2015 READING CHALLENGE: MARCH ROUND-UP

In March I read a total of 9 books, meaning that I have read 20 books in total so far in 2015, and I am 67% of the way through my reading challenge. I had a very good reading month in March.

I was very excited for March, there were a lot of books that I wanted to read this month that I had been really anticipating for ages (looking at you 'Fire and Flood' and 'Ready Player One').

Books Read in March:

1. 'Cross Stitch'- Diana Gabaldon
'Cross Stitch'- as it is known in the UK- is more commonly called 'Outlander'. The whole 'Outlander' series has a massive following in America, also having a TV series. Firstly, what I have to say it that the cover is just so, so beautiful can we all take a moment please. I went into this book with very high expectations because of the massive hype behind it in America- and I was disappointed. I'm so upset because I really wanted to love this book and I was fully prepared to love it, but I just didn't. It was a good story and so tense and I loved the characters, I just didn't love this book enough. The copy I read was over 850 pages, and I have heard that the first 200 pages are quite slow, but in the end I found myself kind of pushing myself to read it so that I could go and read other things. On the plus side, I was in a kind of mini reading slump when I started it (which is never good when starting a brand new book), and it did get me out of my slump. Overall I don't think I'm going to read the rest of the series (there are 7 more super thick books), but I would really recommend the TV show, which I am really, really enjoying.

2. 'Maus (Volume Two)'- Art Spiegelman
I read the first of the two volumes in February and, while I thought it was really interesting, I didn't find myself engaging with it all that much. I did want to read the second volume though to see how how the story progressed. I think I enjoyed the second volume more, I read it in one day, which is not all that difficult seeing as it's a graphic novel. I found myself slightly more engaged and interested in the story this time round. I will repeat again what I have said before, this is a very important story. It's immensely interesting hearing the story from a survivor's point of view- especially someone who was an adult during the War- and I think it's a story that everyone needs to read.

3. 'Yes Please'- Amy Poehler 
The first thing I have to say about this book is it's so HEAVY. It's a hardback with the average 300-350 pages, but it's also made of that really thick, fancy, glossy paper. I had to hold it in two hands or prop it against my legs when reading it to avoid wrist pain. It's a really quick and easy read in a good way, I thought it would take a lot longer to read than it did, I read it in two days without having to push myself or even realising that I'd read it so quickly. Starting it, I thought I wasn't in the mood for it, but it turns out I really was. I loved this book, I love Amy Poehler, I loved her style of writing, and I thought her book was really interesting. It sounds stupid, but she includes motivation quotes etc. that make you feel really empowered. I loved it and it well deserves the hype.

4. 'Fire and Flood'- Victoria Scott
I was really excited to read this, and I feel a little let down. The book was really good, but I was expecting so much more. I feel that it was meant to be aimed at older teenagers, but ended up seeming more aimed at early teens. The premise of this book was to die for: The Hunger Games mixed with Pokemon and a little bit of The Maze Runner. What's not to love about that? I would estimate this book to be set around 2013/2014, which is really weird because you never get dystopian-style books set in modern times, normally they are set in the future. This book is also a weird one as it's kind of dystopian, but kind of not because the world is as we know it, just with this added, unexplainable extra. Initially I really disliked the main character's voice- she's immensely concerned with her appearance and lack of Internet access, and I just didn't like some of the phrases and words she used. While she really, really annoyed me at the beginning, she grew on me massively as the story and her character developed, and I really did love her by the end of the book. Good character development, that. I did really enjoy this book, but I expected to enjoy it a lot more. I will definitely be buying the second book- 'Salt and Stone'- which is out now or soon.

5. 'Ready Player One'- Ernest Cline
I was so excited for this book, so many people have said that it's one of their most favourite books ever, and, with every over-hyped book, I was disappointed. I hate to say it, but I think I was just a bit bored by a lot of this book. Saying that, it did get really good towards the end, but some bits of the book were so slow-paced that the ending just didn't make up for it. The world building and background is quite slow for the first 70 pages, but the story does pick up slightly after that. What's scary about this is that the situation the world is in is completely plausible- the extreme poverty, lack of essential fuels, and the dependence on a virtual world could actually happen. The virtual world is confusing, the only thing I can really compare it to is the floating Internet chairs in Disney's 'Wall-E'. You don't need a vast knowledge of the 80s or video gaming to enjoy this, but it does help if you have a bit of interest in it. This is the first sci-fi book I think I've ever read, and maybe it's just not my thing. My main problem with this book is that I just really didn't like the main character. As with 'Fire and Flood', I just really don't know how I feel about this book.

