8 vlogs & blogs about lifestyle that inspire us in 2021

8 vlogs & blogs about lifestyle that inspire us in 2021

We’re asked frequently who we love to watch/read online, so we had a think about our faves in 2021 and have compiled our top 8 vlogs and blogs about lifestyle for you right here!

If you were following us back in 2020, you’ll know we had started to make positive strides on our video work. We documented the ins and outs of house and pet sitting around the world and showcased many beautiful destinations.

It was a pleasure and a privilege.

Sadly, it all came to an end. But we know that many of you reading this have also been impacted by all that the COVID pandemic has shut down. Not a great time to be a content creator in the travel business.

All of the time and learning we put into our content hasn’t gone astray though, and it’s for this reason we love to find vlogs and blogs about lifestyle that keep us coming back for more. There’s been a few standouts for us in 2021.

Here are our favourites in case you’re in need of a little fresh inspiration too.

8 vlogs and blogs about lifestyle that keep us inspired in 2021 :)

 

For travel inspo:

📽 LeAw Leave Everything and Wander: Luca & Sara

We stumbled across this travel blogging couple by accident, but we just love their content. Sara and Luca are Italian, and they are so so cute. Their channel features an enviable line-up of destinations and experiences, and we have been making our way through their travel playlist.

Most recently, the pair were showcasing the delights on offer in their home country, Italy, where they ended up laying low during the worst of COVID.

Sara and Luca are authentic and likeable. Their video production is terrific too, and includes stunning drone shots, great editing, and soundtrack. The pair also publish a beautiful blog and are all over social media.

If you, like us, are wanderlusting like crazy to set foot back into a dazzling Italian landscape, take a ride with these two in their travel van, Luigi, and get inspired about where to go to next.

 

Island life (our fave island)

📽 Dwayne Muffin in Ibiza

We make no secret of the fact we are huge fans of the island of Ibiza in Spain. In fact, it maddens us that people who have never been to Ibiza have a preconception of what the island is.

Sure, there’s partying (hell yeah); but there’s a magical and mysterious side to this place too.

Dwayne is an English lad living the dream and actually residing and working in Ibiza full time. While the pandemic has hit his business hard – along with many in tourist destinations like Ibiza and its neighbouring Balearic Islands – Dwayne has taken the opportunity to give regular vlogging a go. And hey, are we grateful! If we can’t be there, we’ll wander around the bars and the beaches and boats here on YouTube, living vicariously through Dwayne.

Thanks to his time on the island living and working with the locals, he also gets some cool behind the scenes glimpses into venues and events that most of us wouldn’t.

A great channel if you’re a fan of Ibiza (or think you might be one day).

 

Expat entrepreneur life

Mike Thurston

We first stumbled across Mike’s channel when he filmed his 2020 summer in Ibiza. Man, were we jealous. All the pretty shots and the pretty people and pretty places. Jealous.

But we moved past that to see that actually, we wanted in on more of this vicarious adventuring.

Mike has an enviable life brimming with travel, a successful business, a new fitness app, and plenty of time at the gym. To be fair, he does work hard (on his business and abs) but he seems like a nice guy with fun friends… who wouldn’t get motivated through watching?

He’s just spent another highly enviable summer in Ibiza and has returned to his adopted home of Dubai to get to work again. It’s glossy and fun – count us in.

 

Manifesting and LOA

📽 Mary Kate

Want to shift your mindset to improve your circumstances?

Believe you can manifest the best things in life?

Me too!

While there are hundreds of manifesting and Law of Attraction content creators and mentors out there, for some reason this year I’ve really been drawn to Mary Kate’s channel.

She’s passionate and interesting, yet humble and not over the top like some other names in this space are. I just like her vibe and I think she’s doing a great job at influencing in this space.

Her training and meditations are helpful too. I’d say her work would resonate mostly with women under the age of 45, but if you’re into the topics she covers, take a look and see for yourself.

