Book Tag! (Way Better Post Than That Last One XD)

Yeah, I'm posting twice in the same day. But I figure that's okay for the following reasons:

1. I haven't been posting much lately, so this will compensate a little.
2. I have some awesome news (3 actually) to share.
3. I forgot to thank some new followers :O
4. I got tagged by Silver Angel!

First things first, thanks for following, duck_sister, Marissa, Silver Angel, and Jennoula2009! Wow! :D (Sorry I couldn't find links for duck_sister and Jenn!)

Now, awesome newses XD

I FOUND MY MOOD RING!!!!!! :O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O I had totally given up, but it turned up in a notebook case! I do not remember putting it in there. Am I the luckiest person in the world, or what? ;) Another Fortuna Kendrae.

Awesome news #2: I GOT A CALL BACK FOR DANCE IN "THE KING AND I"!!!!! YAY! :O :D I think Cavender is coming with me, so he'll get to see me either sink or swim, lol XD Hopefully I'll swim. And gracefully XD

News #3: I'm on Facebook. There's a little gadget on the right...scroll down. Keep scrolling. Keep--yeah, there. Add me :D

Okay, now for the awesome tag from Silver Angel (whose blog I like. Check it out.):

Rules: 8 books you'd like to live in (mine aren't in order) and why, then tag 8 people! Easy ;)

Book 1: "Eragon". Sorry, but Alagaesia is awesome. And because it's necessary to continue the story. You know the green dragon appearing in the fourth book? Yeah, I'm the Rider. Oh yes.

Book 2: "Lord of the Rings". Surely this doesn't need a Why?? *sigh* If you must know, it's because I think Tolkien was one of the greatest fantasy geniuses on the earth. His world is so complete, it's hard to believe it doesn't really exist. Every race has its own back story, its own legends, its own customs and ways of life. It's just so rich with detail, and I'd love to meet the Hobbits :) Elves, too, but I do love the Hobbits.

Book 3: "The Chronicles of Narnia". Tolkien was a genius, but Narnia holds an irreplaceable spot in my heart. My friends and I once thought we had actually found Narnia in the backyard of my school. I'm not so sure we were wrong...Talking trees, knights in shining armor and wolves have to mean something, right??

Book 4: "The Mirror". Is it egotistical and/or cheating to want to visit my own book? I want to know that I got my characters right, and I'm sure there's a lot I'd have to see to describe accurately. And I wanna meet Luken rlybad.

Book 5: "Peter Pan". Never land is right up there with Narnia. No lie. And Peter Pan is freaking awesome.

Book 6: "The Farsala Trilogy". Really cool books. Kinda hard to explain, but awesome.

Book 7: "Sophie's World". That is such an epic book. It is truly something. Like philosophy, mystery, suspense, fantasy and education wrapped up in one. It is so cool. You have to read it some time in your life. Really, it's so eye-opening and AWESOME.

Book 8: "Uglies series". It's set in the future. Scott Westerfield has an incredible mind for technology. It would be so cool to use some of the gadgets first-hand. And the problems introduced in their world are very interesting.

Thanks for the tag, Silver Angel! That was fun!

I tag...
Bleah
duck_sister
Marissa
Tay in Real Life
Kailyn
Breanne
Katie G.
Avalon

~Kendra

P.S. I know it's too late to do the blog parade Bekah was having, but the questions are so fun. Would it be okay if I did them in a tag sometime?

Valentine's Day...Eve :)

Thanks for following, Amber!

Well, V-Day is closing in on us! Haha, that sounded ominous >:D I don't usually get that into the holiday besides getting candy from my parents and making cards for my grandparents. However, I thought it might be nice to do some festive things on the blog for a couple of days leading up to the big day.

I should have started this sooner. *mentally kicks self* I love countdowns. I can't believe I missed this. Now I have all these cool Valentine's Day Countdown ideas! D: Fail on my part for being out of it.

*tragic sigh, plays violins*

'Kay, so anyway, in honor of the holiday of love, I've decided to post my top ten favorite examples of love in books!

1. "Angel in the Square" - Misha and Katya
The relationship between Misha and Katya is one of my all time favorite portrayals of love. Misha and Katya are cousins, but raised as brother and sister during the Russian revolution. Misha teases and is often scornful toward Katya, and she in turn irritates him and mocks his ways of thinking. You would never know how strong their love for each other is until the revolution parts them. The distance between them only reveals to themselves as well as the reader just how much they cherish each other. Their relationship is so deep and beautiful that I fall in love with them both every time I read the book.

