Breezy Me

2006-09-06T22:08:00.000-04:00

Hi, sorry I haven't posted in a while. My big baby sitting job went well as far as 3 and 5 year old kids go. But more exciting news - I got into the Senior Company at my dance studio!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I auditioned last night, and I did well until my teacher taught us this killer jazz routine, it was fun and super fast, and nearly impossible to learn in five minutes. I was amazingly happy when my teacher told me tonight. I felt like I could run around and scream, but I held it in. I am so happy!!!

If you are familiar with the show "So You Think You Can Dance", (by the way, the tour tickets were sold out, so I can't go to the tour) you may be familiar with the amazing choreographer Mia Michaels. Well, my dance teacher went to a convention recently, and Mia taught a class! They learned a contemporary routine, and my dance teacher taught it to us tonight!!! It is the most amazing thing I ever learned. Surprisingly, it came really natural to me, and I felt pretty comfortable with it. It was an amazing routine.

2006-07-28T12:00:00.000-04:00

I got offered a big, huge babysitting job!!! The first week of August, I am going with a family from my church to a big music festival for a week to help watch their two kids. It's a long time, I've never been away from home (by myself) so long before. I'm a bit nervous, too.

The top 10 contestants of "So You Think You Can Dance" are going on tour, and are coming to Boston, MA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And I am going with some people from my dance studio, my mom, and my Grama!!! I am sooooo excited. I could never see the show live because I live in New Hampshire, and that would be a long plane ride to LA just to see a one or two hour show. I am sooooooooo happy that I finally get to see them live! I hope Benji and Heidi do their Mambo again.

2006-07-18T20:48:00.000-04:00

Hi! Sorry I haven't posted in a while! Been kinda busy. My friend who moved to China came back to visit for a few days for the Fourth of July! It was fun to see her again. We had some amazing fireworks. And I took pictures of them. There is a fireworks setting on my camera, so I thought I'd test it out, and it worked! They came out really well. Also I have been watching "So You Think You Can Dance". I love that show. I am glad that nobody has cried during their Lyrical class, though Benji came close to that when he broke down when Mary told him he was on the top 20. Ha ha. For those of you who haven't been watching the show, you probably have no idea what I'm talking about. I kind of feel that way when people talk about "American Idol" because I don't watch it (we don't have cable, but my Grama, who does have cable, records "Dance" for me). That is pretty much it! Hopefully I'll remember to do a post tomorrow. I'm trying to get into the groove of doing regular posts.

2006-06-22T21:28:00.000-04:00

Sunday was my birthday!!!!! The big 1-4! (14, or fourteen) My parents gave me a nice digital camera, and I got a ton of cash!$!$ That was really fun. Also my little brother gave me an iTunes gift certificate. And kind of for my birthday, my mom gave me and my Grama tickets to go see Grease! We have a summer stock theatre in town that's in an old barn. It was amazing. The best scene was the "Beauty School Drop Out". The teen angel's voice was incredible. He had a HUGE vocal range - he could probably sing higher than most girls and still sound great, and sing really low, too. It was so good.

We are going camping this weekend! We are going some place in the White Mountains. We got a tent a while ago that we never used that we are going to try out. We built it today to so that we wouldn't get there tomorrow and spend hours trying to build this tent at the camp site. It's better to look silly in your backyard than in a public camp ground. We managed to build it pretty painlessly, and it's a really cool tent. It's huge! The tent part can fit 7 people, and also there is a screen room. I can't wait!

2006-06-12T19:21:00.000-04:00

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been kinda busy with my 5 dance recitals (which went very well) and I'm trying to get a bunch of school done. We are still doing some school during the summer. Bleah. But we didn't get a lot done this school year because of the addition on our house and we took a whole month off at Christmas - yay! But hopefully I'll get enough done to pass the 8th grade! Oh! Another exciting thing is my dad and I have started a new website RandomiPod.org. We are fighting against pseudo-random iPods. I'm sure that those of you who have an iPod will have experienced that when you put your songs on shuffle, some songs seem to play a lot while others go un-listened to. It's very sad, so we have to do something about it. Now understand that the site is still under construction, so there's not a lot there yet, but we're working on it!

2006-05-29T20:04:00.000-04:00

Sorry I haven't posted in a while, I don't know what my disease is...Oh well. Not a whole lot has been going on lately, we finally have summer weather! And my birthday is coming up really soon. Oh, I found something slightly interesting to write about. My dance recital is this weekend, and I am in 5 shows - one on Friday, two on Saturday, and two on Sunday. Not to mention the three dress rehearsals this week! It's crazy! Then summer dance classes start up two weeks after the recital. Also we are doing school during the summer. We go on a lighter schedule my mom calls our "summer schedule", that consists of math, grammar, and maybe some science and history and spelling. Hmmmmm, sounds kinda like a regular school day to me!

2006-05-16T20:52:00.000-04:00

The other variety show at the highschool went well. But right after that, I came down with a cold! How fun. And I thougt the "sick" season was over. Also, we have been getting a ton of rain since the end of last week. A bunch of people have had a bunch of flooding. We even got a few puddles in our garage, which is kind of weird because we live on the top of a hill. The rivers are over flowing, some people who have houses that are close to lakes had to evacuate. Even some of the woods have a ton of water in them - it looks like trees and bushes grew out of the middle of a pond. Some of the roads are torn up, it looks like a tornado hit them. It's pretty wild. It's been a long time since we had this much rain.

2006-05-13T14:23:00.000-04:00

Last night I participated in the local highschool's variety show. Most of the girls in Junior Company go there, and they wanted me to do our dance with them. The variety show is interesting. There's some singing, dancing, the robotics team shows off their cool robot, and a couple of hilarious skits. There's one called American Icon, and guess what it's spinning a play on? (In case you haven't guessed, American Idol) That one was funny. Also, there was one called Team Awesome. That one is so weird, and so funny... If I try to say how funny it is, I will fail bitterly. Team Awesome is about two people (the characters are Raven from That's So Raven, and Harry Potter) who save the world. Then there's Hitler (who apparently faked his own death) and his stupid assistant who steal John Lennon's mail ordered brides to take over the world. And John Lennon shows up too. But using Harry's magical skills, and Raven's psychic powers, they are able to stop them. The finale of this skit ends up with the cast (which is about ten people) randomly singing "My Heart Will Go On." That was the funniest thing I have ever seen. These ten people pretending to be great love-song singers, and they were really bad, it was hilarious. There's another variety show tonight, so I can't wait to see it again.

2006-05-11T21:09:00.000-04:00

Our last competition went really well. One girl in Senior Company couldn't dance because she hurt her ankle really bad. But she was able to dance in Battle for the Pirates Treasure, which was good because it got a Platinum and 1st place overall production!!!!!! The Junior Company dance got a Gold, but tons of people (even people from different studios) said we should have gotten a Platinum. It was fun and a good end to this competition season. It's kind of a relief, but now we have the recital to stress about. After that, I don't want to use fake eyelashes or spritz a bottle of hairspray for a very long time.

2006-05-03T20:25:00.000-04:00

The strangest thing happened on Sunday. The church decided to have a late Easter egg hunt for the younger kids. I helped this adorable 3 year old. It was so funny when she found an egg, her face would light up, and she would gasp really big. Anyway, she was opening her eggs, and most of them had what you would expect in them - candy, chocolate, etc. But guess what was in the other ones? Onions. Little onions. Some of the kids were so upset because all they got were onions. There were onions scattered all over the ground by the betrayed children. I decided to get to the bottom of this madness. Turns out my little brothers were a part of it - no surprise. Also two other boys who came up with the smelly plot. It would have been funny, but 2-5 year olds don't really get it.

2006-04-27T20:53:00.000-04:00

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Since I'm an Orthodox Christian, and our Easter was a week later this year, we just had our Easter. And the week leading up to Easter is really intense - two services a day every day. Then, late on Saturday, we go to church just before midnight, and we have a midnight service. And you don't get home until around 5:00 a.m. So the sun is almost up by then, which only makes it harder to sleep. It's a little stressful, but fun. I always look forward to that day because of all the great food.

Tonight was probably the most tedious dance lesson ever. Actually you can't really call it a dance lesson, because we had a photographer come in and take pictures of the different classes posing in their costumes. It was really hectic. They would take your picture, then you would have to run, change your tights and costumes in a crowded room with barely any time. Wow, that almost sounds like a competition! Except they're not taking your picture and you're really nervous.

