DIY Winter/ Christmas Garland.

With only one day left in November, my Christmas spirit is well under way. I mean I have been feeling the Christmas spirit since September, but at least now it is socially acceptable. I am actually writing this while I listen to Christmas music, having a very good sing-along so my Christmas vibes are through the roof! Anyway, on with the post.

The other week I was longing for some wintery / Christmassy decorations. However, we haven't got the decorations down from the loft yet. So, I figured why not try out a little DIY. This was probably the first major successful DIY I have done so I was feeling very proud after this. 

Today I will be telling you how you can create this super cute and festive garland. This was great fun to make and would be a great idea for a family crafting sesh! It's relatively easy and if I could do it then I am certain you can too. One of my favourite things about this is how it can be used through the entirety of winter and is great for the build up to the festivities. So, with that said, on with the craft!

What you will need:

A wodge of A4 paper in whatever colour/pattern you desire.

(You can also use felt if possible as this will make it stronger.)

Some brown string.

A pair of scissors.

A pre-cut snowflake. 

(You can either create this yourself or print off a template.)

Sticky labels the same colour as your paper.

A hole punch.

Step 1- Fold your paper in half and draw on your snowflake.

Step 2- Cut out your snowflake into individual snowflakes. Repeat this until you have the desired numbered of snowflakes.

Step 3- Punch a hole into one end of the snowflakes. Taking your scissors, snip up the sticky label creating approx 1cm flaps. Then taking your hole punch create a hole in each flap.

Step 4- Cut the flaps into squares with the hole central and apply to the pre-cut hole in your snowflake. This will ensure a stronger hole for threading and reduce the chances of your garland breaking. 

Step 5- Thread the string through the snowflakes and voila! You have a garland!

 You can easily leave your garland as it is at this point and hang it up (I recommend the window or fireplace). However, I decided to add a little more sparkle to my snowflakes by adding glitter!

To do this part you will need:

PVA glue.

Glitter (I chose a copper colour).

OR

A glitter paint.

This step is super simple but makes such a difference. In order to do this, you just need to take your glue and go along the lines in the snowflake.

 Then just sprinkle the glitter and you're done!  Just by adding a little glitter, this garland is transformed and you have a super personal and cute festive decoration! 

This DIY is great fun to make is simple enough for any DIY newbie. It's great for the season and just adds that festive element to your home!

I hope you enjoyed this post and maybe want to give it a go?! 

Happy Holidays and I will speak to you soon!

Holly Xx

Christmas/Winter candle.

I am a mahoosive fan of candles all year around. However, when the temperature begins to drop and the scarves come out I get very excited because I know that means the Christmas candles can be released! In my opinion, Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year and one of my favourite things to do in the build up is to burn a good candle. So you can image my delight when my friend got me an entire box of Christmas candles for my birthday!

The box includes 5 Yankee candles that all smell absolutely heavenly. But, this one just has to be my absolute favourite. I hadn't really come across this one before and in all honesty, I wasn't expecting to like it as much as I did... but it's amazing. It smells like the definition of winter and Christmas and all things great in life! Okay, maybe I am exaggerating a bit but I seriously love it so much and definitely recommend it to anybody who loves Christmas and candles. 

That's all for today but I am just so excited about this candle that I couldn't help but write about it... seriously, give it a whiff!

Holly Xx

Autumn/ Winter Fashion || Oversized Tee

I can hardly believe that Autumn is coming to an end already! It seems to have flown by this year, even more than normal. As annoying as that is, I am so so SO excited for Christmas! Yes, I am one of those people who start getting excited for Christmas way back in September. It truly is the most wonderful time of the year!

Anyway, on with today's post. Last week I decided to do a little bit of cheeky online shopping with my birthday money. I often prefer to shop in person as this way you know what you are buying and can get a better understanding of what it will look like on. But being under the weather at the moment, I resorted to a bit of online retail therapy. Thankfully, I love all of my purchases so you can expect some more posts on my purchases soon! One of the items I purchased from New Look was this oversized tee. 

I don't often go for oversized tee's but this one just looked so comfy and I thought it would be perfect for layering up over the colder months. It's a plain tee which makes it very versatile in terms of outfit options too. I seriously love mustard as an autumn colour so I think this will be perfect for the last of Autumn. I also picked up this tee in both green and red (they were on sale!) which will be perfect for the Christmas period!

I am a big fan of this oversized tee and can't wait to share my other purchases too!

Have a lovely day and I will speak to you soon.

Holly X

18th Birthday.

