Daydreaming And Forgetting Yourself

It's crazy to believe that it's the month of August already. The summer has passed by with incredible speed, leaving me feeling overwhelmed in its wake. 2015 is steaming by, which consistently shocks me as I mark off another day on the calendar. I believe that I have spent the majority of the summer so far simply waiting for warm, balmy weather to arrive. Which it hasn't achieved so far.

The summer has been, to quote John Montague, a ''drama of unevent.'' In previous years, this would have irritated me yet now, it thrills me. To have the ability to simply rest and read a couple of chapters of my favourite book in the evenings, without the feeling of worry or dread due to pending study is wonderfully peaceful. I am happily content to spend my time going for walks, reading and daydreaming about everything or anything.

Walking in the evenings, with weak sunshine shining on my face, I smile and reflect on the days of summer so far. The weather has been far from perfect. immediately after the exams there was a warm spell which left as abruptly as it arrived. It was a shame in all honesty, I'm looking a little pale as of late.

The Leaving Cert results day is Wednesday August 12th. I turned my calendar onto the month of August, shuddering as I saw my own handwriting with ''Results Day'' written down for a day that has been awaited with baited breath since June 18th. I promise that I'm trying to avoid discussing or thinking about that day, when I receive an extremely important piece of paper. However dwelling on the possibilities of what the future holds isn't an easy activity to avoid. For the time being, I shall just take a deep breath and try prevent the waves of anxiety and fear from sweeping over me as days stretch into new days.

I think I know why they're called ''waves of anxiety.'' Going to bed after scratching another day off on my calendar, leaves me open to wave after wave of fear and nerves hitting my system. Extending from my lungs to my mind, these waves seem to both metaphorically and physically cause unease and fear. Choked breaths and shaking hands seem to fill the room as I search desperately for a book or music to send the waves away. For a little while at least. The closer the day gets, the more frustrated and desperate the distractions become.

For once, one of my frequent distractions isn't blogging. My current distractions are music, reading, Netflix, writing in one of my many notebooks, playing meaningless apps on my phone and walking.
As I shake like a leaf in Autumn, I realise how vital is it for me to keep myself distracted.

There are some days when forgetting ourselves, if only for a little while, is utterly necessary. To be free, breathe fresh air in your lungs. To forget all of those seemingly unsolvable or anxiety fuelled problems, even if it's for an hour or two.

 As the last few days waiting for Results approaches, I can feel my heart rate accelerate and my breathing become ragged and tense. I close my eyes and breathe in deeply. In the words of the poet Sylvia Plath, 

''Let be, let be''  

I will be brave and try keep my nerve. I was told something interesting a few weeks ago. To cut a long story short, we must always keep our nerve, as there is always something out there in the future that will make us nervous and terrified, particularly with regards to the next step and direction that our lives take. We must not lose our nerve for surely something just as nervewracking will surely follow suit. 

Aveen 

''And I Still Feel That Rush In My Veins.''

I cannot find an accurate song lyric to title this blog post. It sounds dramatic yet it is a problem that has been on my mind all week. It has become so horribly strenuous to gather my thoughts onto one linear progression of thought and one page.

I feel imprisoned. As I breathe, I sense my creativity evaporating into the dark, cloudless sky to be replaced with fear and rote-learned paragraphs. I am shackled down by the pressure I place on myself. Going further than expected and going the Extra Mile - every time is both rewarding, yet, exhausting. I know I will value this ethic I posses in the weeks to come. However at this moment in time, it seems to be the source of my difficulties.

I have not written an honest thought in weeks. I can feel my emotions, thoughts and ideas seeping into other areas of both my conscious and sub-conscious mind. I fear that this may have a detrimental impact.

I am becoming quote conscious of my private life - and the fact that I like to keep some parts of my life as an enigma or little mystery. Many now believe that due to the fact that I write openly on this blog, my private life should become intertwined with a concoction of deceitful lies and their own inadequacies splashed across the classroom walls.

