Music Therapy

Hi everyone, For a long while after going through a particularly bad 18 months of my life, I felt I just couldn't listen to music anymore.  I stopped listening to all my favourite songs and I stopped singing, both of which have always been a big passion and influence in my life.  but lately I tried again, I started with really old favourites that I knew would make me feel good and it worked!
That was about a month ago, and since then I've been able to really get back to listening to a lot of my absolute best songs and even singing again, which has actually felt so amazing!  I'm still working up to certain other songs that I know may trigger bad memories but I'll get there because I feel I'm on the right road.  But the best part is, I feel I have part of 'me' back, a part of my soul that was missing for a long time, and it's helped my mental health SO much!!

Yesterday my best friend Shelley tagged me in a facebook challenge, the 30 Day Song Challenge and me being me, completely obsessed with music and very passionate about SO many songs, I just had to turn it into a blog post, especially now that I have music back in my life again!

Also I haven't done a tag post in forever and to help beat the boredom at the moment, I thought it would be fun for you guys to join in and post your answers too, either in the comments or on your own social media pages, and get others to join in too.

I've also added a few more questions, because why the hell not and because there's just so many songs I love that needed to be mentioned.  Plus I couldn't help but add more than one song for some of the answers, I just couldn't decided because more than one song fitted the bill :-)

So finally, here is the tag -

1. Song you like with a colour in the title? Black & Gold by Sam Sparrow and Behind Blue Eyes by Limp Bizkit
2. Song you like with a number in the title? A Thousand Years by Christina Perri (so beautiful) ♥

3. Song that reminds you of summertime? Replay by Iyaz (full on summer :-D)
4. Song that reminds you of someone you'd rather forget? Unfortunately there's several, mainly Bleeding Love by Leona Lewis
5. Song that needs to be played loud? Lost in the Echo by Linkin Park (Amazing track!!)
6. Song that makes you want to dance? On The Floor by Jennifer Lopez, 4 My People (the Basement Jaxx radio remix) by Missy Elliot, Blow by Ke$ha AND Please Don't Stop the Music by Rihanna (Love, love, love them) :-D
7. Song to drive to? (I don't drive but) Liberate by Eric Prydz (still sounds so cool when you're going down the motorway with the top down and the wind in your hair lol)
8. Song about drugs or alcohol? Happy Little Pill by Troye Sivan or Morphine by Michael Jackson
9. Song that makes you happy? Shut Up & Dance by Walk the Moon :-D
10. Song that makes you sad? Sooo many but My Immortal by Evanescence
11. Song you never get tired of? Moondust by Jaymes Young (gorgeous!)
12. Song from your preteen years? This Ole House by Shakin Stevens
13. Song you like from the 70s? You've Got a Friend by Carole King
14. Song you'd love to be played at your wedding? Never Gonna Leave Your Side by Daniel Bedingfield or A Thousand Years by Christina Perri
15. Song you like sang by another artist? Cold Water sang by Hobbie Stuart (it's AMAZING!!)
16. Song that's a classic favourite? Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen :-D
17. Song you'd sing a duet with someone on karaoke? Time of my Life from Dirty Dancing
18. Song from the year you were born? Nope, not answering that one!
19. A song that makes you think about life? Everybody's Free to Wear Sunscreen by Baz Luhrmann (Brilliant track!)
20. Song that has many meanings? My December (live) by Linkin Park ♥♥
21. Song you like with a person's name in the title? Valery by Amy Winehouse
22. Song that moves you forward? Beautiful by Christina Aguilera
23. Song you think everybody should listen to? Take It All by Ruelle (amazing!) PLUS all the other songs I've mentioned that you don't already know!
24. Song by a band you wish were still together? Numb by Linkin Park ;-(
25. Song you like by an artist no longer living? Underground by David Bowie
26. Song that makes you want to fall in love? Insatiable by Darren Hayes AND All of Me by John Legend (Beautiful song) ♥
27. Song that breaks your heart? Goodbye My Lover by James Blunt
28. Song by an artist who's voice you love? Lost by Michael Bublé (voice like melted chocolate ♥)
29. Song you remember from your childhood? Daddy's Home by Cliff Richard
30. Song that reminds you of yourself? Bitter Sweet Symphony by The Verve

