Thank you...

Thursday November 28th 2013. Today is Thanksgiving, in the USA and Canada. Traditionally celebrated on the fourth and last Thursday of the month, the holiday was originally a harvest festival and is now an opportunity for people to spend time with their families and those they love, share food and appreciate what they are grateful and thankful for in their lives. Or if your name is Joey or Monica, to shove a giant uncooked turkey onto your head... oh Friends references. Of course many people take issue with Thanksgiving, arguing that, as it is essentially a holiday celebrating the destruction of Native American people and their homes and communities, its a bit ridiculous, hypocritical and insensitive of everyone else to spend the day roasting turkeys, consuming pumpkin pies and watching football games and parades. I think this is probably true to a certain extent, but at its heart I think Thanksgiving is a really lovely idea. If you can ignore the aspects that you may personally disagree with, and enjoy the spirit of it: being grateful for what is good in your life, and appreciating how lucky you are, then there are a lot of benefits to be found.

Its quite sad that we don't celebrate in the UK. In my opinion we could all do with feeling grateful a bit more often. I know I spend so much time thinking about the future, the things I wish would happen, the things I want, the expectations I have, that I barely ever take the time to think about what is good about right now, in the present. Not to sound incredibly cheesy and annoying, but we are all pretty lucky. Most people have roofs over their heads, families and friends who love them, exciting things to look forward to. I think its nice to spend a day enjoying those things rather than obsessing over everything we could potentially do or have at some unspecified time in the future. To be honest the worst things I have to worry about are not life threatening or even that bad at all: getting a job, trying to learn enough to pass my A-levels, hopefully going to university. And although everyday life gets boring and stressful, and November is a horrible month, and getting out from under your duvet in the morning is a challenge and sometimes you just have a bad day, thinking about all the good things about life is the best way to make yourself feel happy again.

 

I'm happy that Christmas is now less than a month away. I'm grateful for my bed being really warm and snuggly so I can hide from the world with cups of tea when I'm feeling ill. I'm thankful for all the stuff that I love that makes me happy, like all the covers of Love is on the Radio with Carrie and Giovanna. And this Taylor Swift song. And just for YouTube in general and Twitter and the fact that I have lots of blogs to read. And Rookie and Humans of New York for making me feel better about humanity. I'm excited for all the things I have planned for the next couple of months. I'm happy that I watched this video earlier today and that it gave me the idea to write this. (I'm also thankful for lots of the same things... Harry Potter, socks, tea and coffee, just to name a few.) And make up. I'm very grateful to whoever invented mascara and concealer and bronzer and all the other stuff that means when I get basically no sleep I don't have to look like an actual zombie, despite feeling like one.

What are you thankful for today? Happy Thanksgiving!

An Open Letter To Sleep.

Dear Sleep,

Although we haven't ever been the best of friends - in fact we haven't been very close since I was old enough to refuse to be put to bed - I hope we can work this out between us. I'm sure I slept properly as a baby and even when I was little. Its just since then that we've struggled.

Because I do love you, sleep. I love having a long lazy lie in, when you know you have absolutely no reason to drag yourself out of bed before lunchtime. I love falling into bed - the rare nights when this happens - exhausted, drifting off as soon as my head hits the pillow, worn out from a busy day or a run. Its just all the other times that we don't get on - I'm too busy for you, too distracted, stressed or having too much fun to bother with you.

I don't know who's fault it is for our disagreements either. I spend too much time ignoring you and pay too much attention to other things - my laptop for one. My phone is another, Facebook, Twitter - all to blame for our relationship being slowly destroyed. And we definitely haven't spent as much time together since I started my A-levels. However, you haven't ever been that nice to me. I can lie in bed for hours on end and my eyelids won't so much as feel heavy, let alone close. You can keep me awake until 1 or 2 am when you know I have to get up early the next day.