2. "Eragon" - Eragon and Sapphira
Eragon's and Sapphira's love is so fun and unconditional. I just love it. They have no choice but to be in each other's heads 24/7, and they still love each other for who they are. Their relationship is intimate and comfortable and a great example of true friendship. They share thoughts and experiences, and help each other through the tough times.

3. "Lord of the Rings" - Sam and Frodo
I will admit it: I have been known to cry during the LotR movies simply because Sam and Frodo's relationship is so wonderful. I think Sam represents exactly what a true friend should be. He sticks by Frodo even when it's the most difficult and painful thing he could possibly do. Even when Frodo is plain unfair to him and sends him away, Sam looks past that and remains a loyal and true friend.

4. "Betsy-Tacy series" - Betsy and Joe
I love Betsy and Joe, and I love them together :) They make a great and complex couple. They have very similar personalities at some points, but balance each other well at others. Although they don't always get along, they do always end up working things out. Starting out as acquaintances, moving on to friends, and finally realizing their love for each other, Betsy and Joe's story is a wonderful journey to follow.

5. "A Spark of Strenght" - Ember and Coal
Ah, yes. Unrequited, but still strong love. Ember and Coal have an interesting relationship because it is never addressed as a real relationship. Ember silently (well, mostly silently XD) loves Coal, but he never looks at her as anything more than the sparktress (girl) who's always been around. He likes her as a sister, but never in any outward way. Ember and Coal's relationship is a bit hard to handle sometimes because of the silent ups and downs, but still a very intriguing situation.

6. "On to Oregon" - John and his siblings
Such a favorite story :) I fell in love with this book the first time I read it. Anyway, due to unfortunate circumstances, John Sager is forced to lead his six younger siblings across the prairie to get to their father's dream land. John has a hard time expressing his love to his siblings, but the reader easily picks up on the deep feelings of affection and protection that rage inside him.

7. "The Two Princesses of Bamarre" - Addie and Meryl
Princess Addie and Princess Meryl have a really good relationship as sisters and best friends. While complete opposites, they love each other with their whole hearts and would do anything for each other. The loyalty and friendship in their relationship is really great.

8. "The Lily series" - Lily and Art
Especially in the last books in the series, I love the relationship between Lily and her older brother, Art. He's there for her and helps her and gives her advice, but in a very realistic way. I don't like books that portray sibling relationships as really two-dimensional and perfect. Lily and Art have a wonderful love/"hate" thing going on that makes me want to read the books over and over again. He really comes through for her, and she can go to him with her tough problems. A great example of love there.

9. "The Giver" - Jonas and the Giver
I think the mentoring relationship that Jonas has with the Giver is really fascinating. They both benefit from each other, and it's really nice to see Jonas soaking in the wisdom from such a wonderful mentor.

10. "Bible" - God and us :)
The best example of love of all! God loves us more than we can ever realize. He would do anything for you. He would die for you. Oh, wait, he already did! ;) God's love for us is the perfect love. It's all my favorite elements combined!

The protective, fun love of Misha and Katya;
the all-knowing love of Eragon and Sapphira;
the unfailingly loyal love of Sam and Frodo;
the strong, silent love of Ember and Coal;
the sweet, fierce love of John and his siblings;
the friendly love of Addie and Meryl;
the practical, realistic love of Lily and Art;
the wise, mentoring love of Jonas and the Giver.

God loves us in every way possible, and more than we can imagine!

This Valentine's Day, don't just honor the love of two lovers. True love comes in many different forms; let's cherish them all :)

~Kendra

Camp Overview: Day 1

*sigh*

Don't you hate it when you find out bad things about someone you looked up to? I just went through one of my friend's (sort of) pictures on Facebook and found out she isn't quite the girl I thought she was. I'm really sad :( I sort of looked up to her, I thought she was pretty cool, and now it turns out apparently our ideals aren't the same at all. What an awful feeling :(

I really don't feel like posting at all right now, but I need to post about camp or I never will, haha. 'Kay, here:

THURSDAY:
~~~~~~~~
- Got up at seven and finished packing.

- Brianna came to pick me up at 8:30.

- Went to the camp leader's house.

- He was old, but still pretty fun. His name was Arnie.

- We waited around at his house until everyone else showed up.

THE CAMPERS:
1. Me (9th grader) :D

2. Brianna (9th grader): The fun-loving, easy-going, nice girl who makes you feel special and comfortable even if you're a total dork.

3. Erica: The responsible college girl that came along as a chaperone. She was fun, but sometimes a little brusque. I don't think she liked me that much...

4. Jessica (11th grader): Possibly the funnest girl there (me and Brianna aside :D). She was really nice, really fun, had a great personality, and seemed genuinely interested in talking to us.

5. Jenny (9th grader): Jessica's little sister. She was fun, but a little quiet and sort of timid. She seemed nice enough though.

6. Kara (9th or 10th, I think...I'm not sure): She was fun and really pretty. I don't know why, but she was. Her eyes actually sparkled. Like, I've read that in books, but I didn't know what it would look like if someone's eyes really sparkled. It was weird. Her eyes were actually sparkling, but they sizzled and gleamed with fun sort of...hmm...

7. Haley (9th grader): Haley was gorgeous. I hope this doesn't sound mean, but I could tell immediately that she was a "rich girl". She wasn't snobby though. Just obviously from a more well-to-do environment. She was fun, but she stuck by Jenny pretty closely, so I didn't get to know her much.

8. Courtney (9th grader, I think): She was okay. She said she was the "crazy one", but honestly, I didn't see it.

9. Eddrinia (9th grader): She was nice, but...she was homeschooled and, well, she was much more like a "homeschooler" than me or my friends. She was really sweet and I love her to death, but she wouldn't sleep in the beds. She said she doesn't sleep in other peoples' beds. She also put on sunscreen every ten minutes, and THEN just laid there on the dock *covered up with her towel*. She did watch a movie with us, and though she didn't say why, I think it was because it was rated PG. Yeah. Anyway.

10. Cathy (10th grader?): Ah, Cathy. Couldn't stand her. Don't ask me why, I'm not even sure, but I really couldn't stand her! And the frustrating thing was, everyone else *LOVED HER!* She was loud, had to have her way, thought she was all that, thought she knew everything, and enjoyed snubbing and ignoring me whenever possible. Probably some of that is in my head, but a lot of it was real.

Back to the camp experience.

- We piled into Arnie's van and Erica's car and started off to go to the lake house.

- Stopped at the grocery store to get provisions. That was pretty fun. Ish.

- Drove for about forty-five minutes, then stopped and got Subway (yay!).

- Drove for probably another forty-five minutes until we got to the lake house.

- From the road (or really from the loooong driveway), I could tell that the house was small and not in the best condition, but it looked okay.

- We went inside. It was hot and small, but still okay. It was old, but it looked clean enough. At least the kitchen/dining room and the living room that we could see from the front door did. The house kind of had three floors. When you walked in, you were standing on the dividing line between the living room on your left, and the kitchen/dining room on your right. Dead ahead were maybe six stairs that led to an eight-foot-long hall way with three bedrooms and a bathroom. There were also maybe six stairs that led down to a small downstairs. Arnie told us that we girls got the upstairs, and he got the downstairs.

- We unloaded our stuff, and blew up the inflatable innertubes and stuff.

- We were hot and sweaty, but we went inside and got changed into swimsuit attire and headed down to the dock.

- Some people tubed, but I just rode in the boat. Some people tanned, and I tried, but I got sooooooo bored just lying there doing nothing.

- At around seven, we had dinner. It was hot dogs. They were okay. I didn't starve.

- Then we had Chapel Time. Wow. No offense, but it was *SO* boring!! I have a whole new appreciation for my youth group. All we did was read a Bible passage (OVER AND OVER, too), listen to Arnie talk about it in the most boring way possible, read a song while Arnie interrupted every line to explain it to us, then we listened to the song (always a really...not-very-contemporary song), then Arnie just talked about boring stuff that I already had heard at least a thousand times...Oh, and I forgot communion! *moan* Wow. It takes talent to make something so dull. He's just so repetitive! At least the communion bread was really good :D

- Erica, Brianna, Eddrinia and I watched "Casablanca" while the others did stuff outside in the dark. I never noticed how awesome the dialogue in that movie is. It's so good. I advise anyone to watch it. It's an old movie, has great dialogue, it's pretty funny, and it's a great love story.

- We went to bed around midnight. My bed didn't have sheets on it, which was kind of a downer, but I was so tired I didn't even care. I wasn't homesick at all either. Like, at all. I used to get really homesick, but lately I haven't really cared. There was no cell signal at the cabin, though, so it's a good thing I wasn't homesick--I couldn't have called home if I'd wanted to!

And that was day one. If you got this far, I'm proud of you. I won't post days 2 and 3 now, though, so don't worry. I'll do one tomorrow and one the next day, I guess.