I can not believe that I am 18. I seriously do feel like I am old enough to qualify as an adult! I can now legally get married, buy a house and vote. All things that include responsibility and scare me immensely. Anywho, it is what it is.

My 18th birthday was an amazing day. It wasn't exactly the traditional 18th celebrations but it was perfect for me, especially considering how I am still not well. I went for a breakfast brunch with my family at my favourite breakfast place and it was so delicious. I went for my usual... pancakes! Then we came back to our house for a little while to just hang out before a couple of my friends arrived. 

I had the best afternoon catching up with my friends as we watched one of my favourite films (the longest ride), had afternoon tea and finished off the afternoon with some sparklers. It was such a lovely lovely time and it was perfect for me. To finish off my day, I watched another film with the family before heading off to bed.

I really did have an amazing day and am so thankful for all of my friends and family who could celebrate it with me.

Holly Xx

Getting A Diagnosis~ Lyme Disease.

I have been wanting to write this post for quite some time but it never really felt right (I will explain why later) until now. This blog has always been something quite personal to me and I am usually pretty happy to share what is going on in my life. I really enjoy having this blog and enjoy sharing these parts of my life. However, it can also be a little daunting sharing such personal things, so bare with me. In this case, I feel the need to share not only for my personal gain but in hope that it will educate others in an area I feel not many are aware of.

So, in my case this all started about 6 months ago, towards the end of May. I remember suddenly getting pretty ill. I was completely wiped out and was struggling to go about my normal day. Being around the time of my exams, I assumed that the stress of A-levels and revision had just exhausted me and that I would feel better within a few days of rest. Throughout my life I have had a tendency to get sick pretty easily and was always catching a cold. So, when this came along I didn't think much of it. I thought that it was a little odd how quickly it had come on, but I just assumed that it was nothing too major. Then, I started to accumulate more symptoms. Along with this intense fatigue, I started to get really strong headaches, pain throughout my body and my vision started playing up. I have never had great vision, hence why I have glasses, but it just got worse very suddenly and my glasses didn't make much of a difference. After this, we decided it would be a good idea to take a trip to the doctors. 

Over the next month, I had taken numerous trips to doctors, had a few different blood tests (which I really did not enjoy by the way... I have a tendency to get more than a little faint), get even worse symptoms and still no answers. By this point I was having chest pains, more frequent pains in my knees and back, difficulty concentrating and with my memory and all my previous symptoms had worsened. Overall, I just really did not feel like myself. Typically, I think that I am a pretty positive and bubbly person, but practically overnight I had switched and just felt like a completely different person. At this point, the doctors were struggling to give me a diagnosis, all tests had come back normal, including Lyme's, and it was beginning to look like I had CFS (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome). I really didn't feel like this was my diagnosis but I couldn't think of any other answers. Throughout this time, I was constantly asked about my home life and school like, asking if I was depressed. I can obviously understand why they have to ask this but I knew that I wasn't depressed and I knew that it wasn't all in head. But as time went on and we still had no answers, I began to worry that maybe I just needed to get over it. I knew that as hard as I tried, that wouldn't work but I was simply running out of options. 

I had started my first part-time job back at easter and only a couple of months in I had to take a month off due to the illness. Having had a month's rest and no longer having to worry about school, I felt a little better and managed to go back to work. This was only a part-time job where I worked 5 hours, twice a week but I still struggled with this. I had to sleep before going and I was in pain the entire time. It was really difficult and I dreaded it each week. However, I needed to earn the money to pay for a exhibition planned for 2016. It finally came to the end of summer and I knew that school would be starting soon. I knew that I wouldn't be able to manage school and work together and it really worried me. But, I sat down and figured out that I should have earned just enough money alongside the other fundraising ideas I had planned. I was so so thankful that I was then able to quit my job. I hadn't had the job very long but it was what was best for me and I knew I would be a lot happier without the job to worry about. 

The next week, school had started and I was feeling well enough to attend. I didn't feel like my normal self, but it was good enough. I was still having difficulty in class in terms of my concentration and memory abilities but I just figured that I needed to work harder. I think this was around this time that a lovely lady from our church got in touch and asked us if I had been tested for Lymes disease. She had a friend who was diagnosed with Lyme after many many years. Many years too late for him. My symptoms sounded very familiar to him and he was worried about me. We then got into contact with him where he began to share his knowledge about the disease with us. I hadn't really ever heard of the disease up until then and found it all very interesting. It was around this time that we discovered that the tests in the UK are very unreliable and that the doctors do not know very much about this Lyme disease. I didn't remember having a bulls-eye rash, the main symptom that doctors appear to use for this diagnosis, nor did I remember ever seeing a tick on myself. As familiar as the symptoms sounded to me, I just didn't think I could have this disease. 

