Fly Away with Me - Wishlist

Tuesday 28 January 2014



There's nothing new or unusual about a trend for bird printed fashion or accessories - no matter what the season, birds and owls (rereading this later and laughing at myself for classing owls as a separate category) seem to be a popular choice! However, I couldn't help but notice a few bits and pieces recently that I really liked (particularly the chiffon dress from H&M), and thought I'd make a wee wishlist out of them!

1. Chiffon Swallow Print Dress - H&M - £14.99

2. Pale Pink Lace Trim Parrot Print Cami - New Look - £12.99

3. Cream Swallow Print Knitted 3/4 Sleeve Top - New Look - £14.99

4. Pink Swallow Print Skater/T-Shirt Dress - River Island - £25

5. Swallow Print Scarf - Not on the High Street - £14

6. Tatty Devine Swallow Necklace - Tatty Devine - £25

7. Cut out Lovebirds iPhone Case - Accessorize - £12

Hope you enjoyed that wee selection! What's your favourite print of the moment?

Have a lovely week all, and thanks for reading!

A Perfect Week

Sunday 26 January 2014

For the first time in ages I had a totally free week - what a novelty! After my last exam last Thursday I honestly didn't know what to do with myself, I've been in total study mode for weeks on end! So, I decided to make the most of my free time this week and indulged in lots of (naughty) dinners out, glasses of wine and cocktails, catch ups with pals and strolls round the shops. It was bliss (though my bank balance begs to differ), and I thought I'd share what I got up to during my freedom with you before the chaos of the next trimester at uni begins again tomorrow!


Monday was a nice wee lazy day - I had a lie in, and then got myself looking presentable to film a couple of videos. I was trying to find an appropriate thumbnail image the other day and accidentally paused at the moment in the above photo, which made me laugh - not sure what I'm so surprised about! It was nice to have time to actually plan out a couple of videos rather than just filming something last minute like I got into the habit of during the last two months of 2013. Then, after a marathon of Home & Away and Neighbours with my mum, I headed up to Emma's to plan a wee day out the following day - really though, it was just an excuse for a cup of tea and a chat, the planning took up about five minutes of the evening!

Tuesday was a lovely wee walk down memory lane - Emma and I headed into the West End of Glasgow for lunch in The Old Schoolhouse, a pub next to Glasgow Uni and one of our old haunts. Days like that make me miss that time in my life so much. Don't get me wrong, I'm having a ball at uni this time around, but I just get really nostalgic any time I'm around the beautiful Glasgow campus! We had a huge lunch consisting of (in my case) a barbecue cheese burger, chips and salad, and an amazing apple and blackberry crumble and custard. Some health kick this has turned out to be ;)

After lunch we walked up along University Avenue and reminisced about the hilarious things that happened when we were students there. Then we cut along Ashton Lane (pictured above in all its instagrammed glory) and kept walking for a while to work off some of the food! We got the subway back into the city centre and wandered the shops for an hour before heading home. It was a perfect afternoon.


Wednesday was the only day this week I technically wasn't free - I was working 9-5. But after the working day was done I headed to Pizza Express for a catch up with my lovely friend Gemma. With a 40% off discount code the sky was the limit, so we enjoyed our usual favourite pizza and wine combination, followed by a tiramisu which we shared (how good are we!). We had a good wee gossip as always, before heading across the road to The Counting House (one of the many Glasgow Wetherspoons!) for another drink and a chance to talk weddings - Gemma's getting married next year and it was so nice have a proper chat about it and hear what she's got planned.

Thursday was a quiet one, and a chance to give my purse strings (and waistline) a wee rest. However, it turned out to be just as good - if not better - than any other day, because the results of one of our huge group projects at uni went up online. This was one that we had worked ridiculously hard on, and I've mentioned before that I was lucky enough to work with an amazing group. Anyway, the long and short of it is that it went really, really well and we got a brilliant mark for it. I'm not usually one to talk about that kind of thing but I'm so, so proud of this! I loved every minute of that project and I'm so thrilled that it went well. It just shows what you can achieve when you work hard!


