Hello, World

I thought I'd make the most of our wifi actually working again and whip out a new blog post, because I am seriously overdue one. I promised myself that I'd write one at least once a month, but I think we can all see that I haven't been doing that. I guess I'm just extremely forgetful. And lazy. I AM JUST BUSY, OKAY.

So hello, I'm back. I'm now in my final year of sixth form (oh my goodness) and I have a gargantuan amount of work to be doing (which I should be doing now, BUT THE WIFI IS BACK) so I am genuinely very busy most of the time. Soz. 

India was incredible. I never got round to writing about it when I got back to England, so I guess you'll have to hear about it now. It really was a completely life-changing experience and I am more than hoping to go back again next year. There's so many things to be thinking about at the moment though; university, gap-years, working full-time: I just don't quite know what I want to do with my life yet. But fingers crossed that I'll be able to go back next year with Chennai Challenge again.

Life out there was extremely different to life here in England, which is something I loved being able to immerse myself in. The one thing I noticed mainly when I got back into England was out quiet it is here. I remember walking out the airport and just thinking, "...Wow." Because of how silent is seemed. In India, whenever you were awake, you could guarantee you'd hear the horns from the autos or people talking, or just some form of noise. Here, it is SO QUIET. In fact, it took me a little while to get used to it again. Crazy stuff.

All in all, I am so grateful for my time out there in India. I am grateful for being able to meet all the wonderful people we met, I am grateful for all the different foods we tried, I am grateful for everyone helping me with my fundraising, I am grateful towards Chennai Challenge for providing an absolute life-changing experience. I now really do see life with a whole different perspective; it's odd to think how just under three weeks can completely change you as a person. I can't urge people enough to sign up with Chennai Challenge for next year; I really can't emphasise how rewarding and brilliant the time out there is. Hopefully you all kept up with our blogs on the Chennai Challenge website(?!) If not, you can still read them now here! Also, if you'd like to know where all the fundraising money went, you can read about that here. There's some good reading material to get your teeth into.

Since being back in England, I have been doing a lot of thinking (Frances Corbett, thinking? What). As I said before, it's my final year of sixth form and we are being thrown decisions at us all the time. I am only seventeen, I feel like I'm too young to be deciding exactly what I want to do with my life yet. The main goal is going to drama school, but I am swinging towards the idea of British Sign Language and perhaps doing an interpreting course. I passed 102 of my Level One award and I have my final exam coming up at the beginning of November, so please pray for me! I think I'm dealing alright(ish) with the amount of work being given to us constantly, but I am trying to stay positive and keep reminding myself that in a year's time all of this hard-work will be over and will hopefully pay off. Even though this is the case, I don't want to leave school, I've only been at my new school for one year and now we're already so close to leaving next year, I don't feel like I've spent enough time with everyone whatsoever, but I am grateful for meeting so many people that have contributed to my life so much. (Gosh, it's not even Thursday). 

I guess I really should get back to my English essay before heading to the bus stop, so I am concluding this post RIGHT NOW. Thankyou once again to everyone for the last few months, and hopefully I will start blogging again more frequently soon. Even though I always say that, and we all know that doesn't happen. And I say my English essay, but really I am downloading some more music for my iPod. This is just as important as A Levels, right?

Jumping out of aeroplanes

Alas, one finally has internet. I have been planning to write a new post just before I go to India for a while now, but that happens to be difficult when the wifi at home is broken and I have ran out of 3G. Darn.

ANYHOW. Here I am. The last few weeks have been extremely exciting and I am now finally at the airport waiting to board my flight to London, where we will then be boarding our flight to CHENNAI. It's crazy how fast the last few months have flown by and the day is actually here when we're all ready to leave. After months and months of fundraising and preparation, Chennai Challenge 2014 has finally begun. (#deep)

A week and a day ago I did my skydive (which was my main fundraiser for Chennai Challenge) and it was literally the best thing that I have ever done. I loved it so much that I'm planning on saving up for the Accelerated Free Fall course so I can jump again, but on my own next time. How intense. I raised a good amount of money from the jump and it was makes things even better with the fact that I enjoyed it, so thankyou to everyone who has sponsored me! 

The year has been absolutely brilliant and so many good things have happened. I can't believe that I now have several things ticket off my bucket list (do a skydive, learn sign language, volunteer in India, etc) and all of this has happened within just under a year. I have now a raised a total amount of £1,911 for Chennai Challenge and I just want to make a final point of how grateful I am for everyone who has helped me raise THAG amount of money and to how many people have sponsored me. THANKYOU SO MUCH.