But I'm sorry, sleep. Can you forgive me? If I promise to make the effort to spend more time with you and make you a priority in my life, not an afterthought, will we be able to get along again? Because I honestly need you: I function much better when we are friends, my eyes feel clearer, my brain is less foggy and I don't feel like I'm going to die when someone asks me a question about the French Revolution. I eat much healthier when I'm not deprived of you and I don't find myself craving chocolate to stop me being snappy or Red Bull and coffee simply to keep me awake all day. I'm a lot nicer to be around as well, after a good night's sleep I won't be moody, stroppy or grumpy to anyone - except if they're reeeaaalllyy annoying.

I think we should stop fighting each other now and try to get along. And for once, I am actually feeling sleepy before 1 am. So I'm going to make the most of this and put my PJs on now, turn off my laptop and curl up in my bed. Before getting up tomorrow morning at 5.30 am. I might cry.

Wish me luck.
x

My love for magazines...

I have a confession to make. While as someone hoping to do a degree in English Literature, if she manages to pass her A-levels, and someone who started a blog to have somewhere to write about all the movies she (supposedly) watches, you might assume that reading a book or watching When Harry Met Sally for the sixth time would be quite high up on my list of things to waste my time doing. However, for the last two weeks all I have wanted to do - every time I finish an exam - is get home and read a magazine. I think they're starting to recognise me in my local shop now because every time I go in its either for chocolate - who can possibly revise without chocolate, be serious? - or Elle, Vogue, Company, or any other magazine I can find.

Anything with glossy pages, shiny adverts, beautiful pictures. I want interviews with Cara Delevingue, or Kate Moss, fashion editorials of clothes inspired by The Great Gatsby, beaded flapper dresses, headbands, feathers. I want to read about what eyshadow I should be buying, even if it costs £19 rather than £2.50, and I have only set foot into Mac once and left because the 500 different shades of lipstick scared me. I want to tear out pictures of models in fairy-tale, princess dresses, in photo shoots set in snowy woodlands to stick to my bedroom walls.

I want free samples of foundations and moisturisers I would never actually buy, glued between pages of adverts and articles about hair products. I want the free gift that you get with the magazine - whether its a Benefit mascara or a travel size conditioner that smells of coconut and summer.

I love reading about the people who live the lives we would all secretly love to have. The parties on millionaires yachts, holidays to glamorous islands with secret beaches, St Barts, the Caribbean, Ibiza and Hawaii. You can almost imagine yourself to be lying in the sunshine, picturing blue skies and golden sands, enjoying a gentle breeze from the ocean and the palm trees, drinking cocktails and wearing a sparkling designer bikini and sunglasses that don't come from Primark.

There's nothing wrong with a bit of escapism, especially in this grey English excuse for a summer.

Growing My Hair

"Long Hair Don't Care."

This is one of those quotes that I see all over Twitter all the time and have to pretend I have a clue what people are talking about when they use it. I also have suspicions that those people who do say it don't really know what they mean either.... However, it seemed an appropriate starting point to this post: I don't have long hair yet and I really REALLY do care. About that fact. Also about other things - mainly how to make it grow faster. This is a slightly random topic, but it's something that's been on my mind more than usual lately. In fact it's becoming a bit of an embarrassing obsession. I feel like I spend half my day looking at my hair in the mirror, pulling it straight so that it looks that all important half-inch longer and generally driving everyone around me mad. I saw a quote someone posted to Twitter lately which I can't remember exactly but was something along the lines of: "The biggest mistake in a girl's life will always be that one time she cut her hair short." Oh wait, I found it: Here's a cheeky screen shot. Is it bad that I actually have no idea who this is or why I follow an account named BoobsOnBlonde??



PREACH.

