Senior Pictures

As you may already know, I really enjoy photography. I have a few friends who have asked me to do their Senior Pictures. Right now, I'm trying to figure out pricing and packages and such. I think it would be really cool to be able to do my "client's" hair (if they are a girl) before the shoot.

For my Senior Pictures I want to have a professional photographer do mine. They all seem so expensive though! I really like the look of Tess J. Photography's pictures and that she does hair and makeup beforehand. I don't think I'd want any makeup done on me though. I don't normally wear makeup, so why would I put make up on for the photoshoot?

Yet Another Fun Weekend

Last Friday evening my family and I went over to the Donahue's for Mexican Burgers! The burgers were delicious, they tasted like tacos! :) The visit with the Donahue family was just spectacular! We had nice talks, played Dutch Blitz, ate ice cream, and Corrie and I made flower hairpieces. <3

Saturday morning, I baked a Honey Bundt Cake for breakfast. After breakfast, Mom, Shannon, Billy and I helped out at the workday at the Root Cellar. I ended up sorting out a HUGE closet full of clothes with a lady who was volunteering there also. We sorted the clothes into mens, girls, boys, womans pants, womans shirts, womans dresses, and we even had a box for a few household things like curtains and wash cloths. There were SO MANY womans clothes!

Millie and Grace came back to our house for a sleepover. I got to paint their nails converse! I also made pizza for supper and after supper we played Dutch Blitz until 10pm.

On Sunday, we went to church. :) It was good. Millie, Gracie, and Kevin came to our house after and had lunch with us, and then we played Dutch Blitz again. We left to go pick up Kyle and then to the Marston's house for a game night with our home group.

All in all, it was a fun weekend!

Fancy Dinner!

On Tuesday Tucker texted me asking for a little bit of advice for a fancy dinner he wanted to do for his parents. His idea made me want to do something special for my parents too. We both figured out that Thursday would be the best evening to do it for our parents. Then, Tucker had a crazy awesome idea that we make it a double date for our parents and make the fancy dinner at his house! Let's just say we planned a fancy, candlelight (with a few dimmed lights), delicious dinner in two days. We had lots of help from Rebecca, Samantha, Billy and Shannon though! :D

On Wednesday afternoon I secretly printed, stained with tea, and burned the edges of a fancy invitation for Mom and Dad. I gave it to them at supper time. :)

On Thursday we had SMASH rehearsal at 1pm. The Kidd's drove us to SMASH and Mrs. Kidd stayed at SMASH and watched the rehearsal. Which was really nice because that made it so Mom didn't have to come  pick us and the Kidd's up like she normally does.  We rehearsed Act 3 Scene 3, which is a scene I'm in! :) It was LOTS of fun! Samantha directed the acting because Pastor Sam was teaching in Augusta, I think.

After SMASH Billy, Rebecca, Tucker and I got to work in the kitchen. We baked a chocolate cake, thawed shrimp, fried/baked steak, made mashed potatoes, boiled carrots, corn, made salad, salad dressing, and cocktail sauce. I ironed the napkins and Rebecca folded them beautifully. Billy, Shannon, Tucker and I all wore black pants (or skirt) and white button down shirts. Billy brought his four bowties with him so we all wore bowties while we served our parents.  We used Tucker's iPod and speakers to play classical background music.

Pictures and words can only describe a fraction of the fun we had doing this special dinner for our parents.

The nicely set table that Billy, Samantha and Tucker did. Rebecca folded the napkins though!

Billy boiling the carrots WITHOUT an apron. Tisk , tisk.

The parents seated. 

A different view of the parents seated.

Pastor Sam wanted me to take a picture of them eating the cake I made and "decorated".

They aren't *actually* drunk but they were certainly overtired.

The servers! Good job guys!

A big thank you goes to Samantha and Rebecca who helped!

Cool Camera Settings

The other day I actually decided to take a closer look at my camera's owners manual. I learned how to change the ISO (image sensor's sensitivity to light) speed, change the picture style (I can now take black and white, sepia, purple, green and blue pictures), I can change the shutter speed, change the depth of field (I need to experiment with that a little more), and how to do live view shots (where the image you're about to take shows up on the screen instead of having to look through the view finder). I'm pretty excited to play around with it! I just have to find a good time and good object or subject to play around with. I'm sure if I come up with some cool pictures I'll post them on here.

