Life Updates: Volunteering, gown-hunting, and staying put.

To me, blogging is a bit of a "cheat" way to keep in touch with people from home. I'm not writing directly to anyone, but I feel like my friends across the pond can take a glimpse into my day-to-day life through my blog. And that way, when I talk to them on FaceTime or see them in person they seem to be totally updated with most aspects of my life (you know, aside from the really personal stuff that I choose to keep off the blog).

So today, I thought I'd take the time out to answer the question that I ask and receive so often: what's new?

For one thing, I've started volunteering at a charity shop on a weekly basis. To be honest, it's sadly not as altruistic as it seems because I'm not just volunteering out of the goodness of my heart- I'm actually doing it for an assignment. My Social Anthropology class called Ethnography is based around one big project that we work on incrementally throughout the term.

For those of you not familiar with the term ethnography, it's basically the process of studying a space over time through passive observation as well as participant observation (aka getting your hands dirty). This means that my groupmates and I have been behind the till and behind the scenes of the charity shop- making transactions, taking donations, and designing window displays. All while attempting to make anthropological observations, taking notes, and conducting interviews. It's a totally different experience for me- I've somehow managed to get by in life having never worked retail. But I really think it's something that everyone should try at least once!

Another activity that has become a rather significant part of my life lately is going to black-tie/white-tie affairs. Since November, I've been going to one fancy event per month, which means I have to do a lot of shopping for full-length gowns. While you'd think this would be fun 100% of the time, I promise you it's not- especially when you nearly fall into the height category of a midget and have quite possibly the most disproportionate body in the world.

I don't think I'll ever get over how pale we both look in this photo. 

But what I like most about picking out new gowns and going to these balls is that it feels like prom all over again. Except, without all the drama (my prom story is actually hilariously bad) or the pressure of finding a date. In high school, I probably would have claimed that my prom dress was absolutely the most important gown I would ever wear. But now I have ample opportunities to dress up. Now that I think about it, my prom dress is my least favorite of all the gowns I own!

So many good lookin' friends... But which one is the real prom??

Finally, and this may be a little bit premature to say... but I'm so happy that next year I'll be staying in the same beautiful flat as I've been living in this year! We're re-signing the lease tomorrow morning, and we're crossing our fingers and toes that things don't get muddled up any further. We have a new flatmate moving in since one of the gals is studying abroad in Italy and France next year, and I honestly couldn't be more excited about staying put. Our flat is not only stunning design-wise, but I think it's going to be a lot easier to transition into the notoriously difficult third year of uni if we don't have to worry about getting used to a new place.

You can see what our flat looks like in this post in case ya missed it.

So that's what's new in my world- congratulations on making it to the end of my rambly post!