July favourites

Another month has past and I got a few favourites collected to share with you.

Book: F*ck! I’m in my twenties by Emma Koening. This book I got for my twentieth birthday this year, because it seemed appropriate. And I loved flipping through it, whenever I needed to wait for something or just felt like it, so much that it just took me a few hours to finish.

Udder cream: My skin has been so dry these past two months and nothing seemed to help and I tried everything we had, until we found udder cream somewhere hiding in our house. I though why not give it a try and it felt amazing, I almost heard my skin drinking al the moist that was in it (I swear I hear it slurp). My skin felt so much better and softer after the first try.

Candle holder: I always wanted a candle holder with a holder so you can carry it around, like you see in films about stories in the 18^th century, and I found one just in my home town in a cute shop full of second hand things.

Face mask: Dr. Van Der Hoog, Hypo sensitive. My skin was so dry, tight and sometimes even painful that I needed something to calm it down and bring back some life in it. I went to the shop and bought this one from Dr. Van Der Hoog to give it a try and I’m happy I did. It does exactly what it says it will and my skin feels more relaxed, less dry and definitely not that tight or painful anymore.

Something I never done Before

You might know from reading my Liebster award post, that the people I know (like friends and family) have never seen my blog or even know that I have a blog. And because I do want to share the thing I enjoy most with the people I love, I thought that my parents should be the first to have a look, because right now they are the only ones (together with my aunt) who know that I’m blogging and are very curious about it.

Of course I don’t want to just give them a link and be done with it, what I would like is to make a little present out of it.

This summer might be the last time we spent it the way we always did, together as a family, we all know that this year lots of things will change, I will move out, study, make friends and we don’t know how next year will look like. And that’s why I thought this would be a great time to give my parents the link to my blog, which they have been waiting for such a long time (I know they have). Like I said I wanted to make it a bit more like a present, so what I’m thinking of doing is to write it on the back of a card and give this card at the end of a day where we would have spent the entire day of having fun together as a family, perhaps at dinner.

Now I did limit my choice to just two cards, but I’m not sure which one I like more for this occasion. So if any of you have a suggestion on which one you like most, please let me know, because it would be very helpful. If you are wondering about what the first card says (it is in Dutch), it says: Lots of love (Veel liefs).

I feel so nervous about doing this, as I know how much of a big step this is. Also, I know my parents would appreciate it and probably be surprised about me getting these cards on my own and in such a spontaneous way. Even I am very surprised, I know what is the big deal right, well, I have never done such a thing before I used to stay home and not leave the house, last year I would be terrified to do this and therefore I would not have gone on a spontaneous trip to the store. This show how much I have grown this year and makes this present even a greater deal for my parents.

Chocolate Muffin

Yesterday it was my uncle's birthday, and I’ve been told he loves chocolate muffins, so I thought I bake him a couple. Because I loved the other recipe so much I customized it to a chocolate muffin recipe, basically the basics are just the same as the blueberry one.

I have to tell you I’m not a massive chocolate lover (I know, weird), but even I liked this muffin.


Preparation time: 30 min

Cooking time: 15-25 min

Serves: 12-13 muffins

Oven at 200° C/400 F

Ingredients:
-200g plain flour (1 & 2/3 cups)
-150g caster sugar (1 & 1/2 cups)
-1/2 tsp salt
-2 teaspoons baking powder
-75ml vegetable oil or just sunflower oil (1/3 cup)
-1 egg (or two small ones, like I did, our chickens don’t do big eggs)
-75ml milk (1/3 cup)
- 2 tbsp cocoa powder
- 1 small bag vanilla sugar
- Pure chocolate bar (add as much as you like)

Put all the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl, then mix these with a metal spoon. Now you can add the vegetable/sunflower oil, egg, milk and mix until you get a smooth consistency. Now you can get to be aggressive with the chocolate bar and “stab” the chocolate into small chunks and add and mix those pieces into the mixture.

The only things you're left to do are to divide the mixture between the muffin tins and wait for them to get ready in the oven. They should be ready in around 15 to 25 min (depends on your oven). You can check if they're ready by sticking a toothpick in one of the muffins and when nothing sticks to it they are done.

Before

and

After

I love the way they look so round when they come out of the oven, it’s ridiculous how excited I got when I first saw them coming out of the oven (oh the joy it gives me!).

Change

It’s official now, since a day, my life is going to change drastically at the end of August and the beginning of September. Of course, this isn’t the first change I have had on my life and this won’t be the last, but it’s the biggest one I had so far. My childhood will be officially over. I will be going to school again and this time for real, the last two years have been a waste, first choosing something I later found out was definitely not something for me and second my anxiety who had a hold on my life so big I couldn’t do anything. This time I will do something that is out of my comfort zone, which does frighten me. I will be educated to become a journalist if everything goes right at least, and I do look forward to this whole experience.