2006-04-15T20:18:00.000-04:00

I had another dance competition last weekend. We did pretty well - both of the numbers I was in got a High Gold (which is the highest award you can get). So it was fun. Nothing really interesting happened, nobody fell off the stage, or threw up on it. We did see some rude people, though. Two of our props are an inflatable boat on wheels, and a very fragile paper mache rock. We caught several people playing and jumping around in the boat, and people practically sitting on the rock. When my dance teacher saw two girls (older girls, not little kids) sitting in the boat and playing around in it, she asked them nicely to get out. But wait, it gets better. They went over to their group (about 10 feet away from where my dance teacher was standing) and started saying pretty loudly how mean she was to make them get out of her boat. My dance teacher says that it's an unwritten law at competitions that you don't touch other people's stuff. 'Cause you don't know how long it took to make it, or how expensive it was, and most importantly, it doesn't belong to you. Hopefully we won't run into that at our next competition.

2006-03-28T20:25:00.000-05:00

The competition was awesome! The girl with the injured knee healed in time to dance, so that was good. There was a couple of dramas (that fortunately didn't have to do with us). There was this dance where the dancers were blind folded. And guess what happens when you're blind folded? You fall off the stage! Yes, this girl fell off the stage. She didn't hit a judge, or hurt herself too badly, because she hopped back on the stage and started dancing again. Then there was another girl who puked on stage. She ran off, and the other girls finished the dance, and another girl accidentally put her hand in the puke. Ugh. They cleaned it up after the dance. The Junior Company got some pretty sweet awards. We got a Gold, and the highest in our category (jazz, age 13-14 is our category). And that's not all. We got the highest overall small group in our age!!! There were about 13 other numbers in our age group. That was awesome. When they announced it, we didn't know what to do or where to go, because we didn't get anything big until then. So we were just sitting there probably looking really stupid with shocked expressions on, and a few of us wandered around until the announcer stopped that madness and called us up to the front of the stage. Then we understood. The announcer gave us a HUGE plastic trophy and we all got to say our names in the microphone. That was so cool. It was a big accomplishment for us. And we know that most of the other studios are better that us. We only have an hour and a half a week to rehearse our Junior Company number. Most other studios have much more time than that. So we really like this competition, because they understood us, and understood all of our dances. Finally! We want to go back there next year.

2006-03-19T19:28:00.000-05:00

Well, I have another competition coming up this weekend along with another dilema. A girl in Senior Company not only does competitive dance, but also competitive gymnastics. It's called sports acro, so there are a ton of complex tricks and lifts. So anyway, this girl was practicing a back flip (which she can normally do) and landed right on her knee. She was at class the other night, but she didn't dance a whole lot and had a bad limp. So if her knee isn't better by this weekend, I might have to stand in for the Seniors again. Also, a girl in Junior company is doing model U.N. on the same weekend as the competition, so a girl in Senior Company is going to stand in for our dance. And we pretty much changed the whole entire Pirate dance. It's kind of hard to learn a 7-minute long dance in just two weeks. And we are changing the name of it, too. Instead of "Pirates of the Caribbean", it's going to be "The Battle for the Pirates Gold". The reason why we are changing the name and the whole dance is because the judges at the last competition didn't get it. Okay, there is a group of good pirates, a group of bad pirates, swords, fighting, and treasure (the two sides are obviously fighting over the treasure). How can you not get that???? We clearly interpret that in the dance. So we are making it even more clear by all of the changes. We had the same problem with one of our duets. The song is called "Bolero" (that awesome song from the second Moulin Rouge soundtrack), and I guess Bolero was an opera or something, so the judges have "opera" swimming around in the back or their heads and are wondering why these girls are doing a modern dance to it, and why there's no story being told. So they are just going to have to change the name of the duet. These judges seem to need every dance to interpret a story. I don't understand that. I just think a dance needs to be well choreographed and fun to watch. Hopefully the judges at the next competition won't be as obsessed with stories.

2006-03-11T19:06:00.000-05:00

I forgot to tell you something really funny about the competition. I know that you guys are probably tired of reading about dance, but oh, well. Anyway, there is this girl from my studio, who's name is Deschenes (it's pronounced "Deshane"). She's from Canada, so that would explain the spelling thing. At competitions, there is an announcer who announces the number and style of dance. And if you're doing a solo, the announcer says your name too. So sometimes the announcers have a little trouble pronouncing Deschenes's name. At this one, the announcer guy said "Please welcome to the stage (awkward pause) Deshesnes!" We were laughing so hard afterwards. Deshesnes. He pronounced it just how I spelled it in the last sentence. You have to read it carfully - he added an extra "s" before the "n". He totally butchered a pretty name. I had my name mispronounced once. I thought it was impossible. But I was at a convenience store, and donated a dollar to muscular dystrophy at the register, and signed the green shamrock thing they give you. And as most of you know, my name is pronounced "ivy", like the plant, except I spell my name "Ivey". So anyway, I give the shamrock thing back to the lady behind check out desk, and she says "Is that pronounced Ivay?" She obviously mistook the "ey" in my name for a long "a" sound. So I said "No, you silly little girl..." just kidding, I just pitied her and left.

2006-03-08T20:47:00.000-05:00

The competition was sooo much fun!!! I've never had more fun dancing in our Jr. Company number. And for the first time in my life, people started clapping during the dance. One part when we did some lifts, and another part where we line up and do a bunch of cool ripples. We met some really nice people (from a different studio) back stage, they were supporting us and were really friendly. We got a High Silver award, same as last time. Pirates of the Caribbean got a High Silver too. At this competition, they had codes for the different studios. For example, we were studio H, and before you go on stage, the announcer announces the dance and studio code. Studio K was probably the best studio. They did sooo many tap numbers that were awesome. They did one tap dance to the song "Black Betty", they did one called "Percussion and Strings" which was really good, and there was this cool part where they went off stage, and got out fake violins and bows and tapped around with them, pretending to play them. Then at the end, they all tossed up their props and fell down (on purpose, of course). It was so cool. It was kind of funny, because there were probably 25 girls, and one guy. It seems like every studio except ours has guy dancers. It's not fair, because they can be really good - especially with tap. Also hip-hop. The thing with hip-hop is that it's really fun to do, but if done wrong, girls look kinda nasty dancing hip-hop. But then lyrical is really pretty on girls, but looks rather feminine when guys do it. There was this one guy who did a lyrical solo. He was really good, but the "cool" thing for guys is to dance lyrical topless. It just kind of adds to the awkwardness of "masculine" lyrical.

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you about the vocal. Yes, there was a singing division at this competition. It was hilarious. It was this 12 year old boy who's voice hasn't changed yet, so he sounded like a girl. He sang the song "One Moment in Time", and I've never heard that song before, but he kind of ruined it. He was off most of the time, then all of a sudden he would just BELT something out. I had my head buried in my program, laughing so hard that I was in tears. I hope nobody else heard me. I was fortunate that I didn't put on my make up yet, because I would have cried it all off. It was worse than American Idol auditions. But besides the vocal, It was a fun competition.

2006-03-04T09:42:00.000-05:00

I have another dance competition to go to today. Actually only the Senior group numbers are today, the Junior group number and all of the solos and duets are tomorrow. So it's a two day competition. Most of the Junior company is going down (the competition is in Holyoke Mass.) today to cheer for the Senior Company, 'cause it would be kind of disappointing to dance your butt off and have no one screaming for you. At our last competition, the JAWS studio only clapped and screamed for their own students. And if someone else who wasn't at their studio was on stage, the JAWS people would just start talking and laughing. And pretty loud too, one of the girls from our studio had to "shush" them. I hope we don't encounter them again. It's almost time to go, check back in a couple days to see how it went!

2006-02-20T19:58:00.000-05:00

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've got writer's block again, I can't find anything interesting to write about. Okay, I'm about to prove that I am totally lame, because I am going to tell you about my writing class. Not that the class was bad, just that that's the only interesting thing I can write about right now. Anyhoo, a homeschooling mom organized a five day writing course with an English/Latin/History tutor. It was for middle school and high school level kids. It was pretty small, just seven of us - well, eight including the teacher. It was kind of weird having a teacher after not having one (except my mother) for five years, and I had homework! That was even weirder. Our teacher was really great. He wasn't boring, or wouldn't drone on and on about something and never really get his point across. And at the last class he brought cookies! That was the best part.

2006-02-07T20:27:00.000-05:00

Sorry I haven't updated in a while. I've been kinda busy because our first dance competition was last Saturday. But first the big catastrophe before that. A girl on Senior Company (the "big girls") had a semi-formal dance at her school on the day of the competition (Saturday). Now my dance teacher had called the competition and asked which day we would be on. They said on Sunday. So this girl had made dinner plans, had a date, bought a dress and all the works assuming the competition was on Sunday. Then the competition called and told us that, oops, we're on Saturday, not Sunday. So this girl was upset, but decided to go to the dance instead. My dance teacher was so mad. Competition is serious business, and she chose to go to a dance that her school has four of each year. Ugh. I can see that she was in a tough situation, but you don't miss a competition unless you're sick or have broken bones, a major family problem or some other emergency.