Whether or not you agree with this, it certainly struck a chord with me, and judging from the amount of retweets, clearly a lot of other people felt the same way. Like most little girls, when I was really young I had that typical bob with a fringe from the ages of about four to six, at which point I think I started growing it longer. I've seen pictures and when I was that age it did honestly look quite cute - although I've not forgiven my parents for dressing me in a kilt and a matching bobble hat. WE'RE NOT EVEN SCOTTISH - what were they thinking?!?! Anyway, I honestly have no idea why, at the age of about 11, when my hair was actually a reasonable mid-back sort of length, to chop it all off again. Any people lucky enough to have seen my stunning Year 7 school photo will agree with me here - I look ridiculous. I then went through a phase of growing it and then cutting it short again for the next few years and also had a fringe from some of this time. I also discovered hairdye - so hey there, split ends, welcome to my life. Please move in, stick around and basically ruin the condition of my hair.

Throughout Year 10 and 11 I coloured my hair about five or six times, sometimes with friends to help and sometimes (more messily!) by myself. My hair at prom was a dark-red and in mid-length (for me) curls with a fringe and at the time I absolutely loved it. It helped that by that point I had found my amazing hairdresser who is literally the only person I have ever felt comfortable with cutting my hair and has been so full of helpful advice when it comes to growing it - mainly: Don't just stop ever having it cut. She also said: Don't bleach it, but I conveniently managed to forget that one and yeah, I tried out the dipdye look - don't judge me. I've learned my lesson and will not be bleaching it again any time soon - until I'm willing to have a good inch at least trimmed from the ends. I liked it at the time, but the main problem with bleach (as probably I should have thought about first - duh) is not even so much that it damages it at the time, but as its weakened the structure, the damage done to it by blow-drying and other heat styling as well as general day-to-day wear and tear has so much more impact.

Anway, for the last couple of months to a year, I have been, sometimes slowly, and sometimes really, really slowly, growing out my hair. This process isn't exactly fun: the awkward stage between a bob and my shoulders is thankfully over now, but the whole thing is giving me flashbacks to primary school. It's mainly growing out the fringe that is painfully slow. I loved my fringe but I'm bored of it now and the problem I can't just click my fingers and be rid of it... I wish! At the moment my hair isn't exactly what you would call long, but it's no longer short so that's something. My goal is waistlength... I can dream.This will probably take me several years and that's being optimistic so for now I'll settle with being happy with shoulder blade length. It's officially past my shoulders now even when dry so only a few more inches to go.

 

My haircare routine is probably pretty much the same as many other teenage girls. I don't do anything remotely special and tend to use whichever brand of shampoo is lying around our bathtub. My routine does also include using a couple of products that I swear have saved the life - or at least salvaged the condition - of my poor hair. One is a VO5 miracle oil as well as a VO5 Frizz Free Blow Dry Creme. Not only do these products smell amazing, they make your hair soft and managable even after drying and curling/straightening etc. They provide really good heat protection as well. The other main things I do are focus on mainly using repair and protect type conditioners such as anything of this type by John Frieda or Tresemme. I'm lucky in that these are the brands my mum tends to stock up on but the rest of the products I use I buy for myself.

There are also a couple of tips I've discovered that have really helped with this process, mainly from beauty blogs and magazines, so I thought I would post my own version on here and explain what has worked for me.

1) The first, and most important, is to treat your hair as if its very delicate and fragile. You want the growth that's appearing now (if you're trying to grow it) to still be strong and healthy when it becomes the ends. The length of time this takes will depend on how fast your hair grows but in any case, taking good care of your hair and getting regular trims is definitely the most beneficial thing you can do to improve the condition. You can do this by:

- Washing your hair gently. Don't scrub at it, just shampoo gently. Then wring as much water as possible out of your hair before applying conditioner. Concentrate on the ends, otherwise the roots can get greasy faster if over-conditioned. Combing through with a fine toothed comb at this point is a really good idea to remove tangles as well, although I don't know whether this works for every hair type.