We're doing my scene in SMASH today! I think it's my favorite scene to do (out of the ones I'm in). We, my fellow watchmen and I, get to arrest Borachio and Conrade while they're drunk. :D

Sickness.

I don't think I've mentioned that I have a cold. I caught the cold from Shannon about a week after she got it. She still has the cold! I feel like my cold has improved since Saturday (that's when I got it). Friday night, Saturday and Sunday I just had a nasty cough. In the middle of the night on Monday I got the nose cold part of the cold. Yep. So, I had trouble breathing through my nose and too much breathing through the mouth caused me to cough. But, with about two cups of hot tea with honey, and about 4 cups of hot water with little or no honey at all for about 5 days in a row I am feeling much better! I don't need to blow my nose half as much and my coughing fits of decreased. :) I highly recommend doing what I did when you're sick. I also have been going to bed a half hour earlier. 

My friend Jenna is putting on a photography contest and she asked me to judge with her. If you enjoy photography, I suggest you consider doing the contest! :) For more information: go here. :)

Converse Nails!

Last night I decided to paint Converse on my nails because Cutepolish posted a video how to do it. I REALLY like how they turned out. My right hand doesn't look as good as my left because it's pretty hard doing detail with my left hand.

I didn't do the black line over the white tip and I painted every nail a converse shoe. Her nails look much better than mine though. :/

These are mine. My favorite one is the green one, I think.

This morning I made burritos with scrambled egg, cheese, sausage, pieces of sliced ham and a teeny bit of onion. They were rather filling! Tomorrow, I plan on making some sort of bundt cake for breakfast.

Breakfast Ideas

I'm the cook this week in our house and I'm getting a little tired of the same breakfasts. We have like three or four basic breakfasts which are Egg Mcmuffins, pancakes, waffles and muffins. On various occasions, we have French Toast. On days where we sleep in too late we have either bagels or cold cereal.

I spent the night at the Kidd's house last Friday and discovered a new delicious breakfast meal! It's called Dutch Babies! They're kind of sweet so I wouldn't suggest having them too often. I like putting butter, powdered sugar and maple syrup on them.

This morning, Billy gave me the idea of making breakfast burritos. That sounds sooo good! I've had them before but I guess I never considered making them myself. We would put scrambled eggs, cheese, bacon and sausage in the burrito.

What are some of your favorite breakfasts?

First Scene!

I get to do my FIRST scene today! We've been rehearsing for quite awhile now but today I actually get to do a scene! I'M SO EXCITED! I have about four lines in this scene but that's okay. I'm in both casts so I'll get to say m y lines twice, I guess.

In case you didn't know, I'm playing a dumb volunteer police officer (a watchmen) named George Seacoal. Yesterday, after SMASH, Mom, Billy, Anna and I went shopping for shoes at Goodwill for our characters. We were only shopping for Billy and I though, because Anna is going to borrow Shannon's black boots from last years play. Billy got "menacing" (according to Mrs. Phillips) black leather boots, and me brown sillyish (for Shakespearean times) shoes. They're very similar to hiking boots. They are also a size and a half too big so they look clunky which Mrs. Phillips likes. :)

SMASHness

Today we have SMASH again! I'm not in any of the scenes but I'm going anyway to hang out and watch Billy do one of his scenes. :) Tomorrow will be the first time I get to do one of my scenes! I'm SO excited! I only have about 3 or 4 lines in the scene I'm in tomorrow, but I'm still excited.

I know you're probably sick of hearing about hairdos but, today I did a side fish bone braid with some twisted hair around the head. The back looks kind of like a waterfall. Tim and Mom already said complimented on it. :)

The fish bone braid. It's kind of messy.

The "waterfall" look. 

With the "waterfall" look, your shorter layers don't fall out of the ponytail. It's really nice. The look adds a unique touch and keeps hair from falling out of the ponytail. To be honest though, it's kind of hard to do this look on yourself. But you could also go without doing the ponytail and just leave the hair loose. It looks rather elegant. :) I learned how to do this look with this video. The lady calls it a layered ponytail.

Twisty Updo!

In yesterday's blog post I said I would show you guys how to do a twisty updo. Corrie gave me the idea by doing a similar hairdo meant for short curly hair and I improvised. My hair is wavy, long with some short layers, and thick!

First off, get your hair damp.

My hair all wet and finger brushed.

You'll need lots of bobby pins, a few big ones but mainly regular sized ones.