By the start of October I was missing school. My symptoms had worsened again and I literally felt as if my body was shutting down. It then continued to get worse to the point where some days I couldn't even get out of bed. I believe it was around this time that we decided to look into private Lyme testing in Germany. We had discovered that this rash was only found in about 50% of sufferers and that ticks can be as small as a poppy seed meaning that I could easily have been bitten without realising. The more research I did, the more people I found who also didn't realise they had been bitten and had very similar symptoms. Speaking to this friend who is a sufferer, he also was feeling worried for me as he recognised the signs and symptoms all too well. We also had learnt that the longer you leave treatment, the worse the disease gets and can leave you with lifelong issues. With this in mind and still no answers, we decided to go with the private tests. I was very fortunate that my parents were willing to go to this effort and pay the additional money or the private tests as I know that no everybody would be this lucky. 

We had the blood taken and sent off to Germany and my symptoms continued. I was too unwell to complete any school work and was always worrying about my health, my education and even my future. It felt like this illness was going to stick with me forever and I worried that I wouldn't be able to live the life I wanted. I am a pretty positive person and I tried to keep these thoughts at bay, but as you can imagine, they arose every now and then. About a week after sending the blood, we got the results. My mum was actually out when she received the e-mail but she couldn't open the document on her phone so she called me to do it from home. I was seriously hoping that the results would be positive (as strange as that may sound) because I was just dying for an answer. I was really really nervous before opening the e-mail and I was shaking like a leaf.

I finally opened the document to see the words 'negative' over and over. My heart sank as I assumed this meant no more answers. However, I then scrolled through the rest of the document where there were lots more results with numbers and other things I didn't really understand. One thing that stood out to me was 'indication for an actual cellular activity against borrelia burgdorferi'. To me, this sounded like it was saying I did have the disease. At this point I was just very confused and didn't know what to think. So, my mum send these results to a lady from the private testing base in England and to our friend, the sufferer, asking if they could interpret this for us. To which they responded telling us that it looked like I did, in fact, have Lyme disease! I was so so so beyond happy upon receiving the news. I had finally been given an answer after 6 months of struggling and a month of being in bed. I know that some people go years and years and years without getting diagnosed and I really feel for those people. I am very thankful that we were able to go down this route and finally receive at least some form of answer.

Throughout this time I have often wanted to write about it on my blog. However, considering I had no idea what was wrong with me, I didn't know what to write. I also had many theories about what it could be but didn't want to offend anybody who was an actual sufferer. Finally, when I did have something confirmed to say, I felt too unwell to write about it, hence why it has taken me so long to write this post. 

I am very aware of how huge this post is right now so I think that will be all for this post. However, I still have a ton more to share about the symptoms in detail, trying to get treatment, my NHS journey (the different hospitals and tests) and where I am at now. I plan on sharing all of this information, but if you have any specific questions about this then feel free to leave a comment or contact me directly. 

I am still not well, however, I am getting there and feeling better than I have in weeks and weeks. 

Thanks for reading,

Holly Xx

Messy bun.

A messy bun is my go-to lazy hair. Having thick curly hair, having it down often leaves me feeling like a lion (I am hoping to get it cut soon so hopefully that will solve my problem. I can't wait!) . I also hate having my hair in my face most of the time so I end up just throwing it back into a messy bun. Now the typical 'messy bun' is usually pretty high and looks cute and messy. However, this does not work for me I have quite a lot of thick hair. This means that in an attempt to create this cute bun the whole messy aspect just doesn't work and the actual bun is big and heavy meaning that gravity takes over pulling it down. In result, it pulls on my head and creates this whole 'flat on top and big on the back' kind of vibe. Definitely not cute.

So, I have discovered the perfect way to create my own messy bun that looks pretty cute and doesn't pull at all. It is a very basic low messy bun that is great for when you just need tog et your hair out of your face. In order to create this, you take a hair band on your wrist and just pull your hair into a low ponytail. However, when pulling the hair through, don't pull it through the entire way. Then, twist the band and repeat the last process until the band is right. Super easy, super cute and it literally takes 10 seconds. 

Here are a few pics of the end product...

I hope you enjoyed reading about my messy bun and maybe you fancy giving this a go too. To make this a little less messy you can pin the bun into shape or you can just leave it as is, the choice is yours.