6. 'The Princess Bride'- William Goldman
I was really in the mood for an alternative fairy tale type book, and this is one of the weirdest things I have ever read. I went into this book knowing basically nothing, and it can be very confusing. The introduction is very long and odd, and is all fabricated, it's worth searching the book briefly first to try and make sense of the 'back story' the author talks about. I can't say enough that this book is so, so weird, but it has fast become one of my most favourite books of all time, I'm trying to force my whole family to read it. I loved it so, so much.

7. 'Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban'- J.K. Rowling
In December I started rereading the Harry Potter series from the beginning. My family are always saying that the third Harry Potter book is the best one, I was never convinced until now. This book was so, so good that I can't see why I didn't notice it before. My family are cocky about this, but I am converted. I loved it even more than the second one, which was previously one of my favourites.

8. 'Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse'- Rick Riordan 
In January I started reading the Percy Jackson series for the first time; this is the third book in the series. The book was so tense, with so many unanswered questions and cliffhangers, that I powered through it in two days. Both J.K. Rowling and Rick Riordan are geniuses.

9. 'Doon'- Carey Corp and Lorie Langdon
This book. THIS BOOK. Ohmygod. I loved it so much. So, so much. I expected to enjoy it, but I never thought it would end up on my list of all-time favourite books. I need to read the second one now, but then I don't know how I can wait for the third one (there's going to be four in all). Parts of this book made my heart hurt so much, but the ending has just shattered it into a million little pieces. I preferred Veronica's chapters, but luckily there's a lot more of hers. It makes me sad that I can't live in Doon with my solemate. I can't express all my feelings about this book into words. Can we also just take a moment to appreciate just how beautiful the cover is. Just to say here that I read this book on Kindle, the first book I've actually read on Kindle, and it's currently 99p on the Amazon Kindle store.

OUTFIT OF THE DAY- 28/03/15

Sticking a quick note up here to say that I've finally made a blog twitter, only a few months after I decided that it was about time I did. My twitter is @Rozoid97 - drop us a tweet 'hello'. 

This is my outfit of the day from yesterday, when it was slightly hotter and not raining, featuring my faithful black Topshop Jamie jeans (though it is time I got another pair, these ones are looking a little no-longer-black).

Camisole tops were my new favourite clothing discovery of last summer. This one is from Next, and is actually more of a plum/berry colour than it looks in the pictures (UK weather is impossible to work with when picture taking). Berry is one of my favourite colours, so I couldn't pass this top by when I saw it, despite it being a little too early in the year for camis yet. One of the best features of this top is the adjustable straps, so useful as cami tops are often a little too lose.

It's simple, but it works. (I also think it would work well with blue jeans). I style this with white converse and a thick, oatmeal-coloured cardigan.

The top is still available online from Next.co.uk for £12. Next are such an underrated brand, but they're one of my favourite high street shops.

INCREASING PRODUCTIVITY LEVELS

As a self-confessed procrastinator, I have been working hard this past year to up my productivity levels and to work harder. I'm doing well, so I thought I'd share my tips on how to increase productivity levels and get the shit done.

Set a Reasonable To-Do List for Each Day
This is one of the most important things on here. Always be reasonable when planning your day- don't set yourself too many tasks because you will just increase the amount of stress and pressure you put on yourself. You won't feel good if you've been over-adventurous and can't complete everything on your list. Make your to-do list tiny, then you will feel way more productive and positive if you complete your goals and then some.

Motivate Yourself as soon as You Wake Up and get Excited About what you can Achieve
This is pretty self-explanatory, be excited about how much you're going to get done (even if it's just a tiny bit), and this should help motivate you to complete it.

Start at a Reasonable Hour
Don't try and start too early or you won't feel motivated, and then you'll feel bad about yourself if you don't start early like you wanted to. I tend to start working at around 10:30am-11:00am, then I can lie in bed, get ready and organise and plan my day before I start.

Get Up
Be up and ready before you start working- wash your face, brush your teeth, have a shower, do your hair, get dressed. You'll feel much more productive than if you try and work in pjs.

Organise Everything First
Organise your folders, books, pieces of paper, stationary, whole desk-area before you start, then you won't have to keep getting up and down and interrupting your work to fetch things you've forgotten.

Have an Internet Binge
Scroll through the Internet, watch pointless Youtube videos, check your social media. All before you start working. If you look at everything that distracts you first, then if you try and look there later, there won't be anything to look at, so you'll have to work. Flawless logic.

Make a Drink
Bring a cup of tea with you when you start working- it's nice.

Have a Tidy Workspace
This is so important when preparing to work. A messy workspace means you can't find anything you need, everything is chaotic and it personally stresses me out even more. Before I work I always sort out my desk so that the only things on it are things I will need for that one piece of work, and then I can rotate stuff around between tasks.

