Spring is here!!

Finally, the wonderful season of Spring has arrived!  It's around 80 degrees here right now....my mind is blown!!  It hasn't been this warm yet, and it feels wonderful.  The world is getting a little color back, too.  Well, my backyard is at least.  Not much, but it's a start.

Okay, you caught me....I cheated and made the pictures look more vibrant than they actually are...but isn't that what technology is for these days...?

I found it odd that Nikita chose to sprawl out on the wooden porch rather than the comfy green grass.

Skirts are wonderful!  I mustered up enough courage to wear a skirt to school on Friday to celebrate the warm weather.  Because I like reasons to celebrate.

Happy Spring, everyone!

A fairy tale forest

Manzanita, Oregon is our absolute favorite vacation spot.  It's a darling little town with fun shops everywhere, including a delicious coffee shop that is usually walking distance from where we are staying.  We rent out a cute little house that has a view of the ocean, and just completely relax the whole time we're there.  We take walks along the beach (that usually results in me getting blisters all over my feet because the sand refuses to be kind to me), stroll around "downtown" (which consists of a few streets of shops), and chill out at the house.

Two years ago, in 2011, we went there, and we took this hike that made me feel like I was in a storybook.  Everything about it seemed magical.

These two are pretty much the same, but I couldn't decide which one to put on here, so I did both!

The greenery was absolutely gorgeous

These are probably my favorite pictures from the whole hike.  The mist and the sun just made everything so much more wonderful!

Trees, trees, and more trees!  I love them!  So majestic!

This one was so cool.  This tree was in the middle of a clearing, and with the mist swirling around it, I felt like centaurs and fairies were going to start appearing.  I wish....

These two pictures are from stopping point of the hike.  We were on top of this hill sort of thing (you know, those things that aren't big enough to be a mountain, but aren't round enough to be a hill?  I'm never sure what to call them), and we could see all of Manzanita.  It was quite a view.

And then there's Piper.  Okay, so this wasn't from the hike, but....but those pantaloons!

Have a picture....or two....or three.....or....yeah

Last year in tenth grade, I took an intro to digital photography class.  It was a fun class; the teacher was super amazing, and I had friends in the class; it was just an all-around easy-going kind of class that was totally worth it.  It was especially worth it because I actually got a few decent pictures out of it.  So, if you haven't guessed by now, here are some precious seconds I stole from life with a click of the camera:

I didn't realize the benches at Table Rock Cafe could be so artistic!

Our lovely, faithful piano

You can never go wrong with books and flowers.  It's a fact of life

Not super original; I mean, who hasn't taken a picture of colored pencils in a circle?  But I still like the idea :)

Nikita being her sleepy self

Gorgeous flowers (from the Rose Garden downtown I believe)

A leaf.  A Maple leaf.  A green Maple leaf.

Our old Leicaflex camera.  Film cameras still beat digital ones, even though I have absolutely no idea how to work them.  That's my dad's and sister's job

Records, however, I do know how to work.  And yes, they still rule over CDs and iPods.

Again, books just automatically make any lame picture eye-candy

Another old camera.  A Rolleiflex this time.  

For my class, I wanted to make the previous picture look even cooler, so I inverted the colors.  What bugs me is that the little pink reflection in the first one turned green in the second one and it's all I see.  I could probably fix that with something like Photoshop, but it would take me ten hours to figure out how.  Technology is not my strong point, which is why I am using Blogger and not making my own Website.  I am taking Web Design this year though, so maybe eventually I'll do something like that....

ANYWAY....now that I am completely off topic and only have one more picture to show you....

I have a strange obsession with round, flat, smooth rocks.  Well, no, maybe not an obsession exactly, or I would have more than three or four, but they're lovely all the same.  So I took a picture of them.

I don't have an artistic eye for things like my sister does, but I wish I did, so I do my best.  I hope that whoever may have happened to stumble upon my blog today enjoyed looking at my wonderful (or not-so-wonderful...depends on what you think of them I suppose) photos.  You have now just experienced about 1/10927487364285245th of my life.  Take it or leave it.

Frisbeeeeee!

I joined my school's Ultimate Frisbee team this year.  It's such a fun sport and if you haven't played it, you're missing out.  If you haven't even heard of it........then this world should be ashamed of itself for not making Ultimate Frisbee known to every single human being.  Well, okay, I admit...it's not that popular of a sport.  There are over 100,000 people who play it in over 50 countries around the world, yet it still doesn't get around to everyone.

Anyway, enough with statistics.  If you haven't heard of it, it's a no contact sport that is kind of a mix between football, soccer, and every other game you can think of, and it's played with a Frisbee.  I hope you figured that last one out on your own.  It's quite a fast-paced sort of game, intense, and ridiculously fun to play.  Also, another cool thing about it, is that all the teams must be spirited and encouraging to the other teams.  At the end of the season (which is Spring), a spirit award goes out to the team who was the most spirited and encouraging.  There's also the championship award too, obviously.

