jeez! i need to blog!

     Oh my goodness— I'm so, so, so, so sorry!  I haven't blogged in forever!!! So, so sorry!  Well, in the time I haven't been blogging, I've:

• arrived in MT
• had a great visit from some PA friends
• developed an allergy to pineapple
• spent time with my awesome friends Hannah and Adair
• started a week-long musical theater camp
• had family arrive
• built a teepee
• not found a severed leg

      I've got a lot to talk about! (Actually, write about.  I'm on vocal rest till the show tomorrow!)

Sooo.

     We arrived here almost two weeks ago (gee, I'm making myself feel even guiltier!  It's been ages since I blogged!) and two days later Joe, Laurie, and Paul from PA arrived— they're going on a cross-country trip ad have been to all sorts of awesome places all over!  During their stay with us, we visited an old Métis eagle capturing site, some buffalo drive lanes, and a big medicine wheel.  We also had a picnic at a beautiful waterfall in the mountains, and climbed Crystal Mountain (and gathered lots of crystals!). It was a blast— Hannah slept over while they were here too, and we worked on our fort, played in the mud by the river, and had an all-out battle of the cereals (Cheerios vs. Froot Loops).  It was a lot of fun!
     I started theater camp, too.  Camp started on Monday, and tomorrow is our performance: a 20-minute mini-musical called "A Little Bit of Showbiz".  I have four hours a day of singing, dancing and acting... It's been a lot of fun!  However, I've been singing so much this week at camp, that I completely lost my voice.  I didn't get a low solo (I'm an alto) (More like a tenor >_<) and my solo is wayyyy too high to sing.  Plus, I can't hit the right notes, for some odd reason.  Oh well.  I'm performing with 32 little tots anyway, as I'm one of the oldest kids.  Hot tea and vocal rest for me.  Wish me luck!
     A couple days ago (that's how tired I am... I don't even remember what day!) I slept over at Hannah's, with another friend, Adair.  We had a great time!  We floated in the creek in tubes, and had smoothies and such at the coffee shop.     :D
     My Aunt Amy, Uncle Erik, and cousin Emily arrived last night! YAY!  It's great to see them!!!!  We're going to have a lot of fun this summer!

     Today we built a teepee.  Yup.
 
     Oh, and there's this severed leg that I can't find.  It's starting to make me nervous.   

haha, weird cloud formation.  YOU ARE THE CHOSEN ONEEEEEE

me on top of the mountain

pretty waterfall up the canyon (but not the one we picnicked at)

