Moving to University!

If you saw my Results Day post from August, you may have guessed why I've taken such a long break from blogging recently - I moved to university! It's been a crazy month filled with a lot more booze and less sleep than my body is used to, so it's been a bit of an adjustment!

What I've Been Loving Lately #1

I realise that I haven't done a Favourites post in a little while and this isn't going to be in place of that either, because I wanted to just talk about some of the random bits I've been loving lately, mainly just to see if anyone else is as sad as I am!! So here's 8 things I've been loving lately!

Poker Stars All-In Kitchen, Bristol

If you saw my Week in Outfits post last month, you'll have already heard that I attended a Poker event in Bristol recently, but today I decided to dedicate a whole post to the event and tell you all about it!

Results Day!

If you follow me on Twitter, then you may have realised that last Thursday was a pretty important day for me - it was my A Level Results Day!
I was considering writing a post the night before talking about what I hoped to get the following day and what it would mean for me if I did/didn't get the grades that I needed, but I decided in the end that I would be too depressed if I didn't get the grades to look at the post afterwards and it may have led to me suddenly abandoning my blog in shame of not getting the grades!
...I did get the grades, by the way.

Pineapple Cilantro Yankee Candle

I've been a bit of a Yankee Candle fan girl for a number of years now and if you are also a candle fan, you'll know that there is no feeling quite like that when you have nearly finished a candle. Today I thought I'd say RIP to one of my favourites for this time of year, Pineapple Cilantro.

Spinach and Ricotta Cannelloni

I'm off to uni fairly soon and I've made it my mission to make sure that I at least have a basic understand of how to cook before I go, so last weekend my best friend Sophie and I decided to tackle a Spinach and Ricotta Cannelloni Recipe adapted from this recipe by Jamie Oliver, and we thought we'd share it with you!

The Five People You Meet In Heaven

As I mentioned in my Dead Ends book review, I'm part of a Bloggers' Book Club, and this time I got to pick the book we were reading! My dad got me The Five People You Meet In Heaven by Mitch Albom for Christmas and I've been looking for an excuse to read it ever since, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity!

Week In Pictures #7

1: I'm still so in love with this dress from DressLink! 

2: The bugs in Spain certainly took a likening to me... I'm covered in bites 

3: An example of what holiday lunches look like every day! Think I might've put on just a bit of weight 

4: Managed to find a fake Triangl bikini for just €14! 

5: We went to visit the beach and stumbled up some peacocks and saw some baby ones hatching from eggs and it was a magical experience 

6: I've actually only really used my Kindle this holiday, I've converted to the dark side of eReaders!

Week in Pictures #6

1: On our terrace there were rocking chairs that were the cosiest little things you could imagine, I've spent many evenings watching the world go by from up here! 

2: Mum and I have a little balcony and I couldn't resist taking a picture of the view at night 

3: We bought an inflatable Dolphin and mum managed to catch a picture of me riding it... I look so pale! 

4: My nana looked after my younger brother and sisters one evening so mum and I could go out for a meal together, it was lovely! 

5: We've played cards pretty much every night so far. Wish I could say I've been winning... 

6: Picture of the pool and a bit of the view! 

7: Sleepy cuddles in the evening for mum with my two little sisters and my little brother in the corner 

8: These sorbet ice lollies were my favourites as a kid on holiday and we found some at a restaurant - I couldn't resist!

What To Expect From Glastonbury Festival

For those of you who don't know, I recently went to the one and only Glastonbury Music Festival for the first time! I had an amazing time and it really was an experience like nothing else, so I thought I'd write up a post explaining what to expect from going to Glastonbury for those of you who who have never been! In case you didn't know, Glastonbury Festival takes place from Wednesday to Monday over the last weekend of June every year. It is in a small town called Pilton near Glastonbury in the South West of England, which conveniently for me, is only about 30 minutes from my house! I'm not sure how well known Glastonbury is around the world but I'm guessing from the amount of BBC coverage and the artists who perform there that it's a pretty big deal in the UK at least, not just in the area that I live in. So, given that there's a lot of hype around Glastonbury each year, it can be hard to tell how much of it is exaggerated, or what the festival is really like. So, what can you expect from Glastonbury Festival?