15 Extra bonus questions, because, why not!

1. Song to relax to? Teardrop by Massive Attack or Children by Robert Miles
2. Song that makes you cry but you love? Goodbye to You by Michelle Branch (this version)
3. Song that reminds you of great times? Any 90s dance!!  I.e. You Sure Do by Strike or When I'm Good & Ready by Sybil, so so many!! :-D
4. Favourite song to sing to? Bring Me To Life or Imaginary both by Evanescence
5. Song that makes you smile? (Apart from 90s dance!) If I Lose Myself by One Republic ♥
6. Song you listen to when you're angry? Wth>You, Figure 09, Qwerty or Victimized all by Linkin Park
7. Your least favourite song from a band you love? The Little Things that Give You Away by Linkin Park
8. Song you love that someone else introduced you to? Shatter Me By Lindsey Stirling & Lzzy Hale (thank you Shelley)
9. Song with the best beginning?  No More Sorrow by Linkin Park (Best beginning ever)
10. Favourite rap duet? Love the Way You Lie by Rihanna & Eminem, Airplanes by B.o.B and Hayley Williams and Champion by Chipmunk & Chris Brown
11. Song you can fall asleep to? MCXMC album by Enigma
12. Song that you think is just really cool?  Starboy by The Weekend (love it)
13. Your karaoke song? Warwick Avenue by Duffy
14. Old song you love that's your parents favourite? Heartbreaker by Free (it's awesome, in fact the whole album!)
15. Over-all song you love? Mr. Vain by Culture Beat :-D ♥

I have absolutely LOVED doing this tag because I've re-discovered so many songs that I love that I'd completely forgotten about and haven't listen to in so long.  I hope you give it a go, it will definitely make you smile and I think we could all do with that at the moment.  Plus I highly recommend having a listen to all the tracks I've mentioned, because they're ace :-D

So until next time, Stay Happy and Stay Safe ♥

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25 Questions About Me - Get To Know Me

Hi everyone, I recently saw this tag doing the rounds so thought I'd have a go to, so you can know a little bit more about me.

1. What is your middle name?  Jane

2. What was your favourite subject in school?  Probably art, but I loved english, history and drama too

3. What is your favourite drink?  Hot chocolate :-)

4. What is your favourite song at the moment?  It's still If I Lose Myself by One Republic, I love it, love it, love it :-)  I've also been loving Shut Up & Dance by Walk The Moon, I can't stop listening to it

5. What is your favourite food?  Original plain Pringles with chocolate!

6. What was the last thing you bought?  My new Walking Dead mug, I'm so happy with it, I just can't decide if to use it or keep it safely hidden away somewhere.  Have a look on my Instagram if you fancy a peak.

7. Favourite quote of all time?  "When words fail, music speaks", I can just relate to this so much and it means a lot to me.

8. Favourite colour?  Lilac/purple or silver

9. Favourite Perfume?  I used to like Anais Anais or Channel No5, but I don't wear perfume these days, I'm allergic to anything scented :-(

10. Favourite Holiday?  A skiing trip in France when I was at school

11. Are you married?  Nope, not yet

12. Have you ever left the country?  Yes only a couple of times, but there's many places I would love to travel to

13. Do you have any pets?  Yes, two gorgeous toy Poodles :-)

14. Do you speak any other languages?  Not really, it was never something I was good at learning!

15. How many siblings do you have?  None, it's just me

16. What's your favourite shop?  Probably, Boots, Primark or Tesco, not very exciting but there you go!

17. Favourite restaurant?  Nando's but I'm not really a restaurant type of girl, give me a nice walk and a bag of chips over posh-nosh any day!

18. When was the last time you cried?  A couple of days ago, sometimes things just all get too much ;-(

19. Favourite blog?  If I had to pick just one, I think it would have to be What Amy Did Next, love the new look of her blog too :-)

20. Favourite movie?  I love so many, more than I actually realised while I was compiling my big list the other day, so if you fancy having a look through that to find out the type of films I love watching, click on the link to my last post - My Favourite Movies

21. Favourite TV show?  Well that's a silly question to ask someone who is clearly obsessed with just one program!  The Walking Dead of course!!  ;-)

22. Mac or PC?  Well since I've never used a Mac, I'll have to say pc

23. What phone do you have?  A Samsung Galaxy S4 mini, and I absolutely love it
5 phone pic

24. How tall are you?  5 foot 4 inches, I think, it might be 3 inch I'm not sure

25. Can you cook?  Kind of, as you know I love baking but as for regular food, urr I'm not bad, I do tend to over-cook and burn things but I do love trying to cook and experimenting with new things if that counts!