Due to receiving somewhat decent test results as of late, my name and reputation was blackened. More than ever I have become determined to prove others wrong. You know my name, not my story. Little do you know, I have a history of proving others wrong about their ill-based assumptions.

These feelings of keeping my life and its mundane details private and close to my chest has prevented me from concentrating my efforts into crafting a substantial blog post. With everything, I feel that the closure I crave will inevitably come from the therapeutic effect of formulating my thoughts onto a page. Typing directly from my mind to the keyboard feels cold, unplanned and insincere at times. The warmth of my pen resting in my left hand as it swirls across endless pages of white, is a beauty like no other in my eyes.

These feelings of anxiety will undoubtedly take time to fade. Yet I hold the strong belief that the feelings of inadequacy will recede in due course, as usual. I know that what has happened will make me a stronger person who will use their voice even more to call out anyone who hinders my progress to becoming a better person and my goals, both academically and emotionally. It was their own flaws and feelings of jealousy which they allowed seep from their mind to someone else's mouth.

I found a lyric. ''And I still feel that rush in my veins'' I can feel that rush of adrenaline and fear. It hasn't evaporated yet. In the future it will be a rush of adrenaline and elation. I inhale. Positivity and knowledge fuels my mind. Exhale. Negativity and memories of fear leave my system and float away in the dark, star-filled night.

My usual blogging schedule should resume after the past few hectic weeks. 

Stay Strong, Happy and Fearless,

Never let anyone try make you feel inadequate - It's their problem. Not yours. 

Aveen 

*Lyric The Kids Aren't Alright - Fall Out Boy

'Singing I am your worst, I am your worst nightmare''

Hey Everyone!

It has been a long time to say the least since I have written here. As you may expect, the preparation for the Mocks and ultimately the Leaving Cert does leave me with little time. Time is a luxury few Leaving Cert students can afford. I should probably inform you all about the wondrous and soul-soothing things I've been up to as of late!

As a Sixth Year with Mocks starting on Monday (English Paper Two, along with Irish Paper One) time is truly of the essence so any time I get to relax, I truly savour it. I try to stop studying at around 9.30 on school nights (I need copious amounts of sleep just to function) so I do 3-4 hours of homework and study each school night. Weekends are easily 4 hours a day and then the evenings to relax.

Last Saturday I treated myself to the Divergent DVD and sadly, instead of blogging, watched it instead! I had watched the film when it was in the cinemas but really wanted to watch it again. It's such a rarity to actually sit down for two hours to watch a film and not be plagued by thoughts of the Mocks or Leaving Cert. The exams and hours of study consume your entire life for a school year. It really isn't pleasant but I'm optimistic all these hours of study will be worth it all in the end. (It's the only thing you can hope for, isn't it?)

School has been as can be expected. Talk of Mocks, Debs, Leaving Cert, CAO, all hang over every conversation at The Bench. It genuinely causes you to sit back slightly and think,
 'This is real. This is happening. It's not just my mind thinking that this is happening, it is actually happening.' It is both a source of anxiety and a mixture of reluctant excitement with shock.

We watched for years as Sixth Year groups came and went from the school, leaving us remaining, now it's our turn to leave. Soon we won't even be secondary school students, we'll be finished and moving onto ambitious and life-changing places. It does lead to your breath hitching in your throat occasionally when you think about it.

I'm studying for the Mocks, but I don't want to work so hard that I burn out before the Leaving Cert, if that makes sense. We're told to do well, BUT, not too well. Yet good grades are expected. But if you get an A you'll be marked down. I am planning to aim for a grade below what I'm planning on getting in the real LC. I  think that's reasonable and leaves a sturdy foundation to work on for June.

Down below are some photos (mainly photos I've sent on Snapchat) during the time I have been absent from my blog.

Asking the serious questions whilst wearing a cat onesie.

Watching 'Divergent' and crushing on Ansel Elgort, as you do.

Waiting for pizza when The Parents and The Sibling travel to Limerick and you have a study day.

Home alone on a Sunday. Fun, fun fun. 