Week in Pictures #5

1: I made my friend take this photo while I was driving because I thought it was such a pretty sunset 
2: Later on that evening we ended up ordering 3 sundaes between the two of us and they were all delicious. No regrets. 
3: Somehow ended up with a free day between Glastonbury and Prom and my holiday AND there was nice weather, so I actually spent time in the garden with a book?!
4: Prom time! These are my 3 friends who I went on holiday with last year and who I love a whole lot 
5: This is my friend Adam who offered to be my date for the evening and got just a little bit drunk and adorable 
6: SO many selfies. So many. 
7: My friend Patrick, who doesn't actually go to my school anymore so it was lovely to see him! We also went on an adventure the next day, feeling a little bit worse for wear but I didn't get any pictures of that 
8: We finished off the evening with some fireworks and all in all, it was a lovely way to say goodbye 
9: The school my little brother and sisters go to had a Prize Giving Day and it was decorated like a beach hut, with buckets and spades and seagulls and it was so cute

What's In My Travel Make Up Bag?

I'm going on holiday in a few days and am in the process of packing my make up bag for while I'm gone, so I thought I'd share with you today what I've packed with me so far! Just a side note that I'm bringing all three of my Naked palettes - yes, I know that's excessive! - but they don't leave much room for anything else when they're in this make up bag so they're going in my case separately, so of course I forgot to include them in this picture! I also haven't got around to cleaning my brushes yet so I'm not including them in this post either!

Week in Pictures #4

1: I had my last ever exam and thus my last time having to wear my school uniform! 

2: Ended up going a tad overboard with Glasto shopping - 6 bags of food alone... 

3: It's not Glasto if you don't end up with major hay fever and covered in Glitter! 

4 and 6:  Some of the photos of the stages I took were stunning so I just had to put them in! 

5: Me and Rebecca were reunited with our best friend Antonia and had to take a selfie to prove it of course 

7: On our last night, we trecked up to the Glastonbury sign and it looked so pretty all lit up! 

8: I met up with my little brother who went with family friends to watch his guitar teacher play a set 

9: I never did figure out what the big tower was or what it did, but it sure was pretty and a good landmark!

Week in Pictures #3

1: As you can tell from my 'My 18th Birthday!' post, that was the main event of the week!
2: On the Friday night, we all got dressed out and went clubbing in Bath for the first time as a group!
3: Typical Megan dropping her phone and smashing the screen on her birthday... 
4: I will never not be terrified of this photo.
5: This photo is my only acknowledgement that I had exams that week. They will never be spoken of again. especially C4 
6: If you've read my birthday post you'll know we did this to my brother's door on his 18th too - crazy to think that was 5 years ago! 
7: As well as being my birthday this week, it was also my best friend Tonicha's! It was like a week of endless celebrations 
8: Photos of me and my stepdad are very rare and this one always makes me giggle so I had to share it! 

My 18th Birthday!

Recently, it was my 18th birthday and it was honestly one of the most memorable days of my life so far! I'd just like to start off this post with a little thank you to all of my wonderful friends and family members who made it a day I will always remember fondly, as it was full of lovely people and lots of laughter! I was absolutely spoiled for my birthday this year - everyone went above and beyond to show their love for me and there were many times throughout the day where I just sat quietly with a massive grin on my face, unable to get over how special I felt. I really did feel like the birthday princess!!  I'm not really going to go into the materialistic/presents side of the day in this post because that can often come off as sounding like bragging, or showing off how much money someone has. My family are fortunate enough to be able to have enough money to make days like this really special and I know that if we weren't as 'fortunate' (although I do really hate that word!) as we are, then most of this won't have been possible, although I don't think I'll ever be able to fully explain my gratitude with this post, so let's just get on with a rundown of the day, shall we?