When I'm in India, I'll be blogging but through a different blog (dreadful, I know, how could I betray Blogger?) which is under the URL of www.franceselizabethcorbett.wordpress.com. The URL won't be working just yet as I haven't uploaded any posts yet, but as soon as I get to India I'm hoping to update it regularly to let everyone know what we're doing and how the project is going.

So from me, it's goodbye for the next three weeks. I am now sitting with everyone else who's playing UNO (I'm not being unsociable, I promise). 

Thankyou once again! Au revoir.

Chennai Challenge Fundraising Update/Ideas

So the last month and a bit has been pretty stressful with exams, hence the lack of blogging. Although, I have been up to quite abit and have been doing a lot in terms of fundraising for Chennai Challenge.

The big news is that I HAVE RAISED MY TOTAL OF £1,500! This is absolutely brilliant and I am eternally grateful to everyone who has donated and supported the cause. I've now raised my minimum, but this doesn't mean that I need to stop fundraising. As I haven't done my skydive or a carboot sale yet, I should hopefully be able to raise more for Chennai Challenge. I have pushed my target on JustGiving up to £1,600 which I'm sure that I'll be able to reach. Please carry on supporting me! 

I'm now going to list a few of the fundraising events that I've been doing to help raise my minimum amount so other people can get ideas if they're fundraising also.

1) Selling old clothes on eBay. This has been a great contributor to raising the money as I have lots of old clothes that I don't need and am more than willing to sell them and then give the money to charity. 

2) Selling Chennai Challenge wristbands. These have been highly popular as the person who's buying is getting something back for their money. To do this, myself and a few friends who are also going contacted a wristband company, designed the wristbands and then ordered them. I've been selling them for £1 each and have almost sold 300 of them. :-) 

3) Collecting spare 50ps that you have. My grandma has been doing this for me and she raised up to £100! 

4) Skydive. Although I haven't actually done this yet, I have received a number of sponsors. As this is something that is completely out of my comfort-zone then people are more than willing to sponsor me because of this.

5) Cake sales. A highly popular one. No one can say no to cakes.

6) Rabbit flannels. Myself and my two grandmothers made rabbits out of small flannels and then put Easter eggs inside of them. These were highly popular around Easter time, but now we're still doing this but with bath bombs instead as obviously the Easter eggs are now out of season.

7) Sweet jar. I bought a small jar and filled it with sweets and asked people to guess how many sweets were in the jar for 50p. This has raised quite a bit and I will be announcing who's won it on Friday! Woooooo! 

8) Carboot sale. I haven't done this yet, but obviously this is a good way of getting rid of old belongings whilst also raising money for charity. 

And that's about it, I think. I've thoroughly enjoyed fundraising and I cannot wait whatsoever to get to India already. Only 52 more days to go!

If you have the time, please like the Chennai Challenge page on Facebook. https://m.facebook.com/chennaichallenge

You can also still donate to my JustGiving page which you can visit by clicking this link here.

Au revoir. 

Decisions

WARNING: BORING POST.

As of late, I have found that absolutely everywhere and everything involves a large matter of decisions. I only recently noticed this the other day as I'm generally quite laid back about things, but all of this talk of university is beginning to seem extremely terrifying. I feel that sixth form has flown by incredibly quickly and I am no where near ready enough to be choosing where I want to spend three years of my life when I don't even know how to cook a suitable dinner. Nevertheless, I am still trying to stay happy despite the many decisions that I may have to face soonish. I'm considering a gap year doing volunteering work in a foreign country, but I guess I'll pass that bridge when I arrive at it.

My job is going reasonably well and I feel that I've settled in happily. My school-work and revision is going swiftly and I'm generally getting everything finished. 

With my next training weekend for Chennai Challenge next week, I have already topped my target of £1,000 by this meeting and I am now only £200 away from my minimum amount. This really is brilliant and I couldn't be more grateful to everyone donating and being so generous.

And here's a picture from The Railway Children seeing as you're THAT interested.

Don't lie, of course you are.

Thankful Thursday #18

It's quite shocking how long I've been writing this blog for and I've only done eighteen thankful Thursday's. Hmmm. Actually, it's quite shocking in general just how much I've been abandoning my blog. As exams are rolling along very soon, I'm not going to say that I'll try and blog more frequently as I just need to focus on the next month to get it all out of the way. 