 

Fashion and beauty

📽 Busbee Style

I’ve got to say, I’m super behind the times following YouTubers for fashion and beauty content. I’m a ‘magazines’ girl of old. But, I somehow stumbled across Erin Busbee’s channel and have been hooked ever since.

A former TV news reporter turned stylist and fashion content creator, Erin’s approach is engaging and honest, not to mention really informative. I had to leave my entire wardrobe of clothes, accessories and shoes behind in England, and my enthusiasm to start again in a hot climate that I do not enjoy as much as I do one with four seasons was seriously lacking.

But, Erin’s helped make shopping fun again!

She’s got a great blog and Instagram you can follow too.

Currently she and her family are taking time out from life and work at home in the USA to live in Spain. Another reason why I think Erin is just too cool.

 

Puppy love (and training!)

📽 Zac George

Call it a midlife crisis, or more like a COVID crisis, but we went and got a puppy!

What?

Yep, we decided that after years of being without a dog – stalking dogs in the street and on the Tube in London, saying hello to everyone else’s dog and generally wanting nothing more than a dog – this little man arrived 👇

 

Now, he had a lot to live up to. Our last dog, Harry, a blue cattle dog, was a prince among dogs. He was beloved by all – even non-dog people. The best dog ever.

London – named after our much-loved adopted home in England, is a West Highland Terrier. When he was a puppy, we’d frequently change the ‘terrier’ to terror. Wow. Puppies might be cute but there’s an evil streak in there 😉

Which brings us to Zak’s channel. We got obsessed with this personable dog trainer’s channel before the puppy ‘arrived’ and during his first few months. Everything on routine and crate training and all in between was spot on.

This channel is a great one if you’re looking for actionable advice on all sorts of dog behavioural challenges and training. It’s also great if you’re quite simply, a dog person. We do owe Zak a debt of gratitude for getting this far with the cheeky Westie though. 

 

Travel and content creation

Two of our favourite channels for content creation and travel follow:

📽 Lost LeBlanc

Stunning filming, editing, locations and great advice on content creation: we love this channel.

Christian (Lost LeBlanc) is literally living the dream. His ‘about’ profile says:

“QUIT my job to travel the world. This is my story of unconditionally pursuing my passion for filmmaking and travel.”

You see why we’re in, right?

 

📽 TopJaw

These guys create awesome productions from locations we love in the UK and Europe. More enviably, they focus on food and drink!

Each location is brimming with dozens of great places to eat through all day long. We started keeping a bucket list based on their recommendations but gave up – there’s too many.

We’ll come back to it when we hit the northern hemisphere once again.

A great, lively and channel – easy to binge.

 

Who are your favourite content creators? Let us know in the comments! 

 

Travel Live Learn vlog

Travel Live Learn vlog

 

Have you seen our latest clips? We’ll post below from Tuscany, but you can subscribe here on YouTube and never miss one :) We also post alternative content on Instagram and Facebook, linked on this site.

Let us know if you have requests for clips from the UK and Europe and we’ll see what we can do!

Thanks for stopping by,

Coops and Sarah

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6 reasons why you should create a YouTube account

 

6 reasons why you should create a YouTube account

6 reasons why you should create a YouTube account

While I’m more a woman of the written word, during the summer break Cooper really started to explore the visual world of videography and encouraged me to create a YouTube account to showcase our newer content.

Inspired by the Casey Neistat-esque vloggers of the world, I’ll admit that Cooper’s actually gotten pretty good at setting up creative shots and editing stories together. He’s simply gone about teaching himself, which is how I’d encourage anyone to better understand digital content production (e.g. social media, blogging, vlogging). He’s the first to acknowledge that we need to improve our editing software and invest in new technology (no Cooper, we’re not buying a drone!); but despite every day offering a new learning, I’m actually really impressed by what he’s come up with, particularly as the resources he’s had available are very average by professional industry standards.

Here’s a sample:

We’ve all heard it before: content is king and video reigns supreme.