Oreo Cheesecake Recipe

As I mentioned in my April Month in Review post, my brother's girlfriend and I made an Oreo cheesecake by following a recipe but then not quite having the right ingredients - but we think it came out even better than it was meant to, so I thought I would share it with you here today!

April 2015

And so, another month has passed! I feel like April had a lot more going on than I've got written on my calendar but I don't think there's much missing from it... It was a pretty crazy time though so let's get going!

Dead Ends

A little while ago, I saw that Fleur from WishesandTea was starting up a Bloggers' Book Club and I decided to join in! Evidently I've not been a very good member as this post is 10 days late but it wasn't actually reading the book that delayed me, but finding time to sit down and write this post! The first book we decided to read as a group is a YA Novel called Dead Ends by Erin Lange.

X+Y

On Thursday, I went to go and see the film X+Y with a couple of my friends after watching the trailer and thinking it looked pretty interesting! If you know me personally, you might know about my intense love affair for Maths... Yes, I really am that lame! But the second I heard that about this film, I begged my friends to go so off we did and today, I thought I'd share some of my thoughts about it.

Why My Mum Is The Best!

You know how at the start of Hauls/Collections/Birthday posts, people will try to clarify that they're not meaning to brag, they're just showing what they've got? This post is the opposite of that - I have every intention of bragging about what an amazing mother I have here! So - this is my mum Michelle! I hope she won't mind me posting so many photos of her on here... Oops!

Driving!

A large part of the reason why I haven't been feeling up to posting much lately has been because I have been very stressed out about something... My driving test! I started driving on my 17th birthday, June 17th last year, and finally decided a few weeks ago with my instructor that I was ready to do my test, which I did on Monday 2nd March.

February 2015

Hello everyone! Sorry for my lack of posts lately. If you follow me on Twitter (@MeganMcMahon022) then you'll have seen that I decided that I wanted to take a little break from blogging while I got my life sorted out a bit more and I can't say I'm quite finished doing that yet but there's a few end-of-the-month posts I can't help but do so here I am! Last month I decided that I would start a 'Month in Review' post and I got some pretty positive feedback from it so I decided to continue! It's actually really helped me to keep my calendar organised and actually encourage me to use it, which is always a good thing!

Wicked!

Those of you who follow me on Instagram will have seen that I was fortunate enough to be able to go and see Wicked as part of a Christmas present from my ever so amazing mum last night at the Hippodrome in Bristol.

When we got there, the whole building was glowing green and they'd even put out a green carpet to celebrate the occasion, which I thought was a really lovely touch! There were also posters and banners dotted all around the city which myself and my friend Sophie squealed at every time we saw. It seemed like the whole city was getting excited for the show!

Galentine's Day!

(Image courtesy of Clockwork) Now I have never seen Parks and Recreation so I feel bad calling this post GALentine's Day after realising it was meant to be yesterday but I'm sure you can forgive me and my lack of wit for not being able to come up with another title...

Sweet Treats Popcorn*

I was recently contacted by a company called Sweet Treats on Twitter (@Sweet_Tree_Co) and was sent a sample of some of their popcorn to try and let you know what I think!

The Body Shop's Camomile Cleaning Butter

Today's post is one that I promised in my January Favourites post last week and it's a review of my new Body Shop Camomile Cleansing Butter! I bought this after seeing a lot of rave reviews from bloggers and I thought I would add my opinion to the mix. 

BPW UK

If you read my January in Review post last month then you'll have seen that on the 15th and then again on the 31st, I took part in a public speaking competition run by an organisation called BPW UK. I am really grateful to have been able to participate in this as I feel like the whole experience taught me a lot, and it introduced me to BPW and what they do, so I decided to write a post about them today!

The Handmaid's Tale

Hello everyone, today I'm back with another post about the book that I'm currently reading, which is The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood! 

