Orals

Wow. I am so lucky. Last year, I got Mrs. Soriano, and my oral lasted 10 minutes. This year, I was freaked out over that one really hard Medieval History question about the eras of the Medieval period. Well, I got there, and found out my teacher was Mrs. Salmon. Talk about luck. She skipped the Medieval History part because she had me for Medieval History, so she already knew what I knew about it. I can't believe I got awesome teachers two years in a row. Before my oral, I was praying, "O please god. Let me get Mrs. Salmon." I actually did pray that....
wow. That was an awesome oral.
:)

Kids

Kids are the cutest things ever. Since I haven't given much background about myself, I will start now. First of all, I have 7 brothers and sisters (8 if you count Nathan):
Nathan Alan (24): Technically, he's not really my brother, he's my brother-in-law, but whatever. I don't know that much about him. He's got dark hair and a beard and blue eyes. He's about a foot taller than Lisa, and he's pretty funny.
Elizabeth Anne (Lisa for short) (24): Really hyper and crazy. She has brown straight hair and brown eyes. She's always coming over and saying, "Hey, Mary! Let's go do something!!!! So you wanna come read while I sew!!!!" and other stuff like that.
Stephanie Louise (Steph) (22): Dark hair and brown eyes, Steph is a nerd. She goes to the University of Chicago. She is obsessed with the Lord of the Rings (not as much as she used to be).
John Michael (20): Light brown hair, blue eyes, remnant of a goatee. He is very funny, especially paired with Joe. He also makes songs and beats.

Joseph Mark (Joe) (16): Brown hair, brown eyes, super funny, although he's shy at school. Joe's awesome :)

Peter Dominic (12): brown eyes, brown hair, ADHD. He can be really annoying, but also funny.

Thomas Clyde (Tommy) (9): blond hair, blue eyes, loves football.

Anthony James (AJ) (6): The amazing kid! This kid can do DDR on Heavy mode, plus, he is super smart and good at sports. When he was 1 1/2 he knocked Lisa over. I taught him how to do multiplication just by telling him what it was, and he can also solve the problem x+-5=-8

My mom does Day Care, and these are the little kids she watches:

Grace Green: I think shes about 3. She has long light brown hair and huge brown eyes. She is soooo cute! sometimes, when she's in a good mood, I'll come home and she'll just say, "Mary!" and run up and hug me.

Sammy Spanier: ok, he's about 2. Blond hair and blue eyes, a little chubby. He is super energetic all the time, and is known to start jumping around and shouting, "It's a big airplane! Airplane!" everytime he hears one go overhead. He also loves cars, and whenever he sees a bus go past, he'll shout, "Bus! School Bus! City bus!!!"

David (don't know his last name): 1, I think. He has dark hair and huge dark eyes. He is super chubby, which makes him even more cute. He can't say much, but he can say "Hello." and sometimes, he's say touchdown, which sounds more like, "Taa Daa!"

Once, Grace and Sammy (his mom is from Wisconsin, i think)had an argument. Sammy said, "Go Packers!" and grace said, "No! Go Vikings!" which kept on for about a minute....
I love kids.

Storms and Such

Well, I remembered why I have so few crosses to carry---I'm too phlegmatic. For example, about a day after my last post, I didn't really care much about not getting lessons from Mr. Jorlett. I can't stay upset for long, which is really great, although it makes it almost too easy to carry crosses with joy :P
Today I went over to my Grandma's house. I was expecting it to be really boring, as most visits are, but instead, it was AMAZING! She lives out in the country, and when the storm passed through, we had the garage door open, and we looked out, and I got to see clouds being formed into funnels. They were amazing! half the clouds in the sky were going one way, the other clouds were going the opposite direction, towards them. Then the hail fell. My little brother Anthony found a golf ball sized hail. And when we got a tornado warning, all the kids went down to the basement, and I comforted the little kids who were scared. My cousin Johnny was freaking out, saying that he was scared, what if the cloud touched down, and I had to tell him at least five times that funnel clouds don't touch down that often, and that even if it did, we'd be fine. But yeah, it was the best visit to my grandma's ever. I love storms.

