RECOMMENDATIONS | CLASSICS BY AND ABOUT WOMEN

Penguin have recently released the Sisterhood collection - six beautiful editions of classic novels, all written by and about women. I was lucky enough to be gifted a copy of Little Women by Louisa May Alcott and it's inspired me to put together a post honouring three of my favourite women writers of classic literature.

Each of these women gets a bit of a raw deal by the 'literary canon' and gets lumped into writing straight romance (by people who think romance is bad) when their work has so much more to offer. So I wanted to make the case for each of them, and hopefully inspire you to check them out if you haven't! 

BOOK REVIEW | THE SILENCE OF THE GIRLS BY PAT BARKER

The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker - Published August 2018 by Penguin - ⋆⋆⋆

BOOK REVIEW | GHOST WALL BY SARAH MOSS

Ghost Wall by Sarah Moss - Published September 2018 by Granta - ⋆⋆⋆⋆⋆

DO YOUR BOOKS SPARK JOY?

Mari Kondo has been causing quite a stir among the book community. As I mentioned in my recent Instagram post this isn't because she explicitly said anything bad, but because the internet loves demonising, drama, and self-righteousness. If you've missed this, essentially the KonMari philosophy is all about really thinking about what you want and need in your life, and making a conscious decision to only buy and keep objects that are explicitly necessary, or spark a certain joyful feeling in you.

FEBRUARY GOALS | RAISING MY BLOGGING GAME

Oh my god the first month of 2019 is already over! January was a weird month because on the one hand I did a lot of really lovely things, but on the other some pretty horrible stuff happened. So it was a bit of a mixed bag. One of my personal goals was to stop being a crappy friend and always finding excuses not to see the people I love, and in January I made the effort to go see almost everyone I'd been flaking on, and was so proud of myself and delighted to catch up with some of my favourite people. 

I'm hoping to hold myself more accountable to my goals this year. I'm that person that will set huge elaborate idealised lists of things I want to do in a new year, only to flake on them by April, so I'm going to start tracking my goals on the blog, in order to hold myself accountable. So without further ado...

MY CURRENTLY READING PILE

As I mentioned in my 2019 Reading Resolutions, I'm taking the pressure off myself to read a certain amount this year, my only goal is to try and read every day. One side effect of this is hopefully buying fewer books and not spending so much money on things I just never get round to. As a way to track and control this I've split 2019 into quarters of three months each (very business-like I know), and will only buy a number of books I can reasonably expect to read within that time frame. If I get to the end of that stack with time to spare I can pick up something else, otherwise any more book-buying will have to wait until the next quarter.

So I thought I'd share my reading pile for 'Q1' (how corporate) and go through the bits that I'm hoping to finish by the end of March.

CRUELTY FREE BEAUTY FAVOURITES #5

For any newcomers to the blog (hi by the way!) I started switching up my makeup collection to all cruelty-free products back in 2017, and I can honestly say I don't regret a thing. I have moments where I wish I could buy a new MAC lipstick, or one of Nars' iconic blushes, but there are so many great cruelty-free bands and products that it's never really a problem.

Today I'm sharing some recent discoveries that I love, and hope to inspire anybody looking to add more cruelty-free goodness to their collection. 

NEW YEARS IN ANDALUCIA

Hello all! I took a little break over the festive period to restore and refresh a bit, and am really ready to make the most of 2019. During the 'dead days' between  Christmas and New Years I was lucky enough to join my parents in Mijas, a beautiful town in Andalusia, in the south of Spain and thought I would share a few photos. Gotta keep up that #travelblogger aesthetic after all! 

BULLET JOURNAL PROMPTS AND TIPS

With 2019 fast approaching, it feels like the whole world is laying down plans for the New Year, and a common goal is to get organised and start a planner or bullet journal. I've gone in and out of bullet journalling for the past few years, often falling off the wagon just when I start to get really busy - which is, of course, the time when I need it most - but I'm determined to make 2019 the year that I stick with it.

The original bullet journal system is somewhat dry, and very much focused on function over form. Like a lot of people I took the general premise of the bullet journal method and expanded it to suit my own needs and tastes, not only using the notebook for planning, but also to store ideas and information. My own bullet journal contains recipes, doodles, trackers, wishlists, and a whole host of other stuff that makes the notebook a very important part of my daily life. Today I'm sharing a few pages from my own bullet journal, as well as some advice for getting started, and of course a few prompts that might inspire some creativity.

ON WINNING NANOWRIMO | ADVICE AND PLANS

The year of our lord 2018 marks my fourth attempt at the Legendary task of NaNoWriMo. The difference this year is that I fucking won. 

