Saturday 31 January 2015

How I Told My Mum About My YouTube Channel

A few days ago I decided to tell my mum about my YouTube channel. I've had it for over a year so it was about time wasn't it?

You can watch my mums very enthusiastic reaction here!

Not a lot of people in my personal life know about my channel. Telling my mum was quite a big deal for me because its the first time I've properly told anyone. The only people that do know found out themselves, so I've never had to physically tell anyone.

The main reason I told her was because I want  to start filming more this year. To be able to do that I cant always wait until I have the house to myself. I think it would freak my parents out if I sat in my room alone and used phrases like "hey guys" and "see you guys soon", if they had no idea what I was doing. 

I told my mum that starting a channel was a "hypothetical" scenario. I said it like that ironically because we both knew that I was being dead serious. I've wanted to start a channel since like year 8 and my mum knows I love YouTube. She also knows I love filming little videos so to be honest she probably put the two together and knew I had a channel ages ago.

My mum is the "you can be as crazy as you want but don't blame me if something goes wrong" sort of parent (within reason). Living with me, she's witnessed me do one or two crazy things over the years so I don't think me having a YouTube channel is the biggest shock ever to her. I think she knows making videos would make me happy. I think she just wishes I chose a different hobby or something "useful and productive"  to obsess over haha!   Izzy- Making my parents proud since 1998

If you are thinking of making a channel, I would highly recommend that you tell your family as soon as possible. Explain to them why you are doing it and that you will be safe online and not give away any personal information. I wish I did that because it would have avoided a lot of awkwardness. The amount of times I had to pack up my stuff in the middle of filming because I heard my parents pull in the drive and I didn't want them to catch me- oh my!

Thank you so much for reading and if you watched the video thank you for that too. The song of the day is Happily by One Direction. If you have a YouTube channel how did you tell your friends and family? Let me know in the comments xxx

P.S. No one in my family knows about my blog yet because I don't know how they'd react if I told them hehe!

Wednesday 28 January 2015

Happy 1st Birthday To My Blog

*Warning*: this post will be extremely rambley but I just have so much to say. Words cannot describe how weird it feels to be writing this. I've officially been blogging for a year. To be honest I never thought I would keep up with it for even a week but here I am!


Thank you so much Georgie, for being the first person to read my blog and always supporting me with it. Cant believe we've been writing blogs for this long haha!

On the 28th of January 2014 I started my blog "Izzy K". My first blog post ever, 10 facts about me, was the first time I ever wrote for fun in my spare time. The reason I started my blog was because I just wanted a little space on the internet to express my thoughts and feelings. I had no confidence at all to make proper YouTube videos so I searched for an alternative hobby. I discovered that many other YouTubers had started out by writing blogs. I was like "meh, I've got nothing to lose, might as well give this blogging thingy a go".

Just thought I'd mention that I had no experience 
with blogging and had no idea what to write about. 
I just did it for a bit of fun.

Then, to my surprise, something strange happened. I actually started to enjoy reading and writing. English was always my least favourite subject at school and I basically had to be dragged there kicking and screaming.
                                        
                                                 Me before every English lesson I ever had

But there's just something special about just letting your thoughts flow out of you when you write. That's one of the main reasons that I love reading other people's blogs so much; you can always tell how someone was feeling at the time they wrote it. 

Writing blog posts became my life so much so that I felt the need to start a second blog, Izzy K: Fashion and Reviews, in July. This blog was for purely writing about my favourite makeup products or about any trends I've been enjoying. You know, that sort of stuff. 

September is when things really started kicking off, thanks to the wonderful people at Beau Bloggers. I came across Lauren's post about wanting to start a community for bloggers and instantly emailed her about joining. That was the best decision I've ever made because I've loved every second of being part of it. I could never have dreamed of meeting nicer people and the support everyone receives is incredible. I know that I can always count on everyone there to brighten my day by giving me new posts to read or leaving lovely comments on my blog. I love you guys so much (sorry if that sounds really cheesy, but oh well haha)

Click here to join the best blogging community there is. Everyone is welcome!

One final thank you to everyone that's been a part of my blog this year, whether we have collabed, you left a comment on my blog or even just read my posts. I started this blog writing to an "invisible audience" and never imagined that there would be anyone out there who would even stumble upon it. I can still remember the excitement when I got a comment for the first time. I think I literally cried with astonishment that someone had enjoyed my little thoughts that I didn't think anything of. 

...To all of you reading this!

This blog has been my absolute life lately and I don't think I could cope without it. The song of the day is thnks fr th mmrs by Fall Out Boy because I've made so many wonderful memories from this blog. I really hope I will be writing a similar post this time next year because I really want to keep blogging up. Thank you so much for reading xxx

Friday 23 January 2015

Beau Bloggers Post Of the Month: My Inspiration

This month on Beau Bloggers the theme is inspirations. I personally think this is a really good topic to write about because you can learn so much about people based on who they look up to. 



I don't think I've mentioned it before (ok maybe once or twice) but my favourite singer is Ed Sheeran. It might seem random that he's one of my inspiration since I'm not a singer myself. Something I admire about him, apart from his talent, is his personality and ambition.


