Day 7: A photo that makes you happy

Okay, I know I just posted, but this one is SO EASY:



This is me, just after Olly proposed (and I accepted). I think you can tell from the picture how happy I am about the whole situation...

Day 6: Whatever tickles your fancy

Well, since it's nearing the end of the month, what tickles my fancy is the fact that there's a new theme approaching! Last May, Bethany (my flatmate) decided she needed to use her imagination more when choosing clothes. She invited me to join this endeavour and named it 'no jeans June'. Since then we've been improving our lives in various ways through the simple medium of alliterative months. We're reaching the end of 'Aquatic April', where we had to drink lots of water and do other aquatic things like swimming, looking at rivers, wearing boat/naval inspired clothes. Sounds awesome, but we failed a little bit because we were both pretty busy this month.

Floral February was probably our most successful month since 'no Jeans June' - we both managed to wear something floral every day (more difficult AND expensive than you might immediately imagine) and our flat was abundant with floral displays. We also gave lots of people flowers, which caused many of them to try and get on board with our theme that month.

Anyway, even though we won't be living together for that much longer, we've decided to continue with our months for as long as we can... This is going to seriously stretch our imaginations/vocabularies! So far for the rest of this year we've come up with:

Musical May (oh yes, watching musicals, listening to the soundtracks... this will be fun.)
Juvenile June (wearing our hair in bunches/pigtails, revisiting childhood dens, reading Enid Blyton - could oust February in my favourites.)
Joyful July (a little vague right now, doing things that bring us/others joy. Culminating in the extreme joy of my wedding on the 31st!)
We're totally stuck on August - any suggestions?
Studious September (I'll hopefully be starting Bible College so that one's easy... Lots of preparation for going back into education!)

That's pretty much as far as we've got. Feel free to join in the fun - it may sound odd, but it really does bring variety to your life!

Day 5: Favourite Quote

Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy

"you make known to me the path of life;
in your presence there is fullness of joy;
at your right hand are pleasures forevermore."

Day 4: Favourite Book

What a ridiculous question. As if, out of the world of literature at our fingertips, I could possibly pick one favourite book. You could at least narrow it down to a genre, although choosing a favourite crime novel would also be difficult, seeing as how I've only ever read crime books as a result of desperation at having absolutely nothing else to read.

Anyway, I suppose I could answer this with the list of books I took to Senegal with me; luggage allowance restricted me to only a couple so I chose 'The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets' by Eva Rice, and 'I Capture the Castle' by Dodie Smith. They were chosen on the basis that I thought I would be able to read them over and over for a year and not go too mad. Which was true. People who know me well might be wondering about the lack of Jane Austen in my luggage - that was due to my theory that any community of more than 3 ex-pats would probably include owners of classics (fyi I was right. It also included people with almost all Georgette Heyer's regency romances - I call that a win.). I also didn't take any L.M.Montgomerys, partly because they're mostly series' and you can't just take one of a set, but also because they're all available online.

Right now my brain is filling up with books, all of them shouting 'pick me! pick me!' Maybe I should write my own version of that BBC top 100 books... It would definitely include the Harry Potters (sorry to those of you out there that think they're evil but I love them), Narnia (oh, Narnia!), LOTR, some Sproul (not fiction but fabby), Tozer (ditto), Enid Blyton (just finished re-reading Malory Towers, great nostalgic reading), as well as all the ones I rejected in the 'favourite film' post for being better as books. Man, this is turning into an epic ramble...

Also, for those who are wondering why I didn't just pick the Bible and be done with it. Don't worry, I still love it! But I've always held the view that it's totally cheating to pick that in these situations. Akin to those people who, when asked what item they'd take to a desert island, answer 'a boat'. Gah! Aside from that, I wouldn't really put the Bible in a list with Jane Austen. It has a category all of it's own, a much higher one!

Finally, completely gratuitously, look at all my books! Okay, only about half are mine, but the hallway in my flat is lined in bookcases filled with our (mine and Beth's) books and it makes me happy! Sometimes I'll just look through the open door of my room at all those books and heave a sigh of contentment...

Spring...

Is one of my favourite seasons. A large part of that is because it contains Easter, which is my favourite of favourite festivals! Creator of the universe dying for you and me can't really be beaten. But, in second place on my list of 'things I love about Spring' (probably tying for second with the sun making much more frequent appearances) are Daffodils! Possibly the happiest flower in the world. It's so glorious to be living in Somerset right now and seeing 'hosts of golden daffodils' everywhere I look.

Day 3: Favourite TV programme

This is a fairly easy one. Not too long ago I would have said 'Friends' immediately, but that was before I was introduced to 'Outnumbered', a fairly recent British series about an English family. The thing that makes it so fabulous is that, while there is a script and a plotline and all, a lot of the kids' lines are totally adlibbed and it's beyond hilarious. Americans/other internationals, I'm not sure if you can experience this joy yet, but I'd highly recommend that you find out! In fact, series 3 started last night and I was at work... No prizes for guessing what I'm about to do - thank you, BBC iPlayer!