I didn't start out this years challenge with high hopes. I expected myself to fizzle out around the 20,000 word mark as I usually did - blaming myself for not preparing enough, and blaming the fact that I was busy and tired and that my novel idea was terrible anyway. Honestly winning has come as such a huge surprise to me that I couldn't really muster up any feeling of pride or accomplishment when I verified my word count and the website flashed up the winner's page. I'm still more surprised than anything else.

MY 2019 TOOLKIT FOR POSITIVE CHANGES

I generally hold fairly tightly to the idea that buying material objects, with the idea that they'll somehow improve things in your life, is bollocks. I can't count the amount of times younger-Isabelle would convince herself that this designer bag, beautiful bedding, or luxury skincare product would kickstart some kind of change, and transition me into being a better, more 'adult' version of myself. What a load of nonsense. Needless to say, I remained the same person, with the same positive traits and flaws, but with a new bag, duvet cover or eye cream.

However, I do believe that certain things can facilitate us in making positive changes in our lives, and sometimes creating new habits and healthy patterns can be made easier when we have basic tools for the job. So I'm sharing a few things I'm planning to buy early in the next year, and the changes they will reflect in my 2019 plans.

COSY WINTER READING RECOMMENDATIONS

The nights are getting longer, and the evenings are getting colder. There are a lot of downsides to the changing seasons, but one upside is that it's the perfect weather to snuggle up with a thick blanket, a warm beverage of choice, and a pile of books. So I've compiled a list of my favourite cosy reads for the colder weather to share with you. 

SMALL BUSINESS + SUSTAINABLE GIFT GUIDE // HOMEWARE BOOKS + ART

Following on from the Sustainable Gift Guide that I published last year, I thought I'd curate another little collection of beautiful, sustainable gifts from smaller businesses. I'm hoping I can inspire others to make conscious choices when buying gifts for loved ones over Christmas. 

 Anyone who loves jewellery knows how great is is to have somewhere special to store it. These dishes from PeonyLondon are a gorgeous option and would go well with any decor. Kate Charlton's bracelet stacking stands are perfect for making a dressing table instantly instagram-worthy.

A MASTERS IN LITERATURE | THE VIEW FROM HALF WAY THROUGH

  Since September I've been enrolled in the University of York, undertaking an MA in Romantic Literature (the time period, not the genre) and given that I'm nudging half way through, and almost at the end of the taught portion, I thought I might do a quick overview of how I'm finding it and what it's involved so far, for anyone who might be considering a masters in literature, or just curious about postgraduate education. 

TIPS FOR A HEALTHY BEDTIME ROUTINE

Many people should be getting more sleep, and I am certainly in that camp. I suffer from a condition I'm calling brain-fires-up-the-second-the-lights-go-out-itus. I think a lot of people do. It's almost impossible to stop my mind from wandering when I'm lying down to sleep, and specifically wandering into places that make me anxious or stressed. I get to enjoy my mind scaling such terrain as 'worrying about the academic paper I turned in a week ago and am still waiting for the marks for' and 'what will I do with my life in the interim between my MA and a PhD?' and 'What if my family, boyfriend and all my friends secretly hate me and throw big parties together where they do nothing but talk about how glad they are that I'm not there?'

It's not fun but it's definitely not unusual, I think most of us struggle with it from time to time. I've recently begun to implement a routine in order to help me sleep better, which then means that I wake up rested and happy and enjoy my days more.

SUSTAINABLE GIFT GUIDE

The first brand I want to highlight is Ara The Altar.  It's founder Lauren creates stunning jewellery in intricate, minimalist designs.
Using recycled precious metals and biodegradable packaging, Lauren is one of many artisans choosing to value sustainability and integrity in their craft, offering products made to last a lifetime over cheap novelties.
Inspired by astronomy and nature, Lauren's pieces are perfect gifts for loved ones. They are keepsakes and statements of love.

NEW YEARS IN PARIS

For my first post, I thought I would just take myself down memory lane and talk about how I started off 2017. In Paris with my very best friends, staying at one of their houses with her parents and boyfriend.

We'd all been to Paris before and none of us are the tourist type so we didn't do a huge amount of deliberate sightseeing, rushing from one attraction to the next, and instead spent a lot of the time walking through parks and finding places to eat, and playing games in our pyjamas in a beautiful Versailles apartment. Nevertheless you can't walk around Paris in winter without being drawn into some of it's sights.

Of course the Shakespeare and Company Bookshop was on all our 'To-Do' lists. Given that we're all big readers, the chance to visit somewhere with so much bookish history was one we couldn't miss. Taking photographs of the inside is not allowed, so all I've got for this segment is the same basic ass shop front shot that everyone else does. We'll survive I'm sure. The inside is big but crowded with people and high bookshelves, with the ground floor being a commercial bookstore and, up a narrow flight of stairs, another floor full of old books and information about the history of the shop.