Choosing your word of the year for 2019
January 25, 2019
It’s becoming quite popular – or at least, I’m hearing about it quite a lot – to choose a word of the year to guide you; often instead of making New Year’s resolutions.
I still haven’t worked out what to do when I grow up! I’m mainly a writer, an artist, and a fairytale dressmaker with various crafty hobbies! Here (and on YouTube) I share bits of my life, thoughts, and what I’m learning along the way. Let’s find magic and inspiration; join me for this creative living adventure!
Musings and ramblings
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Blogging problems and Making blog plans for 2019
January 9, 2019
Happy New Year! I cannot believe we are welcoming in a new year already! Anyway, it’s time for me to sit down with my blogging notebook and make some plans for 2019. A little bit of your help would be really appreciated 🙂
Season’s Greetings and Merry Christmas! And Thank you!
December 25, 2018
Hello! This is just a very quick message to say I wish you very happy season’s greetings and Merry Christmas! I hope you’re having a lovely holiday and will have a very merry new year!
By the way, thank you very much if you took the time to vote for me in the UK blog awards, whether or not I make it to the shortlist next year, I appreciate it so much!
See you in 2019! May you have a good one 🙂
If you don’t love yourself, don’t panic! My problem with “inspirational” quotes & musings on self-esteem
December 20, 2018
I don’t often use this blog as a platform for a rant, but I’m going to on this occasion! There was one particular so-called “inspirational” quote that really got me riled up enough to write about it. This is what it said: “If you don’t love yourself, how can you expect anyone else to love you?”
A quick Vlogmas update + 1000 thank yous!
December 5, 2018
If you haven’t heard of Vlogmas, or aren’t entirely sure what it is, it’s when a bunch of entirely mad youtubers decide that in the busiest time of the year they will vlog every single day of their life from the first of December until Christmas Day and edit and upload the video the following day. There is of course the blogging equivalent: Blogmas, but as I’ve done Blogtober in the past, I’m not about to try that again! I was one of those mad youtubers last year and the year before, but in 2018 I thought I’d do something a bit different….
4 problems people who talk to themselves have to face and how to solve them
November 29, 2018
People think you’re mad. Or at the very least, a bit weird.
Although it’s kind of nice that your husband also works from home, or is just around a lot; it’s really annoying that you can’t talk loudly to yourself; because even though it’s only him, that would still be a bit embarrassing.
If you just think a thought, it’s not quite real enough, so you have no choice than to say it out loud. That can actually be somewhat bothersome. Particularly in public…..
Why creators shouldn’t be criticised for posting their best life
November 23, 2018
The reality of my October is this: I spent a miserable month in a block of flats with paper-thin walls and not getting much sleep due to the noises; a tiny bed and inability to relax in such a soulless place. What you see of my October is quite different: Photos of me smiling in outfit posts on my Instagram and blog; photos of beautiful landscapes and sunsets; blog posts about pretty parks and interesting places to visit, and youtube videos showing me being (mainly) positive. Creators get a lot of stick in the media for giving an unrealistically happy, positive, perfect image of life, but at the end of the day, would you actually want it any differently?
A response to Sara Tasker’s podcast episode with Lucy Sheridan; Hashtag Authentic
October 19, 2018
I adore Sara Tasker’s podcasts, but when I saw the title of this particular one, ‘A Cure For Comparisonitis’, I very nearly didn’t listen. Whenever the subject of comparison comes up, there is one particular phrase that is always mentioned. And it makes me scream and weep with frustration. It’s this: ….
3 reasons to be glad of a wet bum
June 22, 2018
Something dawned on me at Glastonbury Festival on the Thursday night last year and this is the story behind it: Rain and I were sitting in a field on our little fold-up seats, surrounded by all sorts of weird and wonderful vehicle creations waiting for Johnny Depp to appear (in actual real life, right in front of us) to introduce The Libertine, soon to be shown on the massive screen in front of the ever-growing crowd. All of a sudden, a woman amongst the group of friends sitting near us jumped up, saying something along the lines of, ‘I think someone’s spilt their drink here – I’ve got a wet bum.’…..
Fourteen years of blogging – why do I do it?
April 7, 2018
Happy Birthday When I Grow Up blog! Yes, if you can be bothered, you can click on the ‘Archives’ button over there on the right and see my first feeble offerings beginning on the 7th April 2004. I don’t know anyone who’s been blogging that long! We didn’t even own a digital camera then, so none of the posts have photos to go with them for a while! Many people talk about needing a creative outlet as their reason why they started a blog. Well fourteen years ago I had recently done my A-level Art and was on my second year of a part-time degree in Creative Writing with a novel about to be published; so I can’t really site that as my reason. My kids were eight and five, but ‘Mummy blogging’ wasn’t yet a thing, let alone a thing that occurred to me to want to do, so talking about parenting wasn’t my impetus either. At the end of the day, I suppose it all boils down to the simple love of writing…..
How I’d do things differently if I wasn’t a teenage Mum
March 13, 2018
I’ve never really considered being a Mummy blogger – I’m not sure why – it just wasn’t what I wanted to write about; however this topic of conversation came up in the car a while ago, and as it was Mothers’ Day on Sunday, I thought I might do something a bit different and write about the subject in a blog post!
Yes I am in a category. I am a statistic of the 90’s. I was a teenage Mum….
Being demoted back to work-experience girl by YouTube
January 18, 2018
I’ve been showing up to work at YouTube for close to three years now on a part-time basis. I didn’t start doing it for the money and I didn’t expect to get paid to begin with. I did it for the chance to get my name out there and reach people who might be interested in reading my blog or purchasing clothing from Threads of a Fairytale and hopefully entertain everyone along the way. I didn’t realise quite how much of my life it was going to consume. Each video takes a minimum of two hours to edit; and the longer ones such as travel vlogs; well that can be up to ten hours. It’s a lonely hard slog.
Filming can take anything from half an hour for a quick sit-down and chat video (plus the time it takes to put on make-up, tidy up around me and sort out lighting) to several hours over a period of weeks for the more in-depth ones. Then there’s the head-space vlogging takes up – working out how you’re going to tell the story of your day; remembering all the little transition shots; giving a good blend of talking and showing; making sure there’s a comfortable mix of slow and fast pace to the video etc.
It was a joy to get to the point where YouTube started to pay me a little money – maybe enough to get the bus to work and go halves on a coffee once a week. It’s not much at all, but it’s a little recognition of how hard you’re working and you start to see a little opportunity – a glimmer of hope that there might be some financial reward for your efforts. And then I received an e-mail from YouTube this morning telling me they are going to take this away…..