Bobby pins!

Step # 1: Part your hair to the side.

Step # 2: Gather your top layer and twist it into a small ballerina bun in the back. Pin the bun with a few large bobby pins.

The front of my hair "gathered".

Step # 3: Grab a strand of hair from the side and twist it in towards the head. Bring the twisted strand around the head and pin it right by the crown of your head. Do the same with the other side of the head.

The "strand" of hair.

The strand of hair "twisted".

The strand of hair wrapped around the head.

Step # 4: Continue to wrap twisted strands of hair around your head until you get below the ears. Start twisting strands of hair just like before but go up and wrap the strands around and on top of the ballerina bun.

All the ends are a little crazy so in the next picture I pinned them inwards.

Step #5 If your hair is long as, or longer than my hair your ends are probably poking up in random spots. Just gently grab the ends and twist them in and pin them randomly in the middle of your hair.

Step # 6: If the hair that you pulled back in the ballerina bun is too lose for your taste go ahead and use a bobby pin to pull the hair tighter.

(optional) Step # 7: Put a flower hair piece or some other pretty hair piece in your hair.

Done!

I recommend letting your hair dry a little more than I did for this hairdo. It was a little too wet.

Hairdos!

Yesterday, after church I went hairdo crazy. :) I looked online on how to do easy and cute hairdos. Some I would never wear but I learned some new ones that I like and I also made up some of my own through the other hairdos.

Here is a picture of a hairdo called Maiden Braids. I learned it from a blog Rebecca showed me.

I should have smiled... 

Next time I'll try and only do four braids (two and each side) because this looks really messy on the sides. :/

I should have smiled for this one too...

This is a side fish bone braid. It's kind of a messy hairdo but I still like it and I added a ribbon at the end because I thought it would look cute. :)

This picture isn't meant to show the hairdo, but the hair piece. Corrie and I made it when I was visiting her last   Friday night.  We learned how to make them from Anna's blog. :) I'll explain how to do the hairdo in another blog post because it's easier to explain with pictures.

Weekend Plans

Tonight I think we are going to the Donahue's house for pizza! :D I'm excited for that. I love the Donahue family very much! Before I go to the Donahue's, I'm going to workout, and try and mail out the thank you cards.

Tomorrow I'm going to go see Beauty and the Beast by Leavitt with Sarah and maybe Billy, Calvin, Rebecca, Tucker, Pastor Sam and Mrs. Richards. It should be good! I know atleast the person who is playing Gaston.

SHANNON IS COMING HOME TOMORROW! That'll be my highlight of the day. Shannon is the greatest sister I could ever ask for. <3 She's been gone for a week in NYC. 

Here is a song that Corrie and I really like!

My Thoughts on Modesty

I think girls shouldn't wear shirts that show their midriff. I don't really like those shirts that have such wide collars that they slide off the shoulder. Shirts shouldn't be too low either. But I'm not going to get into much detail on that...

Shorts shouldn't be more than 4 or 5 inches above the knee. Depends on how long your legs are.. Half way down the thigh is probably best. Skirts and dresses should be no shorter then the knee. You could maybe wear a skirt or dress that's a teeny bit shorter than the knee as long as you have leggings on. Jeans shouldn't be too tight either. There are alot of girls whose jeans looks spray painted on. Not only is it immodest, it must be horribly uncomfortable. Oh, and please put a skirt or dress on over your leggings! Wearing  just  leggings as pants is REALLY immodest.

Your bathing suit shouldn't show any midriff either. I know one pieces are not fun sometimes so I recommend a tankini. They're great! Bikinis are big no-nos though. Put a tshirt and shorts on over a bikini if you can't find a tankini or a one piece that fits you. 

Now guys, I have a few thoughts for you guys too. Please GET A BELT! Don't let your boxers show, it's gross! Also, don't wear super tight skinny jeans. That just looks weird. 

To close, I'll post this video that I really like. It's directed towards girls but that's probably because girls can get a little crazy with their clothes, more so than guys anyway.

The reason modesty is so important is because it lets a person get to know you as who you are, there won't be much physical distraction. Also, to honor God. You shouldn't wear something that puts complete attention on your body. How can you be a light or a witness to someone when the clothes you wear directs all the attention on you?

Planet Fitness with Billy and Jenna!