Oh yeah and he also likes cats!

He's genuinely one of the people that really deserve their fame and everything they achieve. You can tell he's worked hard from a young age to be where he is today. I don't blame him for wanting to set people straight when they say he was born with his talent. Don't get me wrong, I think he is very talented but he even said himself that practice makes perfect. After working so hard it must be a bit of a slap in the face for him to be told its easy for him because he's a natural.



He's so sassy in this especially with those raised eyebrows! 

Ed kept plodding on when times got hard. He was advised to dye his hair because "nobody would listen to music by a ginger" apparently and to stop rapping. Those are two of the things I adore about Ed and I cant imagine them being erased from him. He was never afraid to start small either. He knew that his hard work would pay off one day. 


One of his old tweets, I'm getting really emotional now!

There is no doubt about it either that Ed is a down to earth, kind man. He has done numerous things for charity and goes well out of his way for his thousands of fans. The only thing that people seem to critizce about him is his dress sense. But personally I think its a good thing. Its obvious the media cant get anything bad on him so always just label him as "worst dressed". 

I don't know why people are complaining.
 I think his fashion is on point.

Quite possibly one of Ed Sheeran's greatest achievements to date is selling out Wembley Stadium. In case you don't already know, Wembley is bloody huge and he will be playing to over 80,000 people. And he will be breaking many records by doing so. Ed will be the first artist ever to sell out Wembley Stadium by himself with no band as back up. Pretty impressive eh?


"I wont stop 'till my name's in lights" - You need Me, I Don't Need You

I could continue to write this post forever but I better start to finish it off before I ramble on. The song of the day is You Need Me, I Don't Need You by the man himself, ED SHEERAN. He has been my favourite singer from the moment I first heard the A Team. Who is your inspiration? xxx

Sunday 18 January 2015

Seeing Bethan Leadley (Musical Bethan) Live!

Yesterday, the 17th of January, I went to the Birmingham Institute to see the amazing Bethan Leadley perform live. 

She is also known as her YouTube name MusicalBethan. On her channel she has uploaded many songs, both covers and originals. She has a great talent for singing and song writing and I'm so happy to see how far she has come. After starting off by posting songs on YouTube she is now touring around the country.

Here is my ticket which is signed by Bethan and Dodie

I went with my friend Georgie, after discovering that she watches Bethan too. I couldn't believe it when she told me because we'd both been watching her for ages but it just never came up in conversation before. Georgie organised the tickets and sent her dad on a mission to buy them as soon as they came out. He clearly did a good job as we were lucky enough to get the first two tickets from the entire night! And we got to the second row which meant we were so close the entire time. 

The support acts were friends of Bethan and also fellow YouTubers. The show started off with the lovely Dodie Clark (Doddleoddle) who sung beautifully. Apparently she was really nervous but I thought she was hilarious and did really well. Then the band Box of Light performed. They were great too and really got the crowd in the spirit by playing loudly (in a good way) and dancing around on stage. 

Then it was time for the wonderful lady, Bethan, herself to come on. She made a brief appearance before hand as she had to walk across stage to get to the toilet. We all pretended that "we didn't see that" though. She perfomed a couple of covers by Ed Sheeran, Fall Out Boy and Taylor Swift as well as the songs from her new EP. We were even lucky enough to get an exclusive preview of a new song that she recently wrote. 
Me and Bethan!

I look so awkward but here's me and Dodie

As we were queuing for merch, she walked right passed me. Like right NEXT TO ME! I tried to play it cool but my inner fangirl was exploding. After that we managed to get photos with both Bethan and Dodie. Bethan was lovely, we took loads of pictures and she hugged me like 5 times. She apologized for all the hugging which honestly wasn't necessary! Then we spoke to Dodie and took pictures. She told us she was so nervous about performing and her heart was pounding loud. To be honest you couldn't tell and it just looked like she was really exited. 

So there we are, that was me experience meeting and watching MusicalBethan. If you haven't already, please check out her channel. It was one of the best gigs I've been to and all the acts can sing really well live. The song of the day is Alright To Be Alright by Bethan Leadley because that's my favourite song of hers. Do you watch Bethan on YouTube? If you do let me know in the comments and we can fangirl together xxx

Thursday 15 January 2015

My 17th Birthday

I've been waiting for my 17th birthday for ages because that means I'm finally allowed to drive. On Wednesday the 14th of January it was my birthday and I had such an amazing day.



I woke up in the morning and opened my presents from my parents and sister. My parents brought me One Direction tickets for October, Hollister jeans, a One Direction diary (spotting a theme here?) and driving lessons. Really cant wait to start driving. 

My sister brought me some lipstick in a gorgeous shade and some Tanya Burr eyelashes. Not to mention how heartfelt her card was. She always gets me some sort of sarcastic card and this year mine read as follows: "Hi Izzy, Lol bye, I'm Vicky". 

I'm sorry but who signs a card as "I'm Vicky"? 