Carrying Crosses with Joy

Well, I found out that lessons from Mr. Jorlett cost $30 for half an hour. Not surprising, considering he's world class. But $30 is too expensive for my family, so I can't have lessons from him. I haven't had many disappointments in my life, I'm generally not very sad ever, but this was a big disappointment. I mean, this is probably the only chance I'll ever get in my life to take lessons from a world class director. It's already amazing that he came to Trinity, but it would have been so cool if I could take voice lessons from him. I read a chapter each night of a book Stephanie (my sister) gave me for my confirmation called "The Imitation of Mary". I few nights ago, the chapter talked about carrying your crosses with joy, because, how can you hate something that God has sent? How can you say, "God, take this cross off my shoulders and don't send me anymore troubles." We should love our crosses that God sends us, which is really hard to do sometimes. Not getting voice lessons from Dr. J is one of my crosses. It is small, compared to many crosses other people have to bear, but I want to really try to carry it with joy. I'm never very joyful to begin with, I am a bit of a pessimist, so it's not going to be easy. I think that carrying a cross with joy is a cross in itself, because what I want to do is moan and complain and feel sorry for myself. But I have decided to at least try.

I'm trying my best to remember to post once a day :)

I have zero motivation. So it's pretty surprising that I've kept this up this long. Last summer, I said, "I'm gonna learn hiragana this summer! (hiragana is part of the japanese alphabet). Well, I started learning it.....
But after I learned the first five lines (Japanese cpnsonants are always paired with vowels, so hiragana starts off with A, I, U, E, O, then Ka, Ki, Ku, Ke, Ko, then Sa, Shi, Su, Se, So....etc)
then I quit. I didn't want to quit, I just never got around to learning the rest. Yes, Mary is lazy and completely unmotivated. The only thing that motivates me is a sense of duty. I have to clean my room and do my chore and do my homework, so I do it, even if it is somewhat sloppy. So, I told myself again "This summer I WILL learn hiragana." I wonder if I ever actually will......I hope so, but you never know...
Also, I'm going to take voice lessons. It would be awesome if I could take them from Dr. J (he's world class, so it's not like I could find anyone better) but he lives far away. I've heard he teaches at Trinity though. Is this true??? If so, then I really want to take lessons from him. But if he doesn't, I'm taking lessons from a Trinity graduate, who also taught Iris violin, and who judged the Bach competition this year. I've never taken voice lessons in my life, so it will be interesting. Sometimes, I wonder how a person knows when their voice has changed. Because I know that it's bad for your voice to use vibrato when it hasn't changed yet...
Sometimes, when I sing, I notice a little vibrato, and then I worry if it's bad, or if my voice has already changed? My brother says my voice has probably already changed, because girls mature faster than boys, and boys' voices change in 9th or 10th grade....
I dunno...

another post :O

Ok, so, we had a "Poetry Cafe" in Lit/Comp, and we had candy. Man, I LOVE watching what happens to me when I get sugar. So, Iris started to bounce her pencil case into the air with her books and I sad, "What, are you trying to be a pancake lady?" Then she said, "No, it's a flapjack." in a southern accent, "with soda."
So I started doing it too.....
Oh yes, by the way, for anyone who wonders (not that anyone actually reads this anyways, it's probably really boring) The poem I did for the cafe was Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf, by Roald Dahl:
As soon as Wolf began to feel
That he would like a decent meal,
He went and knocked on Grandma's door.
When Grandma opened it, she saw
The sharp white teeth, the horrid grin,
And Wolfie said, ``May I come in?''
Poor Grandmamma was terrified,
``He's going to eat me up!'' she cried.

