Lightroom 5

So I love taking photos and got given a free trial of this amazing software from Abode the other day. It's called Abode Photoshop Lightroom 5. Im really liking editing pictures on it and thinking about buying the full version when my trial ends in a month! Here are some shots that I've taken and edited using the software. 

Beach in Goa, India

Infinity pool in India and the view from it 

Zip trekking in Canada

Zip trekking in Canada

Family Time

Family Time

View from where I was staying in India

You can download a free trial of the software here: https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/tdrc/index.cfm?product=photoshop_lightroom&loc=en_gb 

Canada 2014!

I am so excited to be travelling back to Canada for the third time!! I thought I'd write a blog post about things ive enjoyed doing whilst ive been out there before.

So my first time I went to Canada I was young about 14 I went with my dad, sister, auntie and uncle. My cousin lives out there and we we had a few days in the city of Vancouver then travelled up to Whistler for a week then came back for a few more days in the city. The second time i went was last year with all the same people minus my sister. We pretty much did the same kind of thing, had a few days in the city, Whistler then back to the city again.

Canada is so beautiful and it has so many amazing experiences. Whilst we were in Whistler we watched a biking event called Crankworx, its awesome. Its a week long event full of different races and stunt shows. I'll admit i wasn't a big biking fan but ever since I've been there I love it. 
Here are some pictures of Crankworx...

My first trip to Canada I was also able to do White Water Rafting. Another amazing experience. Most of my family did this and we were able to get our own boat for it, it was crazy the weather wasn't great but you didn't even notice when you were having so much fun. 

The third thing I did was Zip Trekking. for people who dont know what this is, you basically fly down a wire in-between the trees in the mountains. I was lucky enough to do this both times when I went out there and hoping to do it again this year as well. The first time we did it you got to sit in a really comfy harness and you were a bit safer. but the second time you we went with a different company and were able to move around a lot more. I managed to get some amazing shots and also filmed a video of my Zip Trek. 
Zip Trekking video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlVxzz2pjlQ 

5 things I want to do this year!

So this post is a little late but I got inspired to write it when I was reflecting.

Instead of creating a new years resolution for myself I do something a little bit different and create a list of things I hope to achieve throughout the year. Last year I managed complete everything on my list so I thought if I blog about it will give me more motivation to get this years list done as well!

1. Be More Charitable 

A couple of years ago I went to India (Read all about it in my other blog posts) and we had to raise money to even go on the trip and then got to help out some amazing people. Reflecting on this i decided that I wanted to become more charitable this year. I've already donated to a friends skydiving she's doing to help a good cause. Also entered a raffle when all the money when to Cancer charities, but I still want to carry this on throughout the year and I'm looking at donating to Make A Wish Foundation or MIND which is a mental health charity. 

2. Take more photos with people

I love taking pictures and I think that taking them is really important you can reflect on what you've done and have really nice memories. I decided I wanted to take more pictures with people and just generally of things I do and places I go. 

3. Pass my second year of university

I go to university and if I'm honest I really hate it. Ive wanted to drop out several times and I transferred to a university closer to home. Passing my second year with a decent grade would be a huge thing for me as its makes me one step closer to what I actually want to do in life!

4. Apply for grad schemes

This links in with my previous thing I hope to accomplish. Ill be going into my final year of university and I will need to start applying to places, I've got a few places in mind but need to do a bit more research over the summer to make my final decisions!

5. Fly First Class

This is something which is actually on my bucket list! But I'm going back to Canada this summer to watch CRANKWORX which is this kind of mountain biking festival, loads of different competitions and things to do. Im flying back earlier than my other family so i decided to bump myself up to first class as a little treat! I'm so excited to complete this task!

Thanks for reading! If you've got your own blogs I would love for you to comment them down below and Ill check them out! 

Birthday!

So had my birthday yesterday! 

Thought I'd share my day and a few bits that I got... 

Started off the day heading to work for the morning, first birthday ive actually had to work. Guess it was a good as year as any as I am no longer a teenager, felt like the world was saying to me 'Welcome to the real world' you can't just have the day off because its your birthday! 

I came home to massive balloons from my dad!

which was a lovely surprise! 

But I have such a sweet tooth and two of my favourite things from the day were

My Millies cookie, which is this amazing cookie place, my sisters boyfriend ordered me a giant double cookie with chocolate in the middle to hold them together. The icing is strawberry and you could smell it as soon as you opened up the box! It was amazing!!! 

But my most favourite thing I got was my birthday cake! 

