It's Beginning To Look Like Christmas

 

It feels like its been so long since I last blogged even though its only been a week. After I did my first GCSE mock I had to complete all my homework that had been building up and revise for a test of mine the next day. But anyway after thursday I collapsed on the sofa and did nothing all night.

Last friday night my parents and I visited a town near us and it was lit up by Christmas lights. Of course I brought my camera with me even though I am a bit shy when it comes to taking photos when there are people around. Anyway I hope the photos have magnified your excitement for Christmas.

After our little trip, I've learnt that taking photos at night in the dark is rather difficult. Even though you may be holding the camera as still as you possibly can, some of the photos still somehow turn out a bit blurry. Sorry that these photos aren't the best.

Anyway I really want to visit Oxford Street in London as I've seen photos of amazing Christmas lights flying between buildings there. Are you doing anything Christmassy soon? Tomorrow (fingers crossed) we are putting our Christmas tree up! I should have a new blog post up next saturday so keep an eye out next weekend... it may be Christmas themed.

Dreaming Big Enough

I found these photos hiding on my laptop and thought that they would suit this weeks blog post so hope you like them 

This week has been a bit busy and I've got two big exams coming up next week, including my first GCSE mock! So I thought I would just look back at something I wrote for my schools newspaper last year and edit it a bit for I didn't want to past a week without uploading when I had this right under my nose.

I haven’t really uploaded a post like this before but I hope you enjoy and find it useful. By the way as I read what I had written a year ago I literally crawled up into a ball. Beware it's a bit cheesy. 

There is something that we all fear. It saturates our souls with joy even by us thinking of it. We’ve all experienced it as we have changed our mind about it over and over whilst we have grown up. Dreams. As young children, we all had our big, crazy dreams for the future. Some of us may have wanted to become the first astronaut to land on Mars, become the Prime Minister, or achieve ‘world peace’. But where have all those dreams gone? Those old, big dreams have been thrown away as we’ve grown up.

Why shouldn’t we be allowed to dream big? Dreaming provides us with motivation and allows us to be free of the limitations of time, expectations and effort. No expectations. No restrictions.  And no pressure. Dreams drive us to become who we can be. They are goals and visions which coax you to think of your future self. Without dreams, you wouldn’t feel encouraged to become something that makes you happy and fulfilled.
 

Fear of failure is one of the reasons that we stop dreaming “big”. When you meet a certain goal, the word ‘fail’ appears. But did you really fail? You may not have completely succeeded in attaining a goal but that doesn’t mean that you have failed life. In most scenarios you should learn from it and doesn’t that mean you have grown? This may all sound cheesy but can’t it be true? Did you find other things, better things, as a result of that goal not working out? 

We all have to take a step to reach our dreams. All things are possible if you try.  I say keep on dreaming. I’m dreaming.

A Letter To My Sixteen Year-Old Self

Dear my sixteen year-old self,

A week ago I turned fifteen and that doesn’t sound old even though a few months ago it felt like a ‘big’ age. Now the number ‘sixteen’ sounds big and old. I’m guessing that by the time I’m nearing my sixteenth birthday I will be waiting to turn seventeen but maybe I’ll surprise myself. 

 

Now as a result of you reading this I’m assuming you are still blogging and if not pack your bags and leave. 

 

I began year 10 and realised that I had been wasting three years of my life revising and working hard when it wasn’t that important. I’m not saying it wasn’t important but year 10… oh wow. The start of GCSEs… 

 

And I can’t even imagine how scary year 11 will be. I’m just hoping that you’ve stuck to working hard and haven’t put everything off over the summer holidays. I know you well.

As I’m writing this I’m stabbing myself in the back for not having a plan or an idea on how I was going to write this but anyway.

Year 9 was an amazing year just like years 7 and 8. You had a bump but it’s over now. I feel stronger now for it happening. You’ve learnt to see the positives in things and go with the flow.

Strangely I haven’t felt stressed with school work for months. That is a good thing, don’t worry. Just surprising and unexpected. Have no idea how that happened so unfortunately I can’t help out if you are feeling stressed with school when you’re reading this. I think one day I just decided that there was no point in getting stressed. Being stressed only prevented you from getting work done which was what you were firstly stressed about.  

Now here’s a list that hopefully you are achieving or have achieved by the time you come to read this:

• smile as much as possible
• always see the positives in things
• make new friends
• write more
• stay in touch with all your friends
• try more foods
• help out when you can
• don’t just concentrate on school, spend time doing other things

Love from, your just fifteen year-old self

My Name

One day. One ski lift. One man. One woman. One name. My name.

Yesterday I turned fifteen years old and therefore it seems like a pretty good time to tell you the story about how my parents came up with my name. 

In my first blog post, I mentioned how I wished that the idea of me starting a blog had occurred on the ski slopes on a ski lift since it would sound ‘more magical and story like’. I do love a good, magical story. But a magical story that has happened in real life… that’s even better!

Well here is one. Maybe I’m making too much of a fuss over something but where’s the fun in life if we don’t exaggerate and go on about things. 

So here it is… the story of my name.

My mother was four months pregnant with me and was sitting beside my dad on a ski lift in France. And just like so many other future parents they had the topic of baby names in their minds. But not only did they talk about names but they decided on a name for a girl and a name for a boy since by then they did not know that a baby girl was in my mum’s tummy, me. 

I know someone might mention my little error in my first sentence above, ‘one name’. I am aware that my parents decided on two names, one for a boy and one for a girl. But I’m just going to ignore that part… such a rebel.

Anyway as you can probably guess they settled with the name 'Gemma' if I was a girl and 'Ben' if I was a boy. Not Jemima or Benjamin. Just Gemma or Ben. So that's how I got my name. Maybe one day I will share with you all the nicknames I've been given in my life.