Anywhooooo, I'm getting a little off track.  What I'm trying to get at is that my team finally got our jerseys in the other day!  I have been waiting for these for three or four weeks now, and we finally got them.  We are called the Marooners.  We couldn't do Patriots (which is our school mascot) because we are technically not part of the school, sport-wise; we're a club sport.  I guess we chose Marooners because our school colors are maroon and silver, so we were still trying to stay connected with the school without using the word "Patriot".  This is what the front looks like:

Funny, because the size is a small, yet it still goes down past my rear end.  We have white ones too, because the two teams on the field play white vs. dark, and dark is whatever the other jersey is besides the white one.  If that made any sense.

This is the back of it.  My dad wanted me to have number 37 because it's apparently the first irregular prime.  He's a math geek.  But I didn't have any other number in mind, and that one sounded cool, so I went with it!

At the start of each point, the teams are on either side of the field at each end-zone.  The team who is pulling (throwing the disc to start the point) picks the people they are going to mark/guard on the other team.  There is the same amount of girls and guys on each team, so the girls don't have to guard guys.  But now that we have our jerseys, I'm pretty sure I look like a short person of the male gender, what with the pixie cut, big baggy shirt, and long baggy shorts.  I definitely got a lot of confused looks from the other teams, and at the start, there were a lot of guys running up to guard me, followed by double-takes.  So that's the only not-so-great thing about my new jersey: looking feminine is not my strong point when I'm wearing it.  Buuuuut.....it's so worth it for the looks I get! 

I'm sorry for such a wordy post.  That took way more explaining than I had anticipated.  And it wasn't very humorous either.  And only two pictures!!  I should be ashamed of myself.  But next time I blog about Ultimate Frisbee, I will try to include pictures from our games, because my dad brings the camera to them.

Have a marvelous day, my friends!

Ummm....happy Easter?

Ok, so I know it's a bit late for Easter pictures, but I kept meaning to do a post about this and just never got around to it.  My friend's (Katelyn's) neighborhood hosted an Easter egg hunt for all the kids in the neighborhood, and a couple of my friends and I helped out.  I painted little bunny noses on kids (like what you see on my face and my friends') So here are some pictures!

That is me, with a creeper bunny in the background (Katelyn is the one roasting in the costume)

I got this adorable shot of Ashley

My two bunny friends!  They're lookin' pretty hip....itty hop.....hahaha...ha...ha....ok, I'm not one for puns, so I apologize for that awful one that you probably didn't even get

Aubrey looks absolutely adorable as a bunny, no?

All the kids had to come up and get pictures hugging the Easter bunny, of course.  Well, it took a bit of coaxing from some parents...

Chillin' with the Easter bunny

These two kids ran around and around and around poor Katelyn.  The one in the stripes was trying to get her tail.  It was cute at first, but they literally did it for, oh, I'd say about 7-ish minutes.  Doesn't seem like a long time, but I'm sure it felt like 7 hours to Katelyn, who had to spin around with them to avoid getting her tail pulled.

A trio of little bunnies. :)

Playing patty-cake with the Easter bunny!  He was so cute!

And there you are!  Happy late Easter, my friends!

(Ha, funny, I just realized I have my mouth open in all of the pictures of me.  I'm just a....very happy person?)

Boredom

This is what I do when I get bored in class.  Especially in German.  We literally do nothing in that class.  He gives us 20 page packets to do for the unit and lets us loose.  We only have about 6 people in the class so we all talk and mess around.  (It's a class where you have to video chat type-of-thing with the other schools, and the actual teacher is at Eagle whereas we are at Centennial, so all we have to do is put us on mute and then do whatever.  Our proctor doesn't care as long as we get our stuff done.  It's pretty great.)So when I get done (or when I get bored, which is more likely the case) I doodle on the whiteboard or on a piece of paper.  And these are the results:

I did the "Smile Today!" with the little guy leaning against it.  Everything else except that target-looking circle in the top picture other people did in my class and other classes.

And this is my doodle on paper.  I feel bad for the poor guy.  He looks so overwhelmed and bewildered.  I would be too if I were in his situation.

Cats and whatnot

My cat's (Nikita's) favorite activity is to distract me from doing homework.  And it usually works.  She either walks all over my desk rubbing herself up against my face, presses random keys on my laptop without my permission, lounges on my papers, or desperately needs on my lap.  She's purring all while doing it, so it might be for attention, but I think it's a cat's equivalent to "my dog ate my homework".  Instead it's "my priority was my cat because she was being cute."

This is a special technique she uses to keep me from getting things done.  She lays on my lap and I start petting her with my left hand because my right hand is busy writing things and such, and she innocently and sweetly lays her head down on my arm.  And moving my arm is out of the question because she's so cute when she does it!  I fall for it every time, though.  So it's kinda my fault....I do admit that.

This is Nikita being all adorable and curled-up-like.  Just thought I'd share some cuteness. :)

And of course, I can't forget my bubbly laptop screensaver!  This also distracts me, as I am easily entertained.  It fascinates me how the bubbles change colors, but I can't figure out if they change colors when they bump into other bubbles, or if it's just random.......ah, the great mysteries of life......

**Oh yes, and two of my friends also have started blogs, and you should check them out!  This one is Katelyn's and this one is Ashley's.  They are fantastic!**