Friday was a day I've been looking forward to all month - tapas and karaoke with some of my favourite blogger ladies! I don't know why I still often refer to them as blogger friends because they're just my regular, 'in real life' pals now, but it's a habit I can't get out of! Anyway, the lovely Lynne organised this night for us and it was such an good night! I got myself all dressed up in a cheeky wee H&M purchase from my shopping trip with Emma on the Tuesday, and headed into Waverley to meet Iona. We had dinner in Cafe Andaluz which was AMAZING - myself, Lynne, Kirsty and Lianne split into a little four to order and enjoyed a selection of gorgeous food, including some delicious honey and mustard glazed crispy chicken which was my favourite of the night. Washed down with a few glasses of sangria and followed by some caramel cheesecake, we then headed off to Supercube for some karaoke - with everything from an amazing rendition of what is slowly becoming our anthem for some obscure reason, Kate Bush's ''Wuthering Heights'' by Kirsty and Gillian, to Iona and I belting out Nicki Minaj's Super Bass and all ten of us doing THE dance to Whigfield's Saturday Night during Laura's performance, it was a hilarious night. I got a catch up with Jade who I hadn't seen since Aberfeldy, and it was also lovely to add another member to our gang for the night in Terri's friend Brooke - who immediately got on board with the madness that tends to be one of our nights out!

So that just left last night - after a hectic week, spending the afternoon drinking tea and watching Life Unexpected on netflix and then getting comfy in my raccoon jumper and slipper socks and settling down for a dvd night with the bestie was the perfect way to round off the week. Emma recently picked up Carnage (starring Kate Winslet, Jodie Foster, Christoph Waltz and John C Reilly) so we gave that a go, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's based on a play and we are both in total agreement that if we get the chance we want to see it on stage - the atmosphere must be amazing! It's now 3pm on Sunday and I'm cosied up on the couch watching the crazy rain and hailstones outside and trying to get mentally prepared for getting back to work tomorrow (and getting up at 7am!).

So that's it - if you got to the end of this post I applaud you. This was just one of those really lovely weeks that doesn't come along very often, so it's good to appreciate them when you can. I am now slightly afraid to look at my bank balance, and I most definitely need to up my fruit and veg intake and lower my cheese and cake intake this week, but it was totally totally worth it.

Hope you've all had a lovely week! Thanks for reading :)

My Top 7 Albums of 2013

Saturday 18 January 2014


So this post is a little on the late side, since we're over half way through January now (how did that happen!). I had been meaning to do this for ages, and it occurred to me this morning that I'd never got around to it - so, with my week of freedom before classes start back, I decided it was better late than never. I attempted to choose five but it was just too difficult! So here, in no particular order, are my top seven albums of 2013!

Kodaline - In a Perfect World


I fell in love with Kodaline over a year ago when I heard All I Want on the radio in the car for the first time. I thought it was a lovely song, but didn't think much more about, until I saw Fearne Cotton tweeting about how amazing the video was. Checking out the video on YouTube cemented my love for the Irish band, who then consistently impressed me with every track I heard. This album is fantastic. From epic ''life soundtrack'' (hopefully that makes sense!) songs like High Hopes and All Comes Down To, to the upbeat summer anthems Love Like This and Brand New Day, I could listen to these guys all day. I've said before that they remind me of a mix of Snow Patrol, Mumford and Sons and Keane, with a tiny bit of Bastille and Coldplay thrown in for good measure - the perfect mix if you ask me :)

Bo Bruce - Before I Sleep


I'm sure this one is a huge surprise ;) I, as we all know, freeeaking love Bo Bruce, and this album is just beautiful. I won't go on at great length here but feel free to check out the full album review I did over on my YouTube channel during the summer. A couple of stand out tracks are Golden and Alive, but my very favourite is Lightkeeper - it's one of the most emotional songs I have on my iPod purely because of how deeply personal it is. Love this lady.

Imagine Dragons - Night Visions


With what became one of the biggest tracks of the year (Radioactive), Imagine Dragons were a band I discovered through my love of YouTube. When everyone started covering Radioactive a few months back and felt the need to YouTube all of their other songs, and fell instantly in love with them. Much like Kodaline, I've described Imagine Dragons before as a total mesh of a lot of my favourite bands of all time - there's a definite hint of The Killers and The Naked and Famous, not to mention Safety Suit and One Republic, who just happen to be next on the list.

One Republic - Native


I've been a huge fan of One Republic for a really long time, and this album is excellent. It came out in March but for some reason I was useless and didn't download it till September or October, but it has some pretty brilliant tracks on it. I love the singles If I Lose Myself and Counting Stars, but three stand outs for me are I Lived, Life in Colour and Light it Up - I've had them on repeat since I got the album. They describe themselves as 'genreless' which I suppose is a good way of putting it; I couldn't really place them in any particular category.