Last night Billy, Jenna and I went to Planet Fitness. It was REALLY busy because people were just getting out of work and squeezing in a workout after their work and before supper. I'm surprisingly not that sore. Billy says it's probably because of the protein drink. The protein drink helps build muscle too. :)

This afternoon Jenna and I plan on going to Planet Fitness again. Billy might join us but he is pretty busy with this geeky thing he is doing with Dad, Richard and Calvin AND school.

A Loverly Weekend

Last Saturday Shannon left for a week. :/ I miss her already. She's doing  a ministry in NYC through Coastlands.

While Corrie, Jolie and Casey we over on Saturday we took pictures of each other, played Sequence, Dutch Blitz and talked. It was lots of fun!

Jolie, Corrie, me and Casey! <3

 

Corrie and I. <3

After Casey, Corrie, and Jolie left we had spaghetti for supper and then we watched The Notebook. I prefer action movies, The Notebook movie is just a tad too "lovey dovey" for me. 

On Sunday we had a good church service. :) After church Billy, Jason, Kyle and I played four player Pentago. Jason won. Kyle went home with his Mom but let us continue to play with his game. I won twice and then Billy won the last round. 

After we left for church we had a lady and her daughter from our church over named Shannon and Evy. Evy and I made pizza and blonde brownies. We made the blonde brownies for home group at the Kidd's house.  During our home group study Lily fell asleep on my lap. She's so cute. :) 

Today Billy's friend Richard, Billy and Calvin are helping Dad make a Grocery Lister App. Since 11am this morning Dad has been teaching them geeky stuff in the living room. I'm pretty sure atleast Billy and Richard will be doing this for two weeks. It's quite the process. 

After I publish this blogpost, I'm going to go do an extra lesson of Geometry then workout at Planet Fitness with Billy and Jenna! 

Snow.

SNOW! It was snowing this morning! I'm so happy that it snowed. This has been a very snow free winter this season. By now, we usually have about 3 feet of snow. But right now we only have a couple inches from today's snow fall. It keeps melting away.

Today we have SMASH and then after SMASH Corrie, Jolie, Jessi, and Brenna are coming over for a visit. Corrie and Jolie are spending the night. I'm really excited! The Donahue ladies are fantastic! <3

Productive Picture Day!

Yesterday, Tucker, Kevin, Seth, and Pastor Sam helped me setup my backdrop stand in the corner of the Great Room. John offered to get people for me as I needed to take their picture and his friend checked people off on the cast list as I took their picture. I was so blessed to have so many helping hands! :D I got almost all the portraits done! I may have to do some retakes though, but not many. The way the sunlight came in the window for some of them looked weird.

Today, I'll bring Shannon's laptop and look at the pictures that need to be retaken and get anyone else I didn't get yesterday. I got these done SO much faster than I thought they would have taken!

SMASH Rehearsals Begin!

Today is the day when SMASH begins to get CRAZY. :) We are having two hour rehearsals Wednesday, Thursday and Friday all this month. It's pretty awesome!

I'm in only two scenes so I don't need to go to all the rehearsals but I need to atleast go to enough of them so that I can get a portrait of each cast member. I take portraits for SMASH for the biographies, and to print them out and have them on display on performance nights so people can see who is playing who while they wait for the play to start or during intermission. It's pretty cool. Today I'm bringing my backdrop stand and backdrop and I'm going to setup my "studio". I'll take it back down on Friday so it doesn't bother the Richards.

Christmas Vacation

Lots of happened since the last time I blogged. I had Christmas vacation so that's why I haven't blogged in awhile. 

Christmas Eve

First, I'll tell you about our Christmas Eve. We all slept in a little, had a small breakfast and Mom got the Ham dinner ready for lunch. Before lunch Mom, Dad, Abbey, Shannon, Billy, Calvin and I opened our gifts. I got lots of wonderful gifts! After we were done Aunt Debbie showed up, and a little while later Tim, Angie, Gabe, and Addie showed up. We had a delicious ham dinner and then we opened gifts with the Tim, Angie, Gabe and Addie. Most of us got to hold adorable little Addie and play with Gabie baby.  :D 

That night, after Tim, Angie, Gabe, Addie, and Aunt Debbie left, my family and Calvin went to Free Grace's Christmas Eve service of Lessons and Carols. That was really nice. We ended the service with lighting a candle for each person and singing Joy To the World, the last reading, and Silent Night. :D

Christmas Day

We went to Church. It was a very good service. After Church we opened gifts from the Kidds. :) Grace gave me bobby pins, white nail polish, clear nail polish, and a light blue nail polish. Millie gave me three hair clips, pink nail polish, and red nail polish. 

