Way back in August of 2014 I did a post about my discovery of the ASMR phenomenon and then the following February I posted about my top five favourite ASMR videos that I'd been listening to. It's been a while since I did an ASMR-related post so lets kick off 2019 with one. Today I wanted to share my current favourite ASMRtists, i.e. people who make ASMR videos on YouTube who I've been absolutely loving lately.

I'll start with a couple of old favourites. I've been watching Hermetic Kitten ASMR since at least 2015 and I really love the old-school low-fi style of her videos which I think are filmed on a webcam. She's a really interesting person and makes a mixture of original types of video. She also speaks so many languages and regularly makes ASMR videos in English, French, Italian and Spanish with a couple of extra languages thrown in occasionally. I speak French and I understand some Spanish so I can access most of her content, but I also enjoy watching ASMR in languages I don't understand because it lets me listen to whispering while doing something else without getting distracted. Next is WhispersRed ASMR aka Emma who I always think of as the mother of ASMR - she has a really soothing motherly manner which never fails to relax me, especially her 'tucking you in' video. Her videos have a really high production value too which means I often get visually-induced tingles.

Some relatively recent discoveries who are now favourites are Gibi ASMR, ASMR Glow and ScottishMurmurs ASMR. I think of Gibi as the queen of roleplays as she has an amazing ability to completely become a character and capture their mannerisms completely, as well as invent her own concepts. One of my favourite ideas of hers is the Hogwarts sorting hat series with different characters introducing you to all of the four houses. Essentially I want her to be my big sister. 

Glow makes amazing trigger videos with super tingly whispering mostly in English but also some French - although I usually want to listen to what she's saying rather than drift off. I like the way she mostly uses a purplish background so I always know when I'm watching one of her videos, and she also always has stunning hair and makeup. Apart from having an incredibly ASMR-inducing Scottish accent, Lauren makes a lot of excellent medical role plays. She also recently made a car role play which I enjoyed a lot. I find her to be a really relaxing person in general but she also has a great sense of humour.

In the past couple of months I've also come across some amazing channels that have become firm favourites. Goodnight Moon is especially well known for her Babblebrook series, which is a number of role plays set in a fantasy world of her own imagination. The care and attention to detail she puts into these videos and especially the sets and props is amazing, it feels like you're watching an actual film or TV show instead of a YouTube video. My favourite video from the series is 'The Nightshade Witch Provides a Curse' which never fails to put me to sleep.

Finally I also want to mention Nature Flight Productions, which is a fairly unconventional channel. She makes incredible sensory-friendly artistic videos with an ethereal, eerie vibe which push the boundaries of what ASMR is and can be. Some of her work feels like it could be part of a Nicole Dollanganger music video or something - I don't necessarily watch it for relaxation in the usual sense but because I'm utterly intrigued by her art.

And those are my current favourite ASMRtists!

I recently discovered gracewithabookinherface on YouTube and I was inspired by one of her videos which was a historical fiction tag. It's been a while since I did a tag so I thought why not make it a book-themed one? Even though I have been reading less of it lately, historical fiction is definitely the genre I own the most of (though not necessarily the genre I have read the most of because frankly I have a lot of unread books). They're arranged chronologically on my shelves from Eleanor of Aquitaine to the post-WWII period covering pretty much everything in between so I figured I might have some interesting answers.

Why do you like to read historical fiction?

The main reason I like to read historical fiction is the educational aspect, as you can learn a huge amount about historical events and how people lived in the past just through the context. I also find that details and broader attitudes tend to stick in my mind more when I absorb them through a story with engaging characters and places rather than just reading the facts for example in a more traditional education setting. I especially love historical fiction that's written from the perspective of more disadvantaged groups including women and more specifically working class women, as I think it's only by reading about the (albeit fictionalised) experiences of those worse off that you come to build up a picture of the broader social system of the time.

What was the first historical fiction book you read?