water

water... again

hannah and adair

the group colonoscopy

     Okay, so we didn't actually all go and get colonoscopies.  Yesterday morning, my mom and Aunt Jayne told me we were going somewhere fun later in the day... but they wouldn't tell me where.  When I asked, Aunt Jayne responded, "Well, we didn't want to tell you all at once, but we're all going to get colonoscopies."  Gotta love Aunt Jayne!  So we drove over to Keelin's (if you don't know this by now, she's my nine-year-old cousin) and picked her up.  The whole way we speculated over where we were going.  Finally Keelin decided we were going to Chipotle, and I thought we were going to the zoo.  We stopped and ate a hurried lunch at Hy-Vee and then got back in the car and kept driving.  We crossed the bridge, and passed the ballpark, and climbed up the hill.  Now we couldn't be going to the zoo, so we were puzzled.
     We finally entered the parking lot of the Putnam Museum... and I looked out my window to see a huge poster of the Titanic draped across one side of the building!!! Now, if you don't know me, I AM OBSESSED WITH THE TITANIC.  Not only the movie, but the actual RMS Titanic, and the people, and the fictional Rose and Jack and all things Titanic.  So this was a dream come true!  There was the poster for James Cameron's "Ghosts of the Abyss" which was also awesome because I am obsessed with James Cameron and I have wanted to see the film for a long time.  Anyway, it was sooooo cool!
     When we went in, they had cloths draped down of the balconies of the museum, and they'd created a Titanic with one of the balconies, paint, wood, and cloth.  Then we went to get our tickets, and went up to the exhibit.  To go in, you had to get a boarding pass—they looked so real!  They had the White Star Line seal and R.M.S. TITANIC on the bottom.  On the back, it's like a real boarding pass too: only instead of my name, it says Mrs. Edward Beane (Ethel Clarke) and has my story (I was one of more than twenty newlywed couples on board.)
     Inside the exhibit they had all sorts of fascinating artifacts, stories, and facts.  There was a pair of white men's gloves in remarkably good shape for having spent the past 80 years two miles under the North Atlantic.  They had never been worn and were still attached at the cuffs.  There was a recreation of a first-class passenger's cabin and a third class... unfortunately for me, as I was second class, there was no display for a second-class cabin... but still, I can imagine what it would have been like!  Not as fancy as first class I'm sure, but still!  There was a screen in one of the rooms that showed the bots actually bringing up the very things we were looking at from the wreck.
   One of the coolest parts was the plates.  If you google images from the actual wreck, one of the things that comes up is row after row of perfectly preserved, intact saucers.  I have looked at pictures of those things for so long just wishing I could actually see them!  Right above them was the picture, and then there they were, the very same plates, above ground and right in front of me! It was overwhelming!
   There were also some perfume bottles from the Titanic, that even after all those years underwater, still had their scent.  It was amazing!  In another room, they had a list of people who lived and who were lost.  Fortunately, everyone in our party lived.  Keelin turned out to be the oldest (not last living, oldest) survivor, and my mom was a first-class French lady whose husband gave her his whiskey flask as she was being taken away in a lifeboat, never to see him again, and she berated him for his drinking as a last farewell.  After the exhibit, we saw Ghosts of the Abyss in the iMax theater at the museum.  It was sooooo cool!  James Cameron is so darn awesome.  I'm going to meet him some day.
     Anyway, following the movie, we went to the gift shop for souvenirs.  I wanted everything Titanic.  I really, really, really wanted a t-shirt with the Titanic and the name of the exhibit thing, but it was too much money.  My next choice was a plate with the White Star Line emblem on it—they had first, second and third class.  That was also not allowed, though.  My next choice would have been the DVD for Ghosts of the Abyss, if I hadn't spied out the corner of my eye the Heart of the Ocean necklace worn by Rose in the movie Titanic.  I have wanted that thing for so long...  It's blue and heart-shaped, if you haven't seen the movie, and even though mine is not the crown jewels of some king, it's still really pretty!  I want to go back again!

So, as it says in the movie...

Are you ready to go back to Titanic?

i wanted the poster so bad!

the museum's recreated titanic!  awesome!

a closer look... i felt like i was in southampton waving goodbye to the ship!

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!

the dishes i saw!

the great trip (so far)

Sorry I haven't written in a while.  The first day of our great road trip was Monday, and we arrived here in Moline, IL late Monday night.  We're staying with my aunt and uncle, which is AWESOME.  But I'm so tired it's unbelievable!  Here's some ups and downs from our trip so far:

