Online shopping ♥

Firstly : Merry Easter to all those celebrating. I hope you having a blessed day with your loved ones and celebrating a Lord that died for us so that we can live eternally ♥

So I've just had my very first overseas online shopping experience. I bought a pair of boots from everything 5 pounds which is a UK company and yes , everything they sell is 5 pounds ! I didn't really like any of the clothes but I fell in love with some of their shoes especially their boots. This post is about the pair of boots I ordered.

Price

At the time of my order £1 = R13 which was not too bad at all. Imagine only paying R65 for a gorgeous pair of boots. So I was all in for buying me enough boots to last for the next couple of years until I got to the check out.

This was my final receipt:

Sub-Total: £4.17

Royal Mail International Signed For (Delivery Weight: 1 package of 0.6 Kg's (ships normally within 3 to 5 days):  £11.59

Total: £15.76

So now instead of paying R65 for boots I was paying R205. None the less I still placed my order and finally received my boots yesterday and was very excited and impressed. I’ve worn them both yesterday and today and for boots that essentially only costs R65 I thought they are definitely worth it. They are comfortable and not flappy material that can break very quickly. I do however already have a few scratches on but that’s only because I walk weirdly.

Total price:

·         Boots : R54.08

·         Shipping: R150.67

·         Customs paid at the post office: R43.65

·         Total: R248.40

Although I’ve heard that online shopping is so much cheaper it’s the shipping that’s such a hassle. I recommend you try and find a friend in the country where your company is based who could try and find a cheaper posting method (it is usually free shipping to any place in the country itself). Or even  if you know someone who will be coming to your country from the country where you ordered it from then (hopefully) you won’t be paying shipping at all.

Time:

Although the shipping says it takes 3 – 5 days I think this is only within the country and I was very naive to believe I would get my boots in only 5 days. I ordered my package on the 17^th of February and I got my letter on the 7^th of March that I could collect it at the post office opposite Grand West Arena.They hold your package for 21 days or what you can do (what I did) is you can fax the post office a copy of you ID, invoice,  along with your contact details and the post office of your choice and then they send it there for free. I sent the fax about the 15^th of March and by the 20^th it arrived at my local post office. I was very pleased with how efficient they were and on top of things they were. I could call any time to enquire about my package and as long as I could provide a tracking number they were able to answer all of my queries.

Me and my photographer Lee

Me wearing my boots for Easter at church

I really hope this helps and it encourages you to open your shopping horizon to stores all across the world.

Note : if you going to buy online (whether it be from a South African company or international company) use a credit card to make your purchases as it is safer than using a debit or cheque card.

If you can't find something specific online try finding international buyers such as Raze-Astro . She buys clothes in the middle east and then is able to send it to you. It's also really cool because she buys lots of things on sale from well known brands such as H&M that we don't have access to and know we even able to pay sale prices.

*I am not in any way advertising for the companies I do post about or have any contact with them, I am merely posting my opinion about a product that I bought

DIY kinda girl

I think this heading really describes the creative side to me. The side who wants to try and make things my own. Make them pretty and add "Zina" touches.

When I was in high school I was BEYOND OCD about my work books. I would write my notes in my book and if the heading didn't look right, colours on the page just didn't match or my handwriting was atrocious you can be sure those pages went straight into the bin leaving me with a bunch of book covers with like 10 pages left and no notes.

Seeing as this is not something I can continue with into varsity due to the excessive work loads and the fact that I don't have a teacher or peers who really cares about how my books look I've had to resort to some other outlet to my creative side.

Before

I've gone through the whole "edit my photos" vibe and thank goodness I've moved into a phase where I try to make my photos look as if I've done as little as possible instead of trying every single effect I can find. I really want to plant my own vegetable garden, learn how to sew and eventually design and make some of my own clothes. But until then I decided to do something a little easier and more straight forward : decorate my notice board.

Everyone says that your room reflects your personality and if that were true , there's no other way of describing me as cream and black. Last year my parents bought me a nice and big notice board after a year of nagging and up until today I never took the effort into decorating it. But the big question is : Is a notice board supposed to be for all your due dates or just something to look pretty ?

I think it depends on your personality and the awesome thing is you can actually do what ever you want.