Anyway, the Senior Company are doing three dances - a jazz dance, a tap dance, and a modern dance. So last week my dance teacher called me and told me all about that conflict. She said that the jazz and tap numbers will be okay without her, but the modern is choreographed specifically for eight people, so they were one person short without that girl. So my dance teacher asked me (I'm in Junior Company, a level below the Seniors) to step in and take the place in the modern dance!!! I was so excited when she told me that!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But we learned the unfortunate news about the girl's conflict on the Monday before the competition. So I learned the dance on Monday in two hours, then spent a couple of hours on Wednesday and Thursday cleaning it up. It was quick, but I felt pretty confident with the routine by Saturday.

The competition was in Massachusetts, about an hour and a half away from us. It was the Fire and Ice competition. For those who aren't familiar with the scoring, I'll try to make sense here. There are three judges, and each judge has 100 points total. And they deduct points for things like not pointing your feet, not being together, and for other technique issues, or anything the judge saw fault in. So at the end of each dance, the judges combine each of their points and decide what you get. This competition had a Diamond award, and most competitions don't have that, usually Platimum is the highest. Anyways here it goes : Diamond - 290-300 points
Platinum - 275-285 points
Gold - 260-274 points
Sterling Silver - 240-259 points
Silver - 220-239 points
Bronze - 219 points and below
The Junior Company dance got a Sterling Silver, the modern dance I filled in for got a Gold (Thank God, I was afraid that we might get a Bronze), an our production number (Pirates of the Caribbean) got a Gold. And every single number gets at least a Bronze. It's not like ice skating, where only one person gets Gold, Silver and Bronze. So if we all did a perfect job, every dance would get a Diamond!

The competition was so much fun. It was long (9 am to 6:30 pm), but it was fun. I actually had a blast performing. I thought I would be wicked nervous, but it was great. And we found our nemesis studio - with the acronym of JAWS. They were amazing. And they had guy dancers! It was so cool. They won all the special awards and overall awards of course. I wouldn't mind so much, except most of them had smug little faces when they accepted their awards as if they were used to it. This one studio got the "Politeness Award", and a girl from my studio pointed out someone from the "Polite" studio who had shoved her out of the way. Yea, really polite. I saw one of the most ridiculous costumes, it wasn't even funny - actually it was. This was a JAWS student who did a lyrical (lyrical is a kind of dance that's really slow and dramatic and you take yourself so seriously-not my favorite style) solo to "Nature Boy". Okay, he came out with garlands of ivy on his body, he was topless, and had these pants that were made out of white poofy fur. He came on, and I wanted to laugh, but I realized "Ew, this guy is serious!" He looked like Mr. Tumnus from Narnia. But we referred to him as "Goat Boy". I don't even remeber if he was a good dancer or not, just the pants. But besides JAWS smugly eating all awards up and Goat Boy, it was a good competition. And note: Sometimes lyrical can be really pretty and almost ballet-ish, but Mr. Tumnus was not.

2006-01-27T22:03:00.000-05:00

It's been a crazy week. My cousins and aunt and uncle came up from Georgia to visit. They have never seen a ski area before, so we took them to Mt. Sunapee. And we finally got snow!!! After all these days of my mom stressing out because it was raining! It snows. I told her, I says "Just go with it", and she's all "I can't!" I don't really talk like that. But anyhoo, it snowed. My relatives are leaving tomorrow, and we're driving them to the airport - which, I might add, is two hours away. But I'm glad they got a good NH winter experience.

2006-01-20T20:23:00.000-05:00

So, we got a nice layer of snow earlier this week. But it's all gone by the mean rain. Rain is great in the summer, but not in January. I think Alison is right - global warming is true in New Hampshire. It stinks because my aunt and uncle and two cousins are coming up here to visit for the first time from Georgia, and there's going to be no snow. Maybe a little slushy layer, but you can buy slushies at Wal Mart! My cousins were looking forward to snow, stuff you can't buy at Wal Mart! Hopefully we will get a good foot or so of snow. It's been warm and icky, so we desperatly need a change of weather. I might just have to have a word with Mother Nature and ask what's up.

2006-01-15T19:03:00.000-05:00

It's been a strange past few days. It rained for three days, then it snowed about a foot last night. The power went out for a couple hours in the early morning because it was super windy. We missed church because our alarm clocks didn't go off. It was really cold this morning (about 0 degrees) and we had to shovel snow. So we put on all the clothes we owned to keep warm, and it was barely enough. It was pretty cold. Uh oh, I've got writer's block now. I hate when that happens. I have nothing to write about. My mind has gone cold and blank...Wait! I think I see the fog parting into a sunny day...No, my mind is just playing tricks on me. Oh well.

2006-01-10T17:48:00.000-05:00

Another day of skiing. It was really pretty out - it was a comfortable temperature, sunny, and the snow was great. And the fries in the lodge are really good - always yummy after skiing. At dance last night, our Pirates of the Caribbean costumes came in!!!!!!! We were all so excited. The top is a red velvety leotard with drapey white sleeves hanging down, and there are some drapeys that go around the neck. The pants are black, loose capris with a torn up look to them. They are sooooo cool!

2006-01-04T19:26:00.000-05:00

Happy a few days after New Years! Our party went really well, I stayed up later than I did on New Years Eve. Yesterday was my first day of skiing. It was fun, but very cold. Since there has been so much fraud with tickets at the mountain, the lift people have to scan your ticket to make sure that it's for real. I thought that was interesting. I skied a double-black diamond. It wasn't a glade, those are scary. The trail I did is just really steep at one point, but then it's easy for the rest of the way. This morning, I awoke to discover I am sick. Not in the head, but in the throat and sinuses (a.k.a. the common cold). So I sat on the sofa all day reading the sixth Harry Potter book. I'm probably the only person in the world who hasn't finished it yet. Towards the end of the day, I felt good enough to go to tap. We started to talk about what we're doing for the recital, and since the theme for recital this year is about TV, we are going to tap to the "Green Acres" theme song. Half of the people are going to be glamerous Hollywood people in a nice dress and high-heeled tap shoes, and the other half are going to be the country hill-billy folk. I'm a hill-billy. For our costume, we are going to get over-alls, straw hat, bandana around the neck, and the dorky blouse. It should be interesting.

2005-12-31T15:28:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year's Eve! We are having a big ol' party tomorrow, so we have been doing a ton of cleaning and cooking. My old room is a mess, so in one corner I hung up a sheet in front of it with a toxic waste sign on it. Then I put a bunch of stuff behind it, and it worked really well. Everything is hidden, it's magical! I had to vacuum the bathroom, which was kind of satisfying because the litter box is in there, so there's litter all over the floor. And I hate to walk in there and out with litter stuck to the bottom of my feet. And I'm always too lazy to bring the vacuum up stairs, but my mother was forcing me, or else she'll chop my head off. And I'd rather keep my head, thanks.

2005-12-27T17:31:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas!!! Sorry I didn't post in a while, I was kinda busy over the past few days being Christmas and all. On Friday, I got to spend the whole day with my friend who moved to China! She is back visiting right now. We were at the hospital all day because they had a ton of appointments and shots, so we were in the waiting room most of the time. She was excited to be eating American food when we went out to eat. Even though most of the stuff there is healthy (fresh fish and veggies) it's nice to eat stuff your used to. China is, I think,the most confusing country. For example, people insist on the freshest food: they will not have day-old veggies, and their meat has to be alive one minute and dead the next. But then, they go home and fry it in the middle of their pig sty with old grease in the grease pits. Eeew. Also, some of the taxi drivers try to scam Americans or drop them off in the middle of nowhere and insist that they pay up. My friend said that you can buy anything at the grocery store. You order half a pig, they give you half a pig with everything in it.

I have officially moved into my new room. And most of my stuff is moved in also, yay! I spent my first night in it on Christmas Eve, so it was hard to tell if I didn't sleep well because of new space, or excitement. I got some good stuff for Christmas. I got a sewing machine, some nice monogrammed jewelry, a button box with some cute buttons in it, lots o' cash, and some other things. We had a rainy Christmas this year. At least there was a tiny bit of snow on the ground.