stopping at a gas station before we left and then dad walking into a tall bucket of gasoline and dirt and oil (which conveniently waited to spill until I was in front of it) (...down) • being bored in the car and making quite the disturbing movie... i'll post it below (up) • getting through chicago without too much traffic (up) • and being in chicago at the same time as julian smith and improv everywhere (up) • promptly getting stuck in traffic in joliet instead (down) • biscuit bowl at bob evans (up) • passing a truck carrying two girls about my age, who kept passing us and waving (they had a video camera, haha!) (...up) • arriving in moline about 10:30 pm.. that's 11:30 my time, and seeing my aunt jayne and uncle bill (up) • being woken up the next morning at 8:00 by five little cousins (down) • getting to spend time with five little cousins (up) • helping five little cousins save the fairies in the woods (up) • how meara talks... "my fell.  my like puppies.  her got owie." (up) • jana's new puppy tuli (up... and so stinking cute!!) • opening a dog walking service with keelin (we walked tuli every hour.) and having two whole customers (three whole dogs) (...up, i think) • being a bottomless pit and eating all day (up) • i'm still hungry (down) • ...i want a big bowl of white rice with lots of soy sauce (up) • the dog going missing this morning (down) • forgetting casey was working on the house, hearing a scratching on the bathroom window, thinking it was the dog (bathroom's in the basement... so the window is actually on level with the ground outside) and while changing, going over to the window.  it was not the dog.  it was casey. (down) • dog coming back (up) • aunt jayne and mom telling me we're going somewhere this afternoon, but they won't tell me where... then jayne calmly informing me, "okay... we didn't want to tell you all at once... but we're all going to get colonoscopies together." she should really be a professional comedian, ahaha! (i'm not sure if this is an up or a down...)

This is what happens when Maggie spends too much time in the car.  D:

 

Meara likes jellyfish

 

my and meara.  her so cute!

 

tuli et moi

meara likes dogs

snowcones, suitcases and sacred fish rituals

'Ello.
Well, I haven't gotten on here in a while, because I have been unfairly busy for the past few days.  On Monday, I went to Cedar Point, a huge ginormous awesome amusement park in Ohio.  It was a class trip, and all the 7th, 8th, and 9th graders attended.  For someone like myself who has never before been to an amusement park or ridden a roller coaster, it was a fantastic experience!  I only rode one roller coaster, but I rode it twice—it's called the Maverick and it's AMAZING.  It has the sheerest drop in the park, at a shriek-inducing 95-degree steeper-than-vertical drop, and a terrifying 400-foot dark tunnel with a speed launch of 75 mph.  The two minutes and thirty seconds of sharp turns and plunges was definitely worth the one-hour and fifteen minute wait.  As soon as the thing started moving, I squeezed my eyes shut....  and then, unfortunately, I had the pleasure of opening my eyes at just the wrong moment... around 0:19 in the video below.  It was so much fun!  After my friend and I had lunch (huge snowcone... very yummy!) and I had devoured half of a colossal Sweets n Treats elephant ear (also very yummy) we rendezvous'd with our chaperones at Gemini.  Then a few of my friends and I headed back up to give the Maverick another spin around the lot.  The line was considerably shorter in the heat and when we got up there, one girl in our company got sick and had to go back down—that meant I had to ride by myself, as she was my riding buddy.  Anyway, the coaster was awesome and afterwards we all headed back down to go to the waterpark.  Two of my friends had rented lockers, though, which are located on the opposite side of the park from the Maverick.  We walked down to the lockers, which took foreeeever, and then headed back up to the waterpark, which also took foreeever, as it's on the same side as the roller coasters.  Finally we got there and the water was so nice on our hot sore feet!  I acually rode a water slide (I KNOW!), after chickening out halfway up the steps on my first attempt.  It was fun, and I rode three or four times... It was really high up!  Then we floated down the Lazy River thing (I don't know if that's actually what it's called, so please don't tell the Cedar Point people.  They might think I'm falsely advertising them.  Which I'm not.) and then spent some time in the wave pool.  After that we returned to the thing previously mentioned which I'm just not going to name so I don't have to type all that parenthese'ed info again, and retired from the waterpark.  We waited while Keilani got a henna tattoo and then promptly lost her after she asked us to go buy her a pizza—this wouldn't have been that much of a problem if there hadn't been a chaperone-inforced rule that if you are caught alone in the park without a buddy from school, you have to "spend some time with Mrs. Johnson", and that, with all due respect to Mrs. Johnson (she's awesome), leaves much to be desired while in the middle of an amusement park, surrounded by roller coasters and thrill rides with your name all over them.  Eventually we found her, just in time for the evening roundup and check-in at seven o'clock.  We raced to the carousel and barely made it there in time.  We all boarded our COACH BUS and found out that someone had indeed gone missing.... I won't mention names, but Chase always goes missing, so this was no surprise.  We were almost an hour late heading home, and at 11:30 or so we arrived at the school, tired and half asleep.  I got a ride home from my friend Marissa—a more unfortunate friend, as she had left her phone, iPod, and someone else's camera in her bag with the spray-on sunscreen, which exploded all over from the pressure on one of the rides.  (The phone lived.... but that was it.)
source