This book is one of my three coursework texts for my English A Level (I'm doing the AQA English Literature A Love Through The Ages course - is anyone else doing that? Let me know, it would be so cool to find someone else!) and the other two are Romeo and Juliet and On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan, both of which we studied in class. This text has been an independent study so I've had to devote a lot of time to it, hence why there weren't many #CurrentlyReadings in January - I think I only managed to read two books in the whole month because of this!

Sighh Designs Phone Case

For those of you who follow @pollyvdsz on Twitter, you may know about her online shop Sighh Designs and her cute phone cases. I've seen them all over Instagram for years - I even remember when she made a personalised one for Velvetgh0st that people could buy - but it wasn't until she closed her shop over Christmas that I decided I finally wanted to take the plunge and buy one. As usual, the heart wants what it can't have!

January Favourites

What a month January has been! If you're interested in seeing a glimpse into what I got up to, I posted a Month in Review post on Saturday talking about some of the things that have happened, but this post is all about some of the beauty products I've been loving throughout the month!

January 2015

I'm thinking of starting something new on here where I take a picture of my calendar at the end of every month and talk about some of the noteworthy things that happened to me this month - what do you guys think?

The Netflix Tag!

This tag was created by Alice Spake at Annie Writes Beauty as a way for fellow Netflix addicts to share what they’ve been watching and discover new shows that others love. Thank you Alice, as Netflix is my obsession right after beauty! And thank you to Jo at Miss Josiana for tagging me (and also for unknowingly letting me steal your introduction!)

Chanel Coco Mademoiselle Perfume Review

 Does this make me a grown-up lady now? 

Getting To The Gym!

(If you cannot tell by how tiny I am and also how long my hair is, this is quite an old picture, but it's one of the most recent photos of me actually working out in the gym!)

Ever since I started going to the gym over a year ago, I've really grown to love it! I'll be honest in saying I didn't warm to it instantly, but now it's one of my favourite ways to spend 'me' time. So today I thought I'd share a few of my tips, now that it's the middle of January and you may be lacking in that 'New Year, New Me' spirit that made you join up in the first place and encourage you to keep going!

The Children Act

This one is a bit of a cheat as I've already finished it, but I've decided I want to try and do a post about every book I read this year so I thought I'd do one anyway!

Mr Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

If you follow many Booktubers on Youtube, you may recognise this book. A lot of people started reading it last year so I added it to my Christmas list as a lot of the people I followed recommended it, but once I got it, I never actually got around to reading it! I think I started in the weeks following Christmas but then distracted and never made it past about Page 50... I've been awful with my reading lately and I figured that a book all about bookshops would help kickstart me into doing it a bit more, right? Well, yes in a way, I'm well over halfway through the book now so it's definitely helped me get back into the swing of things, but I was so wrong with what this book is about!

The Little Princess Trust!

I mentioned in this post last week that I've been trying my best to keep my hair in good condition whilst it grows out again, and I thought now might be a good time to do a post explaining why I decided to cut my hair off in the first place!

When I was about 13 years old, I discovered a charity - and I can't remember what it was called - that accepted donations of hair to be turned into wigs for people who had lost their hair due to illnesses such as cancer, but the one flaw was that they were insistent that the hair had to be free of any chemicals like hair dye or perms etc. At the time, I had highlighted hair and I was gutted that I couldn't donate it, as it was something that really interested me! 

Candy Canes Candles in January?

Personally, I absolutely adore Christmas candles but I do think they have their time and their place. That's not so much because I don't want to smell the candles in the middle of July, but I associate scents and memories really strongly together so I don't really want to make my Christmas candles less special by mixing them with summer memories, if that makes any sense?

December Photo Challenge

For those of you who did not catch it, I thought I would create a post of all of my pictures from the December Photo Challenge, created by the lovely Katy from The Lilac Scrapbook who also did the challenge on her Instagram but I decided to do it on my blog instead (I also did a #ChristmasCountdown on my Instagram and just generally post very often if you're interested in seeing more of my life!)

