Meet Arthur

If you don't follow me on instagram, you've probably missed my adorable Christmas present from my boyfriend... this guy!:

I initially had serious trouble thinking of a name for him and after almost a week considered naming him Lord Voldemort for fun. My bestie was not cool with that (and only one of my friends got the reference). I thought he would suit a 'Grandpa' name like Charlie, Harold or George, but they didn't quite have the right ring to them. Then I moved on to grey things. Pepper? No. Earl (like the tea)? No. Babar (the elephant - I loved that show as a kid)? Maybe. But Babar was too recognisable as being an elephant so I looked up other characters from the show and stumbled across this gem: 

"Arthur: Babar's mischief-making brother-in-law."

Perfect. And he's certainly lived up to it. The little scamp loves to chew and today hopped out of his play pen (makeshift from wire garden edging) and explored/raced around the back garden for an hour while I fretted that he could possibly get loose. After I managed to wrangle him and get him back inside, he happily rested on my bed and allowed me to take some glamour shots.

2k plus the approximate atomic weight of Nitrogen..

Aka 2014, aka goodbye 2013, aka Happy New Year, aka how did my last year go?

This year has changed my opinion on 13 being an unlucky number.

2013 has been pretty amazing - of course there are minor moments you would probably rather forget, but these are far outweighed by those that I would gladly keep on a constant loop.

2013: 'The Year That Was' can pretty much be summed up by the following (with 1 and 2 switched around):

1 - Buy a Ticket
After being left broken hearted last year I decided to do something I'd always wanted -but couldn't/didn't want to do with a 'significant other': go on a Contiki tour. I spent little time deciding on where to go and when (Europe in the summer, duh) and booked myself tickets accordingly and organising leave from work. Following this was an agonising -which morphed into exciting- wait over 5 months before I could actually take off.

2 - Quit Your Job
I was always planning on doing this, although not in the way I did. I had always been advised not to leave a job without something concrete to go into and by all means that was what I had planned to do. Then it got to the point where I was a week out from my holiday and I made the decision that that job was not something I wanted to go back to and was giving me anxiety about returning before I had even left. I resigned on Monday morning and thanks to my pre-booked leave I was able to walk out with lighter shoulders on Thursday afternoon.

3 - Get a Tan
This is where I pick back up on my Contiki tale. Although the overall weather on holiday was a little cooler than I was expecting we still caught some rays along the Côte d'Azur in Nice, poolside in Corfu and finally sipping Estrella on the beach in Barcelona. In addition to a tan, I also got drunk, lost, high and more drunk. I made a bunch of awesome new friends and memories I'll cherish forever (and others I'll probably never live down- cheers Facebook).

4 - Fall in Love <3
A boy unexpectedly stole my heart and makes me extremely happy. He lives on the other side of the country and that makes me sad. We'll fix this soon enough.

5 - Never Return
Home is where the heart is and figuratively I'm leaving behind the person I was and looking forward with a new attitude. It's simple really.

Other events of note:

I had a wisdom tooth removed. I've never needed surgery (touch wood!) so this is as big as it gets. Surgery itself wasn't bad- I literally couldn't feel a thing (even the needle) and would highly recommend my dentist. But it was a decent enough excuse to get time off work and use up accumulated sick days.

I landed an amazing job. After about two and a half months post-holiday of watching my spending and receiving numerous 'thanks for your application, however...' rejection emails I was finally graced with a chance which has turned out to be really awesome. In my old job I could never understand how some people could enjoy what they did and not mind going into work, but now I do.

I finished my Chartered Accounting qualification (Graduate Diploma of Chartered Accounting to be precise) well, educational aspect of it anyway- I still need to log a few more months of 'practical experience' aka:work before I can register for membership but yay to putting study/tutorials/assignments/exams behind me (for now).

This year I'm not making any resolutions (my 'Chocolate Free 2013' lasted 4 months), I just want to continue to be happy and healthy and to surround myself with awesome people who do the same.

Happy '14 <3