- I always squeeze my hair to dry it and avoid "rubbing" with the towel with can cause damage. Wet hair is delicate and prone to breakage. When it 70% dry with the towel I comb with a wide toothed comb, find my parting and apply a little oil or serum to the ends, followed by blow dry creme all over. I give the products a few minutes to sink in and seal the cuticle before blow drying. If I feel that my hair is over-heated or getting dried out during this, I spritz on more heat protect, usually from a spray. You should always do this before heat styling as well and, in my opinion, its best to buy a cheaper brand and use a lot more spray as its essential to your hair remaining healthy as well looking gorgeous.

- Finally, don't overbrush your hair, as this can actually do more harm than good. Personally, I give it a quick brush every morning and again in the evening. I also sleep with it in a plait, if I remember, to prevent it getting tangled. If I know I have time to wash it in the morning I will apply a bit of oil to the ends before plaiting it.

2) Eat well, as your hair ( like your skin and nails) is one of the best ways to reflect the health of the rest of your body. Your hair needs certain minerals and vitamins to keep it strong and although you can get these by taking supplements, if you consume them in the form of fruits and vegetables you get all the other benefits, such as fibre, etc. as well as the fact that they are delicious. ALthough I have never eaten an oyster in my life, I eat a lot of other things on this list, such as carrots, green vegetables and whole grains, and my hair does grow quite quickly so there could be something in this. Healthy fats, like in salmon and nuts, are also good for hair.

3) Drink water. Drink water even when you are not thirsty. One thing one of my dance teachers always told us was that if you are thirsty, you're already dehydrated. Just keep drinking water all the time, especially when you exercise. Your hair will look so much better for it. And then, apparently this is the kind of growth you can be looking at in three to four years.

YAY!

I just quickly want to say before I end this post that I am in no way at all an expert and to be honest you might be better off not listening to anything I say. I just wanted to talk about what has worked for me. I'm not being entirely serious when I say don't listen though - seriously, vegetables are good for you :D What are your thoughts on ways to get your hair to grow faster? Please leave any comments below! xoxo

*Also, none of these pictures are mine - I basically stole them from tumblr.*

My Thoughts About Running

I'm going to be real with you guys. For the first 17 years of my life I was the girl who would have rather died than run anywhere. PE lessons were torture and if anyone said the words "gym" or "treadmill" in my earshot I would probably laugh out loud. Yeah, I don't run. That was my thing. But over the last few weeks and months of my life I've been running. Voluntarily. Some a quick mile and a half in 20 minutes and one or two for a good hour or more. I'm starting out slowly and this may not seem like a lot to anyone who's more experienced but please don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that these hours (and they're stacking up) that I'm spending on the run are changing my life. Within the first three weeks I sped up, I got breathless in 10 minutes rather than 1 and my thighs actually did look slimmer. Who knew? And the longer I do it for and the faster I run, the more I love it. Its nice thinking that if there was ever someone chasing me (because, you know, my life is SO like a superhero movie) I might have a chance of getting away in one piece.

So far my running kit extends to leggings and about eight layers of vests, t-shirts and hoodies - I live in the south of England and according to our weather forecast today, its going to continue being about -5 for several more days. It is so cold that when I ran today I felt like my face was being sliced up with knives made of ice. So put it this way, I'm not exactly worrying about sweating just yet. The one thing I really like about what I wear to run in is my sports bra. Yeah, I actually went out and spent like £11 buying this thing that I picked out because it was purple and I thought it would look cute with this black top I already had. It is honestly the best about-£11 I have ever spent because its the most comfortable piece of clothing ever. Sometimes I have to stop myself wearing it just to wear trackies and watch TV because normally when I do that I start eating ice-cream or something and I feel that that would be wrong and offend the concept of "sports"-bras. Basically its great and the best place to buy one if you don't have one is TK Maxx. That's where I got mine and its cheap.. Properly cheap - they have real weights and yoga mats and stuff for like £5, as well as all the cute dresses and jeans that will look so much better on you after you buy the workout things as well. (I think that's how they're marketing them...?)