Day 1 - Selfie

I'm not usually a selfie kind of gal but wearing my new Christmas jumper on Saturday when I was going to a Christmas market? I just couldn't resist! This was my only Black Friday purchase that I made from Peacocks, and I think it ended up being about £12! Gingerbread men are my favourite image this year (last year it was reindeer!) so I just couldn't resist these cuties.

Day 2 - The Sky

This is the view from one of the window's in my gym, where I was sat yesterday waiting for one of my best friends to finish his exercise. It was a surprisingly pretty view considering where my gym's located, and the sky in this photo is pretty much typical of how the sky will be for all of this month! 

Day 3 - Black and White

It's amazing how magical this photo is in real life, yet it seems so chilling in Black and White! I guess it's one of those things that all depends on the perspective you take...

Day 4 - Your Pet

I'm not really an animal person, nor do I have any pets, so this is a very old photo (2012?) of my best friend's cat, who is still one of the very few animals that I love. She always knows when I'm in need of a cuddle!

Day 5 - Candles

My favourite Yankee scent for 3 years running! Unfortunately it's been discontinued now. Does anyone have any recommendations of new scents to try, or better yet - a brand that does a similar scented candle to this one!?

Day 6 - Nature

Basically any of the photos that I take at work could be used here, since I work in the middle of a wood! However none of the wildlife photos that I take can beat this one of a real reindeer that I took a couple of weeks ago!

Day 7 - Something Red

Had my first Christmas party of the year and my mum gave everyone party bags - I felt like I was 5 again (in the best possible way!) It was a really lovely night, a great excuse to get everyone together and I may have spent the whole night snuggled up in a Reindeer onesie!

Day 8 - Throwback

Yesterday's photo was of the party bag from this year's Christmas party and this is a photo of me and my best friend Sophie at last year's Christmas party! As a family, we've always had big Christmas parties as my parents own a company so they like to get all of their employees together - but we all bring along friends too. It doesn't feel like Christmas without them!

Day 9 - Your Fave Food

My favourite comfort food - especially at this time of year - is a good old fashioned Terry's Chocolate Orange! Any bad day can be reversed by one of these bad boys, they remind me of Christmases as a kid and my mum would be in serious trouble if she ever gave me a stocking without one in!

Day 10 - Artwork

I watched a YouTube video a little while ago (I can't remember who from, sorry!) of fun ways to make your bedroom look a little more festive and one of them was to wrap up any picture frames you have in your room, so currently my only artwork looks like this!

The wrapping paper was from Asda last year, the 'Baby It's Cold Outside' sign is from Matalan, the book is 'My True Love Gave to Me' which is a collection of short stories and on top of it is my little Husky Ty that I got from Hamley's!

Day 11 - Family Picture

I think this picture sums up my family quite accurately! It's hard to get a picture of all of us kids together now that we're growing up (my older brother - right and his girlfriend - third in on the right are currently in South-East Asia!) so it's just typical that the most recent one I can find is from last Christmas, when we're all wearing hats themed from The Simpson's! We make hats themed on something different every year - this year, we're going for Cluedo!

Day 12 - Music

Am I the only one who struggled to find a photo of music?!

This is my Spotify Christmas playlist (which actually isn't my most-listened-to at the moment since I have mock exams and Christmas music makes me far too happy to revise!) and I would go through the songs on it, but there's 74...

If you want to check it out yourself, click here and it'll take you to the playlist on the spotify web player!

If I had to name my top three Christmas songs... I don't think I could! But some of my favourites are Pennies from Heaven (which reminds me of Elf - is it even about Christmas?!), all three of the Band Aids, the Glee Cast version of Baby It's Cold Outside, Santa Baby, I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday, Winter Wonderland, Step Into Christmas and Michael Bublé's whole album!

What's your favourite Christmas song? What songs are you loving that aren't Christmas related right now?