The first book I remember reading was Bloody Tower: The Diary of Tilly Middleton, London 1553-1559. I distinctly remember getting this out of the library in primary school, so I must have been about 8 or 9 at the time, although I reckon I've read it at least three times since then. It's part of the 'My Story' series, and I can absolutely credit my love for historical fiction later in life to reading this series at a young age. I remember I had a box set of ten or so of these books including Bloody Tower, but some of my favourites were the ones set on the Titanic, in Manchester during the Industrial Revolution, and during the Irish famine. I have several of the old editions which were made to look like real diaries which just added to the authentic character of the stories. As they were written from the point of view of girls my age (or slightly older), they held my attention and utterly drew me into the stories and have really stuck with me years later. When I think of the Great Plague for instance, most of my knowledge comes not from learning about it in school or through the internet but from reading the story of 'Alice Paynton'.

Where do you draw the line for “historical fiction” and contemporary?

I tend to think of anything written recently but set pre-1900s as by definition historical fiction. Anything from 1900-1950 - which obviously covers World War Two - is kind of a grey area for me, but I also take into account the subject matter of the book when classifying something as historical fiction. For instance, if the book just happens to be set in the past, that doesn't automatically make it historical fiction - which is the case for Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Suskind, which is set in 18th century France, for example. Also, if the main plot actually relates to key historical events of the time or features fictionalised versions of real historical figures then I'm more likely to classify it as historical fiction.

Have you read a book set in each of these eras? Stack your favorites!

1600’s or before

The earliest historical fiction novel I've read is set in 1137 and I have nearly a metre and a half's worth of shelf between then and 1600 so I have plenty to choose from! Some of my favourites from that era are by Philippa Gregory, so I'm going to say the first of her Plantagenet and Tudor series I ever read, The Other Boleyn Girl, which actually comes ninth in the chronological order of the books.

1700’s

I have relatively little set in the 1700s so I'm going to go with a trusty 'My Story': Transported: The Diary of Elizabeth Harvey, Australia, 1790.

1800’s

The 1800s are a strange time for historical fiction in my opinion because there are also so many contemporary novels from this period (think Dickens and the Brontes, for instance) which compete with our interest so it can seem oddly inauthentic to read historical fiction from this time - after all, why wouldn't we read the real thing? I'm not saying I necessarily agree with that, though. Anyway, my pick for this century is The Rose of Sebastopol by Katharine McMahon, set in the Crimean War.

1920s-30s

(For some reason this tag skips out a couple of decades but OK.) The 1920s are one of my favourite eras for fashion and all round glamour, so I'm going with a full-on flapper trilogy: Bright Young Things, Beautiful Days and The Lucky Ones by Anna Godbersen. This series is kind of a cross between 'chick flick' and historical fiction as it's highly glamourised and I would say aimed at a younger female audience, but I remember enjoying it immensely. An honourable mention goes to The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters, which is set in 1922 and is about a middle class but relatively impoverished family who are obliged to take in a lodger. It's also the first overtly LGBT fiction I ever read.

1940’s-50’s

There are so many good historical fiction novels from this period, some of which I've spoken about before. My top three would have to be Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys, Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wien (which Grace also mentioned I believe) and The Amber Shadows by Lucy Ribchester. The latter I would classify as predominantly mystery but it's set in the 1940s in Bletchley Park so the story is hugely relevant to the intelligence activities which were carried out there during WWII.

1960’s-1970’s or later

As I said above I personally wouldn't classify this period as historical fiction but I suppose I would have to say The Girls by Emma Cline which is about the Manson girls. It's not a topic I know a lot about but I enjoyed the book.

What was the last historical fiction book you read?

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell. Again this is arguably also mystery/horror in addition to historical, but it's the closest thing to historical fiction that I've read recently. I wrote a bit about it in my Waterstones book haul post.

What’s your favorite historical fiction cover?

I really love most of Philippa Gregory's book covers, but to mix it up a bit I'll say Gilt by Katherine Longshore. This cover is so simple but really draws you in, I think it's beautiful. This copy is also signed by the author, and I came across it completely by chance in a bookshop in Toronto with my cousin and just had to buy it.

What’s your favorite historical fiction?

I'm not sure what this question is asking exactly but Grace interpreted it as her favourite historical fiction novel so I'm going to go with the book which had the biggest impact on me, which is probably Voyage on the Great Titanic: The Diary of Margaret Ann Brady, RMS Titanic, 1912. When I read this at about age 10 it was the first time I'd heard the story of Titanic, and it really stuck with me. Unless they have a personal family story, I think when other people think about the ship they probably associate it most with the characters in the 1997 film, but for me the biggest association has always been the character of Margaret and although she isn't real it was her I thought of when I visited the Titanic museum in Belfast a couple of years ago.