Back to the present. I have to clean the bathroom because people are coming to stay at our house for the practicum. This practicum is relatively close to my house, so we don't have to travel this time! Yay! our own beds! :) But, other people will have to travel to get here, so we're being a host family. Two families (well, a mom and her daughter, and then a mom and two daughters) are staying at our house. That should be interesting.

I know I didn't post a God Thought today. I do have one, but this post is so long already that I think I'll just save it. Okay? Great :D Thanks for reading, carpe diem, and in the words of Angela the Herbalist, "avoid roasted cabbage, do not eat earwax, and look on the bright side of life!"




P.S. Which signature do you like better?

Not A Whole Lot of News...

Remember that speech I was preparing for a week or two ago? Well, tomorrow is the big day...seven minutes of a book memorized. I actually did it. Now I just hope I can KEEP it until after tomorrow...*crosses fingers*

Haven't heard back from the Eragon website people. I hope I wasn't too late applying...I applied almost two whole weeks after the post about the jobs was put up. Do you think I missed it? Hmmm...

I'm writing "Creepy Story" right now, and it's going better than I expected. I haven't given up on the other two, least of all COJ, but I'm focusing on Creepy for now. I have the most ideas for it.

That idea with the names Cosa and Degan was back last night, and altered a little. I had to think it over again. The plot still sucks, but less than two nights ago. Maybe if it keeps waking me up it'll eventually be worth putting on paper :)

P.S. Omg! It totally just occured to be that it's February! Scary! January is over. Wow. It went by kind of fast...My birthday is in five days :D I wonder if I'll miss being fourteen. It's been my favorite age so far. Oh well. Fifteen will be even better!!

P.P.S. That post I put last night is my favorite. I don't know why, but I liked that one a lot.

P.P.P.S. Do you know what "P.S." stands for? It stands for Post Script. Just thought I'd let ya know :)

Shur'tugalar, "Soup-er" Bowls and Darth Vador!!

Guess what? I HAVE NINE FOLLOWERS! Who woulda thought nine people care what I have to say?? Lols :)

Well, I went to my church's Super Bowl Party tonight. It was fun. Not as fun as it's been some years, but still fun. Usually I end up arguing with someone over something and it all ends up being really exciting and crazy, but this year we've all apparently matured enough to be past that stage :) Everyone brought a crock pot of soup. My mom made killlllllller baked potatoe soup. I pigged out :D Four bowls full!! Wow. Lotsa starch. I'm surprised my fingers aren't too stiff to type. Haha, okay, sorry; that wasn't even funny at all. I'm just still hyped up on caffine (I can't spell) and I'm tired.

The reason I'm tired is that I was up really late last night because I had this idea for a story that would leave me alone!! I don't know if that ever happens to other writers, but sometimes I'll get an idea that just DEMANDS to be thought through. And I have to shake off the drowsiness and think about the plot and decide whether or not it's good enough to pursue. Usually, it isn't, but I always end up getting something out of the exercise. Like last night, the plot was debatably sucky, but I like the names I came up with: Cosa (COS-uh) and Degan (DEE-gin/gan). I don't know, maybe I'm the only one who likes them...oh well. I do :) Sometimes I even semi-act out the first few chapters of the story. I know, seriously, when you thought I COULD NOT get any weirder, I blurt out something like this.

Ooooh, I have news!! Okay, I don't know how many "Inheritance Cycle" fans read this, but I sort of follow the fansite, http://www.shurtugal.com/, and yesterday I found something awesome: they're looking for staff! There was an open job position for a columnist! I totally applied. I hope they'll let me do it *bites nails* It's just the kind of thing I would LOVE to do! Writing, humor, "Eragon;" does it get any better?? I don't really know how funny I am, but to be able to write about "Eragon" in a semi-formal job position, I'll try a lot of things!

I'm pretty sure there was something else I meant to say...yeah, I'm in a talkative mood. At least this time I'm actually SAYING something instead of mindlessly blabbering about personality quizzes *rolls eyes* :) Well, talk to ya later!




OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! I remembered it! (Be proud of me) I was going to say that we're watching the original "Star Wars" movies as a family, and Darth Vador is awesome. He's such an amazing villain. So cold and terrifying. You never know when he's going to strike. And he's so nearly-incincible. And thinking about Anakin's face under the mask makes it better :) Alright, Hayden Christenson can't act his way out of a wet paper bag, and his script is terrible, but he still looks pretty darn good :)

I hadn't seen "Star Wars" since I was seven and Han's getting tortured freaked me out (yes, I couldn't stand guys screaming even then). Well, I want to be able to write villains just like Darth Vador. My own villains disappoint me. If I ever met him, I would be very afraid of Darth Vador (or Durza or Sarumon ), but not MY villains. My villains don't scare me in the least. Does anyone else have that problem with their villains? Is that natural? Or am I just not very good at characterizing evil in a scary way? Hmm...