I've been packing all week for vacation.  Every year my parents and I head out to our family home in Montana, where we spend the summer with lots of relatives and buffalo burgers and Fourth of July celebrations and hikes.  Anyway, I've been packing like crazy in between teaching myself how to play Titanic on the piano, karate practices, cross country workouts, piano lessons, and recitals of sorts... I can't wait to start the trip!  We leave on Sunday.  Oh, and I got my report card.  Frabjous day!  >_<

Yesterday we went to Pizza Pub with my AWESOME aunt and uncle/godparents, Judy and Glenn.  It's really not every day that one gets to carry a covered cloth bag full of live and swimming fish into a restaurant and then whisper guardedly to a random person chatting with your parents, "Pssst... you'll never guess what I have in my bag.  Heh heh heh heh heh.  FISH."  We took the fish out to Judy and Glenn's beautiful house and released them in the pond.  Good-bye fishies.  Have a good summer at fishie camp.  See you in August.

 

releasing fisheseses

judy's tres jolie garden

birdbath in the garden

looking off the porch

glenn's photogenic shoes.  he said to give him credit.  so if you didn't read it the first time, those are glenn's shoes. hahahahaha! :)

summer

Well, I suppose I owe you guys a post!  Sorry—I haven't gotten on here in ages, because I've been so preoccupied with busywork like having cookouts, hanging out with friends, and lounging around the house doing absolutely nothing, because I don't have to and it's summer!  Since 10:45 on Wednesday, I've been out of school for summer vacation.  What's this?  I seem to have survived the seventh grade!  I now have my first year at the high school under my belt, and it was a pretty good year, too.  But I'd rather not think about school now... instead I'll talk about summer, and the great parts of my year.

having awesome teachers (dennison, covs, mr. c) • having awesome classes (english... what's not to love about long socratic discussions about cutting chickens' heads off?) • cross country and races and giving coach grove birthday presents • getting principal's list and honor roll • choir and band concerts • playing keyboard for the jazz band concert • finishing off my knee problems with physical therapy • playing piano and french horn • receiving my yellow belt in karate • being cast as emily in our town and acting out the monsters are due on maple street • watching titanic in english on the last day of school (i love that movie!) and being the only one in the class sobbing when rose promises jack she'll never let go • eating at a fancy restaurant with my mom and godmother on the last day of school, and then stopping at an old-fashioned general store to buy grape soda and sassafras drops • school's out party at the vinsons', complete with slip 'n slide, kickball, s'mores, ultimate frisbee, and the annual burning of the homework • exploring the woods with gabrielle and eric • s'mores and weenie roast at my house to celebrate summer (and singing as high and loud as teapots and imitating basso profundo) • trying to get to hogwarts by singing "floo powder power! floo power powder!" and running into trees and signposts • singing don't stop believing in the cemetery at ten o'clock at night, and then going "kayaking" in the middle of the street • catching lightning bugs • eagerly awaiting tonight's doctor who • the bizarre cloud formation over the coffee shop this afternoon • riding my bike all over town trying to catch my dog • my dad losing his wallet and canceling all his cards, only for some good samaritan to bring it back to him today, everything still there • eating mom's fresh homemade asparagus soup

Anyway, I hope you all have a great start to your summer!  Here's my vlog from last night's cookout, and a couple of pictures:

Hot Dog Vlog

 

i love my self-timer

day in the woods with g & e

"i'll shoot you with my hot dogs!"

successfully setting my friend's camera down in the baked beans

good ol' summer