Have a lovely weekend and I will speak to you soon.

Holly X

Awkward English Weather

I can't believe it is October already! That panics me because it means there are only 2 months left this year and that is terrifying. However, that also means that we are officially fully into the swing of autumn and that is pretty damn fabulous. It's no secret that I love the Autumn. I love the tea, the crunchy leaves, and fluffy blankets. I love it all! However, I always forget about that awkward transitioning stage in between summer and autumn. Now, of course, England seems to attract all things awkward in terms of weather and this is no exception. 

I am talking about the 'freezing in the morning and hot later on' kind of thing. For example, the other day when I woke for school it was 7 degrees Celsius (i.e- cold!). Yet by the afternoon it had over doubled and was 15 degrees (not particularly hot but quite the difference). So naturally in the cold morning, you layer up. Add your thick sweater, a coat and maybe even a scarf. Yet by noon you're sweating profusely. It is not a good look!

Now this is pretty annoying and makes choosing an outfit even harder than usual. However, despite my annoyance, I still love autumn and am super excited for the next couple of months! 

Thanks for reading and have a lovely weekend.

Does anybody else have this struggle or is it just me?

Holly X

#ImMoreThanAWord

Today I wanted to talk a little bit about a project created by Bailee Madison called #ImMoreThanAWord. If you haven't read the original post you can click here and check it out (I totally recommend reading it because she words it perfectly and explains it very well). She has also put together a lovely video that you can check out here too.

I highly recommend checking out those links as I think that this project is a very important one.The basis of this project is labelling, something that the majority of us will be familiar with. With the increasing popularity of the internet, labelling becomes even easier and this can often result in an ever growing population of insecurities. 

However, although the internet is a great place for finding insecurity, it can also be a great place for finding confidence and support. Something that I feel this project is helping to do and something I feel is extremely important. 

As Bailee said 'YOU are worth so much more than a word' and you shouldn't forget that.

For a much better written and well-organised explanation on this project please check out Bailee's post. 

Holly X

P.s- Sorry this is such an unorganised post but I am a huge fan of this project and am 1000% for any project that is aimed at building self-esteem and helping others. 

My Bank Holiday Monday.

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Happy Friday! This week has been pretty busy for me (hence the lack of posts- I explain more later) and Monday feels like it was weeks ago. However, today I wanted to share what I got up to last Monday as I had a lovely time. 

So as it was Bank Holiday, the entire family had the day off and we decided to go to Weston-Super-Mare. We never made it to the beach this summer and the weather was being very English so we decided on Weston. Weston is great for days like this as it still counts as a beach, but it has lots more to do. So we all grabbed our Wellies and coats and drove up there.

Once we arrived we headed to the pier. We all brought along our 2ps and spent them all on the 2p machine where I won a little teddy bear! Then we headed to a little restaurant where I had a sausage, chips and gravy (a beach day must!). A lovely lady thought me and my sister were twins because we both had our hair in braids and had matching coats. People often say that but I don't see it ! Haha! Having finished that we headed to the ice cream parlour. Now let me tell you about this ice cream parlour. The interior is very diner like (which I love) and they do the most amazing ice cream sundaes. So, of course, we purchased a HUGE sundae that is probably meant for 4 and shared it between 2. Then once we had eaten too much and felt a little sick, we headed down to the beach area. It was very muddy as the tide was way out (typical for Weston) but we were prepared so we went and enjoyed the mud. We messed around and laughed a lot. It was great fun! We finally headed off the beach where I went on the Ferris Wheel and Carousel (still my favourite beach ride) before finishing our day at Costa.

I had an amazing day and enjoyed every second of it. I also managed to snap some lovely pics that I might share some other time. Thanks for reading and have a lovely weekend. 

Holly X

P.s- It appears that school and blogging 5 days a week are a little difficult and I don't want my posts to become rushed and boring. Therefore I have decided to commit only to 1/2 blog posts a week. If I have more time then I will post more but I just thought I would let those who are interested or follow my blog aware.

Windy Walks.

I was just browsing through some of the many photographs on my laptop when I came across my photography album. This is the folder where I put some of my favourite photographs, including this one.

I particularly love this photograph and thought I would share it. This was taken a little while ago, but I can still remember the day. It was a kind of cloudy, pretty chilly and very windy day and we had decided to go for a walk. It was up a local hill and of course, got windier the higher we got. I remember laughing at how we could lean into the wind and when you jumped you felt like you were flying. It was a lovely day. 

