America Says Yes!

Yesterday Ireland, Today America, Tomorrow the rest of the world.

Firstly, America I am so fricken' proud of you!!! This is an incredible day for the LGBT+ community in every country. So many people's lives have been changed.

For those of you who don't know (seriously have you been living under a rock?) on Friday 26th June 2015 (today as I'm writing this) America legalized gay marriage in all 50 states. This is such an amazing day for gay people and straight people too. People can finally be themselves and marry whoever they want, man or woman. Love is love - people are finally beginning to understand what that means. It doesn't matter if two boys love each other or two girls love each other it's still love! Today has been a crazy day that will be remembered for ever, and honestly I'm so proud. 

I'm going to do further posts on the LGBT+ community and things like that because it's something I really do support and want to get out there and share my opinions on. I'm honestly so proud of everyone and I'm so happy for every gay/lesbian couple that can now finally get married and have a life together. It also makes me smile that Twitter have realized a tweet emoji so every time you tweet #LoveWins it adds a rainbow coloured heart emoji and every time you use #Pride it adds a rainbow square emoji! Google have also added things and YouTube Spotlight have changed their profile picture to a rainbow play button. It makes me so happy with how supportive everyone is towards this!

Angharad xoxo

A Day In Llangollen

A couple of weeks ago I went to a small-ish town in Wales called Llangollen. It's quite near to where I live (even though I live in England) so we just decided to take a little day trip there. I also vlogged the day on my YouTube channel so you can watch that here. I took my camera with me so I could take a few pictures while we were out, so I thought I would share them with you today.

(The train station sign)

 (River)

 (Old train station)

 (Another train station sign)

 (Yet again another train sign)

 (Cute signs at the train station)

 (a church)

 (another cute sign)

 (some cool vintage suitcases)

 (some really pretty flowers)

 (salted caramel ice cream - this stuff is the best)

 (some really cute castley-house-thing along the canal)

 (another picture of the river)

 (a stream train in the station)

 (the hills)

(a really nice little fudge shop - their fudge was amazing!)

I hope you enjoyed this little post!

Have you ever been to Llangollen? If so, did you like it? If not, would you like to?

Angharad xoxo

A Very Stressful Week

Last week was probably one of the most annoying, stressful and anxious weeks I have ever experienced, like seriously. I'm still kind of stressed out about it so I thought I would write about it in hope that it help the stress leave my mind. 

Firstly, my bus was late picking us up from school. Not just once, three times. Three out of the five days it was late. I mean sure, if it was late in the morning I would have been fine, but it wasn't, it was late after school. Two of the days it was only twenty minutes late, but still, it's not really fair. Plus all three times the school knew it would be late and didn't bother telling us. But on Thursday night it was over an hour late to pick us up which was ridiculous. Also the school decided to leave about fifty kids on the grass/pavement in the school car park for an hour, unsupervised (and yes, they were fully aware that we were there). Now might be a good time to point out that phones are actually banned at my school, which meant a lot of people didn't have a way to contact their parents until the last 15 minutes of waiting when the head teacher finally came out and let us use the office phone. Luckily I still take my phone to school, so I managed to contact my mum soon into realizing it would be late. Plus I did have a good old text-message chat with my friend Maria who is great company when your stuck outside for an hour on a very hot day (I'll remember that forever Maria so thank you so much for keeping me sane). 

Would now be a good time to point out that the same day my bus was late was also parents evening? Probably. I'm usually not the kind of person who cares about these kind of things but this time, I don't know what happened (probably the hour long wait for my bus) but I got quite worked up and anxious about it. In the end everything went okay and all the teachers said lovely things and no one had any bad comments so that's always good. Had a good laugh with my drama teacher about the time she fell in a bin (oops, she told me not to post that anywhere online, but I don't think she knows about this blog so I'm all good, just shhh I didn't tell you). So basically every teacher we saw said I had to pick their subject for GSCEs next year so that's always great (not really). I literally came home and collapsed onto my bed with exhaustion, I had been out since 8am till 8pm. 

The next day I was so tired still, I forgot so much of what I had to do. After having an evening spent with teachers telling me how I never forget my homework and am always organised, guess what I did? Yep, I forgot my art homework, and my french book (but it turned out I didn't actually need that as we just watched a film). I honestly felt so bad, even though my art teacher said it was fine and she didn't mind, I literally got so annoyed with myself, probably because I was really stressed out still.

I hope somehow you may have enjoyed this post. I think I will definitely have a nice relaxing bath and YouTube binge watch session tomorrow evening. Also a huge thanks to Maria for keeping me calm and sane through all of this!