2005-12-20T20:45:00.000-05:00

My mom took our Christmas pictures today. I know it's a little late being four days before Christmas and all. I think our picture turned out good. Our grumpy cat even made a guest appearance. I don't know about you, but to me and my family it seems like it's all of a sudden Christmas time. The month has gone by so fast! I think it's because of the construction that is STILL going on. It has been six long months. Ugh. My room just needs a few finishing touches in the closet and a couple of lights then it's done. The rest is almost almost almost done. Almost. We are re-doing the kitchen floor - we had this cheapy vinyl stuff, so we replaced it with Marmoleum (an updated version of linoleum) stuff. Right now, the floor guy put this stinky cement stuff on the floor to level it out, then he'll put the new floor down tomorrow.

2005-12-17T17:41:00.000-05:00

We saw the fourth Harry Potter today. It was pretty good. I thought "You-know-who" looked, um, creepy/funny/interesting/weird all at the same time. I think they could have chosen a better actress for Hermione. I think they should have kept her dorky and bushy-haired, because then when you see her at the ball and it would have been more of a surprise. But otherwise I thought it was good.

We have a little crawl space in our basement that our cat has been pooping in lately. And it's a pain to get into because the opening is so small, so my brothers and I are stuck with cleaning it up - bleah. There was a turd that we cleaned up just now, and it was my first time ever being in the crawl space (I was the lucky one to go in). My dad said that the crawl space is going to be our bomb shelter. I wouldn't mind it except the ceiling is so low that you have to do a crouching duck walk to get around.

2005-12-12T20:53:00.000-05:00

We got about a foot of snow!!! I'm so excited. My brothers and I have started to build our snow forts. They look like over-sized bathtubs right now. We also got our Christmas tree. It's eight and a half feet tall, and it's really fat. We decorated it last night - it looks so pretty. We hung candy canes on it this year, we didn't do that last year. So it'll be fun to eat them when we take the tree down.

We have started to move into the addition! It's mostly done - a little more electrical work needs to be done, we have to stain a piece of wood, little stuff like that. We moved some furniture in yesterday, we cleaned a lot, and put up our Christmas tree. Our addition has a really high ceiling, so it's nice not to be limited to a tiny 6 foot tree. My room gets the floor put down tomorrow, then the baseboard trim has to go on, and painted a little more. So I should move in by the weekend. Yay!

2005-12-08T20:58:00.000-05:00

It has been a weird week. A good friend of ours from church died in a car crash. It's so strange when someone leaves that fast, especially when you see them the day before and they are fine. The funeral for her was today. My parents went, but me and my brothers stayed at my Grama's house. My mom said it was the saddest thing that she had ever seen. Especially seeing the family crying was the most sad. Her husband (who was in the car with her and survived) had to have his arm and leg pinned together, and has some stitches. My mom said that he just had this look of disbelief that this could be happening mixed with sadness. Irina was a good knitter, and she had made several really neat scarves a few weeks ago. So it's cool that a lot of women in church (who have purchased her scarves - including my mom and me) have something nice to remember her by.

2005-12-02T18:21:00.000-05:00

We got a bit more snow, then it melted away. It was kind of depressing. Speaking of snow, to Allison: I didn't exactly have Michigan in mind when I mentioned the south. I kinda meant my family who live in Georgia and Texas. But now, I mention the mid-west (Michigan is part of that) which, thanks to Allison updating me, has SNOW!! I am SO jealous right now. But ha ha, we don't have to shovel the driveway, or pick up our dog's doo with a sled and shovel...Yet. And I know, Allison, that you don't have a dog. So you have to miss out on the fascinating ritual of picking up dog doo. And if you're lucky enough, you don't even have to shovel the driveway. Your loss!

2005-11-30T10:34:00.000-05:00

Wow, last day of November. And all of our snow is gone. We only have 25 more days for more snow! We had a green Christmas last year, and it wasn't fun. You've gotta have a white Christmas. I know y'all down in the South are used to hardly any snow, but us Yankees are different.

I can't wait till our addition is done because we can get a really tall Christmas tree! Usually we can only get a 6 foot tree because our ceilings are so low. Anyhoo, we have to go clothes shopping now, and my mom is ripping me away from the computer - I guess that's her subtle hint for me to get off.

2005-11-29T08:59:00.000-05:00

Augh!!! Our snow is melting all away! I'm very sad, but hey! I don't have to shovel the snow off the deck! I get a break from that.

My new room is almost done! They put all of the baseboard and trim on. Now it needs to be painted and the floor (which was backordered) needs to be put down for it to be officially finished. The dining room and great room just got the wooden floor put down, it was painted once (it's a deep red color) and some of the trim around the windows was put on. The whole thing has a chance of being done in the next week or two. My room will be very colorful: the light orange paint that we put on the walls seem to glow when the sun comes up, the trim color is a darker, redder orange, and the floor is turquoise with colored speckley flecks in it. It's gonna be really cool.

2005-11-26T20:12:00.000-05:00

Ahhh, Saturday. The best day of the week. I love it. Oh! I watched Star Wars Episode 3 last night. It was rather cheesy and depressing. But a lot of the acting was more depressing than the plot. The best actor of course is Yoda. And where was Jar-jar??? I love that guy. I can't believe other people didn't like him. I love his voice - I can do a voice that sounds similar to it. But this movie is not on the "essential" list; it's more of a thing that you just watch it to see what happens because you've seen all the other episodes.

2005-11-24T19:57:00.000-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!! We got about half a foot of snow! That was fun - except for shoveling off the deck. We went to church this morning; there weren't a lot of people. Then we went to a friends' house for Thanksgiving dinner. I ate way too much of everything - I felt sick for a while. But I had a good Thanksgiving, and hope you did too!

2005-11-19T18:47:00.000-05:00

The kitchen smelled veeery fishy this evening, so Ivelock Bolmes (a.k.a. me) decided to investigate this matter. My mom made fish stew, I soon found out, so I had to change out of my cool detective outfit. I ate a lot of it - I feel quite fat right now.

I had a great Saturday. I slept in really late, played with Legos, went outside, and played more Legos, and discovered fishy stew. When my brothers and I went outside, we played in the woods. We pretended to be a barbarian tribe and founded different "territories". It was so much fun.

2005-11-18T19:54:00.000-05:00

I got some warts frozen today. It was not very pleasant. I have some on my finger tips, and that hurts the most because that place is the most sensitive. Also, the ones on my fingertips will not go away! It's driving me nuts because they have been treated four or five times, and the are on my right hand, so sometimes it interferes with writing. I hope they go away soon, or else I'll be driven to insanity and slice the warts off with a serrated grapefruit spoon!!! But hopefully that won't happen, and I would use a steak knife anyway, obviously!

2005-11-16T20:35:00.000-05:00

My friend told me an interesting story today. Her friend in high school was at work at the pizza place in town and had to walk down the stairs for some reason. Well, she was wearing a ring and it somehow got caught on something and she fell at the same time and her finger ripped off. She went to the hospital, then they had to fly her over to a hospital in Boston to see if they can re-attach the finger. I don't know if they can because it wasn't a clean cut and the nerves are probably all torn up. And it's too bad (well, first of all she lost a finger!) because she was a really good artist and she's right handed, and the "missing" finger was on her right hand. But, after hearing that, I will never wear jewelry of any kind to work!

2005-11-15T19:41:00.000-05:00

After church on Sunday, me and my friend drew weird portraits of each other. It was so much fun. She drew the following of me - an old woman who looks sad, another oldish woman with a very long nose, and someone with too much shading, flared nostrils, and overplucked eyebrows. I drew the following of her - a strange crazy person, a viking with a mustache and someone who just woke up (overly tossled hair, stubble, and bags under her eyes). We were laughing so hard, that people were looking at us and probably thought we were mentally disturbed.

2005-11-12T18:11:00.000-05:00

Our church had its annual bake sale today. I always like to go with my mom just to hang out there - and buy yummy food. There are a couple things I particularly like - peanut butter pie is one of them. (In advertisement voice) a delicious chocolate crust is filled with a thick, creamy, mouth-watering peanut butter mixture that goes down your throat and straight to your waist and butt. My other favorite thing is something called "snails". You take white bread and roll it out thin and spread cream cheese on it and roll it up. Then you chop it up in bite-size pieces in dip it in butter then cinnamon-sugar and baked until they are a little crunchy. They are sooooo good.

2005-11-07T20:49:00.000-05:00

We didn't have school today because it's Sam's (my brother) birthday. We went to a cool science museum, and ate lunch out. I then had dance, so I am really tired. Sorry this is such a short post, but I gotta go to sleep.

2005-11-06T19:28:00.000-05:00

Sorry I haven't kept up my blog for a while. I don't know what's wrong with me. Something bad I guess. Anyhoo, back to me, I got my retainer (as in orthodontist) on Tuesday. It's the kind that you can pop in and out. The fun part is picking out the color of your retainer. I chose sparkley purple with a Calvin and Hobbes sticker molded into it. It's really cool.