 This is loads of cupcakes with yellow and pink icing made to look like roses, with a few fake roses and leaves to add to the effect! Its so amazing and a family friend made this for me. Its my favourite thing from the day because you can see how much thought has been put into it! Im a little to scared to eat one as its going to ruin the whole display of it! 

Got a few other lovely things like lots of flowers and DVD's and a hamper of my favourite goodies from my sister as well. Had an amazing day and can't wait to celebrate properly on the weekend! 

Will be posting a proper blog later on this week to keep and eye out! 

Beauty Haul

So i decided to treat myself the other day to some new cosmetics now usually I'm a high street fan, and on occasion benefit make-up. But i decide to branch out to MAC, Estee Lauder and Eyeko after reading loads of blogs and watching beauty haul Youtube videos. Heres my reviews of the products I brought. Let me know what are your favourites...

MAC

Pro Longwear Blush Shade: Stay Pretty - This product looks really bright when it arrived I was worried that it was going to look awful on but it wasn't the case, gives a nice bright colour. Also I'm quite pale but still works really well.

Penultimate Eye Liner - This eye liner was a little to thin for me, probably best for doing flicks in the corner of your eyes, or for a more subtle eye liner look.


Studio Fix Powder Plus Foundation Shade: N4 - Great colour, blends really well and lasts all day!


Estee Lauder

Illuminating Perfecting Primer - Makes your skin smooth and brightens it up as well! Gives a good even base to start the rest of your make up!

Double Wear Stay-In-Place Flawless Wear Concealer - Now i usually use benefit Erase Paste but i thought it was to thick for my skin, this concealer is great! Hides what you want it to but also isn't a thick layer on your face!


Eyeko

Eye Do Liquid Eyeliner - Loved this eyeliner just the right thickness of the tip and lasted all day!

Brow Gel - Winner of a cosmopolitan beauty award. This product says it suits all brows from blonde to brown. I would disagree a little, I darken my browns with eyeshadow usually and this gel made my brows a lot darker. Maybe to dark for me but it did grow on me the longer I kept it on. You could also tell that it would last the whole day without fading away.

Lash Curler Limited edition blue velvet - I've been desperate for a lash curler and this one is really great, works well on the lashes and they also give you two spare silicone rubber pads to replace yours when they are worn out! Saves you having to buy another one for a little longer!

Links to the websites I got the products from:

http://www.maccosmetics.co.uk/index.tmpl

http://www.esteelauder.co.uk

http://www.eyeko.com

My favourite things I did in India

Here are my top Five things that I did whilst I was in India from Number 5 what i enjoyed to Number 1 my favourite thing to do.

5. Continental Breakfast 

On our last day in India we went to a really posh hotel for the best Breakfast ever. Now in my previous blog post I said about how I didn't really enjoy Indian food, although I tried most of the food served, it wasn't for me. So going to this hotel was lovely because we got proper English food, I know probably not the most popular thing to do on holiday but when you've had curry for three meals a day for 13 days you really appreciate the small things. 

4. Overnight train ride

This was a big experience, something which you will never be able to get in the UK. We took a overnight train ride from Bangalore to Goa. First of all the train stations are nothing like the UK its so busy people are hanging off trains people are walking all over the tracks. But for our overnight journey we had little rooms. this basically had 3 beds on each wall all on top of each other, with a curtain to stop other people from walking in. If you needed the toilet you had a choice of either a hole in the ground or a seat with a hole in the ground. One memory I have is really needing the loo one night so I got up and went (Luckly found the toilet with the seat) and when i came back I was walking down the narrow corridor and couldn't remember what curtain i was behind so I had to peek into everyones section to try and find all my friends, very scary when your alone on a pitch black train. But a good experience to have try whilst in India

3. Henna 

One of the things I loved getting done whilst I was in India was my henna. We got it done by a local lady who worked where we were staying. She did it all freehand, didn't have any plans or ideas, just did it as she went. Its beautiful and i could still see mine faintly weeks after I had it done! If you do get it done though, make sure your not allergic, my friend had a terrible reaction to it! 

2. Going on an elephant

Another thing which I think is a must if your going to india is going on an elephant ride. We were lucky enough to get to go on an elephant ride and also wash the elephant then the elephant washed us! Its a pretty amazing thing to be able to do and really is a one in a life time experience unless your a regular traveller.  