Phew, that was a long one! Well done if you read it right to the end.

It's mid September and summer is well and truly over now, so thought it was a good time to talk about some things I've been loving this summer. I'm very much a creature of habit: while I love finding new things I often stick to the same TV shows and books and find a lot of comfort in returning to them again and again. For some people summer is associated with holidays, adventures, going away and having new experiences, but since being at university for me summer has become a time for being at home for a few months at a time. That's especially true this year as last year I spent two months living alone doing an internship, so in a way this summer has been a time for familiarity and being at home.

The Harry Potter series

Every couple of years I get an overwhelming urge to revisit the Harry Potter universe and read all seven books from start to finish. Sometimes I watch the films over as well, but this time I stuck to the books. For me Harry Potter is peak cosiness and childhood nostalgia, and although I think seasonally they fit better with autumn in terms of maximising that cosy feeling. Even though it's been a few years since I was at school (and I'm just entering my last year of education), there's something about stories set in schools which is inherently comforting to me, I think it creates a familiar environment and helps me identify with the characters which of course I did more when I was of that age. There's not a lot else to say about my re-reading of Harry Potter to be honest, just that they were just as good as ever and much enjoyed.

Continuing with the book theme, a stand-out favourite of the summer was this book by Laura Bates. I've been aware of the Everyday Sexism Project for a while now (check out the website here) and we even covered it in one of my university modules last year, but I hadn't got round to reading the book. Having finished it, I have to say stop whatever you're doing and read it now. I thought I couldn't be surprised any more at the pervasiveness of sexism and sexist attitudes in society, but on every single page there was some terrible statistic or experience which felt like a punch in the gut, to the point where I read a lot of it in tears. Each chapter covers a different theme, from academia to the media, and I have never read anything which resonated with my own and friends' experiences so clearly. It was harrowing to say the least and I honestly think it should be required reading for everybody.

It's taken me over a year to finally watch all of the new season of Twin Peaks, mostly because I wasn't able to watch all of it when it was initially released and had to wait until I got it on DVD for Christmas, but then I also decided I wanted to re-watch the first two seasons before I started it which was actually a good idea. In many ways The Return blew me away. I'd only watched up until Episode 8 before and had been highly confused by everything going on, but when I got past about Episode 10 this time around things started to fall into place. My favourite bits were definitely the parts that focused on the FBI team and the Twin Peaks police department, although some of the new character storylines started to grow on me too. I think the stark difference between the old and new series for me is that the old series is now so familiar, and with the exception of a few disturbing scenes it's generally quite easy and predictable viewing in the sense that things happen in logical order and (again, generally) the weird is toned down. The Return, on the other hand, embraces the weird fully and deliberately tries to unsettle the watcher and create an uneasy viewing experience. Personally I really enjoy being make to think and second-guess my assumptions when watching TV because I feel more engaged with the material, but I can see why people might feel negatively towards The Return because of it. On the whole I think the new season is definitely on a par with the original, although to compare the two in style and content is unhelpful. 

Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery

While I was in my Harry Potter phase this summer I came across a Harry Potter game called Hogwarts Mystery which launched earlier this year. It's an app which is available for Apple and Android (I think?) and I downloaded it onto my iPad and quickly became obsessed. As a general rule I'm no gamer, but the storyline and style of it brought back a lot of memories of playing similar Nintendo DS or GBA games as a kid when I had a few Harry Potter games. It's set in the period between Harry's escape from Voldemort as a baby and him arriving at Hogwarts and follows a story about your character's brother who was expelled from Hogwarts for trying to find and opening the 'cursed vaults'. There are various tasks you have to complete to progress, including attending classes and developing friendships as well as side tasks which can help earn you points and rewards. The only really annoying thing is that it takes so long to complete anything because the main currency of the game is 'energy', where a unit of energy replaces itself every 4 minutes. Different tasks take up different amounts of energy and are time-limited to make it even more difficult, as I've been in a position a few times of not having enough energy to complete a task but running out of time. Of course you can pay real money to replenish your energy, but I'm not that obsessed and I frankly draw the line. I've been playing it for about a month and I'm progressed to Year 3, but I've also been at home mostly and able to go on the game every couple of hours. It's nothing ground-breaking as a game but I've really been enjoying it, especially as I was reading the books as well.