Katy Perry - Prism


I felt like I couldn't include this because I only got it for Christmas, but it would be a terrible shame not to! I'm a big fan of Katy P, she has some insanely good pop songs under her belt, and this album is no exception. It would actually be easer to say which songs I'm not keen on on this album rather than favourites (Birthday, the third track on the record is the one I usually skip past), but if forced to choose my favourites would be Roar (obviously), Dark Horse, It Takes Two and Choose Your Battles - they are all addictive, in totally different ways. I think this would be a brilliant album to listen to if you've not long broken up with someone, it has such a feel good ''moving on with my life'' vibe.

Taylor Swift - Red


It may not have come out in 2013, but I can't not include this because it has definitely been one of my most played albums of the year, having got it for Christmas 2012. I have to say I'm actually not the world's biggest Taylor Swift fan, but with the exception of We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (one of my least favourite songs ever!) this album is amazing. It's the kind of album that I have a music video constructed in my head for each and every track - something I do a lot anyway, but this provides some excellent inspirational material for daydreaming on the bus/train/subway. I think my favourites are probably All Too Well, Holy Ground and 22, but the whole thing is fantastic.

Ellie Goulding - Halcyon


AGAIN, not a 2013 release, but how could I not include my beloved Ellie? I literally love this woman, I really do. I've been an Ellie fan since before she won the BBC Sound of 2010 award, listening to all her demos on YouTube on a regular basis. So to see how amazingly well she'd doing now I feel weirdly proud. It's always nice to see people you've listened to for a long time getting the success they deserve. Halcyon is another great record; I did worry how she would follow up Lights, which was a brilliant first album. It has such a great mix of sounds, from really soft, melancholy tracks like Explosions and Don't Say a Word, to dance anthems like her collab with Calvin Harris ''I Need You Love'', to very typically, traditional Ellie songs like My Blood and Figure 8 - she knocked it out of the park once again with this one.

So, that's it for my top 7 albums of the year - my soundtrack to 2013! What were some of your favourite albums from the past twelve months?

Thanks for reading!

100 Happy Days!

Sunday 12 January 2014

Hello all!

I'm still in the midst of exam/essay madness, so apologies for the lack of posts - I'm going to get back to my Wednesday/Sunday schedule next week, I promise!

However, I just wanted to do a wee post to mention that I'm taking part in the 100 Happy Days challenge - I'm currently on day 6! January is typically the most depressing month of the year. The festive season has left us yearning for cosy nights in eating too much and spending time with family, and enjoying guilt free nights out with friends with no work or uni the following day - subsequently leaving many of us penniless. Therefore, any little opportunity to lift our spirits has to be a good thing!

Obviously, I'm not naïve enough to think that posting a photo of a cup of tea means that life is perfect, or that that day has been full of joy - that's completely unrealistic! But what's nice about this challenge is that even on the most seemingly rubbish of days, you find some little part of it that you enjoy and focus (even just for the time it takes to instagram of photo of it) on that, rather than what has been bad about the day.

Here are my photos so far... there's definitely a bit of a theme to my images, isn't there (food and drink making up 2/5, as per usual)... the last one looks bizarre, but is actually a screenshot of the results of a quiz Emma and I decided to try last night - it was to discover which Sherlock character you are, and I, apparently, am most like Molly. It was an evening of equally balanced deep and meaningful talk, and laughing at absolute nonsense, which is generally how a night in goes for us. So that was a clear winner for yesterday's image!


If you're taking part in the #100HappyDays challenge let me know - I'd love to see what you've been posting. I know you can use lots of different platforms to share your images, but for me it's instagram! I'm @lynseymac1 over there (as well as on twitter).

Hope you've all had a great start to 2014, and be sure to leave me a link in the comments to your twitter or instagram (or wherever!) if you're taking part.

Thanks for reading :)

Hello 2014

Thursday 2 January 2014


Happy New Year!

I can't quite believe we're into 2014 already, where is the time going?!

For my first post of the year I decided not to bother doing any sort of resolutions (I've filmed a resolutions-ish video which will be up on my channel in a day or so!), but instead decided to pick a few quotes I found on Pinterest and put them together to sum up my attitude towards the year ahead.

Be positive, don't be afraid of change, never stop learning, spend time with the people you love and never lose sight of what is really important to you.

Yes. That's right. I'm a psychologist now. Career change for 2014!!!

Anyway, I hope you all had a brilliant New Year whatever you got up to and whoever you were with and here's to a brilliant year ahead!

Thanks for reading! :)