So first I will have an introduction of four days, where I don’t know what we will be doing or where it will find places and where I will be in a group of people I never met before. That is something that was already out of my comfort zone, but what I will be studying even more so, as you might know about me, I have social anxiety and that is probably making it a bit harder to go out and do the things journalist do. Now I’m not complaining or anything, it was my choice and I’m still standing for it. I really do feel excitement as well if I think about it, I mean there is a reason I have chosen for becoming a journalist, because something about this profession attracts me so much.

This is not the only change that is going to happen coming school year, I’m moving out my family home. So this means I’m looking very hard to find a place where I can live, if I don’t find one before September I will still move out of my family home only I will be living at my grandmothers until I do find a place, she lives a lot closer to where I will study.

All these changes lead to one thing, me having to grow up a little, I know that I will never be a real grownup, right?, I will have responsibility and by that I don’t mean doing chores at home, doing my homework or such I mean paying bills and taxes real grownup thing plus the chores and homework. But this is good, right? Because if nothing would ever change I would have to worry so much more (that would not be healthy) and I think I’m ready for this huge change to happen even though I’m scared and perhaps a little doubtful whether I can really do all of that, but I will find a way. I know I will.

　

Do more of what you love

Why is it that when I have a hobby, I still find hundreds of other things I think are more important and I decide to do them and forget about the thing I love doing. I know that I’m not alone in this, I already know a few people who do so and I do think there are a few of you who have the same problem, right? Or am I completely alone in this?

I noticed that I haven’t told you what the things I love doing most are, well the things I love doing are writing and drawing, there is just something in there that just makes the noise in my head quite down. I love creating a story by the pen and the inner peace I get (the fact there are no thoughts) when I’m drawing. So why I’m not doing this more, probably because I don’t give myself the time to do so. But the point of writing this post is telling about what is going to change. 

I’m going to write more! At least I’m going to try to get this done. First, I need a pretty notebook, which you see in the picture above, I got this one for my birthday from my brother, Peter, and am very happy with this. What is better than a fresh new notebook that is open to all sorts of stories, it’s like a new beginning with all its opportunities and possibilities and a bright new chance to become a brand new person (or am I now exaggerating? I just get overly excited whenever I receive a new notebook). The second thing I think is necessary if I want to achieve this goal of writing more is demand myself to write every day (or at least try to), even if it is just for one minute.

Of course, most of the writing will be just for myself, because I think most of it will be rubbish, but whenever I write something that I’m pretty pleased about I will share that with you, if anyone is curious about what it will do to effect this blog.

Is anyone of you struggle with finding the time or energy to do what you love most?
 

Life is too short to not have fun with your clothes

If you read some of my previous posts you would know that I’ve started to experiment with clothes or at least try to. I started to wear clothes or accessories that I would really like to wear, but they were out of my comfort zone and for a long time I was just scared to wear them, but the last month or so I made myself to do it and try not to think about it.

Because September will bring me a new year (life) with a new start. And because a new life will start for me, I would like to finally stop wearing my go to clothes (the ones that are saved and have no personality) and start creating my own style and try not to be as ashamed of myself. Only where do you start? Well, for me, I think I would start with collecting pictures with styles and clothes that inspire me and which I very much like. This wasn’t that hard at all, because I collect pictures for a couple a years now, which left me with hundreds of them. I did this because it used to help me fantasize about the person I would like to be most, I basically lived in my fantasy for years and now is a good time to get ad start my own real life. My blog is a place where I share bits and bobs of my life and I think this journey is definitely something I want to share here on my blog as well, so this is where it starts.

I do not remember where I got the pictures from anymore, I think this is bad, but I can’t do anything about it. They were just so many and I didn’t write where they have come from, but I wanted to make sure you know I didn’t make any of them they just inspire me and make me happy.

Dresses

Something there is about dresses, they can be worn in many different ways and are perfect for summer days, except when it’s very windy and your skirt wants to expose everything. These three dresses I once found on Pinterest and it was love at first sight.

Necklaces

Lately I feel a little bare on my chest and have the feeling something is missing. That something is a necklace. Of course, there had to be something triangle in here and that’s the last necklace, I love it. Another thing I really liked and I recently found out about is the necklace on the back like wearing by Cara Delevingne on this picture, I think, is a fun way of accessories your back when you wear something that exposes it. A necklace is something that finishes up a look I think.

Hats

I always had a thing about hats, I used to wear them a lot, but lately it’s a bit more difficult because I always have the feeling it’s such a big statement and probably I’m exaggerating a bit. I would love to have the confidence of wearing a hat again. The hat I’m most graving for at this moment is a big floppy hat and that probably shows in the pictures that I have here on display.

Cropped

Cropped tops have been something I already started to wear a lot these days, but some extra inspiration on how to wear them or the diversion of them and I couldn’t let them out of this post. I can’t help it, but I just love them so much.

Shoes

In one of my latest posts I told you about my lack of diversion in shoes and lack of sandals. Even on the search on them, I could only find two styles (but they really the same kind of style really) I liked, but I thought I share them with you anyway.