And she was absolutely right.
He ate her up in one big bite.
But Grandmamma was small and tough,
And Wolfie wailed, ``That's not enough!
I haven't yet begun to feel
That I have had a decent meal!''
He ran around the kitchen yelping,
``I've got to have a second helping!''
Then added with a frightful leer,
``I'm therefore going to wait right here
Till Little Miss Red Riding Hood
Comes home from walking in the wood.''
He quickly put on Grandma's clothes,
(Of course he hadn't eaten those).
He dressed himself in coat and hat.
He put on shoes, and after that
He even brushed and curled his hair,
Then sat himself in Grandma's chair.
In came the little girl in red.
She stopped. She stared. And then she said,

``What great big ears you have, Grandma.''
``All the better to hear you with,'' the Wolf replied.
``What great big eyes you have, Grandma.''
said Little Red Riding Hood.
``All the better to see you with,'' the Wolf replied.

He sat there watching her and smiled.
He thought, I'm going to eat this child.
Compared with her old Grandmamma
She's going to taste like caviar.

Then Little Red Riding Hood said, ``But Grandma,
what a lovely great big furry coat you have on.''

``That's wrong!'' cried Wolf. ``Have you forgot
To tell me what BIG TEETH I've got?
Ah well, no matter what you say,
I'm going to eat you anyway.''
The small girl smiles. One eyelid flickers.
She whips a pistol from her knickers.
She aims it at the creature's head
And bang bang bang, she shoots him dead.
A few weeks later, in the wood,
I came across Miss Riding Hood.
But what a change! No cloak of red,
No silly hood upon her head.
She said, ``Hello, and do please note
My lovely furry wolfskin coat.

Ok, two posts, same day. Probably never happening again.

Well, I went to my HGRA game tonight. I found out I'm the color green and our team s South Korea. Two people on my team, Maddie and Anna, both go to Highland, where Iris is going next year. Apparently, they hate private schools because private schools aren't as 'exciting'.
Wow. That really surprised me. They wanted to be in a public school with druggies and smokers and kids who drink? Apparently, it's 'interesting' how the boys fight all the time. I was thinking to myself, "Man, if you really think public schools are better, than you're missing out majorly."
They asked me, "Oh, you have to wear uniforms? And is your school all religious and stuff." I wanted to say, "Yes we wear uniforms, and they're better than no uniforms, because Idon't have to have an anxiety attack about what I'm going to wear in the morning (not that I really would anyway, but that's really not the point) and as for religious, /i like having religion at school, whereas in public schools, you can't talk about Christianity or Catholicism, because not everyone is a Christian, and I like the 'religious' part of Trinity." but I didn't say that. I just said, "Yeah, we have to wear uniforms." I really feel sorry for public school kids. Public schools must be like...Nativity on steroids *shudders* ugh...I'd die after a week in a public school....
Thank God for Private schools :)

Hello

This is the first, and probably last post I'll ever write on this blog, because I'll forget, or I'll have nothing to say. I know they'll probably be super short, but oh well. Today was the last Tuesday of the school year. I can't believe that in three days I'll be in high school! I don't really want the school year to end yet, though, because I love (almost) all my teachers, plus, Iris isn't going to Trinity next year. I am excited for summer, though. At the end of June, I'll be going on my first family vacation in years. I mean, we've had family vacations a lot, but we haven't gone as a whole family for a long time. And Lisa and even Nathan (my brother-in-law) are coming! It's going to be so fun! I can't wait! I also am excited for when Stephanie comes home. John already came home on Sunday, and it's really fun having him around again. He set up his big HD-TV in the attic, so now we can watch movies up here. I'm trying to learn some Flight of the Conchords on my guitar, but it's really hard T_T
I can't believe I've kept talking so much, I never have anything to say! Ugh, I have an HGRA soccer game tonight. It's not that I'm not excited, I just haven't met my team, and I'm a little afraid that they'll be preppy girls. I've had bad experiences with preps at my old school. I don't blame them for not liking me, I've always been a little weird, but even now, when Iris and I go visit for a play or something, they'll say, "Hi Iris!" ... I'm not kidding, this actually happened. Maybe it was because I'm so quiet that they didn't notice me, but you never know....
so, yeah...bad experiences with preps and "popular" girls.
Well, thanks for actually reading this post, it was probably boring as the dickens :P