Sand and Sun (Guest post by Hannah G)

Hello readers! It's Hannah Here from The Caged Bird Sings. As you may have guessed today's topic is all about the beach. The beach is one of my favorite places in the entire world, because I can find so many treasures,creatures, and I can be free. Today I just  happened to take a grand adventure to the beach accompanied with some friends. Let me tell you the story.

As some of you may know it was a very hot and sunny Maine day. After quite a long and strenuous field hockey practice me, and two of my best friends headed off to the beach to soak up some sun! Even though we missed two buses, called the bus station 12 times, and stopped at multiple stops, we finally got to Willard Beach.!! Next it was time to tan, we hit up a great spot on the crowded beach and soaked up some sun. Well maybe a little to much.....

After looking through tide pools for mysterious things, picking up crabs, falling off pipes into the water, being burried from neck to feet in the sand, and getting to much sun it was time to head home. I had found some cool sea glass,and had fun with friends so overall was a good day.My friends are so great and I am glad that I have friends that will always be there to get sunburned with me :) . In the end  I did end up looking like a lobster...I hope someone doesn't mistake me for one. That would not be to good.

Thank you all so much for reading this post, and I hope you liked my little story. Do you guys like the beach as well? What is your favorite thing to do there? Since my favorite place in the world is the beach what is yours? I can't wait to hear your thoughts. have a happy blogging day!

Rainy Day Thoughts

It's actually pretty quiet in my house for once.

My brother and dad are off at baseball practice, my mom is in the living room playing some chill music and I'm just sitting here listening to the music, writing this post and watching the rain lightly fall down.

It's pretty nice to have a bit of relaxation.

Yesterday Olivia came over to spend the night. The original plan was to go to the beach today after our sleepover but we went nix-nay on plan A when I saw the weather forecast...and I'm glad we made that decision. Beach + rain = miserable.

So instead we hung out here and we ate enchiladas for dinner and jammed out for quite some time on guitar and vocals (Olivia) and trumpet (me). It was really fun. We also watched a couple of horror movies. Last night we watched  the 1983 film 'The Poltergeist' which was VERY VERY awesome-ly freaky, creepy, and scary, and I highly recommend it to anyone who likes those kind of movies. And also don't be fooled by its rating of 'PG'. It is most certainly more like PG-13 scary.

And my words of wisdom on the motto of this film:

IF YOU'RE GOING TO MOVE A GRAVEYARD, MOVE THE HEADSTONES AND THE BODIES.

This morning we also watched the more recent movie 'The Haunting In Connecticut' which is actually a true story and wicked creepy. It was very scary, but enjoyable. It included some pretty creepy stuff though like post-mortem photography (WHY would anyone want to take pictures of dead people?) and cutting off eyelids for necromancy and stuff. Very well done and a really gripping and suspenseful story, I highly recommend it to you as well.

And again, my words of wisdom to you:

DON'T DO CREEPY STUFF LIKE NECROMANCY AND CUTTING OFF PEOPLES EYELIDS AND SEANCES AND TALKING TO GHOSTS AND CREATING ECTOPLASM AND DON'T LIVE IN A HOUSE WHERE THESE THINGS HAVE HAPPENED AND YOU WILL BE FINE.

Quite simple things to follow actually, when you move graveyards, move the bodies, and don't do creepy stuff. This is what I learned at my sleepover last night.

Since Olivia went home, things have been pretty chill around here, like I said before. I had some practice up at church for a piece that I'm performing on Sunday, and I went to the library to get a bunch of books (obviously...) and I guess when I'm done I'll work on my packing for Pilgrim Lodge, which I am SO SO SO SO excited for and to which I wish I was going tomorrow instead of Sunday, but oh well. At least I don't have to wait until August, which would be torture. 

So yeah. Those are my rainy day thoughts.

Please take my words of wisdom to heart.

You don't want to get caught up in a horror movie.

Of Trampolines and Friendly Toes

Hello everyone! Yesterday, well, last night actually, I spent the night at my dear friend Lucy's house. As always we had lots of fun bouncing on her trampoline and naming a photograph 'friendly toes' among other things. She was feeling a little left out that she was going away and not going to be around during the whole guest post fest this summer, so we thought we would do a little conversation post for today because we haven't had one of those in a while. I will type in black and Lucy will type in purple. Why don't you say hello, Lucy?

Hello, Lucy.

Lucy, I'm pretty sure that I am Sally, not Lucy, YOU are Lucy, although we do get mixed up sometimes....

Pshhh, ladeeda. I'm hungry. GIMME A STRAWBERRY.