The boy in the image is one of my brothers, Alfie. I love the angle this was taken and I LOVE it in black and white. I was pretty proud of this photo if I say so myself. 

That is all for today's rather short post. I love sharing some of my favourite photographs and maybe I will be sharing more in the future. 

Thank you for reading and have a lovely weekend.

Holly X

Flowers in the street.

I was just scrolling through some of my photos and came across this one from a couple of weeks ago. Now I know that this is not the best photograph, but it was one of those 'I'm in a rush and trying to take a good photograph without stopping' kind of photographs. I took this whilst on the way to meeting a friend in a cafe and was kind of in a rush (I was running late, surprise surprise). I remember seeing them and just automatically becoming very very happy. Flowers are just one of those things that make me super happy. They are just so naturally beautiful and smell lovely too! 

Looking back on it, I kind of wish that I had stopped to appreciate all these lovely flowers and maybe even purchased some. There are often stalls in my town, especially when the market is taking place and I really must remember to appreciate the flower stall more often because it really is very beautiful. 

So that is all for today's rather short post. I just wanted to share these beautiful flowers and remind you to stop and smell the flowers from time to time, because it really is worth it. 

Thank you for reading and have a lovely day.

Holly X

Next Home Decor Haul

My bedroom is currently undergoing a makeover. I am the kind of person that is always wanting to move around my bedroom or decorate items, maybe I have a creative streak ? However, this time, I was allowed to completely redo my bedroom. This includes painting, having a built in wardrobe and even a couple of new furniture items (not new but new to me). This meant that the other day, whilst browsing through the Next home décor section, I actually could purchase some items. This made me a very happy bunny because home décor shopping is one of my favourite types of shopping! As well as shopping home décor, I also love viewing others home décor. Therefore, I thought I would dedicate a post to my home décor haul and share it with you... enjoy! 

The first thing that I purchased was this cushion. Now I absolutely love cushions! People always joke around about how much women love their cushions, but I honestly do! They just make an area look so cosy and comfy as well as adding a decorative touch. Now my room is painted 3 walls grey and one wall a light/minty green (I say minty because the paint was originally meant to be mint green. However it doesn't actually look very minty... but I still love it!). However, yellow is one of my favourite colours and I wanted to add a little more colour to my room as it was looking a little dark (I don't get masses of light through my window), so I decided I would attempt to add elements of yellow as you will see throughout this post. In order to do this, however, I needed an item that would incorporate all three of these colours. There was a beautiful picture that did this, but it was too big and I would have nowhere to put it. Then I came across this cushion, fell in love and threw it in the basket. It's the perfect size for my chair and I love the picture on it. I absolutely love this cushion and am super happy with this purchase. 

Next, up I got these long twigs with yellow flowers (I am not the best at describing things). I have always wanted some kind of tall plant to put in my room and when I came across this, it was perfect! As mentioned above, I was trying to incorporate a little yellow into the mix and not only did this have elements of yellow, it also fitted into my room theme perfectly. I then came across this very simple vase and thought it was perfect for my new plant feature. I originally intended to go for the clear vase as I thought the grey would be too dark. However, it turns out that this colour was perfect. It's practically clear, just with a tint to the glass and I love it! I think that this feature is perfect for my room and adds an element of elegance. I am already thinking of ways I can use this to decorate for the holidays!

A little while back I purchased a few mini cacti (which you can read about here) and have been looking for a better way to keep them ever since. The other day I came across the idea of using a jar and filling it with sand and stones. So, with this in mind, I began looking for a little tray and jars. However, there was nothing that fit this category in the store. That's when my mum found these adorable little mugs. They fit my room theme (which is kind of all over the place but looks really cute) perfectly and I LOVED them. So we decided to buy three of these for my mini cacti and use the jar idea for the larger cacti. I still have to buy the sand and mini stones but I think this is one of the cutest features in my room. I also got this tray from Sainsburys and think it works super well with the mugs. (P.S- Any fellow Once Upon A Time lovers out there? Do these mugs not remind you of Belle and Rumple or what? I LOVE IT!)