2005-10-29T18:56:00.000-04:00

I slept over at my Grama's house last night; it was a lot of fun. For dinner she made patty melts! I had never had one before, so it was yummy. And we had apple turn-overs and ice cream for dessert. We watched the Sixth Sense on TV. I had never seen this movie before - it was interesting. I would never ever want to have that "sixth sense"; I would rather not see freaky dead people. But I thought the creepiest part was when the mom was poisoning her kid - that's just not right. I don't think I've ever eaten so much junk food in a 24-hour period of time in my life. 'Cause, you know, eating 5 days worth of food in 30 minutes to an hour at Thanksgiving isn't really the same thing.

2005-10-23T18:59:00.000-04:00

We got a tiny teensy puny little bit of snow this morning. But it's all gone now because of the rain. Stupid rain. But it was exciting to see a little puny tiny bit of snow for five minutes.

2005-10-18T19:47:00.000-04:00

I got my braces off today!!!!!! I'm so happy - my teeth are beautiful. They feel big and slimey. But it's fun to chew gum and to be able to eat without getting food caught all in them. Also, as a surprise, my mom bought the next Series of Unfortunate Events book!!! It's my favorite series of all times! I didn't hear anything about it coming out, so I was very excited.

2005-10-15T19:08:00.000-04:00

Will it ever stop raining here??? Gosh, we are all going to be albinos because we haven't been outside in so long. Our dog doesn't want to go outside to pee, so his bladder might explode.

Our addition is taking forever. Almost everyone (the insulators, the painter, the other dudes) are all delayed until forever. It has been going on for four months now, my mom is starting to stress about it. Hopefully it'll be done in the next month, or else I'll have to get up and do it myself!

2005-10-14T19:47:00.000-04:00

My mom and my Grama and I just had a scientific breakthrough!!!! We can tap on the plywood floor in the addition! So now I can practice my wings and Hines riffs! They are both totally pathetic, but I'll keep on practicing until they put the official floor down. But I think my mom and I (and Grama) are pretty darn smart!

2005-10-11T20:07:00.000-04:00

There was a ton of rain over the weekend. Tons and tons and tons of rain! Lots of it! Our neighbor's basement was flooded, the pond near our house flooded into another neighbor's yard, and a lake spilled out into the road. When we drove to church, there was a lot of flooding. Then we saw a FIRE!!!!!!!!! We drove by this house engulfed in flames and people running around screaming with their heads on fire!!! Not really. The house was burning down, but it was a controlled burn, in other words, the firemen were just sitting around, and people were pulling out their lawn chairs and taking pictures. But it was really cool, floods and fire in one day!

2005-10-07T19:47:00.000-04:00

Hey, guys my dad's website is losing traffic, so could you do me a huge favor and go there so we don't have to hear him moan perpetually about how little people are on his site? Thanks.

I had three dance classes last night. One of them was pointe. And it being my first pointe class, my feet hurt. My toes were going numb part way through the class, then my ankles started to cramp up after I took the shoes off. Tonight we watched the last of "So you Think You Can Dance", I'm so sad it's over. But there's always next season! Bwa ha ha ha ha!

2005-10-03T20:35:00.000-04:00

On Saturday, I got my pointe shoes!!! They were so beautiful and shiny until my teacher demonstrated how to break them in. She stomped on the top of the shoe and taught me how to bend them. They are a little dirty now. Also I have been wearing them around the house, and with 2 cats, 1 German Shepherd and an un-vacuumed floor, you can imagine what they look like now. Gross. Oh, well. I don't think my legs work right now after 2 and a half hours of dance. My legs were killing me half way through the second class and refused to work for a while. At least I can walk, sort of.

2005-09-30T10:16:00.000-04:00

My dad just told me that my blog has a Google page rank of 3 outta 10! That's really good for a blog, so I would like to thank everyone who reads my blog, even though I don't update it as much as I should. But I thought that was cool. Anyways, my dad went on a hike today, while the rest of us stayed home and did some school, nothing too exciting. But we couldn't do too much school because my poor mama is sick. In fact we all have a little bug going around; it stinks. Especially because there's this awesome festival thing that I want to go to tomorrow. My dance teacher is in charge of the whole thing. It's like an arts festival with dancing, music, and FOOD!! But I mainly want to go because the Senior Company at my dance studio are performing a 25 (that's not a typo) minute modern dance, and my dance teacher is doing a solo.

I saw the most disgusting thing at the grocery store the other day. Macaroni and cheese loaf in the deli. Eeew. I can almost understand olive loaf compared to that.

2005-09-28T19:53:00.000-04:00

I'm so happy! My dance teacher is putting me and some of my fellow dancers in pre-pointe (a beginner's pointe class)! I'm so excited. I am going to get pointe shoes maybe this weekend. The classes start next week, I can't wait! I have been waiting a long time to go on pointe; I hope I don't hate it.

2005-09-25T19:31:00.000-04:00

Only my mom went to church today because the rest of us weren't feeling well. But we felt better enough a little later to go to Otterfest (our annual neighborhood gathering/cookout). It was fun. I helped make some homemade ice cream over there! It was sooo good. Very evil though. Lots and tons of cream and sugar and vanilla extract.

2005-09-21T20:10:00.000-04:00

Lots and lots of dance. Dance has eaten my life. Mondays are the longest days, 2 and a half hours. Anyway, on to happier subjects, I'M GETTING MY BRACES OFF IN FOUR (count 'em) FOUR WEEKS!!!!!!!! I have been going to the orthodontist for about five years, and in regular braces for a year and a half. I can't wait to chew gum, eat without getting food stuck all in my braces, and freedom. So if you happen to be in New Hampshire on October 18 and see a red headed girl smiling real big, that's me!

2005-09-17T18:55:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I finished all of my school done real fast. My mama left for most of the day to go to some doctors appointments. And today, I slept in until 9:00. It was wonderful. I hate getting up at 7:30, even though I'm lucky because most people have to get up at 5:00. I went on two jobs with my dad; actually it was one job because the second one stood us up. I still got paid for it though (yay for me!).

2005-09-14T19:37:00.000-04:00

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with my blog. I have been busy and kept forgetting to write stuff. On Monday I had Jazz and Junior Company rehearsals. Jazz was fun, we are learning a really fast jazz practice routine. Then we're going to learn a hip hop one, musical theater, stretch and leap (lots of splits and jumps and turns) and then we'll try lyrical. But my dance teacher choreographs good lyrical, not the sappy stuff on "So You Think You Can Dance". We started working on our Junior Company dance - and it's awesome!!! We are going to get high scores in all of the competitions - maybe, hopefully.

2005-09-08T20:01:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, I had my first tap class. I was moved up, and it's harder, but fun. Today, I had ballet (same) and also production class. The Junior and Senior Companies are going to do a number together - and it's going to be awesome!!! The music is Pirates of the Caribbean (not "Yo ho, yo ho a pirate's life for me", but the good music from the good movie) and we are going to have pirate costumes - some people will have the pirate ladies dresses, and some will have the man-pirate costumes. It's going to be so cool - we might have barrels and wooden crates, and possibly a plastic sword fight! I can't wait!!!

2005-09-06T19:46:00.000-04:00

Sunday- My mom said we were going to go to church this morning. And I was so proud of myself, because I got up bright and early, I got dressed, brushed my teeth and face, and got my stuff together. I came downstairs to greet my parents...and turns out my mom's sick. Poo. So I got dressed in house clothes and put the dishes away for her. She ended up getting better later that day.

Monday- Last day of vacation for us (noooooooo!!!). We spent the day cleaning, getting ready for school, and had one more day of letting our brains rot. I had seven chapters of a book that I had to finish before school, so I was awake a lot of the night reading that. I also have to camp out in my brother's room because the construction workers get here and start banging around at 6:30 in the morning, and I like to sleep until 7:30 (preferably p.m.).

Tuesday- First day of school. It's actually not that bad if you tell your brain that it's not summer anymore, we have to start school, so deal with it. I'm a believer in tough love. Anyways, we had a homeschoolers play meet at the playground, I finished my school, and that's a wrap.

2005-09-03T18:42:00.000-04:00

Well let's see, the past few days I went to a pond party, went to church, considered getting another dog, broke a toe, signed up for dance classes, watched "So You Think You Can Dance" at my Grama's house, got my hair cut, and went on two jobs with my dad (gasp for breath). And about the dog, right now we are thinking of a Lhasa Apso and would name him Harpo after our favorite Marx Brother. We had a hard time between Harpo and Zeppo, but we love Harpo because he is like a dog in a (good) way. If we do get a dog, we children would have to train him, take care of him, and exercise him. I started reading a book about Clicker Training. We used that for Bubba (or Baby Cuddles), and it worked well. But fortunately we children won't have to pay for any part of it (except for time).