Day 13 - Fairy Lights

Usually, I go crazy with decorating my room at Christmas, but these are actually the only fairy lights I have this year - crazy! I moved bedrooms over the summer so I'll blame it on the fact that I'm still not used to this room! 

Day 14 - Quote

(image from here)

Personally, I love any quote that encourages you to keep trying and congratulates you for doing what you've done so far, so I love this one from Neil Gaiman!

Day 15 - Hobby

I'm not sure if most people would consider it a hobby but one of my favourite things to do in my free time is to go to the gym! I love the feeling of breaking a new personal best or being able to see progress in myself, it's so addictive! Ideally, I like to go 2-3 times a week but school's been a bit too hectic for that to happen at the moment. Oh well, hopefully January will give me a bit more time to go.

Let me know if you would like me to do a post about my favourite work out clothes, or my gym routine! 

Day 16 - Relaxing

Having possibly the most busy week ever so I'm spending the rest of the evening in a mountain of cuddly toys - meet my reindeer, gingerbread man and loch ness monster! Sorry if there's a lack of posts over the next few days! Make sure you're following my blogging Twitter @MeganMcMahon022 for updates on when I do post.

Day 17 - Something New

My latest purchase has been a Vanilla and Cranberry candle from Wax Lyrical - my second one! What are your favourite candle brands that aren't Yankee Candle? 

Day 18 - Today's Shoes

Today I went bowling so this was quite a good photo to have but the only problem was, I didn't realise that's what the challenge was for! The most annoying part is that I even took a picture of my bowling shoes and sent it to my friend on Snapchat, but didn't save it. Oh well - here's a slightly cheating picture of the last time I went bowling but I swear it's the same shoes! Side note - if anyone knows where I can get a pair of these let me know, they're so cute!

Day 19 - Sunshine

I live in England so there's been a distinct lack of sunshine in my life lately! Instead today I'd do a #throwbackfriday (that works, right?) to when I went to Majorca in the summer with my friends!

Day 20 - Handmade

If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen that I accidentally found this hiding under the Christmas tree last week, but it's just too cute not to post! This is a joint present from my three little siblings and I can't wait to open it on Thursday. Usually I hate finding presents before Christmas but this has made me really happy knowing that they care enough to get me a present even though they're all under 10!

Day 21 - Your Fave Book

I actually did a giveaway for my two favourite books for this season on my blog earlier this week so I could share them with some of you! My favourite festive books are Let It Snow by John Green, Maureen Johnson and Lauren Myracle and My True Love Gave To Me, which is a collaboration of 12 different authors and I've done a review here!

Day 22 - A Circle

This is the first circular object I saw when looking through the photos on my phone, so sorry if this seems like a bit of a weird one! This is a chocolate cookie that my maths teacher's children made for us last week and I thought it was soo cute! They used yellow, green and red fondant icing to create this really cute Christmas Pudding design, plus the cookie itself was soo good!

Day 23 - From Your Window

Admittedly, I completely forgot to take today's picture and it's pitch black outside now so here's one from a few weeks ago - pretty similar to what today has looked like to be honest! Bit wet and miserable here in England, I'm still waiting for snow!

Day 24 - Christmas Tree

My mum may have taken the 'Merry Christmas' sign off this tree since this photo was taken but I think it looks so cute with it on! Our tree is already surrounded by presents from friends and family, and Santa hasn't even been yet! 

Day 25 - What Made You Smile Today?

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you've all had a lovely day. I've had a brilliant day spent with my family, we even got a chance to FaceTime my brother for a bit which was the best moment of the day, I can't wait for him to come home! We spent this evening snuggled up together in our pjs eating too much chocolate and watching Elf, it was lovely. 

I decided to finish it after Christmas Day as things got a bit busy (and by busy I mean I started to watch a lot of Homeland!) and I started to lose track of the challenge. It was a really nice challenge to do in the run up to Christmas, and I really enjoyed doing it, so thanks for posting it Katy!