1. Being with the local children 

My most favourite part of the whole trip has to be spending time with the local children, it was so nice to see children who didn't have half the things children have in other parts of the world but they were still so happy! How they came in during there half term to help us build the vegetable patch, how they gave us all a bunch of flowers before we left and played cricket with us, it really was an amazing time!

 Here's a picture of the India 2012 Team:

Trip to India - Part 2

So in this blog post i'm going to talk about the work i did out in india. As I previously said we were in India for two weeks during this time we did a mixture of working with a local village and school but also doing some ecological work. 

Before I explain the ecological work, let me just explain. where we were staying at wildernest we were in-between two animals conservations in the wild. The ecological work consisted of going to an area and checking for scat (poo) of animals to see which animals had been around the local area recently. Sounds pretty disgusting but it was fascinating to learn you can tell what animals has been in an area just by the shape and size of its scat. We also located smaller animals such as snakes and scorpions. We also interviewed a man to help try and get protection for tigers in the area, something which the local people were struggling to do. 

                     

The second part of our work was working with a local village and a school. This was with out a doubt the most rewarding part of the whole trip. We helped a local village build a vegetable patch in there school to help feed the local village. It was kind of a 'half term' for the local children but they still came up and helped us every day in there school uniform but also barefoot! They shared all there tools with us, which were your average gardening tools you would buy at a local Homebase or B&Q. It was a lot of manual labour but was a very rewarding experience to be apart of. 

Before shot of what the soon to be vegetable patch looked like

After shot once we were finished 

We separated the ground into levels so they could plant different things into each section. Minus a few very large rocks which we impossible to move we were pretty happy with how it turned out. 

Once we had finished we returned to the school for one final time to receive a thanks from the heads of the village and the children sang us songs and gave us flowers they had picked for us. We also got to play games with them before heading back home to England. 

               

Trip to India

So back in 2012 i went on a school trip to India. (I know pretty much the coolest school trip ever right?) And every once in a while I like to think about what happened out there and reflect on it because it really does make you realise how lucky you are.

The trip wasn't just a holiday we were doing work with a local village and also doing some ecological and environmental work, (which I will go into more detail on my next blog post this is just about India as a whole and the experience I there.)

India is very different to England (where I'm from) during my time there I was lucky enough to be able to see all different parts of india from the poorest to a very nice built up area and a very posh hotel. 

We went to two different places in India during this trip, Bangalore and Goa. Both very different from each other. Bangalore is a big city. It was very humid a lot was going on people walking in the middle of streets and whilst tuktuks, cars and bikes were everywhere as well. There were shops which sold everything, and everyone wanted you to come in and buy things. Tip: If your thinking of going to India you need to learn how to haggle and stand your ground. 

During the two week trip we only had two/three days in Bangalore then we moved onto Goa. Which is where we focused on doing our work with the local village and ecological work. We stayed at a lovely resort called wildernest. (http://www.wildernest-goa.com/INDEX.ASP) I would check out the link if your thinking of traveling to India, we basically had our own little village with huts for sleeping in, a learning centre and a place to eat. 

                                      

The food was certainly something I had to adjust to! Now I dislike anything spicy, the slightest spice burns my mouth. I guess I didn't 100% think this would be an issue but it was. Whilst we were there we pretty much had Indian food/ curry for breakfast lunch and dinner every day, and Indians version of not spicy was still rather hot for english people. Also another thing proper Indian curry is nothing like over here in England. So I tried the food because you have to experience it whilst your over there but I pretty much lived on rice and bread the whole time I was there. 

                                                                           

Now don't get me wrong we did have a little down time whilst working in-between the two weeks of working we had a weekend down at the beach in Goa which was amazing. The sand was so hot you could burn your feet. Plenty of lounge chairs, nice places to eat and drink and yes we even managed to seek into an internet cafe! (I know its bad but when you have no contact with family and your half way around the world you want to speak to them.) 

                        

So thats just a few things I got up to in India and what its like my next blog I'm going to talk about the actual work I did out there and few other interesting experiences I had out there, any questions leave them in the comments below and I'll try to answer them :) 

Facts about me

Name

Sam

Age

19

Height

5'7 (people always tend to disagree with me on this, I'm rather tall for a girl) 

Favourite colour

Blue use to be a light sky blue but now its more of a dark/royal blue 

Favourite film

This depends on what mood I'm in but my all time favourites are either Pretty Woman or One Fine Day 

Favourite Music Artist 

Hands down it has to be Beyonce, who doesn't love her? 

Favourite Holiday

India, when i went and did work with local village/school and also did some environmental work although I did not like the food!