They're out in the kitchen and for the taking......

Your brother is a very boring person to text, Sally. Have you ever noticed that?

LOL, no, but I can imagine. So Lucy, what are your plans for the day after we eat strawberries, finish this post and do some trampolining?

I'll morph into a potato and sit on the couch doing something completely unproductive. Ya know, the usual.

Oh Lucy...I think I will do lots of trumpet playing (the usual), I need to practice a piece that I'm playing in church on Sunday, an audition and solo piece I need for band camp, and also Bring Him Home for next week at camp. Oh and I'm getting this reiki attunement thing which is like opening up a channel in you for energy to flow and I can like send good energy to people through my hands. It's pretty cool.

So you could send good happy energy to say, our dear friend Ttam? 

Who is Ttam? Wait, I don't wanna know.....SUBJECT CHANGE!

He's in your section, silly goose. But how about we change the subject to cheesecake?

I am pretty sure that on every conversation post we've ever had you have changed the subject to cheesecake. Now how many times do I need to tell you that I HATE CHEESECAKE! Although I do find Louie Armstrong's song 'Cheesecake' quite entertaining.

Ttam likes cheesecake. 

Lucy, you are not prolonging the lifespan of this conversation. Besides, I am getting very hungry for strawberries.

Let's show them the Friendly Toes and wrap this up.

Okey dokey. By the way, I took this picture last summer and the toes belong to my friends Hannah, Molly, Molly, and me. 

FRIENDLY TOES!!!!

Bye guys!

¡Adios, mi amigos penguinos!

Oh Lucy...what am I ever going to do with you?

In the Midst of Summer

Being on summer vacation is a truly excellent feeling.
Yesterday was my last day of finals, and my last day of freshman year. I'm happy to say that I passed all my classes with high honors and am excited for a challenging sophomore year come September!
For now though, I sure am enjoying the summer.
After school was over yesterday, my friend Haley and I hopped on the bus and headed down to the local ice cream shop where we treated our selves to large amounts of chocolate ice cream topped with Reese's and plenty of whipped cream. Needless to say, it was a great start to summer vacation. I spent the rest of yesterday lounging around and playing badminton with my brother and my mom and I went shopping in the evening, which was good because I needed a few more summer clothes.
Got some orange plaid shorts a couple tank tops, and also the lovely outfit I am sporting today, some gray jean shorts and a aqua-green and white striped shirt. Very summery and awesome.

Today I simply relished being able to sleep in until eight, which is so much better than having to wake up at five-thirty every morning to a shrill alarm clock. Best part of summer- no annoying alarm clock.
This morning I went to my brother's final assembly at the middle school at which he received a number of awards, and then came here and finished ready Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows out on my front porch. I figured that I had to read it again before the epic second half of the movie comes out in July :)
I also had a practice up at church for trumpet, and soon I am heading out to my final driving lesson! I'm very excited...I take my permit test of Monday and should have that permit in my hands by 3pm, at which time I can legally drive. Bwahaha.
I'm also going out to dinner with my extended family tonight to celebrate my grandmother's birthday.
All in all, it's been a busy and fun first day and a half of summer vacation!
What have you done so far with YOUR summer?

Birthday Part One

Tomorrow is my 15th birthday!!!! 

I'm really excited despite the annoying fact that it's the first day back to school after our lovely vacation. Anyway. Yesterday, four friends, Anna, Lucy, Isabella and Hannah, came over to celebrate a bit. We had a very good, but extremely LOUD (*cough* lucy *cough* anna *cough*) time. 

Here are some pictures:

First, my mom made me a very very yummy chocolate and mint chocolate glazed cake, upon my request...er...demand. Of course, once the cake was all baked and cooled, I just had to do some decorating...in treble clef fashion.

After dinner we played a great game of Apples to Apples, and wonders of wonders....look what won THIS round:

Isabella ended up winning overall with Hannah coming in second. We had fun :)

Today i'm going to go and see the movie True Grit with Olivia, and tomorrow it's back to school.

Yuck.

in which i recount five days of awesomeness

First I'd like to say THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU to Olivia @ Horsefeathers for this amazing new design. It's beautiful, although the button is still the old one. Oh well :)

Anyways, this post is going to be in pictures recounting my awesome Saddleback trip. We brought my friend Lucy, and our other friend Anna met us up there yesterday, and XanFan who I'll just refer to as X, met his friends Seb and Finn up there as well. 

So firstly, I'll show you the screen shots of my facebook statuses that I was able to post using my mom's iPhone and then get ready for lots of pics :)

This is Larry....he's Lucy and X's jazz band mascot.