My second, or possibly joint number one, favourite thing about running is music. I have spent more time over the last few weeks downloading music than I thought was possible while having time to sleep and stuff. And I can say that the best time to listen to Beyonce is definitely while you're running. Its probably even better if you're running in a storm or maybe just in the rain - I haven't got round to that yet though, but I don't know why, it just seems like it would be more dramatic. And dramatic running is always fun, you can pretend that you're in the music video to your favourite song (does anyone else do this?!) and run past cars that have to sit and wait at traffic lights like HAHAHA. Its so great. Like: "My legs are beating your very expensive-looking car because you have to stop there until a little coloured light changes! That can't stop me - I'm free! I'm free like the wind!" is basically what goes through my head. I now have about seven different running playlists and when I'm bored at any point in my day I just make a new one and plan in my head where I'm going to be running when a song comes on. Its only slightly taking over my life. And if I could give one tip to anyone thinking of starting out, not that I'm qualified to do this in any way, it would be run to something fast and don't keep pausing to skip songs - just have a long playlist of fast ones, with motivational lyric type ones thrown in for once you get past about half an hour. Either that or: plan your route. Because if you're easily confused, like me, you can end up going round in circles and not really being sure where to go. If you have a route in your head that you know is roughly a mile or three miles or however far you want to go, its honestly so much easier. And then if you want to go further, you just run it again. Easy-peasy.

The next best thing about running is (not the actual moving your feet part - we'll get to that) but the eating. Obviously not while you're running, although if that did become possible it could improve it even more. Just kidding, I am of course referring to the fact that you now have a certain number of extra calories you can consume in a day absolutely guilt-free. Or you could choose to not replace these calories and then lose weight, but who's going to do that, right? 2 mile run, burn 250 calories, enjoy your cupcake, ice cream, pizza, whatever your junk food of choice may be and you don't have to feel bad about it at all. Need motivation to run further? Just think about all the Doritos you can eat later and you will feel unstoppable. Have I convinced you yet?

Okay, I said we'd get to the moving your feet part. This is obviously for some people (me) where it gets harder and a bit less fun. But the way I have found to actually force myself to do it is by not thinking about it. For example: its 7pm, I've been to dance, come home and had noodles and stir fried vegetables or something for dinner and am probably sat on the sofa watching Keeping Up With The Kardashians. Ad-break comes on. My brain: "Hmmm maybe I should go for a run?" Body: "Okay." *Gets up, goes upstairs, changes into running stuff, grab ipod, water, doorkey, etc. Press play on running playlist and just walk out of the house.* Then at some point, normally about a song and a half in, I just start running because I realise I look stupid looking like I'm going for a run when really I'm strolling along at a normal person-going-for-a-walk pace. And then I just run until I can't breathe. Stop, drink water and repeat, cutting out the walking as much as possible. It literally involves no brain power at all, which is sometimes a really nice refreshing break from attempting to study for A-levels (those notoriously brain power requiring things we have to do...)



My life is also made a lot easier by the fact that the ipod I have ( a nano or something, I'm not really sure, its small and square if that's any clue...?) has a fitness app pre-installed which is so useful at counting all your miles, times and calories for you. It has a little clip on it which I don't use because its annoying so I just stuff it in my sports bra - what, its designed to hold stuff for you?! Don't judge me, I know you do it too. It actually makes me wonder how guys cope with running - like where do they keep things? Its a mystery to me. Anyway, back to the app...  It lists all your personal scores as well so you see how much you've improved and also shouts motivating things at you mid-run! Like "Get a move on, fatty!" (No, I made that one up.) They're more like "Five minutes to go!" or "You've done 1.5 miles!" I prefer mine though because that's what I shout at myself in my head. So that helps. I think its designed as an exercise ipod, which explains its ridiculously limited storage capacity. Like I need the entire Killers back catologue on there ipod, plus 500 million other things. Deal with it, okay! Fitness app, yep, that's another running essential.