Reward Yourself
It's important to give yourself targets so that you have something to motivate yourself towards achieving. For example, awarding yourself with a snack, Youtube video, few pages of a book, once you've completed each task. Also important is giving yourself breaks, I take a break each time I finish a piece of work, but breaks in the middle of long tasks are important as well for keeping up momentum.

BEDROOM BITS-AND-BOBS HAUL

I have been in the process of redoing my bedroom for the past two years, every time a holiday rolls around I promise I'm going to repaint it... This summer is going to be the one though. In February I took a mini trip to Ikea, so I thought I'd do a haul of what I got there, along with a few other bedroom-related things that I got for Christmas.

Ikea Fake Flowers 
67p each
I like having flowers in my room, but a lot of the time they're just not practical with the amount of space a vase takes up and the amount of leaves and petals dropped. I keep my fake flowers in a Fentimans Rose Lemonade bottle, which you can buy in Waitrose (it helps to drink it first); I love the cute, vintage look of these bottles.

Ikea Vanilla Candle
95p
I can't resist a good candle, especially one coming in at the beautiful price of under £1. For a cheap candle, the smell is incredible, I have yet to light it, but my whole room smells amazingly and noticeably of vanilla. Vanilla is one of my favourite candle scents.

Ikea Garden Pot
£2
Everyone and their mum on Instagram has the iconic white Ikea garden pot, but I actually prefer this one. These pots are so useful for storing things and tidying away clutter, I think I'm going to use mine for my ever-growing nail varnish collection.

Ikea Cushion
£7
I'd wanted a cushion for my desk chair because it has a hard back and I spend a lot of time there working. I love this cushion, despite the fact that my father told me he hates the design, and my mother looked at me like I was mad when I chose it. It's so quirky and weird and slightly horrible, I am very much in love with it.

Wild Fig Yankee Candle
Around £8
The first of the bedroom items I got for Christmas, the scent is very strong and I'm not sure where I stand on it. I can only light it for short periods of time, and it has the tendency to start melting in direct sunlight.

Cactus
This was part of my secret Santa present from my friend, I've already made the fatal mistake of grabbing the spikes. This is my second cactus, they're so cute and low maintenance as they're not something that has to be watered regularly.

Coaster
I'd wanted another coaster for my room so that I didn't have to keep transferring my coaster from the bedside table to the desk and back again whenever I wanted tea.

Rose Fairy Lights
These are my favourite thing in my recent bedroom haul, my parents bought then from the Ideal Home Christmas show in December. I'd wanted fairy lights to put in my room for ages, but I wasn't a fan of the LED ones which appear to be the only thing you can buy these days. What I love about these is not only the fact that they are roses (my favourite flower due to the influence of my name), but that they look really pretty when they're not turned on, and you almost never need to turn them on they make such a good decoration.

THIS WEEK'S NAILS- MARCH 2015

This week's nails comes to you from my friend's sparkle-themed 18th birthday party. I went for the more subtle sparkly nails and makeup, as oppossed to the full-on sparkly outfit.

As with everytime I paint my nails, I always go for a high-quality base coat to avoid nail damage and staining. My base coat of choice for the past year has been Essie 'Grow Stronger', which basically does what it says on the tin. I never skip the base coat step of painting my nails (I never bother to wear a top coat, though, I don't even own one). 

I don't often go for sparkly or glittery nails, Christmas 2014 was the first time I'd worn a glitter nail varnish in about two years.

I painted my nails with Essie 'After School Boy Blazer', a favourite of mine for about a year; I always use two coats of Essie nail varnishes. Everyone knows that I love the formula for Essie nail varnishes, but what I love even more is the wide, flat brush that enables you to paint your entire nail perfectly in about two strokes. Not only is it so much easier for those who are awful at painting nails (like me), but it also makes for streak-free nails at the end of it all. Essie 'After School Boy Blazer' is the perfect navy blue for me, looking almost black in certain lights.

For the glitter I used Barry M 'Jingle Bells' (which I got at Christmas, obviously). I was initially going to go for a standard gold glitter to go with the dark blue, though I went with 'Jingle Bells' more interesting mix of gold and red glitter. Barry M 'Jingle Bells' is a mix of small and large pieces of glitter. My one problem with 'Jingle Bells' is that it is very liquidy and the glitter is quite hard to get on your nails, meaning that you often end up with more clear nail varnish than glitter on your nails.

I am really pleased with this look, the dark colour and the glitters makes it perfect for the winter, and I think it looks great when paired with glittery eye makeup and a black dress.