90's Kid Survey

Here's a little something I saw in a video on youtube, I thought it was something that could  work in a blog post aswell as a vlog. If you were a 90's kid like me hopefully you'll enjoy this little blast from the past...

Favourite tv show?
I loved a lot of tv shows when I was younger but I'd have to say my overall favourite was Pokémon. I remember being really sick once when I was a kid and rushing home from the hospital to see the newest episode of Pokémon, clearly I had my priorities straight! I also loved the Rugrats and show called mopatops shop, which to me was pure magical. Some other favourites were Barney, Animal's of farthing wood, Noah's Island, Tots tv, the Morbegs and postman pat!

Favourite toy?
This is so difficult! well I was a big barbie fan so I liked the little collection my sisters and I had going. I loved betty spaghetti dolls and my diva starz doll which I begged my parents for. Oh and my sisters furby although that was kinda creepy thinking back. I also loved my play kitchen. Anything kept me amused as a kiddo.

Favourite tv commercial?
♪Them bones them bones need calcium ♫ couldn't actually find the version I used to watch on youtube. Another one I liked was the one for those BN biscuits with the faces ♪BN BN doo doo di doo doo♫ anything with a catchy song really had me sold really.

Nsync or backstreet boys?

Is it bad to say neither? I don't ever recall being a fan of either of these boy bands. I think I'd be more familiar with backstreet boys if I had to choose one. I remember loving Westlife though. If you don't recognize the name it might be because they were a lot bigger Europe.

Weirdest fashion trend?
Jelly shoes, choker necklaces, scrunchies, butterfly hair clips and bubble bags, part of me still wishes bubble bags were still cool.

Favourite collectible?
Pokemon cards! I remember me and my brothers and sisters would nag my mam in the morning while she was driving us to school to buy us pokemon cards. My older sister and I would always split a pack and she'd give me all the crap ones thinking I wouldn't notice :P

Favourite beany baby?
Chocolate the moose! I recently learnt that if it was kept in pristine condition it would be worth $600 for collectors, although I'm not sure how true that is. I kinda hope it's not haha. I liked that beany babies had names and birthdays, I'd always try and celebrate them and always forget. I also never saw the point in keeping the tag on them, although I do now!

How many tamagotchi's did you go through?
Well because I grew up in a big family and all us children were very close in age, when it came to toys there was never really any great sense of ownership so I could guess I went through about 3 but I'm not even sure they would have been mine. They were such a money scam, they'd alway die!

Favourite gaming system and game?
I was a playstation kid through and through. I loved the second crash bandicoot game (cortex strikes back!) and the best game ever crash team racing, which we downloaded a few years ago and I still play on our ps3 ( I know!). I also really liked spiro the dragon and a game called medieval. My brothers loved final fantasy but I was never any good at it.

Favourite Disney channel show or original movie?
I only got Disney channel when I was about 8 so I'm not sure if they're considered 90's but I loved Lizzie McGuire and that's so Raven, I think I'd still watch that's so Raven if it was on. She was so sassy.

Favourite music artist?
Britney spears. Thought she was the bees knees. I have better music taste now, I swear!

Favourite Nickelodeon show?
Keenan and Kel. I PUT THE SCREW IN THE TUNA!

Favourite candy (sweets)?
I really liked the hubba bubba with the strawberry liquid stuff inside I don't think they sell them anymore :( I liked jelly tots, flying saucers with the sherbet, push pops! penny sweets back when they were actually cheap, and starburst. Anything really, I wasn't too fussy when it came to sweets. That said I did not really like gobstoppers, they were just painful and unhygienic haha

Favourite game? (board game, school game, etc.)
I went to an all girls primary school so we had a lot of games involving skipping ropes which I loved. I also loved a school game we had called 'My grandfathers shop' it was guessing game and you'd have to run up and down til you guessed what was in the shop. As for board games I liked the usual games like guess who, connect four and one named shopping list that I loved when I was about 5 or 6.

Favourite McDonald's Happy Meal toy?
My sister and I still talk about the time we got Lumiere, the candlestick from beauty and the beast. When you pressed a button at the bottom he lit up which I found amazing at the time! I also liked the Mr. Men toys they had at some point, I remember wanting them all.

Favourite book?
Don't put mustard in the custard! I still think it's genius. Owl Babies. Anything by roald dahl. Oh and a the four seasons of bramley hedge!!

Favourite clothing store?
I didn't really have one at that age, my mam would buy all my clothes which usually came from Dunnes stores or Marks and spencers, I remember wearing Benetton clothes a lot too.