As I haven't been blogging so much, there's many things that I'm thankful for but I'll try and just include a few. (Queue not being able to think of any now).

- GAME OF THRONES IS BACK. So is Bates Motel, but we all know that GoT is more important.

- The run of The Railway Children running entirely smoothly and successfully.

- Spending a wonderful birthday with Lewis, my family and getting the opportunity to see Henry IV Part One at the RSC.

- Finally purchasing a pair of Buffalo boots.

- Having my next project lined up; Animal Farm at the Lichfield Garrick in October. 

- Spending a lovely Easter with my family and finally being able to eat crisps and McDonald's again. 

- Starting my new part-time job at KFC and looooooving it. 

- Popping to Alton Towers on Monday with Lewis, Sarah and Anthony. 

- Raising £1,300+ for Chennai Challenge (only £200 more to go)!

The Easter holidays have treated me extraordinarily well but I feel that I haven't been working hard enough. Lacking motivation isn't too positive.

You can still donate to my JustGiving page for Chennai Challenge at: http://justgiving.com/Frances-Corbett

Tortured Life - Kickstarter

TPublications are now working on a new project (via Kickstarter) to create the next issues of Tortured Life, a thriller graphic novel by Neil Gibson. After reading the first issue of Tortured Life (which is free to read on their Kickstarter page and their website), it is very clear that what they have in store is going to be highly successful and completely enrapturing. After their Twisted Dark and Tabatha graphic novels that have already been published and were completely brilliant, Tortured Life is guaranteed to follow in their footsteps and keep TPublications' theme of excellence running along smoothly.

So, in a nutshell...

Tortured Life is about a guy named Richard Carter who has somehow developed the ability to see how each and every person dies. After firstly thinking that this ability was given to him to help save others' lives, he then begins to feel powerless as he is seeing the inevitable fate of all the people around him; resulting in Richard living an incredibly Tortured Life. 

I have loved all of TPublications' graphic novels so far and have thoroughly enjoyed supporting them through being a member of their street team. When first meeting them and trying out their comics in early 2013, it has been exhilarating to see how they have grown in just over a year. With the brilliance of Gibson, Wijingaard and Watters, Tortured Life is guaranteed to be a novel to remember.

Support TPublications on Kickstarter by clicking here.

Thankful Thursday #17

I really should apologise for not blogging this time, as it was purely down to laziness. I always think, "Hmm, maybe I should write that blog post now," but end up postponing it every. Single. Day. Nevertheless, I am here now and here is a new blog post. You're welcome.

This week I am thankful for: 

- Going to London this Saturday and seeing 1984.

- Getting a B in a Psychology mock. B. I GOT A B. (Big thing for me).

- Finally deciding to give up reading Emma by Jane Austen. I'd decided to force myself to read it as it's "one of those classic books you need to read before you die" but eventually abandoned it as I've never read anything so pretentious in my whole life. Holla at Jane for being one of the first women writers, but damn her writing is dull. Gah.

- Finally having a good clear out in my wardrobe. 

- Selling out for the run of The Railway Children. 

Now the big one. I AM HALF WAY TO MY TOTAL AMOUNT FOR CHENNAI CHALLENGE. HALLELUJAH. 

 

Well I am 53%, so I guess that's even better. I am so thankful to everyone who has donated and supported the fundraising as it completely means so much to me. Quite soon I'll be holding an Open Mic night at school as it'll be a good opportunity for people to sing in front of others and to do a little more fundraising. 

And on the subject of fundraising, I'm now selling these babies: 

It was difficult to find a decent angle of these, but myself and my grandma have been making little rabbits out of flannels with creme eggs in the middle. It was a sweet little idea, and they're ideal at the moment as we're rolling up to Easter. I'm selling them for £2 each, so if anyone wants to buy one and would prefer a certain type of egg/colour flannel then please let me know.

You can still sponsor me here at: http://justgiving.com/Frances-Corbett

Perhaps I'll blog again next week if I don't put it off AGAIN. 

Imogen Finkle Appreciation. 

Thankful Thursday #16

Today I have realised how many pointless things that I buy and how I'm not thinking much about what I spend my money on. For example, last night I spontaneously bought a shirt from Urban Outfitters (which is uncommon for me to buy from as it's so pricey) without really thinking about it much. I liked the shirt, but it's just another item of clothing that would someday end up at the back of my wardrobe. Thankfully, my order was cancelled for some reason (which I don't really care why) and my card hasn't been charged. After thinking about it, I'm going to spend that money on sponsoring a child in a third-world country instead. I feel that this is an extremely positive way to be spending my money instead of pointlessly throwing it about on expensive clothing, as someone will be greatly benefitting from it and I will be helping to improve someone else's life. Just a thought.

