Weekend Vibes //

have an awesome one

H & M SPORTSWEAR // WINNING

I am obsessed with magazines but something seems to happen every time I read a fashion based mag - my eye is never attracted to the £20 top from Topshop, it is always attracted to the £300+ jacket from Rag and Bone or YSL. The same seems to happen when I'm on the search for new sports gear. As you probably know by now I love sport and exercising and I want to look cool while sweating pints on the cross trainer so I regularly spend my evening searching the internet for the perfect capri trouser and the coolest tank (sad?!). However, it seems that all the ones that I am attracted to are way too expensive, at least for a student's purse with a nice Nike pant costing £50+ but over the christmas holidays I stumbled upon H&M's sports section. H&M is not the first place you think to look when you're looking for sports gear but from now on that is the first place you should look! Cool looking stash that is cut beautifully giving you a nice silhouette while the material is perfect for a day of hard exercise and all at a very reasonable price. In the words of Charlie Sheen - WINNING! Here are some of my favs (and some that I have been rocking in the gym recently):

1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6 // 

CALLING THE PEOPLE OF THE WOLD - RELAX //

I am currently in my second term of second year at University and it's not all fun and games - it is mostly work. The jump from first to second year is more like a mountain climb - it's the biggest change in terms of the level of work that I have ever experience and it has taken me a while to get in to the swing of things. I only have lectures 3 days a week but that does NOT mean that for the rest of the week I sleep until 11am and sit on the sofa watching This Morning, Jeremy Kyle and Big Bang Theory. My typical day consists of getting up just after 7am, go the library, possibly head to Starbucks for a little break, head back to the library until early evening and then gym. I have told myself that even if I have work to do by the next day, if I haven't finished it by 8pm then it's not going to happen (reading wise, not essay wise). I get very anxious if I leave things to the last minute so I tend to finish things a few weeks in advance just so I can live my life as relaxed as possible because stress isn't good. I think the point I'm trying to make is that worrying is crap and it does not help anyone in any situation - trust me. It is a lot harder to practice than it is to preach but seriously everyone should worry less and then the world would be a happier place. I think that is my main goal not only for this year but for life in general - worry less, go with the flow more and just relax. That does not mean that you relax to the point where you don't do anything, I mean that if you time manage correctly and set your mind on something 100% then you will take less time doing it, you'll feel better and you'll enjoy life more. So everyone - relax, exercise and love living life because we have all got to do things that we somedays do not want to do but since we have to do them we might as well find a way to make those things more enjoyable. Am I right?!

GOOD MORNING GYM, GOOD MORNING WORLD // HIGH HOPES, KODALINE

Over the last two weeks I have been getting up super early to get my day started with a great gym session. There is something about the gym or any exercise for that matter that I find incredibly relaxing - it relaxes my like nothing else can. I can spend 30 minutes on the rowing machine clocking up around 7000 meters without even realising as I just stare in to space. However, getting up before 7am in the winter means that it is still  dark when I leave the house and start my cycle down to the gym so sometimes its tough to get out of bed when you know that it's cold and, most probably, wet outside. Although last monday I was sat on the bike with the cold air bitting my fingers as I cycled towards the university when Kodaline's High Hopes came on and everything just turned awesome. This might sound extremely weird but I felt like I was in some sort of film, Rocky or something. I was like "yeah, this gym session is going to be great"! Sometimes little things such as a great song can change your whole attitude, not just your attitude for that specific day but on occasions your whole outlook on life. It might sound a bit dramatic but it is true that you can choose happiness and believe me I know that this is not easy but you can always try and that is what I'm working on this week, this month and this year - to choose happiness over everything else. Life is here to be lived so let's get cracking.

 Watching the sun rise on the way to the gym one morning 

 Good Morning Campus

Time to get my workout on

Aberaeron //

A few weeks ago we had quite stormy weather here in Wales and across the United Kingdom and seaside towns were worse effected as the tide came crashing over the sea walls leaving behind pebbles, seaweed, sea creautors among other things across the harbour. Here are just some pictures I took while walking around Aberaeron one Friday afternoon.

Cardiff, Floods & Coffee

We had 4 weeks off from uni over Christmas (which was awesome) and since it was quite a long break I decided to meet up with one of my uni friends, Ellie, in Cardiff (she lives near Bristol). However, we typically planned to meet up the morning after the night when the West was hit by masses of rain and train tracks were either flooded or broken. Thus, it was a bit of an adventure getting to the capital but after a short car ride, an hour on a bus, another hour on another bus, and a 40 minute train journey (yaay for living in the middle of nowhere) I eventually made it (getting home wasn't quite that easy)! First stop was Coffee Barker down Castle Arcade. If you ever get a chance to go to Cardiff I urge you to go down the little arcades and away from the big shopping centres for a bit. They have some jewels down there. Cool vintage clothes shops in the form of A Vintage Affair down Morgan's Arcade (along with others across the city) and the oldest record shop in the world is also situated down Morgan's Arcade - Spiller Records. Morgan's Arcade seems to have everything you need because on our little trip to Cardiff I picked up my new skateboard from Route One which is also placed down the busy arcade. Now back to Coffee Barker... Every time I make a trip to Cardiff I have to have a coffee or a milkshake here (they are insane). It's an awesome place to chill on their super comfortable sofas, have a chat with friends, play board games or do some work. I can honestly say that I had the nicest latte that I have ever had in Coffee Barker. Starbucks who?! So yeah, the next time you're visiting the Capital city of Wales steer away from Topshop, River Island and Hollister and venture down those little arcades, who knows what you'll find.

JT // Justin Timberlake

JT//

I love JT, he's just awesome. Even though he's not the time of music I usually listen to I just love his stuff, both old and new but Mirrors is insanely good. Recently I've been watching his performance at the 2013 VMA's over and over again so I thought I'd share it on the blog :)

'Sup 2014 // let's make it a good one

hello,

2013 was an interesting year it was a year filled with hospital appointments, operations, frustration, frustration, more frustration and stress but also some fun times with Reading and V festivals in the summer, academic success, and many opportunities but it is fair to say that 2013 wasn't my favourite year of all time thus I shall not dwell on it too much. 2014 is the year. It's an even number to begin with so that's already a plus :) Despite knowing that university work will continue to be tough, I now know what to expect (kind of) and how to deal with it and plan my time. I love sport and exercise and throughout 2013 I was hardly able to do anything thus not making life very enjoyable but 2014 is already looking to be much better in terms of getting back in to fitness (I shall expand on this soon). I am not going to make any official New Years resolutions because I feel that they will only cause me more stress if I don't stick to them but I have decided upon some in my head with one of them being to be more positive and to grab every opportunity that is presented to me while also creating my own opportunities (I shall also expand on this in another post). So, here's to a 2014 and a new year (I shall be back on the blog soon with a longer post about the new year) :)