And those are my favourites from this summer!

Now that uni is basically over I've been spending a lot of time just lounging around reading books, watching films and of course watching a lot of YouTube. But let's be real, I watch YouTube even when I'm super busy with uni work - it's just part of my daily routine and has been for a long time now. I love being able to watch snippets of other people's lives and marvel at the creativity and hard work that goes into video-making, whether that's follow-me-around vlogs, sit-down videos or more poetic montages. However, while my YouTube addiction has been growing for several years now the people I'm interested in watching have changed A LOT over that time and I'm always looking for new and exciting channels to subscribe to. 

On that note I thought I'd share some creators whose work I've been loving recently.

I discovered Annabel's channel about a year ago and frankly I'm obsessed with her videos. The production quality is so high and watching her monthly vlogs is like dipping my toes into a glorious little brightly-coloured world of holidays, thrift shops, romantic picnics and artwork. She's an arts student at Rhode Island School of Design and I think she's just finished her second year there. She has a really interesting personality and goofs around a lot in her videos, which is so refreshing and funny to watch. In general she makes a mixture of content, from the more standard format of travel vlogs and favourites videos to more abstract unique videos of her just chatting or painting or both. As you might imagine, she also has an extremely aesthetic instagram!

While I appreciate high quality artsy videos I sometimes get nostalgic for a good old-fashioned sit-down video, and that's where Zannah's channel comes in. She's a smaller YouTuber and doesn't have a huge number of videos, but everything of hers I've watched so far is so interesting and articulate, covering a range of topics from identity to mental health. Her videos tend to be short but they're some of my favourites to watch, like tiny pale gems. She's currently on a gap year so she's been vlogging her travels too which is really interesting.  She's a very nostalgic, thoughtful person and to be honest I feel like we would get along really well.

This is a bit of a rogue favourite and I honestly can't remember how I came across this channel (something's telling me via John and Hank Green?) but I do know that it's one of the most informative channels I'm subscribed to! Caitlin Doughty is a practicing mortician who makes videos mostly about death, bodies and other delightfully morbid topics. She has a number of ongoing series such as 'Morbid Mysteries' and 'Iconic Corpse', but also does some vlogs and other videos with titles like 'What happens to a body during embalming?' or 'Making your Death Plan!'. Why would you want to watch that, I hear you ask? Well, I definitely have a morbid side but honestly this is the kind of information you wouldn't find elsewhere, and definitely not presented with Caitlin's insider knowledge and wicked sense of humour.

I found Harmony's channel relatively recently but I fell in love with her videos and her unique sense of style. She's a practising witch so a lot of her videos tend to be about her craft, Wicca, spirituality and meditation, but she also makes videos about unsolved mysteries/murders and her own experiences of paranormal activity and hauntings. Again, the latter aspects appeal to my morbid side but I've always been interested in Wicca and witchcraft as well so it's fascinating to learn more about it. Her videos are also really aesthetically pleasing and her makeup skills are incredible.

Jack is a English literature student at Durham, which (if you didn't know) is also where I've just completed my undergraduate degree. Again, I'm not sure how/when I found his channel, but I didn't include him in my 'Durham creators' post I did last July because I wasn't aware of him at the time so it was definitely this academic year. He's a study YouTuber who also has a very swish blog and makes a mixture of videos, from helpful study advice to funny sketches. My favourites of his videos are probably vlogs from around Durham because even though I've lived here for 3 years it's so interesting to see it on a screen filmed from the perspective of a fellow student, especially one at a different college. He also just seems like an all-round nice guy and reminds me a bit of my little brother!