The most delicious drink ever. 

Oranges look so happy. Keeping up with my Vitamin C during study. 

My 'To-Do' list last week.. Oh the joys.

I might have mentioned it, but I've been listening to Fall Out Boy non-stop lately! (Along with Taylor Swift and Hozier) This weeks title comes from the Fall Out Boy song 'Novocaine'

So that's about it for this week, tomorrow the mass cramming resumes! 

Stay Strong, Happy & Fearless!
Aveen xx

Struggles And Reality Of Being A Leaving Cert Student.

I thought it was about time to finally post after a fortnight interval.

I feel I should be honest and explain my inactivity on my blog as of late. With the stresses of being a Leaving Cert student, I've found it quite difficult to scrape together some time to sit down and tap away on my laptop like I usually do every week. There seems to be so many other ideas and problems that consume any spare time I do happen to possess and I honestly despise that.

The week before Midterm was quite simply a nightmare. Multiple tests in all my subjects, short deadlines for essays and tonnes of material to be revised, I found it difficult to breathe without feeling anxiety consume my lungs, let alone justify several hours to type on my laptop about things that I felt were so completely insignificant and false in comparison to all the work and study I was doing.

Thankfully all that is behind me. I doubted myself far too much and believed I hadn't done any work since coming back to school. In fact, it was my need and desire to have everything practically word-perfect from my notes that caused me so much stress. I had 10 sets of sraithpictiúr to learn and if they weren't word perfect, well I recited them for hours until they were.

It's officially midterm and so far, I've completed three out of the five essays I was given as part of my week's work. I feel relieved but I won't fully relax until everything is finished. I want to have a few days, an utter luxury, to relax and do NOTHING. I crave mornings where I wake up, with no anxiety or nerves in my stomach, worried about study and work still left to do. I just want a few days just to have fun and live, on my terms.

I'm planning on finishing the rest of my written school work tomorrow and relaxing for the rest of the week. I've had several drafts of incomplete blog posts knocking around my blog for several weeks, either due to a lack of time to add 'polish' to them or I was simply terrified about posting them as they involved real-life incident and my feelings. How terrifying indeed.

I'm also a little annoyed. I had five tests in the space of three short days and studied for all of them. The fourth test, first thing on a Friday was maths. I've double maths on a Friday morning. Maths is quite simply my Achille's heel in comparison to my other subjects.  As a result, I've a huge fear of having maths tests. I mean, a huge fear. As in my other subjects I can learn off the material and regurgitate it in words on paper, I find them much, much easier. Maths, however is a whole different ball game.

However I've made a special effort to not miss any maths tests (or any tests) in either Fifth or Sixth Year. My belief is that you can't skip a day or pretend your sick on the day of your Leaving Cert so why bother do it in school time, instead of learning from your mistakes and owning up to the fact that you aren't comfortable with the topic of the test and should try harder at learning it? I never get A's in maths but I try my best (If you're wondering, I am in Higher Level) and always try scrape an honour in the tests. But it bugs me when people skip the tests out of laziness, yet appear in school later in the day, once the test is over. I honestly find that so cowardly. That sounds horribly blunt but if you want to be in the Higher Level classes you have to do the work, not just sit there and look pretty and brag about being in Honours. School is for doing work and working hard, not to make excuses.

I know that statement will most likely get a negative reaction and probably a few glares and upturned noses when I'm back in school, however, I feel it's the truth. It's better to accept your weaknesses early in play, rather when it's after the mocks and there's little time to rectify your mistakes. I'm not comfortable on certain topics of maths (Trig, ew) so I've brought home my exam papers and book in an effort to try improve  those questions, as well as a general brush up on all the topics.

That goes for all my subjects, not just maths. I read over my notes in various subjects frequently, particularly business and ag science. Soon the information becomes common knowledge to you, not just something crammed into your brain to last for a revision test your teacher sets you.