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I hope you liked this post.  If you fancy having a go at answering the questions too, let me know your answers in the comments, I'd love to hear them :-)

Until Next Time Stay Happy ♥

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What I'm Currently Listening To

Hi everyone, just a quick note first to say I've been having some annoying pc/internet issues this past week, but finally I can now post this post! YEAY :-)

So, I have been loving a lot of new music recently and thought it would be good to share them with you, because of course it's always nice to find great new music to relax to :-)

Troye Sivan – Right from when I first heard Happy Little Pill last year, I was hooked.  To see this young guy on youtube come out with such amazing music and wise insightful words is so inspiring.  If you haven't heard Troye's music already, go and check out his channel.  I'm still constantly listening to HLP as well as The Fault in Our Stars, and I can't wait to get the new EP called Wild, which came out a couple of days ago!  I've been loving the little teaser snippets of the new tracks which Troye's been uploading on his youtube channel, I think Ease and Fools are definitely going to be new favourites (of course Wild is already on my Amazon wish list) :-)

Halestorm – Last Summer I discovered a really great track called Shatter Me by Lindsey Sterling (which you may remember I mentioned in last year's Autumn Favourites). I was slightly obsessed with this song and played it all summer, I still listen to it a lot now and so of course I was really happy to find out that Lzzy Hale who sang the vocals, had her own band, wow was I happy!  I didn't realise at the time that they'd been around so long but I've really been enjoying discovering their music as I love her voice and the hard rock sound.  Miss The Misery is one of my favourites, as well as Amen, Freak Like Me and Mz.Hyde.  I'm still working my way through the massive collection of amazing songs on their YouTube playlist and they're quickly becoming one of my favourite rock bands :-)

Alex McMillan – Being a massively huge Linkin Park fan, I literally stumbled on this guy about a year ago now while looking for LP covers.  I have never heard anyone sing like Chester Bennington (lead singer of LP for those who don't know) SO well and sound so incredibly like him!  Not only that, he is a total one-man show, he plays the guitar, keyboard, sings, everything and comes out with perfect covers of Linkin Park tracks, best I've ever found!  His cover of The Catalyst is just pure genius! But the main reason I'm writing about Alex today, is because of his own music under the name Razor Red Noise.  I love the digital hard rock sound that's made me such a huge Linkin Park fan over the years.  His lyrics and very deep and thoughtful and I really love the softer more ambient tracks too.

Control is absolutely amazing, vocally I think it's one of his best tracks, the music is incredible, it's just one of those songs you just can't stop listening to!!  I love Mountains and Into The Sun too, but thankfully there's loads more on his website to listen to that I've not even had chance to hear yet, so I'm very excited to do that.  I just wish I had the talent and a mind like his, to be able to come up with such incredible music!

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Now as anyone who knows me will tell you, I live and breath rock music, I can go months without listening to anything else!  But here and there just randomly out of the blue, something (or someone) else will catch my attention and I don't care whether it's rock, dance, country (eek) or anything else, if it's good I'll love it, and that leads me on to the next person that I've been non-stop listening to for about the past month (solidly, every day, I need help!) 

Hobbie Stuart - Some of you may have already heard of this lovely lad as apparently he was on X-Factor this year and caused a bit of a stir especially with the ladies (even some of the judges so I heard)! This was news to me, I only found this out a couple of days ago, because I don't actually watch X-Factor anymore, (too much hype and drama these days!)

I first saw him about a long while ago on several of Gabriella Lindley's vlogs and main channel videos.  But it wasn't until I saw the gorgeous Saying Goodbye video that I heard his music.  Since then, I have been working my way through his YouTube channel and loving pretty much everything on there, and non-stop listening to his songs ever since, I am officially obsessed!  I'm in love with his voice and the sound and style of his music, and well lets just point out the obvious here girls, he is extremely easy on the eye and completely gorgeous!!  Wouldn't you agree? ;-)

I love that some of his tracks are so chilled and up beat like How You Love It and yet others are wonderfully soft and romantic, just beautiful, like Day One, but my absolute favourite has to be When I'm Gone, his new track, it's just amazing I love it and cannot stop playing it :-)

I really enjoy seeing him in Gabby's vlogs too, he so sweet, chilled and funny, and he does a really cute impression of Gabby that just has me laughing every time :-)  He's also filmed a really lovely version of Ellie Goulding's song Love Me Like You Do with Gabby (love her voice too), so if you haven't seen that already go have a listen :-)

It really amazes me how much great music is out there that so many people don't get to hear.  That's one of the reasons I really like these types of posts so we can share all the stuff we listen to and help each other discover and share great music. I love finding new tracks to listen to and there's so much I've yet to find, it's exciting :-)

Until Next Time Stay Happy ♥

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Summer Favourites 2015

Hi everyone, oh wow I can't believe I'm writing my Summer favourites already, I swear, doing these seasonal favourites posts really seems to make the year go by a lot faster, or is that just me!?  I'd better get thinking about my Autumn favs as that'll be coming around soon too lol

Ok, so enough rambling and on with the things that I've been loving over the last few months.