Larry in my ski helmet :)

Walter, Lucy's amazing penguin hat. 

Choosing what chairlift to go up.

The view from Red Devil

Another view. 

Lucy on Red Devil.

At the top of the mountain, from left to right, me, Lucy, X, Finn, and Seb.

In the Intimidator glades.

Glades are so pretty!

And so much fun to ski too!

This was another great glade that we skied.

Looking back at the pass before heading into the woods.

The boys would like me to stop taking pictures now and start skiing.

But I had to take just one more....

That's me, master of the double diamonds!

Larry at the top of the mountain.

Because Lucy and I are SO totally expert.... 

Lucy and my mom work their way down the top of Tight Line. 

And we decide to sit down and rest.

What can I say? The views are stunning!

Lucy has the best pajamas...

At the very very very top. 

Again, STUNNING.

It was an awesome week :)

Oh Please...

Goodness gracious I need a break. No, not from blogger, I just got off that break, but a break from the regular, tiring, day to day work. 

Thankfully, February vacation is fast approaching.

Unfortunately, Friday at 1:50pm can NOT come soon enough.

I need a break from getting up at five-thirty.

I need some just easy relaxing time- my last three weekends can't even be considered weekends.

I need a week without bio homework.

A week without getting yelled at in band.

A week without taking notes in history.

A week without gym torture.

A week without the english class that makes me want to rip my hair out.

A week without passé composé in french.

A week without tedious geometry proofs.

Yes, I could really use a week off.

I need a week filled with skiing up at Saddleback,

spending the day, carving up the slopes,

taking stunning pictures from the top,

drinking hot chocolate by a huge fireplace,

conquering the awesome terrain park,

doing moguls with XanFan and his friend.

And the nights, spent in comfy sweatpants and cozy shirts,

eating hot pasta and pizza at a local restaurant,

doing some arranging on my laptop,

playing board games with the family.

And the weekends filled with friends,

and no homework to be done,

maybe hanging with Hannah Marie and our friend Serena this weekend,

before heading up north, and when we return,

a couple of fun-filled days before we return to school,

on my 15th birthday.

Oh, how I wish it was Friday, instead of only Tuesday!

Oh how I long for vacation!

SnowDays

SNOW•DAY (n) 

1. A day you get out of school because of excessive amounts of snow.

Ex: I was really happy because today was a snowday.

As mentioned previously, we get a lot of snow up here (usually) during the winter. Just happens to be one of the perks of living here. (Although SHOVELING the snow is not an added bonus.)

Unfortunately, these past couple of years, though we've had good snow, it's come at un-opportune time.

On weekends,

Vacations,

During the day,

During the night....but stopping well before dawn....

We haven't had our share of good 'ole snow days, lately. 

I used to hate snow days. Now I love them.

Something about them makes you want to squeal with excitement and act like a little kid again.

Which is fun...I mean, when you have a snow day, you just HAVE to follow:

The Snow Day List

1. Squeal with excitement when you wake up and see lots of snow on the ground, and realize your parents turned you alarm clock off 'cause there's no school.

2. Don't go back to sleep but run around the house a couple times.

3. Eat breakfast slowly while playing video games with your brother.

4. After getting mad at your brother for always beating you, take your time and read the comics.

5. Beg and plead your parents to let you have a friend over- they always relent in the end.

6. When said friend is over, challenge your brother and his friend to some sort of competition whether it be on the Wii or a ping-pong challenge, etc.

7. Declare you will most certainly win, if you do, rub it in his face, if you don't, stick your tongue out at him. 

8. Eat something warm and yummy for lunch, like mac'n'cheese. 

9. Make popcorn for you and your friend and go upstairs to watch a movie.

10. After the movie, go downstairs and go outside to play. Say that your brother and his friend are welcome to join you, but hope that they won't.

11. Go outside and pelt each other with snowballs.

12. When your brother and his friend finally DO follow you outside, say your cold and go back inside. You don't want to have your face continuously pushed into a snowbank.

13. Make hot chocolate, and drink it quickly before your friend has to go home.

14. After she leaves go upstairs and blog about your awesome day so far.

15. Your shirt's still wet from outside so you take a warm shower and your mom yells at you for using up too much hot water.

16. Curl up by the fireplace with a good book, something that never gets tiring. Like Harry Potter.

17. Eat a nice warming dinner, preferably your favorite soup. 

18. Play games like Apples to Apples with your family.

19. When your parents say it's time for bed because you've had a busy day and you have school tomorrow, complain.

20. Go to bed and wish for tomorrow to be a snow day so you can do it all over again.

Yep :)

  

 

Party Love

*Note* the following pictures are sure to make you VERY hungry, so have a snack at the ready.