Being in Leaving Cert isn't great. In all honesty, it's quite awful at times. However, I'm only stuck here doing all this work and study until June. After that, the world is our oyster. We can do whatever we want. You can travel the world, go to college, whatever your heart desires. I find that thought comforting in the midst of writing an essay on the weakness of human judgement as seen in Shakespeare's play Othello. (Ps. I reckon it's how gullible and easily led Othello is that leads him to follow and become ensnared in Iago's Machiavellian scheming and to his ultimate downfall in killing Desdemona, based on his over-reliance on 'honest and just Iago.')

Don't worry, I will be posting frequently this week and will most likely be a lot more positive than this. I found that once I talk about what's playing on my mind, blogging in a light hearted becomes far easier to do.

Stay Strong, Happy & Fearless!

Aveen xx

Ps, I'm going to Penneys/Primark during the week so I will be posting a haul. 

The return of Sprinkles that can be Awkward may be imminent. Watch this space. 

Tick, tock, goes the clock. 

Supporting Aware and #BeatTheBlues Campaign

Hey Everyone!

So this blog post is a little different to the rest. Today I want to write about Aware and the brilliant services they provide to people in Ireland and how they are ''Your supporting light through depression.''

In Ireland and all over the world, mental health illnesses are common yet many people hid their illness in shame and embarrassment. It's perceived to a 'weakness of character' and a 'fatal flaw' of a person. It doesn't have to be this way, and Aware have been and still are working hard to break down this stigma that has dominated Ireland for too long.

From their website it's easy to access information about mental illness such as depression, with startling statistics that ''depression affects 450,000 in Ireland at any one time'' That is A LOT of people, it's not just a number, their real people with lives, families and friends. The website is clear and makes finding information on depression easy and has lots of useful links.

Aware also have a #BeatTheBlues campaign which is a free programme for secondary schools in Ireland. #BeatTheBlues is a positive mental health campaign for senior-cycle students in secondary school. Just last Monday I attended the programme as every Sixth Year student in my school had been attending at different times throughout the week.

I can honestly say it was two class periods well spent. We received a booklet and discussed 'The Coping Triangle'  and how to form a coping sentence from using your concerns. I found the coping sentence so effective as I'm in Sixth Year, I'm really worried about getting good test results and achieving all my goals in the Leaving Cert next June. I found that writing down my thoughts, feelings and actions so helpful to articulate my worries about school and my future.

I felt that the programme was brilliant to attend, especially early into Sixth Year, it has since alleviated my stress with studying and the breathing technique we learnt has been quite useful too. We also got to keep the booklet which I've been reading in my spare time and made me realise that I don't have to study 24/7, it's better to study effectively for a short time, rather than study badly and not absorb information for 6 hours straight. It's better to take a break and do something you want to do, like write a blog post!

Aware also have a campaign video here which features graffiti artist Hyerografx and accurately portrays how mental health is so important to us all.

In the midst of studying for exams, it's important to take time to relax and rest :) 

I hope you all enjoyed reading this blog post, if you want to find out any more information about depression or Aware, here is their website. There's lots of easily accessed information and remember, it's okay not to feel okay. 

Stay Strong, Happy & Fearless!

Aveen xx

The Only Thing Embedded In My Mindset, Is How I'm Addicted To Progress..

Hey Everyone!

Lyrics: The Coronas ~ Addicted To Progress
Sorry for the later than usual blog post today, I was actually being sociable this weekend for once! *Shock horror*

This week was my second week back after Mid-Term, in reality it feels like two months. I'm utterly exhausted at the moment, I've actually no idea why I'm so tired. Everything seems to be so stressful and I keep wishing there was more hours in the day to either study or sleep.

It's honestly shocking how quickly time is flying by, in 3 months, I'll be sitting somewhere in Galway talking Irish. In September when I started Fifth Year, I felt that the year was going to last for ever and the Gaeltacht felt like an unreachable destination. With each passing day and week, it's edging ever closer in my mind.