So to start off with, I finally got my hair cut!  I'd been wanting it done for absolutely ages and I finally got it done at Wild Hairdressers by the lovely Rachel back in May.  When my hair gets to a certain length I tend to just get really fed up with it, it gets in the way all the time and drives me crazy, so by this point I was almost ready to chop it all off myself!  I had about 4-5 inches off the length and slightly curved around my face.  I'm still really happy with it although amazingly I think it's grown a couple of inches already, so I may have to have a trim again soon.  I'm not one for fussing with my hair, I don't have the time and no matter what I try and do with it, nothing seems to work, so the thing I love about this style on me is that I can just brush and go :-)

I love GIF posts, I think they're hilarious and I just couldn't help wanting to do my own.  The first one I came up with was my Pet Hates post back in May and then I wrote my All Men Are Beasts post about a month ago.  I just find them so, so funny and it's just nice to do a light-hearted post ever now and again, so I've really been enjoying them too.

I wanted to include this card in my favourites post this time because it was given to me by one of my best friends last month and it really meant a lot.  They wrote some really lovely things in there, I even had a tear or two while reading it, and it was just such a lovely wonderful thought, so thank you FB, you're the best xxx

Ok you might think why am I adding this as a favourite!  But, I just love it, I've been putting it on everything lately and it's SO good!  I have it on toast, scones, it's gorgeous on croissants too.  You could also have it with pancakes, muffins, crumpets, dip strawberries in it or of course have it on it's own with a very large spoon! :-) Yum

I love re-watching old favourite tv shows and over the past few months I've been really enjoying Roswell High.  It's a show that I used to love years ago and I hadn't seen it for a really long time, so I thought I'd re-watch them all.  It's basically about 3 aliens (in human form) that go to school and live a life in Roswell New Mexico, and their 3 human friends.

Of course there's romance and lots of action, some really great gripping story lines and a good bit of eye candy.

It stars the extremely gorgeous (but slightly younger) Jason Behr and the very talented Katherine Heigl.

I adore notebooks, the prettier the better.  I use them such a lot of the time as well, for notes, lists and of course my blog planner for when I'm working on posts etc (which you can read about here).  I bought the beautiful rose collage book (with the bicycle, bird and Eiffel tower on) from ebay for about £2.75, they also do an A4 size and I love that it has pink lines on the pages, so cute.
The other collage book I bought from Tesco but I've had that for quite a while, it's still one of my favourites though, and the sweet floral one in the middle is also from Tesco and I only bought that a few weeks ago.  I'm not too sure what to use this one for yet, but no doubt I'll come up with a plan soon, just so I can use it.

I have always really loved the Candy Rose collection at Dunelm Mill and I've had the lovely mug and a bowl (which I use when I'm baking) for quite a while but a few weeks ago, the mug got chipped when it was being washed up.  I was so sad because I thought Dunelm had stopped selling them but after a quick search on their website I spotted it, and added it along with a few other bits to the cart.  I love the mug so much I wasn't taken any chances in case this one got broke as well, so I ordered 2!  I also got the pasta bowl and this beautiful tray as I thought it would be an ideal photographing background (blogger-brain)!  I then placed the order and within a day it was ready to pick up at my local store.  While I was in the shop the next day, I also spotted these beautiful pale pink and vintage pink artificial roses, they were only £2.49 each.  I've been looking for something like this for literally the last couple of years!  So I was thrilled with these, I think they'll look gorgeous in photos and in my shabby chic inspired bedroom too :-)

I must have been on Google Play nearly every day over the past month.  I've been obsessed lately with various different apps but mainly with photo editing ones.  I've found some really great ones that I love to use, if you follow me on Instagram you would probably have seen some of the pictures I've been playing around with.  I'm also going to be doing a post within the next few weeks about my favourite apps and which ones I find the best for all my blogging needs.

For a very long time, I've been designing and making greeting cards, it's something I really enjoy doing and it's also part of my job but I haven't done it regularly for quite a long while.  I just wanted to add it in as a 'favourite' this time because I feel like I've really re-discovered cardmaking and I really want to get back in to doing it a lot more regularly.  If you keep a look out for the new Making Cards Christmas Special this year, you'll see the cards I was working very hard on about a month ago and I hope to do a more in-depth post about it at some point too, as it's a side of my life that I haven't really mentioned on my blog before but I would like to share with you all.