And that's it for now! I'm subscribed to a lot of channels but these are my current favourites. If you're looking for recommendations I'd also throw out there: Conan Gray, Evan Edinger, Hannah Witton, Hi I'm Mimi and Lucy Moon.

x

This year my Christmas was a bit different as we spent it at my grandparents' house in England, the first time I've had an 'English Christmas' since about 1998. It was odd not to be in my own home for the festive period but really nice to be spending it with my grandparents who I'm very close to and haven't seen much of this year. We did all our usual Christmas traditions - making a gingerbread house on Christmas Eve, watching Strictly and Doctor Who on Christmas Day, a Christmas Day walk, and a spread of cold meats (/vegetarian options) on Boxing day - but adapted them to their house and the luxury of being able to drive to M&S to pick up various Christmassy accompaniments!

Like last year I thought I'd share some of my the wonderful Christmas gifts I received from family and friends this year without doing a totally comprehensive haul. So here are my top five favourite presents in no particular order:

I'm mildly obsessed with Wes Anderson's films, my favourite by far being The Grand Budapest Hotel. I love the characters and most importantly the gorgeous pastel aesthetics, so this is idea. It's essentially a visual guide to his films, with artworks and photos interspersed with interviews with Anderson himself. I'm going to be honest, it weighs an absolute ton (so much so that it apparently fell out of the box and got lost on its way from Amazon so this one is actually a replacement!) so this isn't one I'll be able to take with me back to uni. It will, however, be an amazing coffee table book in the unlikely eventuality that I ever get myself a house with a coffee table.

The original Twin Peaks is basically my Favourite Thing of All Time and I spent most of the first half of 2017 eagerly anticipating the release of Series 3/The Return, the continuation of the show which was originally broadcast in 1990-91. It was broadcast on a Dutch channel that we get in Belgium so I managed to watch the first eight or so episodes that my Mum recorded between getting back from uni and heading off for my internship in June, but tragically the auto-record failed for the rest of the series so I have had to wait until now to watch all the episodes. Having had a taste of the pure unadulterated Lynchian drama that is The Return I am intrigued and can't wait to get stuck into this (although it might have to wait until I go back to uni as my Mum and I are currently knee-deep in series 4 of The X-Files).

I wasn't lying when I said it was my favourite thing... (other TP-related Christmas presents include two Funko pops, a book and a set of coasters). This vinyl is of the soundtrack to the original series in all its glory. The theme tune alone gives me shivers, but I think my favourite track has to be Laura Palmer's theme or possibly Audrey's Dance. I have been playing this non-stop on my record player since I got it and have only regretfully ruled out the possibility of lugging both of them back with me to uni in my suitcase.

This year I'll be going to Jerusalem for a university field trip as its a major part of one of modules, so my aunt and uncle got me this beautiful 'biography' of the city. It's what I call a weighty tome but the cover is absolutely stunning with the gold accents, I can't wait to learn more about the city and its history before I go in March!

In a departure from tradition here is a favourite Tech Item. This is the Rockbox cube from Fresh n  Rebel and its basically just a standard mini speaker that you can plug into your iPod or phone or whatever, but LOOK HOW ADORABLE IT IS. For scale it is about 6cm x 6cm. As a side note it matches the colour of my earphones exactly. I previously had a similar but much cheaper speaker, which I tend to use a lot because my iPod is only a nano (i.e. with no speakers of its own) and one side of the speakers on my laptop no longer work. So hopefully this will be a great new addition to my DVD watching (read: Twin Peaks marathon) set-up.

I haven't done an instafaves in what seems like ages so I thought it was about time for me to share my current favourite instagram accounts with you once again (you can see part one, two and three here). I've really been loving instagram lately and I find myself being more and more inspired every day by the multitude of posts that pop up there. I love how versatile it is as a creative platform and I think it's definitely moved on from its original intention as just an image-hosting app to share your holiday snaps - there's so much more you can achieve with social media, especially visual forms like this, from advertising to sharing artwork. I've become slightly obsessed with the 'theme' of my own account lately, and I spend an embarrassing amount of time carefully cultivating my feed and making sure everything I upload works together harmoniously - I kind of wish I could be more carefree about what I choose to put on the internet but that's my artistic/perfectionistic tendencies coming out I'm afraid! Anyway, without further ado here are some of the instagram accounts I've been loving lately.