Monday to Friday was literally a ''blink and you'll miss it'' type of week.But Pancake Tuesday was glorious, I'm definitely in love with lemon and sugar pancakes. I was extremely positive on Monday morning however this positivity evaporated by the end of the day. At the end of each day I was practically begging to go home, even the other students blocking my locker block would set me crazy. (I don't cope well with a lack of sleep as you can probably tell)

We had a maths test on Wednesday, which I had a number of sleepless nights over (Might as well be honest) Due to the classes abysmal performance, we were given another test on Friday which hopefully will be better. I've been having nightmares and weird dreams about maths nearly every night since Monday, it's been horrible! (Imagine maths equations like chasing you near cliffs and screaming to find the volume of random objects, yep)

On Friday evening was the last week of the Irish Club until September (It's Spleodar, can't say which one though, cos that's a little stalkerish) and my friends and I were sad that Spleodar was over as we loved talking in Irish, playing games, eating pizza and of course, gossiping as Gaeilge!

Which leads onto why I wasn't on the interwebs on Saturday! All the Spleodar clubs went to Carlow for ''Slogadh Spleodar'' where we were in a parade all over Carlow all carrying balloons for Seachtain Na Gaeilge. Afterwards we had lunch and listened to an Irish band called ''Mo Hat Mo Gheansaí'' who were savage and played lots of songs in Irish (including one of my favourites, The Coronas, Heroes or Ghosts, link below to The Coronas singing it)

After Mo Hat Mo Gheansaí's performance (which had everyone up and dancing) We went to another very Irish place, Supermacs. I will admit now, I'd never been to Supermacs, mainly because it's not in my town (Niall Horan is obsessed with the place apparently!) The place was full of Spleodar students. Afterwards we began rehearsing for the Comórtas (Competition) where each club had their own song to sing and the best would be the winner.

*laughs really awkwardly* Our song was about Domino's pizza, honestly. The song was to tune of Waka Waka by Shakira. It was honestly hilarious singing about pizza ''Ni Mhaith Linn Glasraí'' ~ We Don't Like Vegetables, that was a line from the song! I'd post the actual lyrics but I'm laughing so hard thinking about us standing up on the stage singing the song about pizza, only in Spleodar! :)

Overall, it was an interesting week, full of plenty of ups and downs, but that's just the unpredictability of life. I try not to compare my ''behind-the scenes to someone else's highlight reel'' It may seem that bloggers have ''amazing lives'' (I have been told this by people) But in reality, I'm the quiet girl in the class who rarely speaks unless to say ''here'' when my name is called. People think I'm oozing with self confidence, it's the total opposite. I love writing, and this is my way of writing.

Photos from my week!

A random selfie, I'm still getting used to my glasses. 

Top and hoody are both Roxy. 

The place where most of life is now spent. ie, studying (Student-Dying)

I bought this months issue of Company magazine with Zoella on the cover! I've read most of it and it's absolutely brilliant. I loved Zoella's interview and photoshoot, the Grease t shirt was gorgeous.

A random selfie taken this morning. I feel as though my glasses make me look younger? Idk.

''Aveen your parent teacher meetings are on Wednesday'' *Fear in my eyes* 

First trip to Supermacs with malteser ice-cream. Half my OTP (Dantesers)

One of my favourite songs possibly ever, Heroes or Ghosts by The Coronas, in Irish! 

Stay Strong, Happy & Fearless,

Aveen xx

My 2013, a review of The Life Of Me.

Hey Everyone!

So it's the end of 2013, another time span of 365 days has passed. This year has been a really intriguing year for me, but as Augustus Water said ''I'm on a roller coaster that only goes up my friend'' and I feel that this year was similar for me, things only went up, even when others were trying to bring it down. I feel I really matured this year and learnt a lot of life lessons. I even started properly blogging on this blog in 2013 which is a huge thing for me, blogging is just one of my favourite hobbies now!