I'd like to say a massive thank you to all my friends too. They completely spoilt me all day long. Even the ones that didn't have a full day of lessons and went home at lunch messaged me afterwards. I honestly have no idea what I've done to deserve the wonderful friends that I have. 

My presents from friends and family.
Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

My fellow blogger and friend Georgie was lovely too. She specially played Dancing Queen by Abba in the morning as I'm now the dancing queen because I'm only 17...get it? She got me such thoughtful presents. My parents especially loved listening to the Spice Girls Greatest Hits album in the car (not really but they didn't have a choice haha). And I cant believe that she even brought in a caterpillar cake that I could share between my friends at lunch. 

Posing with the caterpillar cake #notamodel

This has been my favourite birthday yet and it also happens to be the first one since I've had my blog. Thank you to everyone who made my day so special, you all mean the world to me. I cant believe the presents I got, there were so many and I'm grateful for every single one of them. Again, I still feel like I don't deserve any of them lol! 

What a tune!

Thank you for reading this post. The song of the day is Dancing Queen by Abba. It's got to be hasn't it? Now excuse me while I listen to this song on repeat for like the next year.

Thursday 8 January 2015

More New Years Resolutions

*Note to self* Do not write blog posts in a rush again. You will miss something out!


My reaction when I posted but realised I missed loads out

I know that I've literally only just posted about new years resolutions and that since its the second week of January, resolutions are old news now. However, since I've posted my last blog I've been kicking myself because I thought of more ways that I could better myself throughout the year. They are as follows:
  • Take more pictures- I'm seriously camera-shy but at the same time I wish I had more photos to look back on. I'm hoping 2015 will be captured with lots of snaps!

  • Enjoy the summer more- I'm seriously a Winter person and I can't stand the heat at all. I think its a shame though because you always see those typical tumblr/instagram pictures of people by the pool and wish you were there. This year I'm aiming to actually go outside this Summer. I think my parents will collapse with shock if they see it happen.

  • Be more spontaneous- Whenever I want to do something that looks fun I always overthink it and talk myself out of it. I always seem to have more fun when I do something without planning and I'm hoping to do more of that this year. 

Thank you for reading these three extra resolutions. I can't wait to look back on these in a year and see how many I actually achieve. The song of the day is Oh Cecilia by The Vamps. Happy New(ish) Year! xxx

Sunday 4 January 2015

New Years Resolutions

I still can't believe how fast 2014 went! It seems like I was only just making my resolutions for last year and its weird to think its time to do them again for 2015!

Back to the future gave me such 
unreal expectations of what 2015 would be like

Here are last years resolutions:
  • Pass all of my exams-  Somehow I actually managed to do this one which surprised me considering I was so stressed I could barely think! I did better in some subjects compared to others, but at least I passed them all.
  • Work hard in school- I'm not going to try and say that I'm naturally clever, but I will give myself credit for working hard. From January on wards I did hardcore revision for my GCSEs and tried really hard at my schoolwork. 
  • Get my YouTube account going- This point last year I had an account but I was too shy to post a lot. My goal was to just post one video this year. I'm pretty pleased that I've done a few more than that. 
  • Write a blog post- I started this blog last year and its fair to say that I've written a couple of posts for it. I've even managed to keep my blog going for almost a year and join a blogging community called Beau Bloggers.
  • Have more fun- This year varied between me having fun by going to concerts to me almost in tears stressing about exams. Overall, 2014 was better than other years because I have had more fun.
  • Get a good start at sixth form- This is one I failed at majorly! I did well at school so I thought sixth form would be a walk in the park. I couldn't be more wrong. I'll admit that this year I will have to start to work harder if I want to get good grades.

And now onto my resolutions for 2015:

  • Start a legging collection- This might seem random but I really love wearing leggings. They go with everything and I could honestly wear them everyday. But to be able to do that I need to build up my collection...and I will.
  • Not get kicked out of sixth form- This probably makes me sound like I'm some sort of badass that always gets in trouble. But in reality its just because my sixth form kicks you out if you get bad AS results and its starting to look like I will. Woops!
  • Revise harder- This links in to my last resolution because, in order to not get kicked out, I will have to work harder. I still feel like I'm working at a GCSE level and I haven't really got used to working at an A-level pace yet. Oh-uh I sound like all my teachers by saying that!
  • Make at least 12 videos this year- I'm aiming for one video a month but I already know I might be busier in some months than others. 
  • Blog every month- This year I missed a couple of months of blogging and I wish I hadn't. I'm going to try and blog even more than last year. 
  • Tell someone about my YouTube channel- This is the scariest one for me and I'm still not sure if I want to tell people about my blog because that's slightly more personal than my YouTube channel. The only people that know about my channel are the ones that found out for themselves and I've never actually told anybody. I feel like as soon as I do, I'll feel relieved because its a massive secret I'm keeping at the moment. 

Sorry this post was a bit long but those are my resolutions and we'll see if I managed them this time next year (wow that's a scary thought). The song of the day is We Will Rock You by Queen because it happens to be the first song I heard this year. Have you made any resolutions of your own? HAPPY NEW YEAR! xxx