Sophie Engels // sophievstheuniverse 

Sophie is a 19-year-old girl from the Netherlands who has some amazing photography skills and posts a lot of arty, slightly vintage and hipster-esque pics. I'm obsessed with her style and the fun adventuring days out she seems to do all the time with her friends and family, plus I also wish I had her luck in thrift shops.

Manisha // manishathill

Manisha used to go to my school a few years ago and somehow I ended up following her on instagram and other social media sites. She currently lives in Barbados which means her feed is full of tropical beaches, lush palm trees and carnival photos and let me tell you, it's stunning and makes me want to move to the Caribbean (even though I actually hate the heat ahaha).

Rachel Marie // r_achelmarie

I follow Rachel's fabby blog (Rachel Coco) as well as her insta, where she keeps her feed perfectly balanced with high-contrast mostly black and white pictures and pops of colour. Rachel is a big fan of Starbucks, shopping and pretty architecture (as am I) so her account always makes me feel calm and relaxed when I scroll through it.

aliencreature

I don't know anything about this girl other than the fact that her username is awesome and her feed is to die for. She has super cool purple hair, likes plants and wears a lot of denim and mustard yellow - her outfit posts are perennially on point and she has wicked art skills and an unbelievably pretty bedroom. Go follow her if you don't already. Nuff said.

Katrina Kalamar // katrinakalamar

I've been following Katrina (of nouvellemonet.tumblr.com) on the internet since her preppy Polyvore days but those times are long gone, as you'll see from her instagram feed which is an eclectic mix of architecture, effortlessly casual flatlays, selfies and basically just cool stuff which somehow works together. I don't know how she pulls it off but she does and it's a delight to scroll through.

Please go ahead and check out this fab people and follow them if you like what you see!

Somehow it's already September which means cooler days, the return of autumn TV and just over a month left till I go back to university. Summer is drawing to an end so I thought I'd do a quick roundup of the things I've been loving these past few months - I'm sure you know how a favourites post works so let's jump straight in.  

Twin Peaks

To be fair I first watched Twin Peaks in the Easter holidays but I rewatched it at the end of term when I had nothing else to do and I fell in love with it all over again. At one point I was going to do an entire post dedicated to this series which demonstrates how amazing it is, it's easily my favourite series of all time. It's also the weirdest thing I've ever seen and it's hard to capture its essence in words, but just as a quick summary it's about an isolated town called Twin Peaks in Washington where a 17-year-old girl called Laura Palmer is found murdered. The first series focuses on her murder and the investigation carried out by the local sheriff and Special Agent Dale Cooper of the FBI who is brought in to work on the case, while the second (much longer) series carries on where the previous one left off and explores the lives of the town's inhabitants in a number of subplots. Basically I love Twin Peaks to death and I can't believe it took me so long to find out about it! Also I'm hella excited for the new series that comes out next year, like I can't even.

Gabby's vlogs

While I have been watching a lot of YouTube this summer it's mostly been ASMR videos so I won't bore you with that in this post, but a 'mainstream' YouTuber who I have really enjoyed watching is Gabriella aka velvetgh0st. Oddly I'm not a huge fan of her main channel videos, I mean I'll occasionally watch one if it looks especially interesting but what I really have been into is her vlogs on her second channel. I don't know what it is about her but she's my absolute favourite vlogger, she manages to make even the most mundane tasks interesting and she loves home decor which I do too. Luckily she daily vlogs a lot so there's plenty of material to keep me going!

Red playsuit from H&M

I got this red playsuit from H&M at the beginning of the summer and I absolutely love it, I wear it all the time and it's just my number one go-to outfit for days out. It's really loose and comfy and best of all it has huuuge pockets! Pockets! I saw it on the H&M website the other day and apparently it's meant to be off the shoulder but I just wear it like a short sleeved playsuit (like in the photo) which works too. I think it was about £22 and it was worth every penny!

Botanic gardens

I first discovered Durham's botanic gardens in the summer term and they quickly became my favourite place to wander around in the evenings, enjoy nature and take photos. Then on my trip to Ireland I visited both Dublin and Belfast's gardens and they were both truly stunning and totally instagram worthy, I could have wandered around them for hours. In general I'm more of an inside person but I do like spending time outdoors so this is ideal for me: a bit of nature but beautifully presented and fabulously photogenic.