2005-08-27T18:04:00.000-04:00

It's been kinda crazy for the past few days. We went to Gorham, New Hampshire, for a vacation. We found a motel that allows dogs, so we could bring the Bubba (but now my dad wants to call him Baby Cuddles). Anyhoo, this place has a heated outdoor pool, it was close to good eatin' places, close to the White Mountains, had cable TV, and I got the most comfortable cot ever. My dad, Baby Cuddles, my bros and I went hiking up Mt. Moriah. We went up the Carter Moriah trail. It was kind of hard getting up to the top, and the views at the top were okay. Then we continued on part of the Carter Ridge and down the Stonybrook Trail. The ridge was absolutely amazing, awesome, I can't find the words to describe its beauty. We caught it on the perfect day (sunny with a few poofy white clouds that give it an underwater effect), and as you would hike along you would end up on some rocks and you were in the middle of all of these mountains; it felt like the middle of a wilderness. It was the most gorgeous thing I have ever seen.

2005-08-19T12:06:00.000-04:00

The auditions were last night. Junior Company was fun, we did a neat jazz dance, there were some flexibility requirements - splits, back bends and some other stretches. We also had to know how to do some turns and do some turn combinations in time with music. Senior Company try outs were sooooooo much fun. After flexibility and turns, we did a really cool lyrical dance that was hard and I don't think I completely got it, but it was awesome. Then we did a really fast jazz dance. It was really fast. It was so fast it was a blur. It was so much fun. We got the call this morning, and I'm in Junior Company!!! I was worried I wouldn't get into anything, I was up a lot last night wondering about it.

2005-08-17T17:34:00.000-04:00

Dance auditions are tomorrow - I'm getting really nervous. I'm trying out for both Junior and Senior Company. I'll most likely get into Junior, but I'm trying out for Senior Company just for fun. I can't wait to be in either of them! I will get to compete! The Companies will compete in 5 competitions - competitively. Senior Company and Junior Company won't compete against each other though, 'cause that would be a little unfair. But we will do a production number that has both Companies in it, that would be fun.

2005-08-13T18:07:00.000-04:00

All of the construction that we're having done made our house vulnerable to leaks when it rains. It rained a lot last night, so in the morning when I came down into the kitchen/dining area, there were buckets and pots everywhere filled with water. My parents spent most of the night dealing with leaks. Water was dripping everywhere - through a Tyvek enclosed opening in the dining room, dripping through light fixtures, even dripping out our noses! Oh, wait...Dang allergies! So we called the builder, and he came and put some Saran Wrap around some places (kidding - he put some sturdy plastic construction sheet in certain areas). Hopefully that will help if it rains again.

2005-08-12T18:11:00.000-04:00

Something went wrong with my brother Sam's braces, so we had to drive all the way to the Orthodontist (which is about 30 minutes away) just to get a wire put back in. But that's okay. We did a little bit of shopping there. My dad and dog went off hiking all day, so it was just me, my mom and my brothers.

After the Orthodontist, we went on a walk, then we went to my Grama's house because she recorded "So You Think You Can Dance". They have come down to their top 16! All of them were really good, except for two of them. There's a really fat guy, that all you can think while watching him dance is "He moves pretty well for a big guy." And the other guy I don't like is a good dancer, but I think he has problems - he cried during his Lyrical dance class, and he bad-mouthed one of the judge/choreographers. The judges got on him about that. But they let him get into the final 16 anyway.

2005-08-10T18:19:00.000-04:00

We went to see a play at the Barn Playhouse. It's a local barn that the town uses as a summer theater. They have a regular cast, and they sometimes use local kids in the plays. Today we saw "Bye Bye Birdie". It was really good. We also saw "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat". That one was excellent. I liked it better than "Birdie". Some of my friends were the plays, but they just have small parts.

2005-08-08T19:38:00.000-04:00

Have you been watching "So You Think You Can Dance"? I found the auditions hilarious. It's even better than American Idol! There are some people that are amazing, and some people that are awful. They are done with the auditions now, and the judges chose people to go to Hollywood to work with some of the world's best choreographers. There are five choreographers - one teaches Salsa, one teaches Ball room, one teaches Lyrical/Contemporary, one Hip-hop, and another teaches a different style of Hip-hop. It showed one guy in Lyrical, and he was dancing. The teacher was telling him to dig deep down and feel the music, feel the rhythm, and all of a sudden, he stops dancing and starts getting so "feeling it", he starts crying. The dude actually cries. And he's a man. And he's crying. During Lyrical. It was soooo ridiculous, it was funny. So the teacher says "Excellent, now put it into the routine!" So he's still crying while dancing, then everybody else starts crying. Except for one guy who didn't understand the point of crying while dancing. That would be me.

Anyhoo, back to me. On Saturday, we watched a parade. It's a fund-raiser parade for our hospital. So they call it "Hospital Days Parade". I like to go because most of the people on floats throw candy. After the parade, my friend and I went to the Hospital Days carnival. I went on three rides, and I was scared to death on all of them because of the poor maintenance. But it was fun. I also played some games and ate fried dough - yum.

2005-08-05T18:25:00.000-04:00

I got my nails done today! Thanks to my awesome Yia Yia for giving me money to go out and get 'em done. I have only gotted my nails done once in my life, so it was fun. I got a French manicure and a regular pedicure. My toes feel all silky. Of course after that we had to do some yard work. But they still look nice.

Have you heard of those Crocs shoes? Well, I got a pair today. They are not the prettiest shoes, but they are pretty darn comfy. My mom started seeing these shoes around and didn't know what to make of them. But then my mom read an article about them in the newspaper, and people loved them. Especially people who are on their feet all day. And my mother, being a busy housewife who homeschools her children, bought a pair and loved them. So I got a pair and they are so comfortable. They are made of some sort of spongy resin material, and they literally add a bounce to your step!

2005-08-01T19:02:00.000-04:00

Yesterday at church, one of my friends brought her new puppy! She (the puppy) was soooo cute! Her name is Daisy, she is a 9 week old miniature poodle. She was so tiny and weighed nothing. Daisy is all black with a little white spot on her chest and a tiny little white spot on her chin. She was really tired that day, so I held her constantly and she fell asleep. At one point she met the other adult dogs outside and she would start screaming so loud, it was so funny. Finally she got used to the other dogs.

2005-07-30T18:52:00.000-04:00

I went on two jobs with my dad. The first one was awesome because the guy gave us tips, and he had cute dogs (they were both HUGE, one German Shepherd, and a Rottweiler). I installed the fan motor in a freezer, that was very exciting. And when the job was done, the guy who we worked for gave me a ten dollar tip!!! And he gave my dad a twenty dollar tip!!! That was the first time either of us had gotten a tip from a customer. He said that he really appreciated that we came out really soon verses Sears, who had said they would be out in three weeks.

2005-07-29T21:22:00.000-04:00

My brothers and I mowed the whole entire lawn today - in less than an hour. And we have a pretty big yard! We have an electric mower; it's great except we have to use two HUMONGOUS extension cords. And it's a two-man-and-one-girl job. I work the mower while my brothers handle the cord. I like the electric mower because it's soooo much lighter, it's easy to start and stop, it's really quiet, and it doesn't stink! It's really easy to use, that's why it doesn't take us long!

2005-07-25T19:27:00.000-04:00

All my family came up on Thursday. I skipped dance that day because of their arrival. I met my new cousins, they're both adorable. Peter is the older one - he is six years old and talked a lot to me. At a restaurant we went to he started having an obsession with beer (which he's never had before) and wanted to order beer, he kept talking about beer and when he was drawing, he drew beer - that was hilarious. And Nikolai is the younger one - he is really cute because he's so little and has the pudgy face; he is also very good at pouting because of his poofy face. He's three years old and the wild one.

We were going to rent a couple of boats and take everyone out on Lake Sunapee, but the stupid people at the boat place messed up our reservation and put us down for Sunday instead of Friday. Poo-poo heads.

Ya know how we're having some construction going on? Well, they finished the walls of the garage and put some of the top on. We like to climb up and have a tribal ritual dance every now and then. Anyhoo, me and the older cousins climbed up the wall to get there. My five year old cousin Grant wanted to get on but we had to say "No" because he was too young. He has a funny way of talking; chay-er instead of chair, day-own instead of down, and on top of that all, a little kid voice. So he goes over to the ten foot ladder that the construction workers put there and he said "That otay, I know 'nother way up!" So he starts to climb up the ladder and my cousin Mina is screaming "GRANT NOOOOOOO!!!! GET HIM OFF THE LADDER!!! OFF THE LADDER!!!!! OOOO MY GOSH!!!! AAAAAH!!!" Then Grant's at the top while Mina has a heart attack and a seizure fit.

