So, To Sum It All Up - December in Photographs

Hi!!!

How are you guys today? I hope you're all doing well. I spent December doing lots of fun things and I took a lot of photos and I thought I would share those things with you today - I figured that sharing some Christmassy snaps with you in January would be fine so long as I'm still in the Twelve Days of Christmas right now. I hope you like it.

Obviously I started my month by opening the first window on my advent calender - this one is the Cadbury one.

 I also opened a tub of Celebrations because Christmas. 

I went to see Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them with Elf Girl and one of our friends.

Elf Girl and I spent the afternoon in Costa - I had a Black Forest Hot Chocolate (one of many many more festive Costa drinks) - and taking photobooth photos until our friend could meet us.

We went for a meal at Chimichanga which I would highly recommend, for both food and decor (I had sea bass in case you were wondering). I enjoyed the film - I thought it was funny and charming.

I spent quite a lot of time Christmas shopping last month and went to several shopping centres on my mission.

The Bull in Birmingham was dressed up like a Christmas pudding which brought me far too much joy, and Coventry had some super snazzy decorations, shown below.

The beautiful ceiling lights were in Hemel Hempstead - I went shopping there while staying with my Auntie the weekend before Christmas.

December was filled with delightfully wintery weather, as showcased in these shots. I was running late one morning and cut through an alley way, but then got distracted by the pretty mist and fog and took photos - I made it with about ten minutes to spare so it all worked out fine. I just thought it looked really cool.

Later on in the month, while staying with my Auntie, it was really foggy again - it took us about one hundred years to complete the drive down.

Then of course there have been frosty mornings which I love having a walk around in.

There have also been some occasions to break out the sunglasses - I love those days when it's sunny but freezing cold.

I went for a meal with my friends before we all began our Christmas breaks. We went to a local Pizza Express and swapped gifts, ate pizza, pulled crackers and posed for photos, which was great.

We also had a walk around a local Christmas market and some shops (with plenty of time spent in Waterstones) before a final stop at Costa and heading home. I did all of these things wearing the paper hat from my cracker because those little hats make me so happy, I don't even really know why.

As I've mentioned, we had a pre-Christmas meal with one side of my family the weekend before Christmas.

We had a full turkey dinner with an array of puddings available to us which was lovely.

We then spent the rest of the afternoon exchanging gifts - watching my little cousins open presents makes me so happy! - catching up and eating enough olives to sink a ship (that last one might just have been me, haha).

I made my nails look all festive too - you might remember this from here.

I saw these Shetland ponies while we were there.

They were so sweet, I just had to show you.

My parents and I went into London while staying at my Auntie's. We went to see Hamlet and also to have a walk around. We went for a stroll along Bond Street to admire the window displays. We also went to Selfridges (which was a bit overwhelming on that particular day, I'm not going to lie - really crowded, really loud music...) and to Liberty where we bought Christmas crackers and I swooned over the pretty clothes.

We saw all of the Christmas lights on display. My favourites were these gorgeous angels on Regent Street and Jermyn Street.

Later in the month I went to Stratford upon Avon where I saw these lovely lights.

I ate this snowman cupcake.

I went to see a pantomime at the Birmingham Hippodrome with my Mom, Elf Girl, my Uncle B and Auntie A and had such an amazing time.

I love pantomime and the Hippodrome outdid themselves this year. It was so fun, so well performed and visually fantastic.

Oh and I had my first Starbucks since 2015.

It was a Fudge Hot Chocolate. It was really nice.

Not shown in photos:

Two of my friends celebrated their birthdays in December and I had so much fun at both.

I received some wonderful and thoughtful Christmas presents from my family and friends which I am super grateful for.

A relaxed, and very enjoyable, New Year's Eve.

And that was what December looked like for me.
What did you get up to last month? Do you have any other comments or maybe some suggestions for posts you like to see? Let me know in the comments.
I hope you enjoyed this post. Thanks for reading!

I hope your day is marvellous!

GingerSnaps xxx

So, To Sum It All Up - October in Photographs.

Hi!!!

In October, I got a new phone. Finally. It's only taken me a year of dealing with one that wasn't working properly to actually get myself to the Carphone Warehouse to upgrade it. I now have a very pretty rose-gold Samsung Galaxy S7. One of the reasons I chose it was its snazzy camera - it is so good! - and I've been playing around with taking photos on it all month. I thought I'd put some into a little autumnal photo essay to share with you all. Its also a bit of an October summary, which is nice.

One perk of getting the bus everyday (yes there are some...) is that I get to walk through some very pretty places to get to the bus stop.

 I love walking and I love being outside so the parks and tree lined roads are always a highlight of my day.

I've been spending quite a lot of time in the house as the nights draw in.

 My room has seen more blankets and books joining the crew, the fan in my bedroom being packed away (yay!) and the living room has been home to board games and even more cups of tea than normal.
 

I've made a little routine of reading on weekday mornings rather than getting dressed straight away which has been nice. I'm currently reading Atonement by Ian McEwan, and I'm about half way through - it is a great read - so points to me!

Oh also, I got glasses this month - I'm short sighted (recently diagnosed). I don't wear them while reading, but they make a nice addition to photos of books, so never mind, haha. Mine are from Vision Express, just in case you were wondering.

I went on a little trip out to Leamington Spa with the familia and  this month on one of my days off (massive YES to days off) and I took some pictures of the autumnal sights in my beloved Jephson Gardens (and made friends with a squirrel).

It is beautiful at all times of the year, but would definitely encourage you to take a trip out this autumn, especially if you're Midlands based like me, because its even more lovely.

I spent some time with my family a few weekends back. It was lovely to see everyone - I hadn't seen some of my cousins in a year which seriously needed to be fixed. I watched Spirited Away for the first time with the littlest ones, played Uno and Snap, ate lots of cake and did a bit of a makeup master class with one of my older younger cousins (did that make sense?). Anyway, it was loads of fun and thanks to my Auntie for having us and everyone else for carving out time to spend with us.

We popped into Hemel Hempstead and St Albans while we were visiting, as we always do, and I did some serious shopping in Hemel Hempstead at TKMaxx, as well as other places. And then in St Albans, we went to the cathedral, which we have done once or twice before - it is such a lovely place to walk around and take in, as are the grounds.

A trip to the Watford Palace theatre was also something we managed to fit into our weekend - we went to see Arms and the Man on Friday night. It was an excellent production (as many are at the Palace), the actors were great and I laughed a whole lot which is always good.

Then, we travelled back home because I had tickets to go and see Jake Bugg at the O2 Academy in Birmingham, which had been bought for me for my birthday (thanks Uncle B!). It was such an amazing gig, and I had such a great time. The set list was fantastic and all my favourites were played and Jake's performance was outstanding (vocals, guitar and personality wise). A major highlight of this year.

 

And then, as it does every October, Halloween happened. Look at the coffee table display for the living room - isn't it super cute?

 

 

 

We had a little family get together with some very nice food, a fire going in the fire pit and some fireworks. When we do fireworks in our family, the policy is 'go big or go home' so the grass is looking a little worse for wear but the neighbours got to see a great display (as did we!). Oh and the next day we all met up again for a huge Sunday lunch.

It was loads of fun - thanks everyone!

So, I hope you liked this post! It was quite different from anything I've done before but I really liked putting it together and looking back on what was a great month.

What did you get up to this October? Did you enjoy this post? Do you like photo based posts as much as me? Got any comments or suggestions for future posts? Let me know in the comments.

Thanks ever so much for reading. Oh and I hope you had a gloriously lovely and sparkly Bonfire Night last night!

I hope your day is spectacular!

GingerSnaps xxx