Hi!
On to Day 2 of the challenge, you can see my ten secrets
here.
Day Two: Nine Loves
I don't think any of these are going to come as a particularly huge shock to anyone who's known me for more than five minutes, but here we go anyway!
1. Books.
Books are my ultimate love. I can't fathom people who say, with pride, that they don't read. I don't get it. Why wouldn't you want to read! I've been devouring books since I was old enough to read, and I have no intentions of stopping. I don't have a kindle or e-Reader, I prefer to pick books up in the library, second hand shops, boot sales, or online - there's nothing like opening a new book, or getting a second hand one with the knowledge that it has already had some kind of impact on another person.
2. Halloween.
I've already mentioned Halloween in this challenge, but it really is one of my favourite things in the whole world. Ever since I was little, I wanted to move to America and go trick-or-treating. I used to dream about living in a town that celebrated with pumpkins, lights, house parties - it's becoming more of a big deal over here, which is brilliant, because it used to be so hard to get nice Halloween decorations! When we were getting married in October last year, there was only one thing I wanted on the tables. Am I a big child? Yes.
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Sitting at the top table on my own. Because we had a buffet service, my dress train had fallen down, and nobody trusted me not to spill my dinner on myself. |
3. Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Words can not describe how much I love Buffy. There isn't a day that passes but I use a Buffy reference or quote - I don't know what it was about the series that caught my attention and imagination so much but it was a huge part of my life during my early teens. My sister and I spent hours and hours doing Buffy quizzes, listening to the soundtrack, writing out the scripts, taping the episodes off the telly and then using the cassette recorder to make tapes of the episodes to listen to on the walkman so much that we'd have memorized them by the time the next episode came out. I have watched the box sets over and over numerous times, and I've read the majority of the Season 8 comics (in which Joss Whedon just completely lets rip and writes stuff he'd never have gotten away with on the telly), but I've still never sat down and watched the last ever episode. I don't want it to end! Can you imagine my excitement when this happened? I totally understand the people who get all manic when they're tweeted by Bieber or 1D now. I get it. Completely.

4. Cross Stitch
My Mum was big into tapestry and liquid embroidery when I was little. She used to get books regularly from those crafty book clubs, and sometimes they'd send cross stitch ones. She had no interest in it, but when I broke my ankle aged 15, I took it up to keep myself occupied. I can't believe I've been doing it now for 15 years! I love doing big huge pieces, and I've done a lot of traditional type pictures and cards, but with the popularization of Pinterest, I've found some amazing little pop culture patterns that I like to do. I'm currently making some Pacman pendants on plastic canvas, and I've already shown you the Mario & Zelda
bookmarks I did a while ago. I made a coin purse with some Buffy quotes on, and I'm working on something to do with DC Comics. I made all our own wedding invitations and I make an awful lot of baby, birthday, and wedding cards. I keep forgetting to take pictures of the things I make, but here's a collage of some of the stuff I've done, and a pic of our wedding invitation.
5. Shadow
The stray dog arrived circa July last year. He was skin and bone, and really afraid. We live in a really rural area beside a lake, so unfortunately it's not uncommon for people to dump dogs nearby. In the last few years I've had the dog warden out at least 5 times to pick up animals. As much as I'd love to keep them all, it's not practical when I already have a young child (and a cat). This guy was different - he looked so lost and lonely that we all took pity on him. We fed him, and agreed that if he hung around the house, we'd get him checked out at the vet and we'd keep him if we couldn't find an owner. A year later, he's a firm fixture in our home, and he's the best guard dog anyone could ever have. As you can see, he's made himself quite comfortable. When he saw me taking pictures of him, he wasn't too impressed. I'd be devastated if anything happened to him, he's an absolute pet.
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"Waiter! Bring me the breakfast menu!" |
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Bloody paparazzi. |
6. Nail Polish
I bet you'd never have guessed how much I love nail polish, right? I'm currently at 373 bottles (not including top/basecoats or polish I've ordered that hasn't arrived yet) according to my
spreadsheet, and I have no intention of stopping. I'm doing a Nail Technician home study course, which is great for teaching me the basics, and I'm going to do another couple of courses when I've finished this one. We were talking the other day about home improvements we'd love to make - husband wants to build on out the back, son wants a games room, I want a polish room. A room full of floor-to-ceiling racks, full of glorious polish. And no, they don't all automatically go gloopy or dry up after a while. I still have polish I've had for over 10 years and it applies fine. You can see my most recent stash post
here - embarrassingly, it needs to be updated.
7. Yankee Candles
I know some people hate them (and call them Manky Candles), but I adore them. I especially love the wax tarts (that I burn in a brilliant Griffin oil burner, seen in
this post). My current favourite is a 2013 release called
Fireside Treats - I have it burning now, it's an amazing blend of sweet marshmallow and camp fire smoke. I love the tarts because they last so much longer than the little votives. I have a stockpile of yankee tarts in the press - this is one of the things I'm a bit snobby about (along with Dairygold and Barry's Tea), I don't like the cheap versions. I highly recommend
yankee.ie too - their customer service is fantastic and they've a great range of gifts.
8. eBay Jewellery
I have an awful eBay accessory addiction. I put €20 on my O2 card (thank god they don't take laser), hit the jewellery section, click free shipping, and behold - loads of little brown packages from China. (There are also hundreds of nail art suppliers on there, just type in "nail art", free shipping, buy now, lowest price first, and have a spree) The majority of "retro" or "kitsch" stuff I see around can be found on eBay - I'm not talking about OOAK handmade stuff, or higher quality stuff like
Galibardy - I'm talking about basically everything Penneys sells, everything considered hipster, or everything with a moustache or owl on it. If you go to eBay.com, you can get things even cheaper - if, for example, something on the Irish/UK site is £0.99 (€1.16), it's usually always $0.99 (€0.76) on eBay.com. I know some people prefer to buy good quality things, but I love having a huge assortment of accessories that I don't have to worry about losing. Here's an example of some of the stuff I've bought recently, nothing cost over €2.50, click on the sellers to see what else they have.
9. My Boys
Saving the best for last, the number one thing in my life that I love is this pair of muckers:

If someone had to tell me in 2002 that by the end of the following year I'd be with the person I was going to marry, I'd have laughed at them. I didn't have boyfriends as such growing up - I was very shy, had absolutely no self confidence, and ate to make myself feel better. I didn't know how to put myself out there and I had no intentions of talking to members of the opposite sex, I never thought I would meet anyone who would be interested in seeing me more than once. I did the usual niteclub/short-term boyfriend thing during college, but it never entered my head to settle down. Roll on one night in 2003, I was only out as a chaperone for my younger sister, ended up drunker than her and her friend, singing a Britney song on Karaoke with a tinsel necklace, and as the old cliché goes, our eyes met, he smiled at me, I bought him a drink (vodka and Red Bull, the devil's own nectar) and that was it. Ten years later, we're married with a lovely little boy and another little person on the way. He gives me my space and has never, ever questioned anything I do or want to do, and I'm the same with him. It's funny how life works out, isn't it?
Back tomorrow with a swatch of China Glaze OMG A UFO if I can make it look not disgusting. I'm not loving it so far, but we'll see.