Sunday night we went out to dinner for the third time in a row. There was an ice cream place connected to the restaurant where me and Mina and one of my other cousins Alexi went after dinner. Mina (who's my age - 13) got chocolate ice cream and smeared it all over her chin, nose, mouth, cheeks, and all over her face. At first it was an accident, but she realized that I was laughing, so she smeared it on purposefully. After a while, she had to go back in the ice cream line to get napkins, and of course everyone was staring and laughing at her. But napkins couldn't get all of the dried ice cream off, so she had to walk all the way back into the restaurant to the bathroom. The guy who held the entrance door open was trying not to laugh, but it was obvious that he was. I was laughing so hard as I was typing this - my brother probably thinks that I have a laughing version of Turret's Syndrome.

2005-07-20T20:19:00.000-04:00

We have done soooooooooooo (2 hours later) ...ooooooooooooooo much cleaning today. The stinky part - you could barely notice unless you live here. My brothers' room went from a pig sty to a beautiful, clean, clear, bedroom/playroom. I vacuumed my room, cleaned a good bit, and did a bit of re-arranging. I scrubbed the bathrooms, but they're so old that a lot of the rust won't come off. We are cleaning our butts off because my dad's side of the family is coming up. My aunt adopted two adorable little boys from Russia, and she's having them baptized up here in our church. I'm so excited!

2005-07-18T20:40:00.000-04:00

Ugh, it was sooooooooooo hot at dance today. Today had high humidity and 80 something degree weather. And the dance studio is an old building with no air conditioning and on the third floor. I'm 100% sure that it was probably 1,000 degrees in there. Fortunately our car is air conditioned and I had watermelon for a snack. So good.

2005-07-17T18:20:00.000-04:00

When we went to church today and the power went out towards the end of the service. Me and my friend were downstairs in the coffee hall, and we went upstairs to see what it looked like in the church. It was so cool - there were a lot of candles lit, and stained glass windows and it was kinda dark. I think a circuit tripped because houses next door had power. Someone just had to turn the circuit breaker back on.

2005-07-16T17:35:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I had a late birthday party. It was soooo much fun. First we went rock climbing at a place called The Wall. That was so cool. Then we went to a bird shelter called Vins. They find injured birds of prey and take them in and you can come and look at the birds. They have so many awesome birds! They have Bald Eagles, Great Horned Owls, Snowy Owls, Turkey Vultures (they are some freaky birds), Barn Owls, and lots of others. Then we went to a Japanese steakhouse called Koto. They have good food. My mom mentioned to the Japanese waitress that this was my birthday party. She said to me, "Oh, what yor name?" I told her my name was Ivey. Later she and some other waiters/waitresses (some of which were American) came out with fried ice cream (the BEST dessert ever!) and sang "Happy Birthday". But instead of saying "Ivey" they said "Abby", that was soooo funny. Then the guy took my picture. Then a bit later the guy came back (he was one of the Americans; and he was kind of goody-goody and all smiley and animated) with a card with my picture in it and a greeting. And he said "Abby, this is something from us, Koto, to you so you'll remember this happy event. Happy birthday."

I had my friends (who kept calling me Abby) sleep over too. We watched chick flicks, ate tortilla chips, and yakked forever. Of course, we didn't get to sleep until early in the morning. Then we woke up at 9:00 later that morning. We were really tired. After we dropped them off I went home and took a nap. And I'm one of those people who is usually incapable of taking day naps.

2005-07-14T20:40:00.000-04:00

Sorry I haven't done a post in a while, but I couldn't help it - I was adopted...Uh, abducted by aliens!!!!!! They took me to their Mommy Ship, where they did some experiments on me. They stuck so many needles in me it was like acupuncture. They put these weird suction cup things on my forehead - I still have the red marks from them. They told me never to do a post on my blog again! I put my foot down on that one. Literally, I stomped on the fleshy blobs they called "feet". I took all the acupunture needles outta me and ripped the suction cups off my face. I then beat them up real bad. Yea, they had a few cuts and bruises when I was through with them. Anything to protect my blog. I got off of their ship and went home and went to bed. The End.

2005-07-11T18:53:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, we went to church. After that we mowed the lawn. Then me and my friends went to the beach to go swimming. That was the most fun part of the day. I went with my friend and her little sister (who is also my friend) and they are the short and really skinny-with-no-body-fat type, so they got cold really fast.

Today, I went on 5 jobs with my dad. I got $25.00 this time. Not bad. One job we went on the people had four dogs - two Labs, and two Dachshunds. The two Dachshunds were sooo cute and tiny! The owner would pick them up by the scruff of their neck when they were in our way - that was funny. They look so funny when they sit because they have an awkwardly long body and one-inch legs.

2005-07-09T18:47:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we just went to Concord for my brothers' eye check-ups and shopping. Nothing that interesting. Today, we didn't go anywhere. Me and one of my brothers mowed part of the lawn, that was the most exciting part!

To Alison: Are you guys up here yet? I haven't seen you anywhere! I'm looking forward to seeing you. Let me know when/if you're coming.

2005-07-07T19:40:00.000-04:00

I had a tennis lesson this morning. For ONCE!!! it was cooler outside. It was so nice. Sunny, maybe around 70 degrees. It's always been sunny and 90 degrees out.

Have you been watching Dancing With the Stars? If you haven't, well ha ha! You missed out on an awesome show. It's a dance competition, but they have celebrities pair up with professional ballroom dancers. Then the pros teach the celebs and all of the couples compete and get thrown off the show every week. It's really entertaining to watch. And the first champion of Dancing With the Stars was crowned (actually "trophied") last night. I hope they have another season next year! Except I can only watch it when my Grama records it because we don't have cable TV.

2005-07-06T19:32:00.000-04:00

I went on 6 appliance-fixin' jobs with my dad. I made $37.00. That was cool. We fixed a cooktop, another cooktop, a dishwasher, and a dryer. We couldn't fix another dryer job we went on. We went on an ice maker job - we need to order a part and go back for that one, so we didn't fix it today. We couldn't fix the other dryer because there was no way to get that thang outta the little laundry cubby. It's been a loooooong day.

2005-07-04T19:55:00.000-04:00

My cat sitting job is over. My neighbors came back this evening from Canada. They gave me 20 bucks for about 5 days of cat sitting! That was cool. They offered me a job in October for some animal sitting. They are going to Europe for almost 3 weeks, so I wonder how much I'll get paid then!

2005-07-03T19:00:00.000-04:00

The cats I am cat sitting are sooo funny. There are three cats. Red: his fur is red, hence he was given the name "Red". Binky: she is all black except for one teensy white patch on her chest. Boots: he is black except for his feet, chin, and most of tummy. All of these cats are very affectionate - especially Boots. Red is my favorite, because he was the first person to greet us when we first moved here. So he's kinda old, but he's a sweetie. Boots is always the first one who comes up to me and talks to me when I come into their house. Binky kind of hides in the shadows, staring at you with her bright green eyes. They are all good cats though.

2005-07-02T19:32:00.000-04:00

Ok, some freaky stuff happened today. I am cat sitting for our next door neighbors, and last time I cat sat, the cats brought in a dead bird. This time, they brought in a mostly dead mink. I walked in the door, and it was lying there. I threw up in my mouth and thought it was dead, but noooooo. It's eyes were blinking slowly, and its stomach was moving. But it couldn't move anything else. I grabbed some cardboard boxes from my house, and got it in. I felt so bad for the poor thing. It's body was limp when I scooped it in the box. Me and my brothers put it out of its misery when I got home. After that disgusting event, I thought of becoming a vegetarian. I pondered this thought as I ate the steak my mama cooked for dinner. Then I forgot what I was thinking about and focused on how yummy the meat was.

2005-07-01T21:22:00.000-04:00

I had to get more of my warts frozen off with liquid nitrogen this afternoon. I had gotten them frozen off for a first round a little over a month ago, but that time it only killed one. So the "wart-freezer" aka dermatologist, did a harsh round today. Every wart (and I have 7 of them - gross) he sprayed 3 times, and about 5 seconds each time. It started to feel like needles harpooning in my hands and fingers. Ouch.

2005-06-30T21:00:00.000-04:00

Our stupid internet connection was down all day, so I couldn't do a post yesterday. Sorry, gosh. Anyhoo, I spent the night over at my Grama's house, and it's my Grama's birthday today!! Happy birthday Grama!!! She is 68 years young. She still skateboards, surfs, sky dives and has that tattoo from high school. Yea.

