Hello, lovely bloggers! Today, I turned 18 years old! It hasn't quite hit me that I'm now officially considered an 'adult'. Despite always being a bit of an old soul, it's quite strange to think that from here on out, I'm very much transitioning through the stage of my life titled 'Growing Up'. This year, I'll be headed to university and will be having lots of new experiences that no doubt go hand in hand with leaving home and living with new people. It's gonna be a pretty big, exciting year for me (I hope!) and I can't wait.
I've had a lovely day today, mostly spending it with family as I still have mock exams tomorrow and Tuesday (very, very sad times!) I was spoilt with cards and money which is officially being put aside for my new camera fund! On top of that, I was treated to a few lovely items of clothing from my very generous mum, which is always lovely! I snagged a few items from ASOS, which will no doubt be making an appearance on the blog soon. However, the things which totally made my day were...
EDIT:
(By the way, I finally joined the Instagram-party a few years late... @chloetamxo)
A satchel from The Leather Satchel Co., as well as a Google Nexus 7!!! (I'm actually writing from the Nexus now, which is very cool! Though I can't seem to upload some photos from here, so I guess this post will have to be photo-less!) Anyway, these were such unexpected gifts from my aunty and uncle - and I'm absolutely in love with them both! So, it's needless to say that I feel very spoilt today! I'm also gonna be celebrating my birthday with my friends next weekend at Handmade Burger Co. as I've still got mocks at the moment, so that should be really lovely, since it's kind of like prolonging my birthday for another week!
Anyway, just wanted to check in and let you all know I had a really lovely birthday! Turning 18 feels like a massive milestone and I'm extremely excited for what this year will bring!
Chloe. X
Admittedly, I'm a little late to the '2013 recap slash resolution blog post' party this year, but better late than never, eh!
2013 was a funny old year, with plenty of ups, downs & everything in between. It was the year that I turned seventeen and started learning how to drive (and consequently realised just how bad I really am at driving). In 2013, I also completed my AS levels, which in itself was one of the most stressful few weeks of my life. Coming out of a couple of my Maths exams in tears was definitely not a good start. However, upon reflection, my exams did actually go a bit better than I thought - I came out with 4 As at the end of it! It was the year of a wonderful summer, during which I was a bridesmaid at my aunty's wedding and spent a lovely few days in Oxford. It was also the year that I travelled to London with some of my closest friends and saw some amazing musicians at Summer Stampede. I went to Thorpe Park for the first time and was able to satisfy the (unexpected) adrenaline junkie in me, which was soooo much fun. I saw all of my extended family over the summer too, which was really lovely. I also embarked on the difficult, stressful journey that is applying to university, which I didn't feel ready for at all! I got offers from LSE, UCL and Bristol, which was amazing -- but also experienced some disappointment from being rejected from Oxford. And though I'm in danger of sounding very cheesy right now, I definitely think that there was a very important lesson in there somewhere -- that rejection is okay and it is something that you have to learn to move on from. I enjoyed many incredible times with family and friends - both old and new. All in all though, it was a really fantastic year and I feel very fortunate for all the fond memories that I have.
So there is my little recap of 2013! Now, I suppose 'tis the season to make resolutions and try to stick to them. Though of course they tend to be forgotten about rather early into the new year, but we can always kid ourselves, right?
Anyway, here is what I plan to try and do in 2014:
Work harder - at friendships, at school and at bettering myself. Laugh more. Do more reckless, spontaneous things. Try my best. Act my age - (i.e. stop wasting my life away acting more serious and grown-up than my almost-18-years-of-age warrant). Write more. Draw more. Make use of that Moleskine book that sits untouched in my bag. Never stop trying to be a better person. Try new things. Be healthier, drink more water, exercise more (repeat & fade)... Learn to deal with criticism and failure and rejection. Smile more. Make an effort. Take more photos and continue to document my life on a more regular basis. Be less judgmental. Be more willing to step out of my comfort zone. Grow in confidence. Grow as a person. Grow. Be myself. Be happy. Be.
2014 is going to be a pretty important year for me. I'll be turning 18 in January, finishing compulsory education for good in May, completing the most important exams of my life thus far this summer, hopefully going to Taiwan with my family and most importantly... Starting university! So the above resolutions will be particularly important this year!