This week I am thankful for:

- Being alive

- Booking my ticket to see Macbeth for the first time! It's one of those Shakespeare plays I have been dying to see for ages, so I'm so thankful that it's being performed in Birmingham.

- Going out for small meals with my Grandma occasionally each week

- Discussing with my parents about the skydive that I'm planning to do for Chennai Challenge. Fingers crossed it'll be happening, but I don't blame them for being hesitant. Jumping out of a helicopter 10,000 feet above the ground is kind of a big thing.

- Beginning BSL classes yesterday with Elizabeth and now knowing how to fingerspell the alphabet. I'm finding it incredibly difficult to stop. 

- Somewhat beginning to be a little more organised.

Coming back to school this week has been lovely as it's always nice to catch up with people I haven't seen for a week and it's always surprising to find out how much has happened within a week. As it's Lent coming up soon, I've been thinking a little about the things I should be giving up. I'm swinging towards the classic chocolate, crisps and McDonald's idea as I quite frankly have too much of those in my life and I could definitely do with giving them up over Lent as it'll be both challenging but rewarding. 

So that's that. I just had a terrifying moment where I thought I clicked "Cancel" instead of "Done," so I guess I'm thankful I clicked "Done" instead. What are you thankful for this week?

On a final note, here's two TOTALLY arty shots I took with my iPhone of the Chennai Challenge wristbands I have been selling recently for £1 each. You should totally buy one if you see me around. Au revoir. 

ADDED: I completely forgot about this. I am thankful of Callum Steventon buying a Chennai Challenge wristband. That's correct, ladies and gentlemen, our dear Callum has stopped being rather self-absorbed and has actually donated to charity. I think this deserves a round of applause. *vigorous cheers from a stadium filled with twenty thousand people with a cheerleader celebration in the centre of the pitch.* Happy now? 

Thankful Thursday #15 (even though it's Saturday)

I said to myself many times on Thursday that I would write this post but of course,

I kept forgetting. So you're getting this post on a Saturday instead. Wowee.

This week I am thankful for:

- Yankee Candles

- Raising £200 for Chennai Challenge within a week

- My Grandmothers for helping me so much with my fundraising

- My new map arriving

- Shopping trips to Birmingham with Matt

- Finding a hole puncher in a drawer I never venture in (I'm always in need of a holepuncher for school and now I finally have one- HURRAY).

- Buying a fresh new pair of Docs and a pinafore (yes, I spent much more than I should have done but let's not talk about that).

- Megan buying me a Mary money bank!

- Settling into work really well; I'm really starting to enjoy working there.

- Finally watching episode one and two of My Mad Fat Diary and loving it.

This week has been EVENTFUL. I'm on quite a low at the moment but I'm trying to think as positively as I can. My fundraising is going spendidly which is brilliant but quite a fair few things are getting me down at the moment which is a shame. On the bright side of things, I have a wonderful family and friends that are supporting me and helping me a lot who I am eternally grateful for. 

I didn't get Lady GaGa tickets but I'm off to see God of Carnage at the Lichfield Garrick tonight. Very exciting times.

Cake Sale for Chennai Challenge - February Fundraising!

My grandmother invited me along to her little club that she attends each Wednesday with her friends to deliver a small talk about Chennai Challenge and to hold a little cake sale! 

Myself and Elizabeth attempted to make some cakes yesterday morning and besides tasting delightful, the presentation of them was slightly incredibly disappointing.

It's supposed to be a smiley face. Gosh.

Thankfully, my mother made plenty of beautiful cakes for me to also sell and they all went down a treat (yes, even the ones me and Elizabeth made). I made a total of £37.00 (within half an hour!) which is absolutely brilliant. I'm also selling Chennai Challenge wristbands for £1 each and they're going very successfully; I've already sold 60 out of 300 within five days!

Fundraising is going splendidly, but I've still got far to go! 

Remember that you can donate online via justgiving!

www.justgiving.com/Frances-Corbett

You can also now donate over text by sending FRAC64 with the amount to 70070.

Visit the Chennai Challenge website by clicking the logo above.

Thankful Thursday #14

Ooh lah lah. It's my fourteenth thankful Thursday and it's the fourteenth of February tomorrow which means VALENTINE'S DAY.

