Spring Showers: A Few Happy Things

I thought instead of acknowledging my er...cough 100 day er absence..cough I thought I would jump straight back into the blogging game by sharing a few things that have made me happy recently.

Turning 22

I can't quite believe I'm 22! in my mind I'm still 18. Although I feel like I'm not quite ready to grow up I don't really have a choice in the matter its kinda inevitable. My Birthday always makes me realise how lucky I am to be surround by Friends and Family who all love me dearly. Sometimes I think Birthdays can fall into the trap of being a bit of a pity party, realising that your not where you thought you would be at a certain point in your life. Younger me most likely thought I'd have moved out by now, have a permanent job and married if not at the very least engaged. But when I look at my life I'm truly happy and I'd much rather be able to say that then any of the above things, because those things will fall into place at some point (maybe). 

Pale Skin, Roll-neck Jumper + Sunday Chinwag

I like my pale skin. A Geordie girl who doesn't use fake tan, no I am not a mythical creature its like I said I just like my pale skin. I recently bought this jumper from eBay for the extortionate price of £1.00 and in truth I feel quite the fashionable lady in it, even if the roll neck does cover half my face up. But I don't care because I just feel too darn cosy in it. I couldn't be happier about the cold weather and the dark nights I am most definitely in my element...my winter element. I'm not usually one for selfies, but I thought what the heck I'm not ashamed to say I like these pics of me, nothing wrong with a bit of self love. I think we could all do with a lot more of it.

I WILL NEVER BE A WHITE WALLED MINIMALIST GIRL (RAMBLE)

Sitting in my room scrolling through Pinterest, pining all those Pinterest-y pins of White wall minimalist interiors. I looked up and looked around my tiny room and thought to myself 'I wish I had painted my walls White' or  'I wish my room looked like the rooms on Pinterest'. It then dawned on me that if I had White walls my bedroom wouldn't be mine, instead it would be a copy of someone else it wouldn't stand out from the crowd of White walled rooms it would just be adding to the pile. Then I thought why do I want White walls? have I truly been that heavily influenced by Pinterest and Tumblr? because it has came apparent that I have. 

little thoughts on being kind

Something that has been rattling around my mind recently is the relationship between kindness and happiness. It's a simple fact that being kind to others makes you feel that little bit happier and your smile that little bit wider. Kind acts don't have to be grand gestures, I often think small acts of kindness are often the sweetest.

October Goals

Give more hugs to the people I love - This is something that has been spinning around my mind recently, that I don't hug people anymore, there seems to be no reason behind it, it's just something I just don't do but I plan to rectify that. 

Go on more walks in the evenings with Friends - I much prefer to go on walks in the evening during the autumn, being able to wrap up in thick woolly jumpers and long tartan scarfs to me is just perfection, and when long walks are accompanied with friends that perfection reaches its limit. 

Get stuck into University - I've been back at uni for  a couple of weeks now and I have started the final year of my degree, After a summer spent working, I'm more than happy to get stuck into drawing and creating again. 

Read at least one Book this Month - there was a time when I would always have a book firmly in grasp and wouldn't leave a seat without at least one hand holding onto a book. I would demolish four to five books in a month but more recently I can't remember the last time I read a book that wasn't an Art one. I picked up Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel to read this month and hopefully in my monthly favorites I will be reviewing it for you.  

Sell a piece of Artwork - as an aspiring artist/illustrator I can count on one hand how many times I have sold a piece of work and truthfully that number needs to be increased. So watch this space. 

Stay organised - I would like to say I am a relevantly organised person (sometimes) but over these past few months I have to say my organisation skills have been on point and hopefully they will stay that way. 

Friendship

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I recently bought these two best friends necklaces from the Etsy shop 'Forget me not Grove' for £7.49. One for myself and the other for my best friend Celene, who is moving back to South Africa on the 26th of April for the second time. I bought these necklaces as a little parting gift. I've only known Celene for 4 years and for two of those she was in South Africa. It has always amazed me how quickly Celene and I became close friends, then again I suppose some people you just click with immediately.

I've always been lucky in friendship and have always had a great group of friends around me growing up, a select few that have seen me at my best and worst. When I was younger the more friends I had the better. As I have grown older I have begun to understand the importance of a close knit group of friends. Over the past few years I have lost touch with close friends, some through one particular horrendous fall out and others just simply drifting apart as we all begin to grow up and find our own way in this crazy world.

 

When I was younger my best friends knew my favourite colour, toy, book and my favourite set of top trumps. But now they know what makes me smile, laugh, cry and are the people I can completely depend on to be there when I need them most, who laugh at my terrible dad jokes when the silence gets to loud, listen to my rants, know how to cheer me up and put simply they just know me. I can count the amount of best friends I have on both hands and for that I am truly blessed.