As you can see there was lots of great food to be enjoyed by all, and that's only some of it!

All my friends made it, though Hannah Marie had to leave early for one of her performances and Isabella was a tad late but it was all good fun. Us girls had a great time chilling on the couch and a little up in my room at first and then both the boys and girls teamed up outside for some pretty epic games of flashlight tag and manhunt. Isabella and XanFan's friend Ansel were really good at hiding, and Olivia and I made a good hiding and catching team. My converse didn't want to be put on fast so I slipped on my drill masters (my marching band shoes). BIG mistake. The grass was slippery and so were the shoes so I kept sliding around. Another bad thing was that when I walked on pavement or on the wooden porch they were really loud and with my menacing 'it' person stare and flashlight, it was pretty intense. After it got too cold to bear, we went inside where the party was winding down and the five of us that we left (Me, Olivia, Isabella, Lucy and Anna because Hannah had to leave) went up to hang in my room and we had a blast just chilling and laughing and stuff. Olivia was going to spend the night anyway, and Isabella ended up sleeping over too, which was very fun. We watched 'The Proposal" which is a HILARIOUS movie. It was totally awesome.

All and all it was a very good party, and I'm not happy to have to go back to school tomorrow. Thankfully, as Isabella pointed out this morning, only seven school days until Christmas break!

Party Prep

If I asked each of you whether you liked parties, just in general, I'm pretty sure that most of you would answer with a resounding 'yes'. They're fun to host, plan, go to...and every one is different.

One of the traditions our family has had for the past few years, ever since we moved into our new house, is host a holiday party a couple weeks before Christmas. (Our house is awesome for parties because the first floor is really open and we have a basement that all the rowdy boys can run around in, lol)

Anyway, we're having this awesome party tomorrow and there's lots to do beforehand! My dad, XanFan and I just cleaned the basement (oh what joy...) which is always at the top of the annual excitement list. (NOT!)

Anyhoo....my mom's gone and got most of the stuff for the food part, and we'll start making some of the food tonight too. (I'll get pics of it all tomorrow, too!!!)

The party itself will be very fun though, and one this I am *very* happy about is that all the friends I invited are able to come. So I'll get to hang out with Lucy, Anna, Bella, Olivia, and Hannah Marie for the evening which will be awesome. I <3 parties.

Random Post {by a rather random girl}

Sometimes I feel as if there are just so many things going on in my life that it's hard to make a separate post for each of them! So I've condensed it to this one, longer, much more random one.

What I'm Reading:

A few days ago I started reading this great book called Deadline by Chris Crutcher.

I'm not done with it yet, (even though I'm dying to find out what ends up happening) but I already love it! Highly recommended.

Next I'm starting Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac (which is kind of an oxymoron...) which is by the same author as the book Elsewhere, so it should be a good read.

What I'm Writing:

Well, I'm gearing up for NaNoWriMo, which amazingly, starts in only nine days! Eeeep!

I have the basic ideas down for Troubled Waters, and pretty much have the characters figured out, so as long as I'm not loaded down with homework every night, I should be fine. I think. I hope.

I did attempt some cover art though and I'm pleased to show you the result:

So How's School?

School is....ehh. The past couple of days I've had (no joke) 3(+) hours of bio homework. Each day, and that's not even mentioning all of my other classes. AHHHH! Band's been fun, except for the fact that our teacher has only worked on this one (really boring) song for the past five rehearsals. In English we're reading A Midsummer's Night Dream (and Elránia is envious), In French it's pretty boring because we're re-learning everything we know, and in World History we're studying Neanderthals and the Stone Age. The worst parts? Gym class we're playing football. (Yes, FOOTBALL) and in math we are working on geometric proofs. Really, my life would be a whole lot better if geometric proofs just left.

Other Activities:

Well, there are only a few days left of marching band! *sob* last years the season seemed to go on forever and then this year the time simply flew by. *sniff* We still have two shows left though, one tomorrow, and then the following Saturday is finals. Really exciting! Because marching band takes up so much time I haven't been able to hang out with my non-marching band friends much, so I'm really happy that I'm able to go hang out with Elránia tonight :)

My Plans Regarding The Next Few Days:

Today: School, math test *cue scary music*, and hanging out at Elránia's

Tomorrow: Marching band show!!!! (Plus we're playing at the home football game!)

Sunday: Church, and the big pile of...h...o.....m....e...w....o....r....k I'm going to be handed today and not have time to do until Sunday. Yay.