I started this year in a bad place, let's be honest! I have discussed this in a blog post here about my mental health and how negative my thoughts were(how wonderfully optimistic).But this not dominating this blog post. I started this year in denial, unsure about what my future held in store for me, I had dreams yes, but I had no idea how to achieve them or if I ever would. I eventually figured out that I had a future, I'd been scared I would never ''achieve my potential'' A bright future had been promised for me for years by teachers and so many more people. I was terrified I would amount to very little in life. I eventually saw the light in late May (ironically the end of the school year I was in, I'm saying nothing) I contribute this milestone to obviously my family and friends, but also to writing on this blog helped so much, so I'd like to say a huge thank you to everyone who reads my blog and supports me through everything. (Don't worry this entire blog post isn't a sob story)

I know my peers slag off my blog at every possible opportunity (please stop lying to my face thanks) but another life lesson I learnt is to not care about what everyone else thinks of you. What's more important is how you view yourself, if you view yourself negatively, then everyone else will too, that's not right. View yourself as a good, positive person. You can only be yourself and you might as well accept who you are instead of constantly changing to please everyone around you. Over this year my self image has improved tremendously, I feel much more comfortable in myself and I'm so glad about that. I used to be so self conscious (I still am at times, nobody is perfect but it's nowhere near as bad as I was) and I used to worry about what everyone in school would say about me and think about me. I thought how other people viewed me was more important than how I viewed myself, which is wrong. Now, it doesn't bother me, if you hate me, it's your problem. (Wow Aveen, such a nice thing to say in your 2013 review)

Of course, this year hasn't only been about peasant fighting and inner turmoil, I feel that I have achieved a lot this year. I went all over Ireland and even to London! I began properly blogging in March 2013 and it's something I truly love. I've always wanted to write, but I felt I was too young to write a book/novel (I've several idea's written down in notebooks and whatnot) so blogging is a way for me to constantly write and even receive feedback and get to know other bloggers all over Ireland, the UK and even further away. It also helped me see what I was doing with my life during a time when I had no idea what the future held for me. I now know exactly what I want in life and I'm edging closer and closer everyday to achieving the dreams I've dreamt for as long as I can remember.

It's been an interesting year, but I wouldn't take back anything for the world. Every experience, both positive and negative, builds our character and our coping mechanisms for the future, I feel fearless in ways,I even jumped on a zip wire when I'm afraid of heights! I also learnt that people have ulterior motives and I have to stop taking people at face value. I read about these kind of people in books, but I never experienced anyone like that until this year, but it's a good life lesson to know people like that, so it won't happen again in the future. I've learnt that everybody isn't your friend, but you shouldn't jump to conclusions about people, and I shouldn't judge everyone by their cover as I hate when people judge me by mine.

I also joined the school public speaking team which was a huge leap for me. I've always loved public speaking for some reason, the thrill of the audience has always enthralled me. It was my first speech in years, we had to have a ''speak off '' for the four places on the team and the topic was mental health. It was a huge feeling for me to be discussing mental health, I couldn't believe it when I made the team. At our first competition the topic was mental health. I was our first speaker which was a huge thing for me, you have no idea! As a girl who isolated herself from everyone for months, pretending to be fine and became socially awkward, speaking in front of an audience was an adrenaline rush of excitement and fear, and one I relive and feel happy about.

As you will see below, I had a tin in the shape of a London bus with random pieces of paper. From January 1st to late March approx, every time I had a happy memory, anything that made me happy during that time, I wrote it down on a scrap of paper and put it into the tin. I eventually stopped as I felt I didn't need to cling as much to these pieces of paper. Yesterday, for the first time since March, I opened the tin and I read every single piece of paper. It was quite interesting and it showed to me how far I've come this year and I felt slightly proud of that. It really hit me when I saw one dated as ''January 1st 2013'' and two words ''Be Strong'' it was quite a shock for me, this year I feel I became strong, happy and fearless.

 Through blogging, I've met so many new people who I would have never met unless I started blogging, huge shout out to all my blogging friends and to the blogs I read, you all know who you are and I'd be afraid I would forget someone if I tried listing everyone! The Life Of Me has opened a huge new corner of the Internet to me, a community filled with lovely genuine people who I've never met in real life and share similar interests and hobbies, but make me feel as though I do know really well outside the computer screen. *Coughs, you all know who you are, even if we've only tweeted once or twice, I still consider you a bloggy friend!*

With Grace of Dainty Sprinkles! 