My best friend kayla has a really cool photo vibe to her notice board and she's had such boards ever since I met her. She loves taking photos and she's very social and this plays out in her notice board (check out her blog here under the same sun )

Robin's calendar

Robin's notice board

My friend Robin on the other hand decided to do something more practical that will keep her up to date with all of varsity's heavy work load and managing to squeeze in some time for herself. She made 2 : the first she pasted pics on and then covered in contact so she could write on it and pin other things to it and the second she designed a calendar on the computer printed it A3 ( I think), had it laminated and just fills in the dates according to the days depending on the month that it is.

I'm not really much of a photo person so here's what I did :

1. I went through all the pictures on my phone and onto the website we heart it (they have the best pictures) and chose some. Choosing what will go on your board is very important. I wanted a soft and girly feel so I chose mostly pink, black, white and cream images.

2. Once you've selected your pictures print them and then cut them out.

3. Cover each picture with contact to protect it.

4. Paste them either directly on your board or paste them on pretty picture and then onto the board.

After

Kayla's photography  notice board

close up

Only half of my board is done so far

time for those new year's resolutions

Sitting awake at 12 o clock at night is not ideal. I’ve been so busy and sleep deprived I found myself waking up on the cold hard floor of our TV room in a very unappealing and awkward position. Varsity is just so much. I’ve never had to handle excessive such workloads, sitting in such a big classroom or feeling so small, unintelligent and in the bigger scheme of things minute. Right now I feel like I’m just part of statistics and it’s up to me to decide whether I’m going to belong to the group that makes it or the group that doesn’t.

So instead of just lying in bed and waiting for sleep to catch up on me I decided to wake up, get inspired and start studying which is something I’ve really been struggling with lately. I’m a last minute kind of girl. The one who has to feel the pressure before she starts working and in my uncles words to me “It’s human nature to be like that” but now it’s time for me to fight my own limitations.

I hated chemistry at school to say the least and it reflected in my poor marks. I can’t even say I liked the subject but just couldn’t cope under exam or test conditions which I often tried to convince myself. And just my luck I find it to be one of my main subjects this year. I find myself sitting in class having absolutely no idea what’s going on and being too scared to put up my hand and ask questions and just not motivated enough to look for the answers. Instead I find myself continuously checking facebook, twitter or just simply doing other work provided I’m not just closing my eyes for a few moments hoping it would wake me up.

So what motivated me at 12 o clock to start working? My New Year’s resolution. I know its March and to be completely honest most of us have given up. I saw the statuses in January already “who still does New Year’s Resolutions – it never lasts” or “New Years’ resolutions are just a waste of time.”  .I get it, we tend to give up so easily when things become tough but think about it: what are our new years’ resolutions? In my opinion they are positive changes we make hoping to benefit ourselves and others. I promised myself that I would work hard this year and if I can’t even do it for myself who can I do it for?

Yes I know those healthy eating ideas have disappeared and replaced by fast food and those gym memberships you took out are now simply a transaction that happens once a month or basically a waste of your money. I want to encourage you to not give up. Start fulfilling your resolutions today and if you fail tomorrow is another day where you can wake up and try again. That’s the beauty of life, everyday is a new opportunity to grow and be or do something amazing it’s simply up to you. You will never regret having that one healthy meal or going to the gym and pushing yourself, these small things may be forgotten but they will benefit you anyway.

I can’t say I’m not going to study for my chemistry test (next week Wednesday) because I don’t like it. If I fail I’m simply going to be one less in a class of 400. I need to do this for myself because the good things are tough but that makes it worthwhile doesn’t it? When you work hard and achieve what you want so badly that you gave it your everything. That sense of accomplishment flourishes throughout your body and over whelms your soul with this indescribable happiness and knowing you did it for yourself makes it that much better.

 

So let’s make a toast to our New Years’ resolutions. The ones that we’ve given up on but we going to start again or the ones we’ve been working hard on maintaining. Let’s do it for the simple reason that we deserve it.

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varsity : week one .

the title of this post is beyond misleading . I guess its sorta true since I did start varsity this week and what was supposed to be the beginning of some of the best years of my life was a total and utter nightmare . this week , I experienced my first loss.

my grandpa and I before my prefect dance last year

my grandpa died .

don't get me wrong , I'm not some amazingly fortunate or just plain naive person who has never experienced death before . but the closest people I have lost before this was my grandmother's siblings . I was the lucky one , you know ... the girl who was 18 with all 4 grandparents , that's rare and I definitely appreciated it . what was supposed to be this happy and exciting week was filled with my acting strong and then crying myself to sleep when I thought no one was looking .

my grandpa was amazing , easily one of the best to have graced this planet , a true blessing . this is the speech I said at his funeral . I'm sharing it with you because I want you to know why I say he was the best and why this week has been so tough , he was definitely hard to loose .