What would you watch when you'd get home from school?
Most likely the Rugrats, Pokemon or anything on cartoon network, Dexter's lab anyone?! :D

WOW. I'm feeling incredibly nostalgic now. I had so much fun writing this and remembering all the things I loved as a kid. If you want to do this survey too feel free and don't forget to share you're posts with me I'd love to read them! If you were a 90's kid or teen, let me know some of your favourites in the comments :)

 -Frances ☮

Wanderlust

I'm not sure if it's just the age I am at or the kind of person I am but I'm constantly finding myself lusting over embarking on adventures and exploring the world around me. I've had an itch in my boots for as long as I can remember and I've been known to doodle places I want to go (see blog header). As much as I love being home, I love thinking and mentally planning an exciting trip more. Here's a few pictures I took from my pinterest board, amazing places around the world, these some of the places that are sitting at the top of my list of places to go see...

Of course these are some of *many* places I'd like to see. Infact, I'd go anywhere that would have me! I'm really going to try work on making travelling a reality for me, and that's probably something I'll try to do for the rest of my life.One of my next travelling missions is to go inter railing around Europe with friends, which is something I've wanted to do since I found out what inter-railing was a couple of years ago. First, I'll have to save like crazy though because unfortunately  I'm a poor student with very little pretty moneys :( Until then, I'll keep pinning beautiful pictures to satisfy my daily wanderlust needs.

What's on your list of places to see? let me know!

-Frances

Mac Archies Girls Collection: Ronnie Red Lipstick

I'll admit, I don't normally blog about beauty related things, I think one of  the main reasons is because there are an abundance of beauty bloggers who do it and do it right (temptalia anyone?). Today I'm posting about a makeup collection I've been really excited about for the past month or two now, the Mac Cosmetics Archie's Girls collection. Inspired by a comic book love triangle of two rivaling girls, Betty and Veronica trying to win the heart of Archie. The collection is split into two, soft neutral tones for a girl-next-door look like Betty or the deep, seductive tones like that of Veronica's style. Of course I opted for a lipstick of raven haired temptress, Veronica. It's a beautiful bright cool toned red with a matte finish. 

 Before purchasing, I made sure it was worth the hefty price tag. I read some really good reviews, Christine from Temptalia gave it an A+ which is quite rare, that girl is critical she really knows her makeup, guys. It was launched in Ireland last week and a guy dressed up as Archie gave us these cute tins of sweets which I've been nibbling on all week... mmm cinnamon :) I tested out the lipstick and it was as nice as I had hoped so I bought it the next day! Yaaaaaaay

 I'm really happy I didn't let this one pass like many previous Mac collections. The colour is super pigmented,  it applys like a dream and wears for hours and hours without feathering or moving around, which is a rare find in a red lipstick for me. It definitely surpasses other red lipsticks I own, so if you're a red lipstick wearer like myself I highly recommend! If not, there are lots of other nice things in the collection to choose from. Sadly this was the only thing poor student Frances could afford. Btw, how fecking cute is the packing?!

-Frances <3

Flâneur: A Doodle

For the past week I've had no internet at home. The stormy weather broke some cable for signal on our roof and we had to wait a whole week until an engineer could come out to fix it. Thankfully I was able to abuse avail of the wifi in college everyday which meant I was able to go on various social networking sites and not go completely mad or lose my will to live. Long story short, I'm only getting a chance to post on here now.

I decided to share this drawing I did in promarkers, I just did it in my sketchbook for fun one evening but I quite like how it turned out. I started a new module on Monday called psychology of space, it's basically about how we interact with our environment. I picked it because it was quite different to anything I get to do in my course normally and I thought it would be interesting and also quite useful for a designer/artist to know some of the things we will be covering. During my first lecture I came across the word 'Flaneur' which comes from the french word 'Flâneur' which I believe means 'stroller' or someone who wanders aimlessly. Correct me if I'm wrong, I did German in school so I probably make no sense! It's good to be back in college after a really long break. I got my results from last semester emailed to me today, I passed all my coursework which I'm delighted about. Calls for celebratory chocolate me thinks.

I'm trying to organize my first ever giveaway for next week. Hopefully I'll have decided on something and it will be up just in time for valentines day! (because I luff you) It'll only be something small as I am a poor little student at the moment :(

-Frances 

△Paper mountains△

(c) Frances J.

