Looking Back

Hello again!

It's been a month since I was last here and I just wanted to fill you in quickly about why I stopped doing Blogmas and where I have been lately.

After finishing my first set of year 12 exams in November, I wanted to create heaps of new content for you all. I'm sure I'm not the only one who starts the holidays saying that I'll post all of the time and hardly ever post, so last December I decided to commit to posting every day of December up until Christmas. I really did enjoy it but after just over a week, I realised that I was spending all of my time taking photos, videos, editing & writing. It got to mid-December and I'd barely left the house. Don't get me wrong, I love blogging, but it was taking over my whole holidays and I didn't want to go back to school in February after sitting on my laptop the whole time. So I stopped blogmas. Just like that. 

On the 19th of December, my family went away to a beach house for a week and before I left, I temporarily shut down my blog, facebook, snapchat & Instagram. That whole week I only ever went on my phone to either play music or text my friends to say Merry Christmas. That same week I became vegan as a trial and have decided to extend the trial to the whole holidays. I exercised every day, got through lots of my holiday homework, got some night driving hours done and swam at the beach across the road with my family.

I got back a couple of days before heading off to NZ for 2 weeks. For most of the holiday, there was no internet, so my social media/ phone detox continued. After a few days of being back, I went away on my friend's boat for 2 nights (again with no internet) and arrived back a couple of days ago. It's been so nice to spend time with the people I'm with (rather than sitting on my phone) that I've hardly gone online, even when I have had wifi. This has been really good, considering it's going to be a busy last year of school and social media is a very addictive distraction. I still plan on blogging this year, but only when I have time as school work does come first for me.

So now that you are all caught up, I just wanted to share a few lessons I learnt this year and then lots of photos and memories for you to see + for me to later look back on.

What I learnt in 2015:

+ You have control over your own thoughts and emotions. There's no secret - just choose to feel and think better thoughts. 

+ You don't have to know what you want to do when you finish high school - you have plenty of time to work that out.

+ You have to take risks in order to discover, but sometimes you fall flat on your face - we all have. But if we didn't take risks we would never learn.

+ Every second is a new opportunity to be happy.

+ Your value doesn't decrease on someone's inability to see your worth.

+ You never influence the world by trying to be like it. 

+ Confidence comes from within.

+ If you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original.

+ Be okay with what you ultimately can't do because there is so much that you CAN do. 

I'd love to know what YOU learnt in 2015! If you feel like sharing, comment below and you may even help someone else who is reading this post.

2015 flew by faster than any other year, as I'm sure it did for you too. So much has happened, but I have written enough already, so enjoy my photo diary of the highlights from this year.

JANUARY

 skiing in Niseko, Japan

 FEBRUARY
market hopping with my friend Caitlin

APRIL

celebrated my grandma's birthday at the Gold Coast

 road trip with my Papa to Melbourne

meet up with Brooke, Mia & Dom in Melbourne

 JULY

17th birthday party


wallpapered my room (it used to be bright orange)
 
AUGUST

blog shoot with the talented Gabi Mulder

SEPTEMBER

end of year 11 social (this is my friend Koozee)
 
 The Grounds of Alexandria with the squad

Dad created a home cinema

Hamilton Island

NOVEMBER

kris kringle party
 
DECEMBER

Brooke came to stay with me for a week + we met up with Emily (Emily Jane Blog)

Dancing around after a picnic in the park

Family beach house over Christmas

Met up with Chloe in NZ (see her blog here)

 

Visited NZ

Looking back at the start of 2015, I made New Year's resolutions which I love to look back and read so I thought I'd write this year's goals down so that I can easily find them. They are quite short & simple this year but that should make them easier to achieve.

+ Be present

+ Take risks

+ Less attitude more gratitude

What are your goals/ resolutions for the year?

Hope you had a wonderful 2015 and that the year ahead is filled with family, friends, success & happiness. Thank you for following along with my blog - whether it's been since I started 2 years ago or you just stumbled across my blog today. I hope you learn something new or I inspire you in some way because that is what I've always aimed to do on my blog.

Have a wonderful week (& year ahead)

G x