This week I am thankful for:

- My family contributing so much in my fundraising for Chennai Challenge 2014

- Finally sorting out my work experience

- Going to see Frozen at the Birmingham REP with Olivia last Friday and ending up at some after party at the theatre

- My new tartan jeans

- A new hat (which I literally can't take off)

- LUSH Body Wash

- FINALLY HAVING A BOOK SHELF!

- Mock performance of The Golden Goose at the Lichfield Garrick going splendidly 

- Free lessons which are spent doing nothing (it's bad, I know)

- Spending the night in with Lewis tomorrow

- The wonderful drawing Nola created of me

Things are stiiiiiiill going brilliantly and I could not be happier. I've had another busy week. Perhaps I'll buy some Lady GaGa tickets tomorrow.

Ah, life. 

Chennai Challenge - JustGiving

Just a quick post to let y'all now that I have now set up a JustGiving page for my fundraising for India. The donations are super secure and go straight to the charity; it's 100% trustworthy and safe. I've already raised 5% of my total amount in only a few hours which is so wonderful!

Sponsors for my skydive can also be made here.

 Every donation will be fully appreciated; no matter how big or small.
You can visit my JustGiving page by clicking on the Chennai Challenge logo underneath.

Thanks!

www.justgiving.com/Frances-Corbett

Thankful Thursday #13

IT'S THE FIRST THANKFUL THURSDAY OF 2014 (for me, at least)!

I have MANY things to be thankful for at the moment:

- I am now working part time at a cafe!

- Issue #1 of Harley Quinn

- Seeing Dealer's Choice at the Crescent Theatre Tuesday evening

- Getting good grades in my mocks

- New episodes of Kill La Kill and American Horror Story

- Sorting out a sign language course with Elizabeth

- Planning all my fundraising and my skydive

- PARTY FRIDAY (tomorrow)

- Old, blank tatty books from Camden

- Visiting the Wellcome Collection

The last two weeks have been fantastic. I've done so much and things are continuing to go really well at the moment. I would not change one single thing. 

Maybe I'd ask for no English essays though. I'm sure that would be very pleasant.

Here's an old photo from one of my first trips to London in 2012. You're welcome.

Chennai Challenge Meeting #1

Last Saturday, myself, Sarah, Mary and Chloe trekked on over to London for our first meeting for this year's Chennai Challenge. As I mentioned in my previous blog post, I am very excited about this and was sincerely looking forward to the day. 

Our meeting was held at the Young Vic (where I'll hopefully be seeing A Streetcar Named Desire later in the year) and here we met the rest of our group who we'll be heading over to India with. There was a grand total of thirteen of us and everyone was very friendly and motivated for the project. It was great hearing from people who had already been before and helped explain their views on what it would be like for us when we go over. 

We had an introduction from Emma and Rob (our project leaders) and some background information about Chennai Challenge, what they have previously achieved and what they keep striving towards. We go over to India for up to three weeks, helping at the YMCA orphanage in Chennai with after school sessions and then also take them on a holiday up to Yellagiri where we give them a fun week of activities. The Blue Edge aspect of the project also sounds very interesting; helping and teaching young adults English. 

We then discussed our expectations of the project and what we think it would be like over in Chennai. As I haven't been to India before, I'm completely clueless as to what it would actually be like. From what I've heard, I'm assuming it will be loud, busy, colourful and eye-opening. 

Mary gave us a song (which is not surprising) which is going to be perfect for when we're over there. Many people said that the crazier you are, the more the kids love you and enjoy themselves. This should be a lot of fun and shouldn't be too embarrassing seeing as everyone will be in it together!

The discussion of fundraising also came up and we discussed various methods of raising money. Someone suggested to me on a train journey not long ago that I hold a variety show evening at a local theatre (possibly my school's). Isaac told us that we should focus on doing as less as possible, for example it may cost us a lot of money to rent out the theatre and then possibly not many people would turn up, causing there to be no profit! We're going to aim on breaking up our fundraising into chunks, doing little parts at a time. Mary, Chloe, Sarah and I are thinking of buying some wristbands to sell for Chennai; helping everyone get something in return for their money! We're going to get on this as soon as possible as we don't want to leave the fundraising until it's too late. 

After Emma's Thought for the Day (which is something we will be doing each day in Chennai), the meeting finally ended and I had a true sense of who I will be working with and what I will expect in the summer. After seeing many video clips and hearing many stories from people who have been previously, I know that I have everything to love forward to. Hopefully this will be a large eye-opener and will give me a different perspective on life as I currently know it.

