Bumper Friday Favourites: 14th October 2016.
Friday Favourites 14.10.16
Idk about you but it seems like AGES I wrote the last one of these and that was just a three part mini one (catch up here.) This week seems to have gone on forever and I have been manically busy. I'm still catching up on work from before I went away and whilst I did a little bit of blog scheduling and social media when I was away, on the whole I took a break and now I'm paying for it.
On the plus side I have a whole head full of ideas for illustrated products to sell this Christmas which I hope will go live at the beginning of November so if you all just want to buy all my current stock so I can finance the loveliest of product ranges that'd be great. Thanks pals.
1. Wrexham.
Obviously. I am going to have to separate why I loved my 3 days away in Wrexham so much because this would be the longest paragraph ever. A 300 mile round trip for 48 hours away in Wrexham might admittedly not be everybody's cup of tea but for me, it's something I do about 3 times a year and something I look forward to every time. In case you're new here (hi pals) I went to university in Wrexham and the reason I go back is to visit my friends who are all spread out the coast of North Wales and I don't get to see very often. I always stay in a hotel in town with Tania and we always do roughly the same thing and we bloody love it. It's a tradition only a year old but we have a lot of fun and this time I also got to celebrate my birthday 10 days early which is always a bonus.
2. My Early Birthday.
We'd been planning on going back to Wrexham at the end of September/beginning of October for a while so when we booked it 10 days before my 24th birthday we decided to go for an extra day and make a celebration out of it. My friends were utter babes and I got two goody bags fulllll of presents which I did open cos lol what's an early birthday without presents but when I got home my parents nicked it and said I couldn't have them again until Monday. Yes, I did say I was turning 24. Tania was an absolute angel and even baked me a cake which she decorated and managed to transport from Manchester to Wrexham safely and was put behind the counter in Frankie & Bennys to bring out with the music and the singing and surprise me. Sadly F&B were utter bells and FORGOT so we had to go back the next day and collect it. They didn't even apologise. I managed to get it home in one piece too and it was uhhhhmazing.
3. Chester Zoo.
Being in university in Wrexham means being about a junction down the road from Cheshire and Chester Zoo takes about half an hour if that. I went every year I was living there and we decided to go back for my birthday last Thursday. We picked Jonny up in the morning and went to the shops for a picnic followed by a Frankie & Bennys breakfast (much better than the cake situation). The zoo wasn't too busy because of the time of year and it was cold but sunny and we had SUCH a good time. We went to the Islands area of the zoo which wasn't open last time I went and it was soooo cute. It's not actually that great in terms of animals, there aren't a lot and you can't see them very well but I expect that'll come when it's a bit more mature. The best part about it though is a go on the little boats they have which was soooo relaxing and a welcome break for our feet. My Instagram grid is definitely reaping the benefits.
4. Primark Haul.
There is no tradition better than a trip to Primark when in Wrexham. Me and Tania specifically didn't go shopping for about a month before we went so we had lots of goodies to buy. I nabbed the usual suspects; jewellery, makeup, stationery, socks etc etc but I also made more considered decisions on clothing. In Primark I (like most I expect) have a tendency to just grab at things I like and chuck them in the basket but this time I genuinely thought about them. I sized up in items I wanted oversized or expect were a bit small, I went a size down in tops that looked a bit baggy and I thought about what would go with clothes I already own. The only thing I got wrong was I sized up in a pair of jeans because the last few I bought have come up small but they are insanely baggy round the waist-nothing a good belt can't fix and a bit of a boost for the ego too. Cute. I got A LOT of jumpers and knitted items and the cutest hat ever so I'm going to be veryyyy cosy for Winter.
5. My Pals.
Undoubtedly the best part of Wrexham is catching up with my loves, my besties, my fellow illustrators and graphic designers. As always I spent the majority of my time with Tania and Jonny but we also managed an evening catching up with our fellow graduates. Honestly it's the type of people you get together with after a year of seeing eachother and laugh your tits off like you've never been away that mean something in life. I had such a lovely evening so thank you to everyone who travelled to come and see us.
6. The Study Room.
I mentioned this briefly last week and a little bit in another Friday favs a few weeks back but I thought it deserved mentioning again. The Study Room London is an online community for creatives (amongst about 2423894783 other things) and Lucinda got in touch with me way back asking if I'd do a spotlight interview which I did and it went live last week. You can read it here and have a nosey at the freebie bullet journal organiser printables I designed for them which are available to download! And if that wasn't enough Lucinda is also my guest blogger for October and her piece for me will be going live next week. Honestly it's been a joy to work with The Study Room London and long may our little relationship continue!
7. IKEA.
On the whole it's been a pretty quiet week for me and my niece. Normally we do something exciting and I get to talk about it on here but this week we've played at home and been to Mothercare to buy a carseat and whilst enjoyable, not really blog worthy. Luckily on Wednesday we went to IKEA which is always worth reporting on. My niece is just 16 months old but she has already learned to appreciate IKEA as much as I do. Admittedly I enjoy it more for the interiors and homeware bargains and she enjoys it because there are 294083298573856 beds and sofas to jump on but we can work on that. We were there a loooong time because I'm not even exaggerating when I say she wanted to try every single bed and armchair but she was so cute it didn't even matter. She asked to get up, she asked to get down, she said please and ta when we gave her things, she named the panda and the camel toy and shouted NAIN* every two minutes to show her something. Oh and she ran through the desk section with her eyes closed shouting RUNNNINGGGGGGGG. She's adorbs.
*Nain is a Welsh name for grandmothers and is what my niece calls my Mum, it's pronounced like NINE which makes teaching her counting to 10 very difficult.
8. My Etsy Store.
Yesss I finally after a year of selling am opening my Etsy store worldwide and offering International postage so now all you non UK loves can have a slice of what's in my shop too which I'm made up about. I have a head full of ideas for Christmas products which will launch at the beginning of November so keep your beady eyes peeled for that!
Shop my Etsy (and get a sneaky 20% off with international20 too!)
9. My Birthdayyyyy.
Happy Birthday to meee, happy birthday to meeeeee. It's my birthday weekend! I want to say I'll be taking a break from social media for the weekend to chill and enjoy especially as Joss has 5 rare days off but in reality, what's the chances of that? I am addicted. I do have blog posts scheduled though by some miracle so whilst I might be browsing Insta, I won't be doing any work. Blissful. Till next week when I realise I've taken off too many days and now my To Do list is 100 items long.
Have a gorgeous weekend cherubs!