Goodbye Dean Cooper

Wednesday, June 11th was St. Johns county's last dayof school. You might know that the state of Florida is facing huge money problems in our schools, just because people voted to get, like, $25 off their tax payments. It is causing us some major problems, and we're having to get rid of a lot of things that we shouldn't have to get rid of. My mom is just lucky to have her music job. So, each middle school in our county has 2 deans, a man and a woman. It's kind of required. But now, with all the budget cuts, our schools don't have enought money to employ two anymore. That means we have to get rid of one. And our principal is letting Dean Cooper go. Most people at my school hate her, but I've grown very fond of her, and it hurts me to think that I might not even see her again. Unless she is certified as a teacher as well as a dean...if she is, she could stay and teach. I hope she does. She doesn't really know me, but on the day before the last day of school, I asked her to sign my yearbook. She was all happy because I was probably the only one that had asked her to sign. I really do hope she stays. She was an important part of our school. She must be really mad. She lost her job just because some old retirees in South Florida wanted to pay a little less tax. It's SOOOOOOOOOO not fair! It makes me mad and sad at the same time.

Indiana Jones/Karen Allen

Now, I know you've heard of Indiana Jones and heard the "rousing adventure theme" (quote my TV's subtitles) that goes along with the movie. They're all really great movies, and the very first one came out when my mom was about 15 or 16. She went and saw it, and she loved it, along with everyone else who had seen it. I had never seen Indy on the screen in my life, until this Saturday, when my mom rented it the first one, "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (I had originally wanted National Treasure 2, but it was sold out for the second week in a row). I'm really glad I ended up watching it, because it was a really good movie! My favorite character was Marion Ravenwood, aka Karen Allen. She was 30 when she made the movie, and she's currently 57. She was really pretty and really funny and spunky in the movie, and I admire her for that. Karen was unaware that she would be in "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" until Steven Spielberg called her one day and said, "Guess what, Karen! You're in the movie!" So, she still plays Marion Ravenwood, an older version, but this time there's a twist. A guy named Mutt Williams (played by Shia LaBeouf) comes to Indy and takes him to a camp where a Mutt's mother, Marion Ravenwood, is being held prisoner. Then, Marion reveals to Indy that Mutt is his son. I was like, WHOA....Anyway, you should definately rent the movie if you get a chance, remember, the first one!!!!!!!!!!!
PS-Anything you hear about Karen Allen being the same person as Margot Kidder is NOT TRUE!!! I've looked at pictures and they are NOT they same person. It's just a stupid conspiracy.

Swimteam

It's started up again. It's only for the summer, but me and my sister both agree that it sort of ruins it. You have to get up almost every day at 7:00 (yes, that's what I said!) and go jump in a cold pool and work out for an hour. It's nice that they give you the weekends off, and we don't go monday either because that's the day they clean the pool. But then, we have swim meets against other teams almost every Saturday. They last about five hours, and you only swim four times! It really ruins your Saturday. It just started a week ago, and I'm really out of shape. I pulled one of my stomach muscles, and it was painful even to lie down on the couch. Also, my arm and leg muscles were sore, but not as bad. The only good part is that our team has been undefeated for the past two years. But I've really come to love thunderstorms a lot more-if you know what I mean.

Silver Sea (by:Elise)

I don't know if you knew this, but I write stories. I just think it's so enjoyable to get my feelings down on paper. I've enjoyed writing sine probably second grade and I've been doing it ever since. I think I really started actually spending a lot of time on my stories last year in 6th grade. I wrote one story that I finished a while ago that was very successful. I won't get into that one, but I am going to tell you about "Silver Sea", my newest story (ps-silver sea is actually the title of one of Meav Ni Mhaolchatha's albums, and the front cover of it is where i actually got my inspiration for this story). It's about a girl named Kayleigh Granuaile who is full blood Irish but doesn't really care. Then she finds out that she and her family are moving to Ireland! Their house is on the Cliffs of Moher, these huge cliffs that jut out into the Atlantic. It's a big adventure for her and she learns a lot and meets some great new people. One of the things she learns is that a family lived in her house (which is actually close to 300 years old) a 100 years ago. The family had just one daughter named Muirin Flynn. She loved the ocean very much, and she asked everyone she met to call her Silver Sea. One day, she falls off the cliffs and dies. Many people belive that she wanders the lands as a ghost. Now, a hundred years later, Kayleigh and her new friend Kiera are discovering Silver Sea's secrets to try to help the ghost to rest in peace. It's a very cool story, and I'm enjoying writing it very much.
Please check out Kayleigh's blog:
http://www-kayleighinireland.blogspot.com

Updates for April

Hey, everybody out there! I'm sure you've noticed the template change! I really do hope you like it. It's been really busy around here lately, and I haven't gotten enough chances to blog. Let me give you some updates...
-We just got back from our spring break trip in Cocoa Beach! I had a really good time. We belong to this new Hilton timeshare now, so we got this trip basically for free (i would explain how that could be, but it's really long and confusing and my fingers can only do so much). The room we stayed in at the resort had 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a good-ish kitchen, a family room, and a balcony. It didn't look out to the ocean, but you could see it if you tilted your head over to the side. We spent a lot of time at the pool, we went to the beach, we did Kennedy Space center (so awesome!), we went on an airboat tour and saw lots of neat wildlife, rented a lot of movies, played a couple games, and just hung out. After a while though, I was getting a little homesick and I'm glad to be back to the norm.
-There was this piano competition I did that was part of BRASS (Beaches Residents Actively Supporting the Symphony) a few Saturdays ago. We're not actually beaches residents, but we live pretty close and it was okay for us to come. I played two of my piano pieces, and the judges awarded me first prize!! I got a check of $75!! Mom promised she'll take me out to this Irish store called Celtic Charm so I can totally splurge.
Well, that's pretty much it. I'll try to blog more, so keep tuning in! Bye!

Goodbye Lance

You're probably wondering who Lance is. Well, he's my youth leader at church. He's in charge of the whole thing. Like, if the whole church was just made up out of the youth, he would be the pastor. I'm saying goodbye because Lance says that God is speaking to him and he feels like that he should be doing something else. He doesn't know for sure what it is yet, but he talked to Pastor Michael about it and he isn't going to be the youth minister anymore. :( Lance will still attend our church with his wife Carleen, but we're getting a new youth minister named Drew Pilkenton. I hope I like him and I also hope that he's as funny, caring, and helpful as Lance was.

Easter

Tomorrow's Easter!! I'm excited about it. We go to church at the regular time, but of course it's a special service. After all, there would be no Christianity if Jesus hadn't risen from the dead. After church, some of our very old friends (not old as in elderly, but we've known them a while) are coming for dinner at 5:30. It'll be 10 people all together. Liz (we've known her since we used to live in Virginia when I was little. She worked on Capital Hill. Then she retired and moved down here. She is very sweet and really cares about us.) and her boyfriend Tom, the Murrays (Marrienne, Jim, Claire, and A.J. who we've known since we moved to Florida when I was six) and us Roses. That's a lot of people, but it'll be fun to all be together again. We have the house decorated with little bunnies and roosters, and we have candle holders with eggs in them. Easter seemed to come a little early this year, but that's fine with me. I'm ready for spring and Easter whenever they come.