All the scraps of 'happy memories' from January to March, I stopped after the London trip.

The very first.

In January, I attended the NUI Maynooth Essay Law Competition, I came fourth (I think) in the category of cyber-bullying, they even quoted me ! 

It snowed for like two hours that one day.

Accurate (Source Tumblr ~ KickThePJ)

The first photo of myself I posted on my blog! Oh the memories! 

The Lovely Dan Howell (Danisnotonfire) whose videos made me laugh so much my stomach hurt, thank you.

The mental health group Project Smilier (we were to help increase positive mental health in the community, my life is one ironic moment I swear)

This year I became obsessed with Tumblr and these two! Phil Lester and Dan Howell, if you know me IRL or stalk my Tumblr, you'll understand the depth of my love for these two YouTubers

Siobhan and I on the London Eye, March 2013. 

Tower bridge (this was my laptop screen saver for months)

Big Ben and Houses of Parliament, I went to London on a school trip and I'd love to go back there again, I simply adored London!

The photo of me that seems to be everywhere..

A group of people who also went on the group, this was on our last night after we saw Stomp in the West End.

Posing outside a phone box with my cousin Olivia 

With Emer in London

I have to admit, this wasn't taken in Downing Street, it's from the Churchill Museum ssh!

I won a certificate from the Seanad (Senate in Ireland) for my speech about ''The Challenges That Face Ireland And Does My Future Lie Here?'' 

                  

A photo of Project Smilier on the set of Fair City with Jim Breen of Cycle Against Suicide, we even made the newspaper! 

On the same day with Colm Hayes (of 2FM), Jim Breen and the other student leaders of CAS. 

At the Leaders On Our Level conference in Croke Park with Colm ''The Gooch'' Cooper! He's a Gaelic footballer and a pure legend. At the conference I also met people like Enda McNulty (who now follows me on Twitter, holla) and lots more interesting people.

Two of my friends Maeve & Caítlín with the model Roz Purcell (she's so lovely in real life)

Always very mature.. 

Caítlín & Maeve on the last day of TY in May

My current profile picture on nearly every single social networking site I'm on!

With my crazy cousins Owen and Oisin! 

The John Green book shrine! 

With Grace from Dainty Sprinkles!! 

My name (in Irish) during the Coca Cola epidemic of names on bottles.. 

RAWR! 

On my 17th with Tara :) 

With Mary, Grace, myself, Tara and Viv for my 17th in September! 

With Aoileann in Tayto Park with the Irish club :)

Grace and I recording one of our YouTube videos

A meme made by the lovely Grace ! (Several others were not suitable for public viewing) haha

Beside the Catching Fire poster! 

Halloween! In a cow onesie.. oh dear. 

Another meme! 

Testing out my tripod (FredOrGeorge)

With my friend Emily at the Spleodar (Irish club) Christmas dinner

With Shannon at the Spleodar Christmas dinner (In Irish of course)

With my friend Maeve of Maeve's Fashion ! 

With Grace filming another YouTube video! 

We're normal people I swear. 

Christmas Eve!

Selfies beside the silage pit

One of the MANY quotes that I live by.

(Source Google Images)

With Harry Styles (ahem he's real I swear)

Christmas Day with my cousin Owen :) 

So I guess that's it for now! Let 2014 begin! 

If you're wondering why this blog post is before New Year's Day, it's due to Sherlock season 3 starting on New Year's Day and I doubt I would be in a calm state to blog on the day. #SherlockLives if you're a Sherlockian check out my Tumblr and we can squeal over Benedict Cumberbatch together! 

A huge thank you to everyone who reads my blog, it's a huge support. I wish every single one of you a brilliant 2014 and the wealth of health and happiness.

Stay Strong, Happy and Fearless! 

Aveen xx