 

 

FIVE HAPPY LITTLE THINGS

This last week has been incredibly busy, projects at Uni are starting to pile up and overlap. However there has been a few little things that have made me feel happy recently.

1. Taking this photograph, I walked into my bedroom and saw this through my window and I couldn't help but smile.

 

2. On Friday I think I may have had the most relaxing bath ever, rubber duck included and felt nothing but happiness.

 

3. I started my Dissertation, possibly a bit of a strange one to through in because writing my dissertation does not make me happy nor is it by any means little. However it isn't due till May and I'm glad that I have started it early.

 

4. On Saturday I went wedding dress shopping with my Aunt and Mum (for my Aunt) and rather enjoyed searching through all the wonderful dresses. Ending the 5 hour search with my Aunt finding the perfect dress that was in the sale too, I naively thought it wouldn't take that long.

 

5.  On Friday night I went for a curry with friends then for few drinks at the pub listening to some live music, the night was packed full of laughter and it reminded me how lucky I am to have friends like them.

 

SEALED WITHIN THE PAGES



I suppose its quite a cliché to start a book post with 'I love to read and don't remember a time in which I didn't' no matter how true that cliché is, so I shall start another way...

 

Old books, those are my favourite. The one's that you need to handle carefully in fear they will fall apart. The one's where you need to blow the layer of dust that has gathered upon it before being able to open the front cover. And of course there's the smell, that glorious smell only old books have. I must admit I'm quite a fan of the oldies. But what I love more than an old forgotten book is when that old book has a handwritten sentiment in it. A lovely moment sealed within the pages.

1. Han's Christian Anderson's Fairy Tales, found in a charity shop in Carlisle.

2. Enid Blyton's The Mountain of Adventure, found in a vintage book shop in Tynemouth.

3. Enid Blyton's The Ship of Adventure, found in a vintage book shop in Tynemouth

A LITTLE NOTE ON HAPPINESS

Happiness... it's a bit of a strange one. There will be times when I think to myself 'in this moment right now, I feel completely and undoubtedly happy' and of course there will be other moments where I won't be so happy, and thankfully these times are just 'moments'. Recently I've been thinking quite a lot about happiness and in particular my happiness.

 

If your new to my blog then you might not know that I'm currently study Fine Art at University, however the course I'm doing is a Foundation Degree. A Foundation Degree is the first two years of any University course, you have the option at the end of the second year to keep it at a Foundation Degree or you can do a top up year which will bring it to a BA Degree. Anyway the point I was making is I have a lot of thinking to do as to what my next move is and where do I want to be in a few years time? and of course the biggest question of all what the hell am I doing with my life? 

 

After a good chat with my dad, it came to my attention that very few people have their dream job but that doesn't necessarily make them any less happier than a person who does. I think the point I'm trying to make is life doesn't always work out the way you plan, and that's ok. You may have a job that you hate but the people you work with are the people you couldn't quite live without. I'm beginning to think you don't need to love your job or enjoy it to be happy.



I FEEL INSPIRED

*Sigh* Where to begin? So I haven't posted anything in a while, and there is a very good reason for that in fact there are many. To cut a very long and frustrating story short, the course I had applied to do at university has been cancelled because you need a minmum of 10 students to do the course we have 8, despite telling my art lecturer (the guy who is running the course) he only needed a minimum of 7. I will spare you the details because its complicated and frustrating (unless you would like to hear them, let me know). It was all basically about Bums on seats and the bloody goverment. (surprise surprise)

But things seemed to have turned around and I am now doing a course that is very similar to the one I would've been doing and I will finish at the same point as I would've, doing the other course (does that make sense, read it aloud that will help). The only very annoying thing is I found all this out on Wednesday so the 11th of September and when was the course suppose to start, oh yeah the 16th 

-_-

The new course doesn't start until either the 1st or 8th of October, but I'm at that point that I want to go back. So, no doubt my blog will be getting a lot of attention. I have lots of posts planned and a couple of DIYs in the works.

What I found strange about this whole thing is when I first heard about it all, I felt incredaibly defeated and disheartened (few other things have contributed to this feeling) but all of a sudden I've have got this new energy a new a lease on life in a sense. I feel strong, I feel like

 "You know what this is what I want to do, you put up walls I'll knock them down."

I feel inspired.

And as I felt inspired I did this little doodle/sketch

xo

I was just going to keep this blog just for my artwork, so let me know if you liked this 'lifestyle' post.