RIP Connel Daniel Scheepers - we love you 

* note : mikhail and lee are my brothers and chloe , blake , nicholas and mia are my baby cousins.

A letter from your grandchildren

Dear Pa

It’s hard to imagine more sorrow, pain and heart sore than we are feeling now. We miss you so much and wish to see you one more time. We know one day we will be reunited but until then we want to thank you for all the life lessons you taught us.

One of the first life lessons you taught me is to be honest. I remember I was probably about 6 when the tazo craze hit South Africa. Small round metal chips could be found in simba packets and children rushed to get theirs. I asked you for money so that I could go to the shop to buy a packet of chips secretly only wanting the tazo. So when I got to the shop I realized only the big packets of chips had tazos in so I selected my packet , walked to the till with the R10 you gave me in hand and when I paid I realized I only received 1c change. At the time I thought R10 was such a lot of money and burst out crying, scared of how you would react that I spent so much money on a packet of chips. When I came home I first told ma and she told me I should just tell you. I feared how you would react but when I told you, you told me its fine and I felt so relieved. That day I realized that as hard as it is to be honest, honesty isn’t something we should fear.

You taught us the real meaning of caring. You would always drop Mikhail at the skate park . And in Mikhail's words “it wasn’t child’s play” sitting in the traffic every morning on your way to canal walks boogaloos with Mikhail ever ready with his skate board in hand you two would venture to the skate park. It didn’t matter what we were doing whether it was skateboarding or rolerskating as long as it made us happy it was more than enough for you. 

You taught us to see the beauty in everything. I remember there was a time when we struggled to understand what Blake was saying but you always said you can understand. You would try and tell us what blake was trying to say. Blake was the special flame that brightened your day. Your eyes would light up when you saw him and blake definitely felt exactly the same. I remember how Blake went through a phase where he only wanted to be with ‘pa’ if you were around and trying to get him to come to anyone else was basically mission impossible.

You taught us how to live in our happy moments. Stories were never far away when you were around. You would tell us stories of when you were young, your family, how you grew up and the things in life that made you the man that you were. These stories were shared among all your grandchildren and I can just picture Nicholas and mia sitting and listening to your stories. I remember the special place that Nicoholas held in your heart. Being the only Scheepers boy left he was quite the special one.

You taught us how to love and I think this is eminent in Mia most of all. I remember how when you struggled to walk mia would hook her arm in yours and walk you around the room. She was so proud of you and took a special liking to taking care of you and ensuring your happiness. 

You passed on the skills you had learnt to make us better people. I remember how often you and lee would sit discussing cricket techniques. When Lee had a match he’d come sit with you afterwards and discuss the match and no matter how Lee played or what the score was you were always proud of him. The same with Chloe in her gymnastics. She will surely miss drawing pictures and giving it to you now. I know they had a special place in your heart being born on the day Uncle Duane died.

You taught me to be confident and not to be afraid of sharing my opinion. During the past 3 years debating has truly become my passion and I loved the fact that you took so much interest in it. I remember getting phone calls while on tour or even climbing into the car after provincial competitions and my mommy saying to me “phone pa and tell him about your debates today because he was asking me about them earlier”. You took pride in us and our passions became yours. You wanted us to become confident and independent grandchildren and to never be afraid of standing up for what we believe.

You taught me to have faith in myself when I no longer felt like I had any left. I was awaiting my results from my varsity application and had already been denied access into the law. I started doubting myself and telling myself that I would never make it into medicine. When I was accepted you were one of the few people I phoned that night. Your words to me were “I knew it ! I knew you would make it, I was waiting for this phone call”. You believed in me when I no longer believed in myself and I will always be grateful to you for that.

When I received my matric results you cried with pride. I remember ma telling me that you were upset one night because you said you would never see me as a doctor. And this is hard for me to accept to. But I realized that that this isn’t true. You have impacted my life and molded me into the person that I am and for this I am forever grateful for the role you played in my life. You will never miss out on anything in my life because you are forever a part of me

My biggest regret with your passing is that chloe, blake, Nicholas, mia and lee will never have the privilege of experiencing 18 or 22 years with you. But I know that even though the years they shared were far less, they are in no way any less memorable or impacted by you as I was.

Mitch Albom said “death ends a life, not a relationship”. We  will always carry you in our hearts as well as the numerous life lessons you taught us.   Thank you for being the best grandpa we could ever imagine and for loving us . We will love you forever