Have you ever had a crazy couple of days like this?

Angharad xoxo

It's Kind Of A Crazy Story...

Wow. Okay, where to start with this one. I have something CRAZY to tell you that happened a few weeks ago. Something so crazy I didn't believe it at first. I have already spoken about this on my YouTube so if you want to see that click here.

Okay so background information: May 11th-17th was mental health awareness week, and mental health being something close to my heart - I decided to make a little video to show awareness during this week. It was nothing special, I didn't think anything of it at all. I uploaded it on Sunday 10th and carried on doing what I usually do, not thinking it was any different to my other videos. 

It got to Monday at school, a few of my friends or people I know said nice things about the video or wore something green. I was happy I had even got one person to show awareness. I got home that day and checked my emails like I normally do. Except I had a rather special email.

The email was the from the producer of 'The Chrissy B Show' which airs on Sky 203. They wanted to use MY video in their show on that Friday. I was so shocked, excited and slightly confused. My video. A video I made. They found my small channel out of thousands, and liked the video enough to actually use it! (click here to watch the video). I frantically texted Liv and showed her it and to be honest, she seemed even more excited than I was (and I was really excited!). 

A few hours (a day actually) and emails later, I recieved another message from the producer confirming my video would be used. I got the email on Tuesday, a day after the original email, in a maths lesson to be precise (I know what you're thinking - "Angharad you're not allowed phones in lessons" - yes, yes I know but it was at the end so I took a sneeky peek). I think that moment was the most excited I've ever been. I mean come on, I WAS ON TV :)))

The day went on and slowly (quite quickly actually considering my friends were walking around practically screaming it to anyone in  one metre radius) more and more people found out - including quite a few teachers who all had the same things to say: "What for?", "Oh thats incredible well done". My personal favourite comment was from one of the french teachers. She was covering a PSHE lesson on whether there is a difference between celebrities and famous people. Towards the end of the lesson we were talking about meeting famous people so me and a few others said we haven't met anyone famous. She said "No I haven't either...oh wait yeah I have, I've met you Angharad". I would just like to thank everyone who said congrats and was really supportive :)

I'm not going to go into detail about all the other days up till Friday but it was definitely a crazy week. The show aired on Friday 15th at 10pm on Sky 203 (you can watch it on their YouTube channel here). I am so happy and so thankful to be given this incredible opportunity!

Angharad xoxo

GGL | Healthy Living

Today's post is another in our series Girls' Guide To Living with Paige and Emily. This weeks theme is Healthy Living, which is very appropriate at this time of year as lots of people are trying to get the perfect 'Bikini Body'.

Around this time of year there is always posts about new diets or fitness tips. I don't want this post to be like that, because that's not really the kind of person I am - plus if you wanted advice on things like that there's about a million other people who could talk about that better than I will probably ever be able to. I am going to include a few tips on healthy eating and staying fit but I want to focus this more on other sides of health. Like mental health and your happiness. I am in no way a professional and this might not help any of you at all, or it might be really helpful, who knows? I'm going to start with the things everyone talks about in the category of healthy living.

Eating Healthier

Not even going to lie, this is something I am so bad at so I can't really give you that much advice. The first thing I would say is do not try one of those crazy diets that basically consist of starving yourself, especially if you are a teenager. Those kind of diets are very damaging to your health and will really not do you any good at all. Also, don't try to ditch all the junk food at once, you'll just end up craving it more and eating it again. Start by slowly cutting out things one at a time. but make sure you are still eating enough, just healthier foods. Just remember that you are beautiful how you are and you do not need to diet for anyone.

Exercise & Fitness
Again this is something I am awful at. I really don't recommend getting a gym membership or some really expensive workout gear. I would say just grab a pair of comfy shorts, some trainers and a t-shirt. You don't just have to do running or cycling or some workout DVD. You could join a club at school or outside of school like ballet, netball, football, or basically anything else. All of these will help you keep fit and are fun to and can make you some new friends.

Being Happy.
I don't think anyone can truly give you amazing advice on this, as it's something really personal to you. The only tips I have are to try to surround yourself with good, caring friends who can make you laugh and have a good time. Find that one little thing that makes you happy and stick with that. Whether that's a sport, a hobby (for example mine are blogging and making videos), or just spending some time with your loved ones.

Saying Mentally Well
With exams around lots of people can get very stressed, sad or anxious. If you ever feel stressed or anxious or depressed please please please talk to someone. I know how hard it is but honestly it really helps. Just try to remember that better times are coming and the hurt will end and exams will be over soon. I know at the time it will feel like it will never end and everything is so hard, and talking to someone can be the hardest thing as it can seem like they'll judge you or won't understand, but I promise if you find the right person they will try really hard to help you feel better. Just remember, everything will be okay in the end, and if it's not okay. then it's not the end. You can always talk to me about anything, just send me a message on any of my social media!