This is just a little extra I wanted to add in, I found this gorgeous little silver bow ring while I was in Claire's Accessories back in June, when I was out shopping with my friend and I was so pleased as I've been looking for one like this for ages.  I think it was only about £1.50 and it fits perfectly too, I'm so happy with it :-)

Lastly I've been loving finding new music on YouTube recently and I have stumbled on some amazingly talented people lately, one in particular and I have been listening to his music Non-Stop!!  But I'm not going to tell you who they are at the moment or add any links, because I will be doing a whole post about my Favourite New Music within the next few weeks, to tell you all about them in detail, because I'm loving it! So keep a look out for that too :-)

Until Next Time Stay Happy ♥

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15 of My Favourite Feelings Tag

Hi everyone, hope you're all having a great week.  So finally there's a new tag going around, yeay :-)  Well it may not be that new but I honestly haven't seen it done before, until I saw it last week on Essie Buttons video, I thought it was a fun idea and just wanted to give it a go.  So here's my 15 favourite feelings, I hope you like it :-)

1. One feeling I love so, so much is the happiness I feel from my beautiful Poodle babies, they mean the world to me, the love and affection they give me back is priceless and the way they greet me every morning is just wonderful, it fills my heart with joy.  I love it when they wag their tails when I smile at them and playing with them is so much fun.  They make me laugh and smile on days when nothing else does!  I could go on and on :-)

2. I love feeling the warm sun on my face, as soon as it starts getting better weather I just long to be outside and could spend all day out there.

I love going to my local park and just sitting by the water soaking up the vitamin D and enjoying the gorgeous warmth of the sun.

3. Having a hot shower is sooo nice, I enjoy the feeling of washing my face and just the fresh, clean feeling of it all.

4. I also like putting my fluffy white bathrobe on after my shower, it just feels so soft and cosy, I love that feeling.

5. Who doesn't love the feeling of snuggling down in bed when you've just changed the sheets?!  I'm all about the comfort :-)

6. Taking off the bra, ooh the relief!

7. I'm a total water baby and just love being in water.  I'm not a good swimmer at all but I just so enjoy messing around and just relaxing in the warm water and being surrounded by it, hmm lovely!

8. There's really not much I enjoy more, than meeting up with my friends, having a good gossip, a laugh and putting the world to rights, they're amazing :-)

9. And while I'm out gossiping with my best friends, I still love having the Costa hot chocolates, despite the fact that it is no longer winter it's still very cold here in the uk, and I don't care; I love them, they're hot and tasty and chocolatey, just gorgeous and sitting there having my yummy hot chocolate laughing with my friends, makes me feel very happy :-)

10. It feels so nice, so exciting wearing an eyeshadow from a brand new palette I've just saved up for or a new lipstick shade I've been longing to try out.  I think most of us at least, can relate to that feeling makeup gives you, empowered, confident, happy.  I really enjoy putting it on (especially on days when my eyeliner decides to cooperate!) It's just such a great feeling.

11. On days when I'm not feeling my best and life is getting me down, youtube, or at least certain people on it, always seem to make me feel better and I just so enjoy watching certain types of videos that make me laugh or that can just generally make me smile and forget about the days troubles, it makes me feel so much more relaxed and when I'm having a hectic or stressful days, that's a very welcome feeling.

12. There's nothing like the feeling of hugging my best friend a loved one, feeling comforted and loved.  There's one certain person in my life that means the world to me and to hug them, is the most wonderful feeling.  I can also still remember how it felt to hug my granddad, he passed away quite a few years ago and he meant so much to me, having the memory of hugging him means so much, a precious feeling!

13. Kissing, hmmm!  Need I say more ;-)

14. If you've read some of my previous posts, you will know how much I love music and what it means to me.  Hearing one of my favourite songs, listening to my favourite band or listening to one of my old 90's favourites, it all just makes me feel amazing, so alive and energized, it's a very powerful feeling!  One of my favourite songs was playing in a shop the other day as I walked in and as I suddenly heard it, I couldn't stop smiling lol I must've looked silly but it just made me feel really good :-)

15. That feeling as you finish a post and hit the publish/upload button, a sense of real achievement, knowing I've worked hard on a post and being happy enough with it to upload it for the world to see.  That definitely makes me feel happy!

Just because :-)

Let me know what your 15 favourites feelings are in the comments, or even if you can just think of a few, I'd love to hear them :-)
Until Next Time Stay Happy ♥

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