Just a little somethin' quick I did tonight on my computer. Very simple in design but I liked the colours a lot. I have a wall in my room that is in need of some new art and design work so I've started making and thinking of potential prints and illustrations for the wall. I'll be posting more artwork in the coming week so stay tuned folks. 

Have a good weekend! :)

-Franki x

My week in pictures

Happy Sunday everyone!
Phew! what a long week it has been. It has been challenging in every sense of the word but I feel as if I've learnt a lot none the less. I've learnt that sometimes achieving one of your new years goals can actually turn out to be bad, yes -BAD! I got a job which I was thrilled about! but I was a little misinformed about what I would be doing beforehand and I got a morbid shock when I found out. I was completely thrown into the deep end and felt out of my depth, it left me feeling anxious and even sleepless. But something good came out of it, I learnt that it's absolutely okay to raise your hand and say "Hey, I really can't do this" -Something I was never comfortable doing before. I'm that silly kind of person that would rather suffer in silence than ask for help.

Things got better towards the end of the week when I went to my friend Áine's house warming party! and when I say house I mean small adorable flat. We all went for cocktails like the fancy people we are. (This is yet another goal I can tick off my new year list- try new cocktails). The cocktails were delicious but the staff were unnecessarily rude. I got a long island ice tea and it had all of the alcoholz, probably my new favourite drink ever!

 Anyway here's a few photos I posted during the week I thought I'd share:

1. My Cousin came over on Monday and we made baked Alaska. It was the best decision ever. Baked Alaska is heavenly.
2. My sister getting impatient with her college essay referencing (see no. 28 hehe)
3. My long island ice tea!
4. My friend Brenda's cosmopolitan that was so sex and the city, but also tasted like straight vodka.
5. Yuki being adorable.
6. Polka dot nails, excuse the overloading of clipart -I got carried away.
7. Don't normally go crazy over MAC collections (not even the recent Marilyn Monroe one) but I think I'll cave in and buy a lipstick from this one. It's themed around the comic Archies Girls.
8. Overly filtered sky, thought it looked pretty.
9. Yours truly rocking the fro. I'm trying to wear my hair au naturel more, curly madness ensues.

I have one week left until I go back to college and I really can't wait, 6 weeks is such a long break!

How was your week? :)

-Frances 

Life lately: Being Sick & Remaining Optimistic

Inspirational quote is Inspirational. Source: Here.

Oh boy! What a week last week was. New years eve was a lot of fun. I went out with my cousin in Dublin and we had a great night, we headed back to my house the next day and there was a massive Christmas dinner waiting for us (Can I get a hell yeah? best hangover food ever!). The day after I woke up feeling very ill. My whole body was aching and I had a horrible fever, I felt freezing even while cocooned in a million layers, then realised I had a high temperature.

The next day I had a very painful sore throat, felt fatigued as f**k and was aching still. I was sort of hoping I was on the mend but I wasn't because, that night I couldn't sleep, my throat was so unbelievably painful and nothing would relieve it. No amount of manuka honey, medicine or caramel chew chew Ben and Jerry's. I was feeling the worst I've felt in a long time and so I went to the doctor later Friday evening and I'm now on antibiotics. Since learning about it in Biology in Secondary school, I've always thought antibiotics should be a last resort because they kill the good bacteria as well as the bad. But I was pretty miserable and I think it was for the best. All this talk of antibiotics reminds me that it's time to take mine...

...Anyway! thankfully it only took about two days for the Antibiotics to kick in. My throat feels completely better today which is such a relief. I'm able to eat again and I've learned to never take the ability to swallow food painlessly for granted. I don't finish my antibiotics until Friday and I really want to make sure to build myself back up after them, Anyone got any tips? I hear probiotic yogurt and garlic help a lot.

Despite everything, I have still remained quite optimistic about the new year. It was a rotten start and I felt annoyed that I couldn't start any of my goals like everyone else. My intention last week was to workout and eat healthy but I think being sick may have worked to my advantage because I complete lost my appetite for a couple of days and lost 4 pounds as a result! RE-SULT! :D Now I'm feeling not so shit about myself when I pick up my skipping rope tomorrow and attempt New year: Take 2.

My view from my death bed: My diamonds in the rough.

Probably the most productive thing I did while I was sick
was paint a french manicure on my nails with a nail set
I received for Christmas :)

 Hope everyone had a better first week of 2013 than me. Let me know if you have any good tips on what to take after a course of antibiotics. I'm saving some probiotic yogurts in the fridge for when I finish them. I was about to eat some then I realized I was just sending the good soldiers to their death haha.

-Frances x