I hope you enjoyed this post and don't forget to check out Emily and Paige's posts.
What are your tips for staying healthy?
Angharad xoxo

A New Look + A Few Updates

As you can see, my blog has had a face-lift. Once again I have decided to change my blog name - this is the last time for a while I promise! I decided to go with the new name, I wanted a new look. I've also changed the way my blog looks a lot recently, because I just really wanted it to be perfect. And finally, I think that look has been achieved.

My friend Paige, has an online shop called Twenty-One Designs that she runs with another blogger called Emily. Basically their website offers different designs for blogs. They have a couple template designs, and some packages. They also set up everything for you, which is amazing as I'm not the best at coding and using the blogger website. Paige actually designed all of this new blog layout herself using the Summer Template I believe. I am so happy with the way my blog looks now, I have spent ages (literally days) trying to get my blog how I wanted and Paige managed to do it in a few hours! So thank you so much Paige! She also has an amazing blog which you should go read because it's one of my favourites!

The new schedule. I've decided I need a schedule for my blog as at the moment I'm just kind of posting whenever. So the new schedule is posting every Wednesday and Saturday. I hope that's okay with you guys, as that suits me the best. Also for the next few Saturdays me, Emily and Paige will be continuing our 'Girls' Guide To Living' series so stay tuned for that!

That's pretty much all I have to say for this post!

What do you guys think of my new design?

Angharad xoxo

GGL | Social Media: Inspiration or Not?

Today's post is a different kind of post than what I normally do. This is going to be part of a series called Girls' Guide To Living (GGL). The series is a collaboration with two lovely bloggers called Emily and Paige, and each of them are going to be doing the same post over on their blogs! The theme is going to be different every week and the series is running for four weeks. The series is designed you help you and give you motivation to change your life around for the better: whether that be to calm your worries, or to help you get more active and live healthier. Today's theme is social media, and whether it's a good thing or not.

I've always been one to be obsessed with social media, I spend quite a lot of my time on it - Instagram and Twitter being my favourite. I never used to see a problem with it, but recently I've been seeing a lot of negativity on these sites.

Let's start with the good points.

Social media can be so inspiring for me. Being a YouTuber and Blogger, lots of the posts and video ideas I come up with are from social media. If I see a picture of something I love, it can inspire me to create something based on that. Or say an event that's happened, that can give me ideas for videos/posts related to that event: For example, the vote for gay marriage in Ireland has inspired me to write a post about the LGBT+ community (which is coming on Tuesday so look out for that). 

It can be motivating. Now that summer is approaching there are lots of tips and tricks of how to workout well and get the perfect 'Bikini Body'. There are also lots of revision and study tips, and ways to get you motivated for your exams at the end of the year. Personally I find these kind of posts and videos so motivating, they just make me want to get up and get out of my room and just go have a workout or get out of bed and start revising, however I know for some people these can make you feel bad about yourself, which leads on to one of my later points. There are also loads of ideas of things to make, ways to decorate, things to do in the summer, products to try and so much more that just make me want to try out some new things and get creative. 

It keeps people connected. Last year my cousin Dominic went to Australia for six months to play cricket. Social media was an amazing way for us to keep up to date about where he was and what he was doing, but also to see his photos. In this instance social media was incredible for us because he was the other side of the world and we could still see what he was doing. It's an amazing way of keeping in touch with family and friends that live far away.

You can share your interests with thousands of people. Blogs and YouTube channels are a prime example of this because really, anyone who writes a blog or creates videos are just simply sharing their content, skills or opinions with anyone in the whole world, and that's a really crazy thought for me. The fact that something I created on a Sunday afternoon could be shared with thousands of people is just such a concept to me. I still haven't quite got my head around the fact I have viewers and even friends now in America and France and tons of other places.

Create personal spaces for your own thoughts. There are so many sites for this. Sites where you get your own little corner of the internet, which you can decorate however you want, whether that's with words, pictures, quotes, thoughts or opinions. That in itself is a wonderful thing. The fact that we can have our own space to do whatever we want is awesome, it's like having your own cyber-room. And you can share your work with everyone and anyone, keep it to yourself, or limit it to your friends and family, depending on what you want to do.

There are so many amazing things about social media but sadly a few things can ruin it.

It can be addicting. I would like to say I'm not addicted to social media, but I go on it multiple times a day. I think we should try limit the amount of time we spend on it because it can be annoying when you're trying to talk to someone and they're just on their phone 24/7. Especially when they don't respond to you because they're too busy checking their social media to pay attention.