^^^ Obligatory 'Asian' selfie wearing my mum's Christmas jumper. ^^^
^^^ My friend's beautiful Christmas tree! ^^^
John Lennon in the background says "HEY. HAPPY NEW YEAR!"
In other news, I'm now back at school and *trying* to work hard for my upcoming mock exams next week. It's been lovely to catch up with friends over the past few days, though I really had forgotten how tiring school was. Definitely catching up on my sleep this weekend. Also, birthday plans are now in the works & I can't wait to celebrate with my friends in a few weeks time! Can't believe that I turn 18 in a mere few days - I don't feel nearly old enough!
Hope you're all well and enjoying January!
Chloe. X
Is it really 2nd January 2014 already?! Where did 2013 go?! I know that once I go back to school, it'll take quite some time getting used to writing "2014" on the top line of my work! 2013 was a pretty crazy year, for lots of different reasons! On the whole though, it was pretty fantastic. I'm gonna try my best to crank out a recap of 2013 post sometime soon! (Hopefully before this month is over - apologies for my erratic & sparse blog posts!)
I've been on my Christmas holidays since 20th December and it has been a pretty relaxed holiday this year. Christmas & New Year were fairly chilled, mostly spent with family which was nice, since I don't really get to see them enough these days. Also, a while back, I did some suitably Christmassy things like ice skating with my friends!!! There is a new
outdoor ice rink in Birmingham which we'd wanted to try out, so after
some persuasion & coaxing of reluctant friends, we made a trip
to the ice rink one Friday after school. Having only been ice skating a
few times a few years ago, I was incredibly rusty when I first got onto
the rink. However, my childhood days of rollerblading came in handy and I
soon managed to make my way round the rink without any assistance! Ice
skating is so so so fun and it is one of my absolute favourite pastimes
-- but the best thing about it is definitely watching your friends fall
all over the place! Alongside that, I also recently celebrated my friend's birthday by taking a trip to the Electric Cinema in Birmingham to watch Mary Poppins! The Electric is a really lovely, old school cinema with the comfiest sofas I've ever sat on!!! It was a really lovely day out & then we all went back to my friend's house for some more celebrating. It's so so so crazy to think that I've known my friend, Gabi, for six and a half years now -- I still remember going to her 12th birthday in Year 7, after first meeting each other at the start of secondary school! It's so crazy how time flies & we've now celebrated her 18th birthday! Makes me feel all nostalgic for my 'youth' (haha). (Some would argue I'm still in my youth, but y'know.) :-)
So this holiday has been very, very relaxing. I have spent literally every day sleeping in very late & watching films all day, every day. I'm a sucker for Christmas television, so have been using my lack of January module exams as an excuse to do nothing all day (though I do actually have mocks coming up... But they don't really count, right? Right?) I'm now slightly regretting my laziness since I go back to school on Tuesday and I'm now going to have to cram all my schoolwork into these last few days. But... YOLO? (No, I don't think I can pull that off either!) Also, along with the copious amount of television, I've also been eating myself silly on most days. My mum's insanely generous friend sent us a Christmas Cartwright & Butler hamper from Harrods! So I've appointed myself the very stressful job of 'sampling' all the various foods: waffles, jams, biscuits, cake, etc. On the topic of food, I also baked some rocky road, which I previously made way back in March & shared on the blog here & brought it all into school on the last day! So I would say that this past holiday has definitely been a triumph in the food department - always a sign of time well spent, in my opinion. ;-)
^^^ Ice skating! ^^^
^^^ Harrod's Christmas hamper ^^^
^^^ 1. The Electric cinema; 2. Friends; 3. Festive bull!; 4. Beautiful handmade Christmas card from my pen pal, Shana ^^^
So those are just a few photos that I couldn't resist sharing! I've got a few more coming up in my next post, where I will hopefully look back on 2013, as well as share some of my New Year resolutions!
Hope you all had a lovely Christmas & New Year!
Chloe. X
P.S. I've been super super super obsessed with The Shins lately. Listen to 'New Slang', it it such a brilliant song. Have been listening to it all holiday. On repeat. All day, every day.