　

　

 

 

 

 

Thunderstorms

Doors wide open, sitting as close as we could, rain falling inside and touching my skin, wind roughly playing my hair while thunder moved the earth and lighting lighted the world. Mom telling my brother and me to smile, because we were being photographed by someone up there. Cooling the heat of the day down, hearing rain drop on the roof.

     The times where my Mom and Dad woke us up in the middle of the night to watch the thunderstorm in front an open door, on our terrace or in front a window with our pyjamas still on and only half awake with sleep in our eyes. It was like magic watching the lighting against the dark sky lighting our house and listen to the mighty thunder shaking the earth.

While others go inside to hide or even lock themselves up in their toilets, because they’re scared, we didn’t, we weren’t. We sat outside and enjoying it, we always have and probably always will. I must admit that when I was little I never understood it when friends told me they were scared of it, how could they be scared of something so beautiful, I enjoyed it from the first moment my family and I watched it together. For me it was and is one of those magical childhood memories you love and adore and will never ever forget. It still is one of the things I love most of life and it’s still as magical and special it once was.

This doesn’t mean I do not feel fear when I’m cycling or walking in an open area with me as the highest point while thunder is above me, I do know thunder and lightning brings danger and I could get struck by lightning (my mom and dad taught me that). But when I sit safely at home on our terrace, it relaxes me.

 

No shoes to wear!

Just to make clear! I do not walk around on my bare feet all day. My problem contains more in the variety of shoes, which is barely any. Just my all-stars and boots. And when I wear a cute dress I do not want to have to pair them with either my all-stars or boots, don’t understand me wrong, I do love my all-starts and boots, but sometimes when it’s hot my feet would like to breath. I would like to have some sandals for summer and some more variety in shoes in general.

The fact that I do not have that may different shoes is holding me back from wearing some clothes I would like to wear, but simply not have shoes that would suit with these outfits. The reason this became a struggle was first that I’m planning to start wearing the clothes I like and therefore get a bit more out of my comfort zone and second I wanted to start doing outfit of the days, because it seems fun to do and perhaps gives me even more fun with my clothes. But whilst I was preparing this I got constantly stuck on shoes.

Of course I won’t give up on this, because I want to do or at least try to do outfit of the days. I will try to find a different way of doing these kind of post, to get me started while I’m looking for shoes. Even though finding shoes won’t be easy, my feet have trouble with finding shoes that fit. They are long and thin and so are my toes and therefore shoes are often too wide for me, especially the shoes from H&M (I never found a shoe that fits in there).

Do any of you find the same struggle when you are looking for outfits to wear or is it just me?

 

 

Summer essentials

My seven weeks of summer freedom have started and I thought it would be fun to share some of my summer essentials. But before I will start with that, I just wanted you to know, that because I have seven weeks where I’m free I will try and put even more post on. Also, after I have my photo taken and uploaded I noticed I forgot to put two items in it, therefore I will mention them later on but there will not be a picture of them.

Jumpsuit: The great thing about a jumpsuit is that it’s so easy to put on, because it’s a one piece and therefore you don’t need to be bothered about what you will wear with it (except the accessories and shoes). Also, because it’s not a skirt there is not much change you will share your underpants and another plus it’s very very comfortable to wear.

Hat: This hat you might have seen before in my latest favorites and the reason you see it again is because it’s perfect to disguise bad hair, to protect your face and hair from the burning sun, which is perfect because summer brings hot summer days with lots of sun.

Sunglasses: The sun is shining and it’s not a luxury, but very well needed. My favorite pair of sunglasses is these round Sunnis I bought a couple of years (perhaps two) from Topshop, wearing them ever since, even though they are a bit too big for me and falling down my nose, I just love the look of them.

Sun cream: The sun is shining and with a pale skin as mine is it will burn, so some protection would be very welcome. I always chose the one with the highest SPF I can find. I do think it’s a good idea to use sun cream no matter what skin type or colour you are.

A book: I always love to read, but when it’s summer time I read the most. Because I have the time, but also what’s better than sitting in the shadows under a tree with a good book (except ice-cream maybe).

Day cream with SPF: The skin on your face should not be forgotten to protect against the sun, so I use this day cream with SPF 30 to moisturize and protect my skin from the Body shop for €.

Shorts: These shorts are by far my favourite pair of shorts I have, they are comfortable, I like the high waist, the fit and I love the orange colour. I bought these last year from Primark.

Boots: Me and my family hike in nature a lot during summer, always did. Through the forest, mountains if we have the change. So a pair of proper good hiking boots are a must have for me, this pair I got when I got my first diploma of the school, which is around 5 years ago. And still they are as good as new.

Bikini: This is one I forgot about putting in the picture with my other essentials, but is definitely an essential for summer as it is the time to go swimming. I do have one I love from with the H&M I bought I think I bought a year ago. Its blue and gray with a small bright green triangle in the middle.

Sandals: The reason that this one isn’t in the picture is simply because I don’t have any, but my feet really need a pair of sandals, so they can breath during hot days. My task this summer will be finding a pair of sandals I like.

What are your Summer essentials you can’t live without?