Polaroid camera

After not using my Polaroid for ages because I didn't want to waste the film I decided to just embrace it this summer and took loads of pics on my trip to Ireland. I'm still learning how to use the settings so they didn't always come out that well (as you can probably see) but the memories and the excitement of instant photos are still there. If only the film wasn't so expensive!

Tidying/clearing out

This might seem like a weird one but I've been really enjoying tidying things and clearing out cupboards this summer. It might be a product of spending a lot of time in my room but I just can't stand living in a messy space and I find it so calming and satisfying to potter around putting things away. At the beginning of the summer I also did a huge clear-out and got rid of so much stuff which was amazing, I love getting rid of clothes I never wear and finding better storage solutions for the things I do want to keep. I also took a bunch of Nintendo DS and Wii games to Game in the UK because they buy them off you which is excellent, I only made about £20 but it was worth having and now I don't have the boxes of games I'll never play taking up space in my drawers. I think it's also to do with having not lived in my room at home for most of the past year - its made me realise what I do and don't need and so I've been able to part with a lot of things I used to hold on to just because I had the space to keep them.

And those are my favourite things of this summer - thanks for reading!

x

It's probably an understatement to say I've been obsessed with Instagram these past couple of months: these days I apparently can't go for more than a couple of hours without feeling the urge to check it which to be honest is getting quite unhealthy, but I just keep finding more and more beautiful feeds to follow! I'm a very visual person and nothing thrills me more than coming across someone who manages to have their whole life coordinated around a particular aesthetic (or at least gives off that impression). So today I decided to share a few more of my current favourite Insta feeds with you - you can see part one and part two here.

Fahimah // @fajitayy

I've been following Fahima on Tumblr for what seems like years but it was only recently that I came across her fabulous Insta (she's actually deleted a lot of posts since I decided to include her in this list, but she's still totally deserving anyway). I love the neutral tones with pops of colour and all the really beautiful details she has going on - in my opinion it all works beautifully together.

Abby // @abby8ken  

I've followed Abby on Polyvore and Tumblr for ages and I'm now slightly obsessed with her insta aesthetic. It's so beautiful and rosy, I don't know how the pictures work together to produce that effect but they do! I feel like I'm in a hazy, rosy wonderland looking at her feed.

Shelly // @shellekatt

Shelly is one of the first people I ever followed on Polyvore over 4 years ago (argh can't believe it's been that long already!). Her feed is also utterly dreamy and full of rosy details, but in a totally different way from Abby's - it's more pastel and vintage-y. I also think the white borders around photos give a unique and distinctive look.

Ruby // @rubyetc_

While I can't say much about the aesthetic of Ruby's feed, her hilarious drawings totally make up for it! After seeing her little sketches popping up on Tumblr for years I only started following her recently, but it's entirely worth it - every new drawing is a tiny pocket of joy and never fails to make me laugh/snigger when I'm scrolling through Instagram.

Emma // @themindfulstudent

Emma is actually a friend of mine at uni and I came across her Insta the other day while I was having a stalk (whoops). Her account is dedicated to mindfulness, healthy eating and slow living, which I find so interesting and appealing despite not being an avid follower of the whole idea myself - I wish I was though! Her photography is truly stunning too, and makes me feel inspired to make bowlfuls of healthy creations.

Who have you been enjoying following on Instagram lately?

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Since we're now getting stuck into 2016, I thought it was about time for another 'instafaves' in which I share my current favourite instagram accounts with you. The first post I did like this was way back in March last year, and while I still follow all the people I featured then I thought it was only fair to switch it up and include a range of different accounts this time around.

I've also had to try a different method with the screenshots since the instagram website was obviously updated a while back - I hope it looks okay!

Elizabeth // @elizabethseal  

Elizabeth is someone I've known and followed for a pretty long time both through Stardoll (where she used to inspire me with her amazing interior decor ideas) and then her beautiful blog. Her instagram feed is the cutest thing ever, full of little romantic pink details, nature pics and photos of her adorable baby, Oscar.