After we left the church we drove to the Richards' house to drop off Calvin there. We gave everyone hugs, Tucker gave us chocolate bars, we talked for a bit and then we gave hugs again and then my family and I left. 

At home we mainly hung around the house, I think. I can't quite remember. We probably played Dutch Blitz most of the day. 

Richards Christmas Open House

Tuesday evening Sean drove over to our house to visit. Soon after he got to our house, him, Billy and Dad tried to put mine, Abbey and Shannon's bedroom door back on. The door fell off it's hinges earlier that day while I was exiting the room. Heh! After they got the door on Sean, Shannon, Billy and I left to go to the Richards' Christmas Open House. 

That was alot of fun! I mainly hung out with Corrie. Every now and then I'd hang out with Stevie, Tucker, Nina, and Kelsey, or Olivia, Evan, Petra, Sarah, and Ben or anyone else I knew. When it was time for us to go we brought Kevin and Calvin home with us. 

When we got home, the door had fallen off again... The boys fixed it the next day and now it works better than it did before it had fallen off. :) Thanks guys!

Wednesday-Friday

We had a quite relaxing vacation. We mainly played games and watched TV or a movie and ate junk food. Sean left our house late morning on Thursday. On Friday Shannon, Casey Billy, Abbey, Calvin, Mom and I went shopping at Target. Rebecca and William met us there to shop with us. :) Rebecca helped me find a nice grey cardigan, a belt, and two cute dresses! :) When we left Target it began to snow. 

Casey, Shannon, Billy and I played Sequence for a bit and then Casey left. :( My Uncle Steve arrived soon after that. 

Uncle Steve taught us how to play a card game called Nines. It's kind of a mixture of Poker and President, I think. It's fun! 

New Years Eve

On Saturday, Dad made a yummy egg casserole for breakfast. After breakfast Uncle Steve began making a turkey dinner. Tim, Angie, Gabe and Addie came over late morning. :) Around 1:30 or 2pm we had a delicious turkey dinner made by Uncle Steve! Cousin Katie arrived at our house around 2:30pm. After the dinner we talked, played with Gabe and held Addie. While Addie napped we opened gifts from Uncle Steve. I got a pretty, red wrist watch. Tim, Angie, Gabie and Addie left around 4pm to go to a New Years Eve Party. 

Katie and Uncle Steve learned how to play Dutch Blitz and then left right before Shannon, Billy, Abbey and I left to go to the Estes for a party. Calvin, Mom and Dad came along in another car a little later.

At the Estes party we played a HUGE group game of Catch Phrase. I believe the girls team won. Woot! After that game, Corrie, Colin, Kenan, Daniel, Billy, Linnea, Catherine, Ellie and I and some younger kids went outside and played Kick The Can in the dark on icy grass. It. Was. Awesome! We played about 5 or so rounds. The one time I "kicked the can" Kenan and John were guarding it. I slowly snuck up until I was behind a tree. If I wasn't wearing Kenan's camouflage fleece they probably would have noticed me. :P Since Kenan is really fast, I waited until he was a little farther off than John and then I sprinted for the can. John went to go tag me and I did a softball slide which dodged his tag and kicked the can. :) 

We played two rounds of Capture the Can (Capture the Flag but with a can). My team won the first round and lost the second round. It was LOTS of fun! 

My hands were FREEZING by the time we went back inside. After I warmed up a little, Kenan, Colin, Daniel, Billy, Corrie, Ellie, Catherine, and maybe a few other people played spoons in the basement. I came in third. I think Billy beat Colin on the last round.

Kenan and Mr. Estes show Colin, Daniel, Billy, Corrie and I his guns. Those were cool!

New Years Day

We played some other games until it was about 15 minutes before midnight. Almost everyone came down stairs and got the bubbling grape juice ready and then we counted down to the New Year! Billy, Colin, Catherine, Kenan and I did cheers. We played a laid back game of Catch Phrase and then the Phillips' left. Us Clarke kids and Calvin spent the night because Dad said the roads were to icy to drive home on. 

Later that morning (because we went to bed in the early hours of the morning) we woke up, had a quick breakfast, said our goodbyes and left!

When we got home we got ready for church then went to church. :) I had SO much fun!