For the rest of my day in London (as I didn't want to go home straight away, I mean it's LONDON), I visited the Wellcome Collection and then went for dinner at a fish and chip shop in Camden. The day was extremely busy, but terribly worth it.

Here's a few picture's from the day:

After ANOTHER £22.90 train ticket  (I never have any luck with trains) and a #yolo henna pattern on my wrist, I finally made it back to Birmingham successfully. I feel that I'm in London so much; time for an Oyster card. 

"Be the change you want to see in the world." - Ghandi

Chennai Challenge 2014

Here's a sneaky little blog post in a small break that I'm having from school work.

A few nights ago, I found out that I've been accepted onto a team to travel to India in the Summer 2014 to help out at an orphanage and then take all the kids to a place called Chennai where they will receive a holiday! A good friend of mine went a few years back and highly recommended it to me, so naturally I am very excited and exhilarated about being accepted onto the team.

Over the next few months, I will be doing plenty of fundraising and letting people know about the work that Chennai Challenge does, as well as attending training days to prepare me for my trip to India. 

As I said before, I am SUPER excited about being able to go along! As it's on my bucket list (on the left of my blog), it'll be nice to get that ticked off. Hopefully if I enjoy it that much, I'll get a chance to go back again in the future.

I'll be keeping a small update here every now and again about how my fundraising is going and keeping everyone updated on my preparation for going along. 

As well as this, I will be having to keep on top of rehearsals, learning Japanese and school work. The next few months are going to be SO exciting. 

HELLO 2014 - NYE, Henry V & Faith Winter Break

WELL HEY EVERYONE. Today is one of my work days as I haven't been dedicating enough time to my school work, so this may just be a quick one. 

The last week has been extraordinarily busy. With NYE, then London and then Stonyhurst, I have literally been non-stop. It's been BRILLIANT.

For New Years Eve, I had a girly night out with my best friends. We all went over to Tuesday's to spend the late afternoon together and gradually got ready throughout the evening. Spending New Year's with my favourite girlfriends was definitely the best way to be entering 2014. 

I hit the sales a few days after Christmas but never managed to find anything that took to my liking; the shops were just so busy and I hate crowds so I didn't really spend that long looking anyway! I decided to outfit repeat and wear my white River Island dress complimented by a simple pair of black heels with a small pearl necklace and red lipstick. LESS IS MORE. 

My main Christmas present was tickets to see Henry V at the Noel Coward Theatre in London, starring Jude Law. My wonderful parents managed to get us tickets somehow and it was absolutely breathtaking.

Jude Law is one of my favourite actors, so it was such a brilliant evening being able to see him in action on stage. He was completely enveloped in the role of Henry, performing with both sheer brilliance and passion. I can only dream of being that good at acting! LIFE GOAL SET.

I bought the poster from the theatre (as seen in the first photo) and today I am hopefully framing it and putting it up in my room. It was such a wonderful day out; hopefully I'll get the chance to see more West End productions throughout 2014.

I left London early the next morning and made my way over to Stonyhurst for the Faith Winter Break. I've only previously been on the younger faith breaks, so this was my first year at the older conference. I was a little nervous of not knowing anyone, but it turned out that plenty of people who I knew from years and years ago all came along aswell! 

The break consisted of prayer, discussions and socialising. It was brilliant being around so many other young people who practise the same religion that I do, so that was always a plus. I've definitely made plenty of new friendships of which I hope to sustain for a long time to come.

The main quote that the session was based around was:

"I have called you by name, you are mine." (Isaiah 43:1) 

This meant that the session was based around vocations and this was the subject of all four of the talks;

1) Baptism

2) Marriage

3) Religious Life

4) Our Place in the Mystical Body of Christ

If not a little difficult to understand at times, the talks were all superb and was presented eloquently and accessible. All four of the speakers were brilliant and they answered the questions from all of us excellently. My eyes have been opened to many different things and I have thoroughly been enlightened to certain topics that I didn't understand before the session.

As I said, there was plenty of socialising involved, including a Ceilidh (my first ever). It was sad how the session was so short; I felt that as soon as everyone was starting to get to know eachother even better it was time to go home. This makes me all the more excited for the summer break though which is a whole five days!

To conclude, happy new year. Hello 2014.

Lord Jesus Christ, we believe in you and all your Church teaches. We give ourselves entirely to you because you are truly the Son of the Living God. Confirm and strengthen our faith. Amen.