent projects.
• Move back in with Matt... as much as I love my family, living at home at the age of 23 going on 24 is not living the dream.
• Actually use my savings account and put 5-10% of my wage into it each month
• Spend more time with my family and friends. This was difficult this past year thanks to a gruelling final year at uni. So I aim to get the balance between work and play more equal this next year

Blog

• Develop my photography with the use of my new camera
• Film a You Tube video
• Buy a tripod and remote for my camera
• Develop my skills in html and continue to edit and adapt my blog layout
• Take part in more #bbloggers #lbloggers etc. chats

So there we have it a reflection on the past year and my hopes and goals for 2013. I hope you all had a lovely evening last night, have had a great 2012, and wish you all the best for 2013. Thank you for all your love and support over the past year, I really do appreciate it as it makes blogging so much more fun!

What are your resolution and goals for 2013?

Why do you wear makeup? | Tag

*Combination of my own images and those from We Heart It*

I have seen this tag floating around on peoples blogs over the past few weeks and it seems to be spreading like wild fire. Now I’m not normally one for tags; I don’t know why, I just never found one that inspired me and if they did, they were quite lengthy. However this tag is short and sweet and gives a little insight into the blogger. So here goes my answers.

When did you begin to love makeup?

Like many others I have forever been a girly girl. When I was a little girl I was obsessed with princesses, pink, glitter, Barbie's and spent my time dressing up, putting on fashion shows and baking mud pies. With this girliness came the love of makeup. I remember I used to have a big pink makeup case at my Nanas house and would stand in front of her mirror applying glitter, stick-on tattoos, peel off nail varnish and sickly sweet perfumes. I have always been gifted numerous makeup palettes for birthdays and Christmas, and as I grew so did my make up case. Obviously as I got older the quality of the product improved.

I first started wearing “proper” makeup aged 12… yes it is a little early, however when I was a younger I wore glasses, which unfortunately made my eyes appear smaller than what they were. I was obviously very self conscious of this and used to (still do) layer on the mascara to make my eyes look bigger. I probably started wearing a full face of makeup when I was 14, again to mask my insecurities, which at the time was my bad skin. When I started wearing a full face my confidence with my makeup improved and so did my experimentation, cue lots of black eyeliner and bright eye shadow… baby pink was one of my favourites for a while. Thankfully my taste has changed and matured, but I still like to have fun with it.

How do you feel without makeup?

A bug! I have a bit of a complex whereby I think my eyes look very small when I’m not wearing mascara, I call them my little bug eyes! As a result I almost never leave the house without mascara, the only time I do is when I’m out running. I know they probably don’t but I just don’t feel very confident when not wearing mascara. I will quite gladly leave the house without other makeup; I choose not to though. When my skin is looking good I will happily just wear mascara and a bit of bronzer and blush, especially during the weekends.

What do you like about makeup?

Quite a difficult question I think as sometimes I love makeup (like 70% of the time) and other times I feel like its an evil necessity and more like war paint than makeup. The days when I love it are obviously days when I’m feeling on top of the world. I love that makeup allows me to look and feel more human. I like that it can help enhance anyone’s natural beauty, and draw out a persons individual and beautiful features that they may not have been aware of before. I also love how colourful and pretty makeup is, the colour combinations and collections are never ending… it’s always great finding a new favourite lippy.

The days when I don’t love makeup are obviously days when I’m not feeling quite my normally self, perhaps a little blue. On days such as this I tire of applying my makeup but I would never leave the house without it. Like I mentioned, I feel like it’s a necessary evil; war paint; a mask that myself and many others apply to hide behind. I wish there was a national day where us girl don’t wear our makeup and show and (try to) embrace our natural beauty, as no matter how much we fight it, we all have something unique and beautiful about out face.

Three “Holy Grail” Items:

Mascara- I’m not fussed on which brand, however I do love L'Oreal Telescopic False Lash Mascara and Maybelline Colossal Mascara

Urban Decay NAKED Palette- A god send for eyeshadow lovers! I use mine all the time, perfect for both day to day looks and for dramatic night out looks. The pigmentation is great and the colours all compliment each other perfectly.

Rimmel Blush Pink Rose- A bargain high street product, but one that is very pigmented, lasts forever and is a great match for my skin tone. Great at giving me some colour on these dull days and a daily wear for me.

I hope you enjoyed reading my answers and learnt a little more about me. I look forward to reading some of your answers, if you do write your own be sure to Tweet me or comment below so I can give them a read.