People think the likes matter. 100% honestly, I do get annoyed if my posts don't get the same amount of likes they normally do, or get excited if they get more. But at the end of the day, likes and comments don't matter. Your self worth is not defined by the amount of likes you get on a selfie. Likes don't mean anything, yeah okay, it's a great feeling you get if you get a lot of likes when you've spent a long time creating something, but you should be creating it for you, not for other people. If you like what you've made and you're proud of it, who cares what others think?  If you're happy with it, what other people think shouldn't matter. I think sometimes we can all fall into the trap and get caught up with likes and comments, even me.

There's a lot of hate. There's so much hate going around social media at the moment, especially on YouTube and Twitter. YouTube creators are getting picked apart for every wrong move they make. I have seen so many people devoting their time to creating hate accounts or saying mean comments on peoples' posts. Firstly, it's such a waste of time when they could be doing better things than writing these horrible things and picking apart other peoples' lives. These people don't even know who they're picking on and how it could be making them feel. It makes me sick. Cyber-bullying is actually illegal yet people still think it's fine. It's not.

It can create false images in your mind. You always see this pictures of really skinny girls with amazing tans and long hair and for some people I think it makes you feel like that's how you should look and it can make you feel really bad about how you look. It can really lower your self esteem. But really everyone is beautiful in their own way and these photos were probably edited and photo shopped anyway.

I hope you guys enjoyed this post and found it thought-provoking.
So, do you think social media is good or bad?

Angharad xoxo

Lyla Loves Wishlist

Not going to lie I had never heard of this company before a few days ago but I am now completely in LOVE with them. For those of you who don't know Lyla Loves is an online shop that sells all sorts of accessories, from necklaces and bracelets to phone cases. They have some really unique items and lots of different styles: Simple, Classy, Bohemian, Grunge, Dainty and basically every other style possible. There items are also really affordable, when I first saw I couldn't believe the prices!

Gold & Black Diamond Necklace - £3.00

The first item I found was this necklace. I love the design on it, I think it's so cute and would be the perfect little touch to a nice plain coloured t-shirt or dress, and for £3 you really can't argue.

Silver Cuff - £5

This is such a simple bracelet but I am in love, I do tend to lean towards simpler jewelry so this piece was right up my street.

Matte Gold Open Triange Ring - £3

If you know me you will know that rings are one of my favourite pieces of jewelry, although I don't really like big over the top ones, I prefer small dainty ones. I fell in love with this instantly. I just think its really simple but classy and I love the triangle trend that's around at the moment!

Geo Armband Metallic Tattoo Pack - £1

Flash tattoos are everywhere at the moment, they were especially popular at Coachella this year and I personally can't get enough. They remind me so much of the temporary tattoos we used to have as a kid (is it just me that loved them?). I really love the look of these as I love how shiny and cute they are!

Have you ever brought something from Lyla Loves?

Angharad xoxo

How To Pass Exams // Revision Tips

Exam season is here for all of you doing GSCEs, A Levels or AS Levels and for everyone else end of year assessments are coming up, well they are in my school. I've decided to share some of my tips for the exam period. I hope you find these somewhat useful!

Colour

One of the best tips I have for you is to use colour. This is literally my favourite thing to do because 

a) it makes your books look pretty

b) it makes important key words or phrases stand out so they're easier to memorize.

I personally love using fine-liners to underline important words or put bubbles around key phrases or word definitions. I like to do this while I'm taking notes in class, but I know some people add the colour when they're revising. I just find it easier to do it as I make the notes so I can just go through them when I need to.

Flashcards

This is the obvious one that I think everyone uses. I find these so useful as they are really easy to carry around. I generally flick through these on the bus to school the morning or at breaks and lunchtimes before a test. My favourite ways to use them are either writing a question on the front and the answer on the back or for french I like writing the words in french on the front and the English translation on the back.

A Good Clean Work Space

For me, there's nothing worse than having to work at a messy desk - ask anyone who sits next to me in lessons at school, if you do, I feel sorry for you. I can't work unless everything is neat and organised, and it just looks so much nicer anyway. My desk is the one place in my room that I tidy pretty much daily. I just can't concentrate at a messy desk. I also have slight OCD tendencies, as right now I am so annoyed by the fact that my pens aren't in colour order and my pen cup is facing the wrong way, anyway that's another story.