The last thing I wanted to mention is the notorious "Runner's High." What is this mythical thing, I wondered to myself on my first run. And then I got home and got in a hot shower and sat down on my (tired) butt. Ohhhhhh now I get it. The best reason to run that I can possibly think of to give you is that it feels so incredible when you get to stop. I'm sure as I keep going and run further I might get to experience this feeling while I'm actually running (which would be a nice and weird thing to happen) but for now if this is as good as it gets I'll take it. I actually told my bed I loved it the other day, as I crawled in with my limbs aching after a 3.5 mile run, mostly up various hills (ouch, basically). MY BED?!?! That inanimate object well-known for its willingness to respond to spontaneous declarations of love - I'm clearly losing my mind. But I don't even care, because I saw my first ab the other day. I have an ab, you guys. I might even have two. That's it: I love running, I said it.

 

This Hellogiggles "Illustrated Tweet Of The Day"
just sums it up, am I right?

 

















So there you are! How a life-long run hater transformed herself into a run lover. Its official: I'm a convert to the incredible toning, stress-relieving powers and general amazing-ness of running. I'm aware that I'm only just at the very beginning, but remember that phrase a wise old Chinese philosopher or someone said: "A journey of 1,000 miles begins with a single step." Turns out that's true for running also, even if that step is only in the direction of the nearest TK Maxx in search of a snuggly purple sports bra. I also wanted to add - none of those pictures are of me: I do not run in shorts and I don't have cute, athletic shiny hair swishing everywhere. These pictures are lying to us. Nobody looks like that - I look like a sweaty tomato when I go running (remind why I'm sharing this with the internet?) but I still love it anyway and I hope you do too; if any of you lovely readers run? Do have any tips for me or anyone else - if so, you know what to do! xoxo

The Gorgeous Great British Bake-off!

Let's be honest, who among us hasn't been loving the dramatic, delicious and totally guilt-free pleasure of curling up on a Tuesday night to enjoy the most British TV show of them all, second only to Downton Abbey, but that's another post entirely...

I am of course, referring to the fact that this evening (sob) is the Grand Final of Series 3 of The Great British Bake Off. That's right, there will be no more Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood, no more John, James, Brendan, and after last weeks semi-final, no more of lovely unflappable Danny. No more cake catastrophes, flavour failures and meringue mishaps. What will we talk about on a Wednesday morning?



I think that's the main thing people have loved about this show. After the beautifully British events of the summer, it's filled the gap left by the Jubilee and the Olympics and given everyone something to remind us of our national talent: Keeping Calm and Carrying On. I've had in-depth discussions with friends about our favourite bakers, chats with customers at work about the merits of the Chelsea Bun over the humble Belgian and rambled on twitter about everything from brownies to bunting. After all, the show is blog paradise: cupcakes, cuteness and all set in the charming, if rainy British countryside. 

Last week was the semi-final or "Patisserie Week" and the bakers created an assortment of Petits Fours, Frasiere Cakes and Choux Gateaus. Some of their creations would have fitted in perfectly in a Parisian boulangerie and some required a certain stretch of the imagination, as did Mel and Sue's attempts at French accents. However, I haven't got over my favourite to win, Cathryn, being knocked out the week before week, although I found out she and the adorable Sarah-Jane have a blog together, yay! Still, no-one else on the Bake-Off can alliterate like Cathryn: "Doughnut doom," anyone? Anyway, these are some of this weeks results and personally I think they all look incredible. As usual, according to the judges there were some issues with awkward flavours, wobbly textures and "soggy bottoms," and John committed the cardinal sin of going over chocolately while Brendan's swans and James' chili, lime and raspberry macaroons went down a storm. My favourite were Danny's blackberry and peppermint ones, based purely on the irresistable appeal of anything that looks like an edible crayon.

Here are some of what the contestants produced this week - gorgeous right?

I've also discovered a surprising desire to learn how to make one of these. Wow right??

I can't wait for tonights episode! Who do you want to win? I hope its James and his lovely jumper collection or John, or anyone except Brendan :D

Jessica

xoxo