Notebook Hoarding and What I use them for

Notebook Hoarding is a thing, right? I'm not the only crazy person that has a selection of notebooks each for their own occasion.

I've been giving quite a few lovely notebooks over the years (pretty much all HP) and have always put them aside because I wanted to use them for something special and specific to each notebook, as I'm a reoccurring giver upper and have lots of started stories, diaries, poems, etc and then not knowing what to do with the rest of the book.
After my birthday and Christmas and another seven books to the collection I knew it was time to get my creative cap on and use these beauties. So after lots of researching of many ideas to use notebooks, these are some of what I use mine for...

Since meeting my boyfriend who is Latvian I have wanted to learn his language and culture and soon as we moved in I started planning how he would teach me some of the basics. My goal is to be able to speak to his grandmother when I meet her in Latvia sometime soon. I selected one of my little Gryffindor notebooks so its handy to carry around in a pocket if I ever need to refer to it.

 

Next up the cutest little idea for a notebook, is a Mutual Love Note Book. In this day and age (god I'm old) there aren't many love letters or even spreading love and I think is an amazing idea to have a mutual book between you and your partner where you leave little notes for each other at random times. And it's a great thing to look back at after many years. I again used one of the little Gryffindor books, this time I'll save you reading the soppy message though. 

When I received this amazing Quibbler notebook I knew I wanted to keep it for travel adventures. I've said countless times I want to travel to many countries and I think its amazing idea to keep a journal of the adventures together, filled with stories, tickets, and photos. Although traveling to other countries isn't financially  possible for us right now, we are seeing as much as we can off our own country and I wanted to keep a list of all the places we have been, so I've split it up into counties and listed all the museums, towns scenic places, and everything else we've seen in each place. I'm keeping this book specifically for lists of places we've been, I will make another book for them travel adventure stories.

I received this incredibly beautiful diary for Christmas and fell in love. Any Harry Potter fans will agree with me here that it looks like a magical spell book and I just love the whole bohemian dark vibrant colors. Obviously, I will use this as a diary, but I plan for it to be a daily positive diary. The spaces for each day are huge so there's lots of room to write about whats been good, fun, and amazing that day and I plan to make my day count and have lots to write about.

Lastly, is my favorite, this incredible Hogwarts Journal. Like many of us, I have seen Bullet Journals all over Instagram and Pinterest and I plan for this book to be my creative space for lists, notes, and drawing. Lots more to follow with updated Bullet Journal pages. 

I know there will be lots of more notebooks to come, and lots more ideas.

Do you use notebooks for specific things and if so what are some of the things you use them for?

A Look Back at 2017

We're all seeing these Snapchat memories of our best bits of the year (although I can't find my own yet) over on our stories and it's made me think back over the past year. I started out thinking "I haven't actually done a whole pile", to know smiling to myself while I'm writing this in the corner of the room while my boyfriend and his brother begin celebrating and feeling very proud of myself and all I have accomplished throughout the year.

It started off last year pretty much how it is exactly on this New Years Eve, we were both dosed with the flu but from then on things got better and better.

One of my biggest things to get over this year was finishing my one year course in college in Monaghan. Being so far from home by myself was a challenge but I got through it to when I took this photo after coming out of my last exam.. which I passed with Distinctions.

And then drove home for four hours by myself, after passing my driving test in the same week.











From then on it was adventure after adventure...
From Sligo to Derry and Donegal, Cork, Cavan, and Monaghan in between.

One huge adventure for me was traveling to Aberdeen by myself for a college interview. This was incredibly huge for me as a nervous flyer and have never gone anywhere by myself, and what an experience it was.

There's been plenty of parties and celebrations including my boy graduating from college and celebrating Kurdish Newroz with my besties and making it to Sea Sessions Festival for a third year... 

In March we celebrated our one year together, in style <3 

We moved into our first apartment together in Letterkenny.

And to finish off the year my best friend gave me a new best friend... 

It really was one incredible year and I appreciate every step off it.

Heres to 2018 and making more dreams become reality. 

Christmas 2017

Christmas this year was a little unchristmassy as on Christmas Eve I came down ill, and I came down hard. So I spent the entire night up with my dad and brother looking after me and then sleeping all of Christmas day as the rest of my family enjoyed Christmas dinner (inserted sad violin) but hey I was well enough to get up for our usually tradition of exchanging gifts in my parents room first thing in the morning and then in the evening opening presents from other family and friends.
Plus I can't completely complain that I missed Christmas as my boyfriend and I had our own mini Christmas in our apartment before we came home to our families so I still had the whole Brussels sprouts, bucks fizz and mince pies shebang.
Christmas for me is all about spoiling my family and we had the best time beforehand going around lots of shops searching for the perfect thing to sit back and smirk at while they open (we all do it right?). So as well as giving gifts, I received some amazing ones and would love to share them because they are so cute and I mean who doesn't love a little nosey at birthday/Christmas hauls.



My boyfriend completely blew me away with his thoughtful gifts this year (soppy ew!). I mean this is the guy who got me a calendar for my 21st birthday (WE SHALL NEVER FORGET!) so when I saw how much thought he actually put into picking out these little bits made me cry, I kid you not the dog book made me snot cry. 

There aren't enough words for this beautiful Harry Potter charm bracelet, little insight it has spells written on the charms for that extra magic. This GORGEOUS diary is almost too beautiful to use, he knew I would love the old style bohemian cover (he also told me it took him a good 10 minutes to pick which one to get). This little dog book is the one thing I lost my head over, now it may sound crazy but I'm a total dog mom and  this is basically a baby book for your dog where you can write all about him and his favorite things, memories, stick photos and there are even recipes for dog treats and a vaccination and health record part, it is  just incredible to have a little book to keep all the deets of my boy in one place to treasure forever.  Lastly but never leastly is this adorable travel fund money box, it's so simple but SO cute. We've been talking about traveling for over a year and we will do it now with this. 

My brother is insane with presents like he always goes OTT and he really did again this year with EVERYTHING being Harry Potter I mean even down to the adorable tea towels. Also, a little hard to see, are two notebooks, a picture frame, bauble, light, socks and hanging decoration. His girlfriend who is practically my sister-in-law got me the amazing Hogwarts pajama set which even includes an eye mask which I badly need (Rich being a night owl has all the lights on when I'm trying to sleep). All of these are from Penny's/Primark's incredible HP range that is so so magical, just look at the detail on the pajama set box. 

A gift for both Rich and I are these super cool Boss Man and Boss Lady mugs from his mum,  perfect for our new home. 

From friends, I got this adorable rose room fragrance, an amazing necklace that actually looks like my dog and a lovely little bath set. 

Also from Santa, I got this brilliant toothbrush set, which anyone who travels will understand, your forever needing to buy new toothbrushes because you leave yours in the last place you stayed, this way I have one for each place. 

Lastly, is it really Christmas if you don't get lots of chocolates? 

All in all, I had a lovely Christmas with family, I hope you all had a brilliant one and an adventurous New Year <3