Breaks

It's really important to take short breaks in between revising as it is scientifically proven that people who work for long periods of time without taking breaks tend to loose concentration and get distracted more than people who take short regular breaks. I like taking a five minute break every twenty five minutes. During the breaks I like watch some YouTube, Netflix, or go on social media. My current favourite TV show on Netflix is Once Upon A Time I seriously recommend you check it out if you haven't already.

Timetable

I really suggest having your school timetable somewhere visible on your desk or somewhere you have easy access to. I find it's always useful to know when my lessons are so I know which subjects I need to revise for first.

Snacks!

My favourite things. Snacks are important when revising in my opinion because you want to keep your energy topped up. I think its a good idea to get your snacks made/sorted out before you start revising so you don't have to get up and move around when you should be studying. I would love to think I have healthy snacks when revising and yes I know, everyone says to have fruit or nuts or something healthy like that but in reality, that's not going to happen for most of us. I personally love the wild berry flavour Skittles at the moment and I don't have these very often, but today my mum decided to buy me some so thanks mum your a babe. I also like keeping a bottle of water on my desk when revising so I keep hydrated.

I hope you guys enjoyed this post and found it helpful. Let me know if you have any other tips for me!

Angharad xoxo

A Few Little Updates

As you can see I have changed by blog around a bit and also changed the name. I loved the name ThoughtsAtThirteen but I decided to change it as I'm not going to be thirteen forever. My friend Maria (From http://beardieeboo.blogspot.co.uk) actually helped me come up with the name so thank you to her. My blog post are still going to be the same - the only thing thats changed is my name.

Which name do you prefer?

Angharad xoxo

Singing In The Rain - Interhouse Rugby 2015

So you are probably very confused as to what this is about right now (unless you go to my school then you will definitely understand). Every year my school has interhouse rugby. Basically it's an afternoon where the different houses (Ragleth, Lawley, Hazler & Caradoc - I'm in Ragleth incase you were wondering) play rugby against each other. Anyone in the school can play in the different age groups. Obviously I didn't play because well I'm not good at sports, but everyone gets the afternoon off lessons and we all have to go down to the big field to "watch" the rugby. I say watch but really a lot of people just take it as an oppourtunity to have fun with their friends, which is exactly what me, Kinno, Olivia & Catherine did.

(Not sure this is the most attractive picture but it's the only one I have as we aren't allowed phones at school)

We started off the afternoon with a picnic (Liv & Kinno's idea) which was amazing. I'm not sure you could actually call it a picnic as it consisted of pringles, magic stars, skittles and galaxy salted caramel. We (Olivia) brought a picnic blanket for us to sit on so we didn't get wet or muddy which was literally the best idea ever as you will find out later on, and Kinno brought a proper blanket to have over us as it was reasonably chilly. We also brought cookies from one of the stands they had raising money for a school trip or something like that, which can I just say were AMAZING!

 We spent the first 30 minutes of the afternoon chatting and eating until about 45 minutes in it began to rain. At first we stayed how we were because it was only light rain, not too heavy. But as the afternoon continued the rain got heavier and heavier. In the end we had to move around a bit and sit in the middle next to each other. At first we tried holding my coat over our heads to stop us getting to wet, but after multiple hits in the face from the zip blowing in the wind, we gave up on that idea.

Now the rain was pouring down, but still we decided to not let it ruin the day. We were all freezing and soaking wet by this point and looked like right weirdos. We gave up on all hope of not looking crazy and decided to sing in the rain (by sing I mean we sat there screaming the lyrics to 'Let It Go'). Trust me we were given a LOT of strange looks from other students and teachers, however a few of our other friends and a couple of teachers joined in when they walked past.

The day ended with my bus being 20 minutes late to pick us up from school, so I had to stand on the pavement outside my school waiting for our bus until one teacher finally let us in reception to wait inside.

Overall it was a pretty fun/crazy/slightly strange day but I really enjoyed it and I can now tick singing in the rain off my bucket list :)

Angharad xoxo

Flower Power

Recently I took a trip to my local garden centre with my mum to get some plants for our garden as in half term we've decided to have a good old de-weed and plant some new things. Obviously as I love taking pictures (especially of flowers as they are just so beautiful) I grabbed my camera and took quite a considerable amount of photos. I'm really pleased with the way they turned out so it was definitely worth the weird looks I got while kneeling on the floor/standing on my tiptoes to take the perfect shot. 

So can we just take a moment to appreciate how clear these photos came out. Don't want to blow my own trumpet but to be 100% honest, I am really proud of how these photos turned out - yes some of them are better than others, but everything is like that. My personal favourite one is the last one of the big daisies (probably because daisies are my favourite flowers).

Let me know if you enjoy these kind of posts where I share my photos with you, personally I really enjoy writing them.

Angharad xoxo