New Year - Blogging Aims for 2015

Hey guys!

Image Source: savidgereads.wordpress.com via google images

So it's that time of the year when everyone is setting New Years resolutions and planning to stick to them.
I have had my blog for just over four months now, but I think that I can make these coming months so much better; there's definitely stuff I would change about the previous ones. 

   I have come up with some blog aims for 2015 that I feel will make this little space so much better, and I am really excited about this coming year. 

1• my first goal has to be to actually come up with a blogging schedule and stick to it! I am irritated by my own haphazardly timed uploads, which I know seems silly as I have a life outside of blogging where I do get busy, but at the same time I don't want to seem unreliable. I am serious about blogging and want others to know that too. 

   I was thinking that I could try to upload a new blogpost on Sundays as that would give me an entire week to plan and a weekend to write and take photos etc. 

   Sometimes I will get snowed down with homework, or be spending time with family and friends, so if a post is late or missed entirely, that's still ok.

2• I also plan to bring more variety to my posts. My blog is a beauty, fashion and lifestyle blog, but right now I feel that the lifestyle side has been neglected slightly. This year I want to blog about day trips, share creative DIYs, recipes and more. I will do my usual beauty and fashion also, but I think having more variety will make my blog so much more interesting to read. 

3• my third goal is easier said than done, and that is to double the amount of followers I have now. I feel it is achievable, but if you're reading this and like what you read, please follow!

4• I think that at some point this year I will invest in a custom blog design, where basically you can pay to have someone redesign your blog or you can pick out a pre-designed template. I have seen many blogs that have this, and I always think they look very professional and appealing and I have spent so long trying to get mine to work with the layout and template tabs on blogger. 

   I know there are many websites offering this service and I have already seen a few I like.

5• next is something that I feel I have been quite lazy with and that has to be answering my comments asap. I have currently answered all comments on my different posts, but sometimes it is a week later and I don't want that sense of unreliability again. Everyone likes a fast reply!

6• you may have seen in my What I Got For Christmas blogpost that I got a camera, which I am now using to take photos for my blog. I am going to try and learn how to use my camera really well to make my photos much better and enjoyable to look at, because good photos look much more appealing than not so good. 

7• last but not least is just to be satisfied with my blog: its content in both writing and photography areas, appearance and variety of topics. Not that I'm dissatisfied with it at the moment, but I just feel like there are positive changes that can be made, and this is the year to do it.

You can expect a lot more of me in the future. As of today I will try my best to bring more variety to my posts, better photography, quick replies to comments, hopefully a Sunday schedule and just be a better blogger in general. 

I hope you agree with my new blogging resolutions and are looking forward to this year's posts. Please follow!

Rosie x

What I Got For Christmas 2014

Hello!

I hope you've all had a wonderful Christmas and happy New Year, this is my first post of 2015! Today I am going to tell you about what I got for Christmas - this is basically a haul and I am very grateful for everything in it. Many people do these and I enjoy watching/reading them and finding out what others got. If you're interested, hopefully you will enjoy...

An overview:

Bath and Body

I got some Soap & Glory goodies, Lush, body butters and nail varnishes, a Hollister spray and some makeup bits and bobs...

I love Soap & Glory's items, and was lucky enough to get the Think Pamper set from my Auntie, which includes 6 minis: a body butter, hand cream, body scrub, foot cream, shampoo and shower gel, as well as a pink netted scrubbing thing.

 I absolutely adore lush, so after having an enormous box sitting on my lap with a gorgeous scent wafting out, I was delighted to unwrap 6 So White bath bombs and 1 So White shower gel from my Nana. So White has a strong apple smell, which I love love love!

I have been wanting some of Zoe's beauty products ever since they were launched, so I was very excited to get Soak Opera :)

 In my stocking I got a few things from Estee Lauder - I got a makeup bag with a black eyeliner in 'Blackened Black' inside, two lipsticks in 'Candy' and 'Pink Parfait' (both of which are shimmer) and the 'Take It Away' removal lotion.

Photography

The thing I had been wanting for Christmas is a camera, and I was really, really excited when I unwrapped this Canon 1200D!! I will be taking all my blog photos with this from now on, and some of my instagrams. I also got a bag to go with it, and a digital photo frame from my Uncle so I can put some of my favourite photos on there. I can't wait to set that up.

Also from my Nana I got Tony Northrup's DSLR Book: How To Create Stunning Digital Photography which I have found very useful so far. It is set out so clearly and is so easy to understand with tips on lighting, rule of thirds, flash, portraits, shutter speed and more. I would totally recommend it to anyone.

Clothes and Accessories

I got several pairs of beautiful earrings and some hair clips and a necklace; my friends know I love owls!

I got a grey Hollister hoodie which is so soft and cosy, and I just think grey is quite flattering, it's one of my favourite colours for clothing.

 This is a 3 quarter length pink dressing gown from New Look from another Auntie which is so warm and fluffy!

One thing my Grandparents got me was this super, super cosy black onesie from Next with white reindeer all over it. This is honestly the softest thing in existence, I can't even describe it!

Miscellaneous

I got a candle making kit, which I am really excited about, some Yankee candles and a tealight in a pot, art supplies, a Paris 2015 calendar and a portable charger.

This is also some of my food, I do love Terry's Chocolate Orange a lot!

 My portable charger is EasyAcc and it's so, so useful and great for travelling/long day trips if you use your phone a lot! I love how it looks being plain white with strips of purple, and it's so compact being the same size as my phone.

My brother bought me Garden Sweetpea and Clean Cotton Yankee votives, which are both beautiful, delicate scents. Clean Cotton is heavenly...

Books and DVDs

I am a Zoella fan, and was very happy to receive her book. I am so excited to read it! :))))) I also love Divergent as you will know if you have seen some of my older posts, and I got Four, which is like a spin off from Divergent with four short stories all about the character Four.
From my stocking, I unwrapped Z For Zachariah, a book my mum has been telling me to read, and it does sound very good. I'm sure these will all appear in my Bookworm Wednesdays!
A Wreck This Journal has also been on my wishlist a while, which I was very lucky to get this year. I have done a couple of the pages already, and I will soon be doing more.

These 3 DVDs were also on my wishlist; I have read City Of Bones and saw the film a few years ago at the cinema, and I have finally got the DVD from my Uncle. I can't wait to watch it again!
I have also read The 100, featured in an older Bookworm Wednesday and I was super, super excited when I unwrapped Season 1. I have so far watched 3 episodes with my brother and we are both hooked, it's soooo good and always ends on a cliffhanger!
Last but not least is Endless Love from my Nana which sounds really good and I will definitely watch soon.

I hope you all enjoyed reading this post and having a little nosy, I always do haha.
I'm not sure if I will do any December/2014 favourites posts like some do, but I have got a post on nails and of course, a Bookworm Wednesday coming soon!

 Happy 2015 :)

Rosie x