This is for several reasons, the top ones being that video is engaging, plus it is easy to digest in a world overflowing with more hours of content than we have available in several lifetimes. Whether you are producing or simply consuming video, there are excellent reasons why you should create a YouTube account to enhance your own experience and enjoyment.

With Cooper exploring the world of vlogging and professional YouTubers, I’ve become more interested in the merits of the medium and have been thinking about why it’s a worthwhile idea to create a YouTube account for personal use.

Here’s some ideas based on my own experiences that might be worth considering if you’re not already signed-in to the service:

 

Enhance your own user experience: 6 reasons why you should create a YouTube account

 

Enjoy a more personalised experience

I’ve been using YouTube as a signed-in member for a few years. Yes, this has been linked to the fact that I use Google Chrome and I’m also logged-in to Google+.

Essentially this just means that I’m a registered user, and I can see my name and profile picture up the top of the screen.

YouTube remembers what I watch and what I’m subscribed to, and helpfully suggests similar content. I’m a huge fan of Hayhouse authors like Gabby Bernstein and Doreen Virtue, and because I watch so much of their content, YouTube recognises this and shares other ideas with me. I’ve discovered plenty excellent vloggers, authors, musicians and content producers through these personalised suggestions. This would not happen if I did not create a YouTube account to sign-in to.

Never miss awesome new content again

So you start using YouTube to view interesting content, which is great, but what happens if you do not create a YouTube account?

First off, you’ll have to search for those channels every time you visit the site to see what’s new, and second, you’ll miss new content created by your favourite channel producers.

If you create a YouTube account, you can opt in to receiving alerts about your favourite vloggers or channels that produce content that inspires you in life, whether it be about health, fashion, food, travel, beauty, news, sport or entertainment.

Learn new things

The best thing about YouTube is that it is free to use. If you’re a savvy viewer you can use YouTube to teach yourself absolutely anything, from how to set up a podcast to learning a language, taking yoga classes or developing an interest in knitting.

Similarly, if you’ve got knowledge to impart yourself, you could create a YouTube account to share your own wisdom and generate publicity for your business or service.

Get involved in communities

Like any other social media, you can use YouTube to get involved in communities with like-minded people.

Unfortunately I have to say that in my personal opinion I don’t find YouTube to be brimming with the kindest of digital consumers (head over to Instagram for a more supportive experience). However, that’s not to say that if you’re following content producers who inspire you that you can’t connect with other genuine fans or people with similar interests.

The same rules apply here as on other social media – if you like something, show your support by giving a thumbs up, leaving a positive comment, sharing the link or subscribing to the channel.

It’s called ‘social’ media for a reason, so be social – the more you put in, the more you’re likely to get out of the it.

Obviously though, you need to create a YouTube account to have this user experience.

Set up playlists

I go to the gym most mornings around 5am (true story!). It’s thanks to Cooper – he drags me there, pretty much. I’m not that motivated on my own. I’m particularly expert at hitting the snooze button on my phone, but I digress… It’s really early, as you can appreciate, and my brain isn’t in any shape to figure out what I need to watch or listen to in order to be properly motivated. This is where my playlists come in handy!

I often come across interviews I want to ‘watch later’ or music that I can work out to. I save it all to various playlists so I can easily access without any hassle or thought.

You can create content too

If you’re inspired – as Cooper has been – then you too can create a YouTube account to share your own wisdom, adventures, life or business tips. The world as we know it is only going to continue to grow in this direction. The upside of being so connected is that we can all contribute to the sharing of positive and useful messages (and drown out those that are not-so-helpful).

Once I would have simply accessed YouTube to play a video I’d sought out for one reason or another. I’ve realised that as an active signed-in user I can get much more out of it, making the service work for me and my own unique lifestyle needs.

More information:

If you’ve not already (and you’re not adverse to the internet knowing more about your likes or dislikes), find out more information on YouTube’s help pages.

Once you’re set up, maybe you’ll consider subscribing to our new channel too. In the future we’ll be sharing plenty of fun travel content, plus digital media tips and tricks. If this is something you’re interested in, then maybe we can inspire you.