Louisa // @louisagrogers

Louisa's feed is bright, bold and sometimes completely bizarre - something interesting and eye-catching of hers is always popping up on my follow feed! It's a weird and wonderful mixture of vibrant high-contrast shots of high fashion, abstract photography and vintage goods.

Renee // @reneenicole

I've been following Renee on tumblr for a while now and recently came across her photography instagram account. The most recent section (shown here) is pink and cutesy, but there are slightly creepy vibes that get a lot more evident the further down you scroll, where you'll find photos of graveyards and abandoned places. In a nutshell, she is basically what would happen if Melanie Martinez and Nicole Dollanganger had a daughter! 

Sonja // @vainjala

Another long time tumblr follow is Sonja. In my opinion her feed is breathtaking: it's almost colourless but full of stunning grainy shots of nature, buildings and her beautiful face. Her aesthetic game is unbelievably strong!

Lua P // @luanna90

Lua is a recent follow but someone who I now realise I've been using photos of in my Polyvore sets for years. In a way her feed is the typically fashion blogger mix of selfies, outfit photos, beauty and details but for me her photos just have a special quality to them, I can't really explain it - it probably has something to do with her gorgeous red hair and impeccable makeup.

Who have you been loving lately on instagram?

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The days are getting colder and while it hasn't quite reached sub-Arctic temperature there's a definite chill in the air - a perfect time of year to curl up with a blanket, a hot drink and a book! Today I'll be sharing my favourite books for reading on cosy days, or at least books I think would be ideal for such an occasion. I've just realised that the one thing they all have in common is that they're set in crumbling ancestral homes/castles, so apparently that is my number one criteria for a 'cosy read'.

I read these over the summer and really enjoyed them, but I think a colder setting, perhaps with snowflakes falling outside the window, would enhance the enjoyment factor considerably. The protagonist is eleven-year-old Flavia De Luce, an amateur sleuth and chemistry whizz who lives on the outskirts of the village of Bishop's Lacey with her family. The series is set in 1950 in the English countryside, which in my opinion is an ideal setting for mystery novels -  you have the perfect combination of technology and olde-worldy-ness that makes solving crimes possible but not too easy, requiring a bit of legwork to piece the facts together. Flavia's skill with chemistry is also an interesting, if slightly unbelievable element that allows her to draw a lot of conclusions and so advance with her investigations.

Starting with The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, every book is a self-contained murder mystery, but they are really best read in order to build up a picture of the village and its colourful inhabitants (each book also has a map at the beginning which is very helpful to situate the various events). The Flavia De Luce books are quite different from any other mystery books I've read - it's hard to explain, but they have a slightly dreamlike, whimsical quality that means the details of the plot don't always hang 100% together, but they're nevertheless completely charming.

I'm sure I've either reviewed or recommended this book before on my blog, but I'm going to talk about it again because it really is that good. It's wonderfully gothic (almost Jane Eyre-esque) and has such atmosphere and feeling, it really had me spellbound for most of the story. The narrator, Margaret Lea, is an amateur biographer whose father owns a an antiquarian bookshop. One day she finds an unexpected letter on her doorstep - it is from Vida Winter, one of Britain's most well-loved novelists who has kept her life a secret for over fifty years. Now gravely ill, she wants someone to write her story before it's too late and has chosen Margaret to come to her home and be her biographer. Margaret is somewhat reluctant to accept, as she has never even read any of Vida Winter's many novels, but she finds herself drawn to Winter's stories of her childhood, which is soon revealed to be dark and troubling.

Re-reading old favourite books is something that makes me feel all warm and mushy inside at the best of times, so returning to a series like Harry Potter (which I have read countless times) is simple a recipe for cosiness. Not to mention the fact that my absolute favourite scenes from the books and the films are set in autumn or winter, when Hogwarts always looks festive and welcoming, so I associate those seasons with the stories anyway. I'm sure I don't need to summarise the plot of these books, but if by any chance you haven't read them yet then I assure you this autumn is the time to get stuck in!

As September draws to a close and the date I'll be heading off to uni looms, I'm entirely conscious that I've done nothing productive this summer (apart from a few driving lessons) and have in fact spent most of my time on the internet. Having said that, the product of my endless hours of tumblr scrolling is a second round of inspiring/aesthetically pleasing images for you to enjoy!