#Demo2012

I wrote this as I was on the coach trundling back north from London. I've had a good day at #demo2012.

#demo2012 was a march organized by NUS which is the national union for students. Universities join you up automatically when you enroll.

Homemade Christmas decorations

Well I'm fully into the swing of Christmas, yesterday was spent putting a 9 hour playlist together on Spotify. Today I have started decorating my room with some home made decorations.

Usually I like to buy Christmas decorations in the January sales but I failed to bring any to uni with me  steal any from home. Either way I am not paying £1 for 2m of crappy tinsel, yes I'm looking at you Morrisons and Poundland! So this year I'm making my own, unless anyone would like to post me some decorations. Please?

Here is what I have so far.

Paper Chains

These are brilliant, they reminded me so much of my childhood . Simply loop long rectangles of paper together.

 Woven paper balls.

These were hard. This is how they are supposed to look, mine....not so much.
I wont be attempting this again. They look good online but for me, they take a little too much concentration

 Woven hearts.

The tutorial is here for a basket style one, I just followed the first few steps to make a more 2D wall hanging.
I'm going to do a few more of these in more christmassy colours.
(Please excuse the fact the glue is still wet).

 What I plan to make

Pom poms! 
Like these here . Again I used to make these as a kid and I simply adore them.
Pine cones covered in glitter.
Remember making those as a kid? Glitter every where!
Christmassy Bunting
It seems to be all the rage in shops this year
Something that smells nice
I love the smell of Christmas, if I manage to make something that captures the 'smell of Christmas' I will let you know

Have you made any Christmas decorations? Feel free to share them below!

Keep it scrimpy.
Laura.

Money saving tip #1 Toothpaste.

So here we all are merrily brushing our teeth twice a day for two mins. You get through quite a lot of toothpaste doing that.

When you try to get to those illusive the last drags of paste are you a roller or a pusher? I'm a chopper!

It's really simple. Put the lid back on, cut of the bottom but keep the plastic as this is your new lid. Then wiggle your tooth brush in and scoop out some toothpaste. I didn't realize exactly how much toothpaste went to waste until I did this. I feel kind of sorry for all that toothpaste going to waste.

I'm thinking of doing these little tips as regular posts, what do you think?

Keep it scrimpy
Laura.

Use by the best before date (food labels)

Food is by far one of the biggest drains on a student budget. So I find it really annoying when people waste food, just because it’s ‘out of date’ when most of the time there is nothing wrong with it.

There is a lot of confusion about all the dates on food packaging and I don’t blame you, it can be confusing at the best of times. So, here is my quick guide to all those dates you find on your tin of beans.

Use-by date.

This one is self explanatory, you should use it by that date.After that date BIN IT. Although personally if the 13th of December rolled round I would still eat it. Use your common sense

Foods that are labelled with this usually include ‘high risk’ foods such as milk, eggs , and fish

Best before

This label has very little to do with how safe the food is to eat. This is purely the date that the supermarket feel the product is at it’s best. Foods like these do not need to be thrown out after this date as they are longer lasting foods such as pasta or often frozen foods. They are still edible after this date. When eating foods past the best before date use that common sense again. Does it taste off? Has it mysteriously turned green? Yes? Then BIN! If not then go ahead, enjoy.

Sell-by (and Display-until)

Ignore this; this has nothing to do with you. This is for the supermarket staff. See the use-by and best before dates instead.

Keep it scrimpy
Laura

Vote!

I'm feeling totally inspired by the current US election but,  I don't feel enough young people are active in politics. I am really passionate about politics. I studied it at A-level where I studied both UK and US politics. Even before that I grew up watching the news every night so I always knew what was going on in the world. When I was in primary school political education didn't exist, moving to high school nothing was really mentioned until about year 10 in 'citizenship' when it was briefly touched upon. I think this is a really poor show. No wonder young people are apathetic about politics, nobody tells them about it! Lets be honest question time isn't the most attractive program to watch before bed.

Most university's have political groups (Labour , Conservative, Plaid Cymru, and LibDem here in Bangor). These usually take the form of societies, I would really recommend joining them even if you just go along to a few things in the year..I joined one (I'm not going to say which one) not because I vote for that party all the time, I just feel that my ideologies (general ideas and morals) fit more with that party.

Registering to vote is your chance to have your say. Don't know who to vote for? In the run up to an election the BBC tends to have really good briefing of each party's manifesto (what they plan to do). Take a look at these if you aren't sure. Please please please don't think that voting is a waste of time it really isn't. Young people need more of a voice and by simply turning out to vote on election day, you make a big difference.

So here is what I want you to do, while you have a free 10 mins at some point I want you all to do me a favor; pop over to http://www.aboutmyvote.co.uk . It really doesn't take long to register to vote but you can really make a big difference.

As a student you can be registered in both your home constituency and your university constituency. You get two votes!

Keep it scrimpy!
Laura.

Homesickness.

Sorry for the lack of recent activity, I've been hit with Homesickness. Again. Most freshers, and even second and third years, will suffer at some point. There are several kinds of homesickness that I have observed.

The one that hits you like a train

This is what I suffer with. I was doing really well for the first few weeks. Then in week 4 it just hit me. Anything and everything would set me off, the smell of bread in Morrisons set me off once and I just stood there on the verge of a breakdown. Then when I got back to my room the photo of my dog set me off again. This kind of homesickness passes very quickly, I found I had a miserable night in, just moping around watching Bambi (boy was that a bad I idea).

The one that makes you seem like a hermit.

With this one people just get really miserable, don’t want to go out, don’t want to eat, or function in any way. If you suffer from this one then try and let at least one person know, flatmates really are understanding when it comes to homesickness, we have all been there.

The one where you just get drunk.

 This one is bad. It costs you way too much to go out and drown your sorrows every night. Plus you feel awful the next morning. If you really must go out and get drunk every night, don’t go on your own, go out with a group and really try and involve yourself in the night out.

The one where you turn into your mother.

I also suffer from this and I am very sorry to all my flatmates who put up with this. My mother is a massive clean freak. This means that sometimes I just have to clean. I can spend hours cleaning. I don’t even know why. I hate cleaning. I also cook a lot when I'm homesick, trying to recreate those homely meals, I make massive portions so my housemates are all well fed for the week after.

Homesickness is totally normal, embrace it, tell your family you are missing them, chances are they are missing you. You need to find your own way of coping with homesickness, mine is to grab a sad film and some popcorn and have a good cry. Although if you are suffering really badly and it is affecting your ability to function normally then don’t suffer alone, most university’s have a phone number you can call just for a chat. Here at Bangor we have Nightline that is run by students for students. You just call them up and they listen.

Keep it scrimpy
Laura.