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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