Next, in my haul, I have this absolutely amazing candle. Now, along with my deep loving of cushions, comes this deep loving of candles. My rather impressive collection just continues to grow and I am very much okay with that. The first thing that caught my eye about this was this the pattern and metallic feature of the candle. I am a big fan of this metallic trend and just fell in love with this candle. Then, when I realised that it was a three wick candle. I fell a little deeper in love. A single wick candle excites me enough, but add another 2 wicks and I go a little crazy. I am always seeing these three wick candles in America from Bath and Body Work's I believe, and every time I get a little jealous. So, when I came across this I got super super happy. I don't know if I have just been looking in the wrong places but I basically never come across three wick candles in England so I was beyond ecstatic. Now, in my deep love for this candle, even if it didn't smell absolutely amazing... I probably would have still purchased it, purely due to these other features and my obsession. However, just to top things off, it smells A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. I feel like it might be one of those scents that aren't for everyone but I think it smells heavenly. Now I stupidly went and threw away the label but I feel like it was sandalwood or something? If that is even a scent, I don't know. I can't even find it online but you shall just have to trust me when I tell it is wonderful. Very happy with this purchase. 

 This next item is more of a practical item as oppose to decorative. I desperately needed a new lamp for my bedside table and thought this simple one was perfect. I was a little hesitant at first to go for the grey one, as I already had 3 grey walls and as mentioned before, didn't want my room to become too dark. However, my Mum and Grandma thought it would be fine and so I went for it, and I am very glad I did. The lamp is against the green wall and doesn't make it too dark at all! It's a perfect size and fits great with my room. Very happy with this too!

The final item in this haul is this amazing wall art (is that the correct word?). I have been seeing a few items like this lately, the whole '3D but behind glass' kind of wall art thing, and I love it! I think this looks super cool and again adds elements of yellow. The butterflies add to my kind of 'vintage, modern, elegant' theme I have going on. It sounds a little strange I know but I seriously love it and think it looks amazing. The more I look at this piece, the more I fall in love with it and I am super pleased with this find. I could go on and on about how much I love this piece but this post is getting rather long and I am honestly struggling to find words. 

So there we have my Next home haul. I still have a couple more items to add to my room and can't wait until it is finished so that I can share it! I hope you have enjoyed reading this haul as much as I have enjoyed writing it and maybe it has inspired your home décor shopping? 

I hope you have a lovely day and thank you for reading.

Holly X

My Braces Experience: Getting my braces tightened (the 1st time)

About a week and a half ago I got my braces tightened for the first time. So, I thought I would write the second post in 'My Braces Experience' series. The first post can be found here if you wish to read that first.

One thing that surprised me about getting braces was how much it hurt afterwards and for how long too. The majority of my friends had braces in the past and so I was aware that they would hurt afterwards for a little while, but my teeth were so so sensitive for an entire week and most people's discomfort only lasted a few days tops according to my research. Another point that I had taken away from my research was how much it hurt when you got them tightened. Most people had said that the tightening was worse than the fitting... and that made me nervous. Getting them fitted was a really unenjoyable experience for me, for at least a week and then to hear it was going to be worse this time. I was thinking 'Oh great! Will I be living off soup for 2 weeks now?!'. But as it turns out I was absolutely fine.

Getting them tightened

The actual process of tightening the brace was relatively fast and completely painless. If felt really weird and sounded funny in my head. I have no idea why but for me it was just one of those body squirming 'this feels weird' experiences, but not at all painful. It just feels unnatural. 

Post- tightening 

Considering that the actual tightening process had been painless, I automatically assumed that the pain would kick in afterwards. We (my sister, mum and myself) went over to a cafe for breakfast afterwards and I thought 'ooh I better eat quickly before the pain kicks in'. My teeth felt slightly more sensitive when eating but not painful. We then left and returned home where I continued to wait for the pain to kick in. However, the pain never arrived and I remained a happy bunny. I thought it was kind of strange that I had escaped painless, especially after hearing everybody else stories. But I can honestly say that it was a painless experience. Now apparently, this means my next appointment will be more painful but I guess we shall see. I have got 4 and a half weeks to prepare for it anyway.

How my teeth look now

Here is a photograph of my brother and I from the other day compared to a photo prior to getting braces. (I am aware that these are not the clearest or attractive photographs but they are the ones where I thought you could see the difference the most.)

I am honestly, so so impressed with the difference already. That one tooth (the main reason I got braces) is practically straight now and I have only had them 6/7 weeks. Even the dentist appeared to be impressed with my fast moving teeth. I am hoping that this means my braces can come off earlier than I first thought. However, I don't know and trust my dentist's opinion more than my own. 

So yes, here is my braces update. I am super happy with the progress and was very pleased how smoothly the tightening process went. I plan on doing another update in about 5 weeks time once the brace has been tightened again. 

Thanks for reading,

Holly X