2005-06-28T20:58:00.000-04:00

Hey, how did y'all like yesterday's post? The Glasses are my dad's dorky glasses that I transformed into colorful, awesome Glasses with nail polish paint. It was a lot of fun to paint. My dad has a weird eye problem. Without his glasses, he would be legally blonde - er, blind in California. Anyhoo, I have to wear glasses too, but I just have a mild problem. So when I put my dad's Glasses on, everything was bulging out, I felt dizzy and unstable. It was weird. They also don't look good on me, but they look fantastic on him.

2005-06-27T20:12:00.000-04:00

Click for larger view of The Glasses.

See these Glasses? I found them in my parents' bathroom. Apparently, these Glasses put you in an alternate world when you put them on. So I put them on.

Me wearing The Glasses-- click for larger view

Everything changed. Everything looked convex; every door, every window, every soccer ball. All of a sudden, I saw a monster coming towards me. I screamed and tried to run, but he got closer - he was 1 foot away...reaching towards me! Then the monster spoke - his voice sounded exactly like my dad's. He said "Can I have my glasses back?" Oops.

2005-06-25T22:03:00.000-04:00

I went on a job with my dad this morning. We fixed a dish washer. We have a deal where I go on jobs with him and I get room and board and all the water I can drink.

Later today we went swimming. Oh! There is a little tiny cement water fall thing that's probably 2 feet high. Isn't that adorable? Just kidding. The cute part is that there were some baby ducks with their mom! They were eating all of the stuff off of the "water fall" and they kept on falling over the thing. It was so funny because they would just plop over and swim around at the bottom. I loved it when they would stick their heads under water with their fuzzy duck butts sticking up.

2005-06-23T22:15:00.000-04:00

My mom and dad had to go to a lawyer's office this morning, so us kids got to stay at Grama's house for the morning. We watched TV and ate popcorn. It was a lot of fun.

My dance classes are going well. We are learning cool new moves. Last year, our awesome dance teacher formed Senior Company - it's where you travel around and have dance competitions. She is going to make a Junior Company, which is the same thing except a level lower. Anyhoo, my teacher wants me in Junior Company - I'm so excited! Then maybe in another year I can be in Senior Company. Yay!

2005-06-22T19:34:00.000-04:00

Hi, sorry I haven't been keeping up lately, but I'll go over some stuff that happened the past few days.

June 18: My 13th birthday!!!! Happy birthday to ME! We had Oreo cheesecake, and I slept over at my Grama's house.

June 19: Happy Father's Day!!!! I am still working on my Dad's card...

June 20: We went to the Flume Gorge, and took the tramway up Mt. Cannon. It was awesome!

June 21: We mowed the lawn. Also, my summer dance classes started! They are so much fun. I almost did a flat split; I was so happy for that. I am also still working on my Dad's card.

June 22 (aka today): Nothing much happened, we went to a furniture store with my Grama and went grocery shopping. And I'm still working on the card - argh.

2005-06-15T20:08:00.000-04:00

Well, some pretty interesting stuff is going on at our house. We are getting an addition to our house. They just started with all of the earth work. They have ripped off the stairs to our house, and have dug a ton. They are obviously using an excavator, and it's so cool to watch it hurl rocks aside. When they first came yesterday, they had to smash up our steel shed, and it was amazing how easily it smashed the thang up! We also got a dumpster delivered to dump stuff in. It's really distracting from school.

2005-06-08T18:22:00.000-04:00

I know you guys probably think I'm dead, and I am. Mua hahahahaha! Not really. I have been so busy with dance dress rehearsals, and dance recitals. I won my 10 year award at my dance studio! I was so happy to waltz out on stage, kiss and wave to the audience, accept my trophy with a fake surprised smile, and make a really long speech because I know everybody loves me! Tee hee! None of that really happened, but I finally got my award after 10 long years. My friend got the jazz award - I was so happy for her! This is her first year of jazz, and she's really good.

Today I got a cavity filled. Half of my face is still numb. The cavity wasn't my fault - my tooth came in as a very sensitive tooth. It hurt more this time than my last filling (that wasn't my fault). I don't know why - the shot, the drilling, all hurt more.

2005-05-28T18:47:00.000-04:00

We bought a new lawn mower yesterday. So of course, we had to play with it today and mow the whole lawn. We got an electric lawn mower, and it's really quiet. We had to use two LOOOOOOONG extension cords that kept on getting dog poop all over them, but it worked! It's a 2 man job, because one person has to mow and the other person has to move the cord.

2005-05-26T20:36:00.000-04:00

Like, OMG! Just kidding. Today when we went over to my Grama's house, my dad came too to fix something at her house. Our dog, Bubba, came along too. Now Bubba is extremely attached to my dad. It's almost sick. Anyway, my dad pulled the hatch on the ceiling to go up to the doomed attic. So my dad went up, and all of a sudden we hear this whining, and whimpers from Bubba. We look, and he's trying to climb up the ladder to get to my dad. Then he (Bubba) started making Wookie noises! It's so funny. So we had to drag this dog away from the stairs and it took my mom, brothers and I to keep him from running up the stairs. But he has a HUGE vocal range, and he can trill his voice/whimpers. He is a born singer.

2005-05-24T20:26:00.000-04:00

Well, I have a cold. Caff, coff, sniffffle snort. That's exactly how I feel. And my ears are all clogged up so I can barely hear, and my throat is screaming, my nose, well I've already described that. I can hardly sleep when I am sick - which is the time you need rest most! So that got me a little T.O.'d, I got five hours tops of sleep last night. It was torture! I was writhing in agony on my bed and screaming because I couldn't breathe! Of course, I couldn't hear how loud I was screaming because my ears are so clogged! Then I tried clicking my heels three times and saying "There's no place like home, there's no place like home!" But that never works.

2005-05-21T18:31:00.000-04:00

Ugh - I had to get up at 7:00 this morning. We had to drop my dad of at a trail head that was almost an hour away. Then we had to drive all the way to a kid's house to drop my brothers off at his birthday party. The place where these people lived was pretty much isolated from anywhere. The nearest grocery store was about 25 minutes away! They lived in a beautiful country place, but way too far from anywhere.

2005-05-20T18:39:00.000-04:00

I got some warts burned off today. Well, I got them "frozen" off with that there liquid nitrogen stuff. My mom got some warts burned off in the past,and she said it stung. So I was really nervous - so nervous that I was almost in hysterics. I know that sounds a bit immature, but I was really nervous. So I was sitting on that scary cushioned thing that the doctor makes you sit on with my eyes slammed shut and my hand held out. The dermatologist was spraying away on all of my 7 warts and I realized that I was being stupid because it didn't hurt. It just stung a bit. That's all, have a good night folks.

2005-05-19T20:34:00.000-04:00

I went to karate with my mom and brothers because I felt like it. They (the students and teachers) sometimes play a game called "Samurai". It's exactly like dodge ball, with different variations. For example, the black belts can only throw with their left hand (or if they are originally left-handed, they have to throw with their right). It's fun to watch. But this time they invited the parents to play. My mom and some other adults said I should play, but I turned them down because it would ruin my image. Just kidding, but I just wanted to watch. It was really funny with the little kids all screaming and throwing the balls at their parents.

2005-05-18T20:39:00.000-04:00

I got an iPod today! I got it as an early birthday present - a month from today is my 13th birthday. I had to pay for part of it. I got a blue one, it's cute and perty! I have 246 songs on it so far. I plan on adding many more.

2005-05-15T18:15:00.000-04:00

I have been SO busy this week. A few friends from dance asked me to be in the high school's Variety Show. So that's taken up tons of my time with rehearsals and stressing and the shows. The shows were on Friday and Saturday. We did an awesome dance to a song called "One Thing". There was tons of other stuff - singing, instrument-playing, dances, and hilarious skits.

One of my favorite acts was the "Toast Song". It was three guys with two girls in cardboard boxes as the toaster streudel back-up dancers. One of the guys was sitting on the ground banging on an upside-down toaster with drum sticks, and the other two were sitting on chairs. The "drummer" would bang on the toaster a bit and stop, then one of the other guys started rapping about toast. Then the drummer would scream "YEA TOAST!!!!" really loud and energetically, and the toaster streudels would spin around. Then the other guy started rapping in French, and the toast screamer screamed "FRENCH TOAST!!!" That was by far the best song. I know it sounds stupid, but if you saw it, you would pee in your pants.

The skits they did were sooo funny. They did a humorous version of Cinderella, a skit called Billy-Bob, and, my favorite skit, Boy Band. One of the teachers appeared in Boy Band as the rapper, Nelly. That was pretty funny. Overall, it was an interesting experience going to the scary high school. I am never, ever, ever, ever EVER going to go there. Except maybe for another Variety Show.