wild rumpus

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Surprises. I have had a lot of them lately.

I have a complex view of surprises; if I know generally what to prepare for, what to expect, I will probably like it a lot; if it seems like everyone knows what it is except for me, I will be virtually tortured until the surprise is at length revealed; if I know something is up, but when I ask about it no one will tell me anything except 'You'll like it', I will be all but driven mad. But perhaps the most surprising thing of all is that I really have enjoyed every one of the most recent surprises immensely. I guess it is just 'getting there' that is hard for me.

About three or so weeks ago, my friends threw me a surprise birthday party (my little sister had a huge hand in it; I think it was even her idea in the first place). I am the sort that when I see something fishy going on - people quieting or shifting feet when I come near, sharing whispers and occasionally glancing my way, or the like - I fine-tune my ears, sharpen my vision, and become the most aware and suspicious sleuth I know.

    Having discovered the hard way from a previous mystery party that my attitude only increased my irritation as no one would tell me anything - that, of course, is what surprises are supposed to be - I, this time, was purposefully ignoring the symptoms of secret-keeping. And besides this, my friends (who had quickly learned my tendency to grow snoopy) were being extra careful to keep me in the dark.

    After returning home from some fun hours of lunch and shopping with one of my best friends, my little sister drew me into our library - my dad is amazing, and we actually have a room devoted entirely to books, and our grand piano (and well, the TV, too) - by playing one of my favorite video games, Spyro: A Hero's Tail. (I cannot resist it, and boy, does she ever know my weakness!)

    About to chastise her for gaming without me, I stopped short when I saw the elaborate streamers, and then looked to the side to see almost our entire church youth group huddled against the wall, smiling like excited imps - they looked somewhere between plain happy and mischievous - and it took me all of a split second to realize what was going on. Then they jumped up and yelled 'surprise', at which I teared up; this, partly because I was impressed at how well they had kept everything a secret without annoying me, and partly because I felt so honored, privileged, and special that they had put in the time and energy to make a surprise party just for little old me on my twentieth birthday.

    And you know what? It ended up being one of the best surprises I had ever had!

When my grandparents took me to the Ordway to see the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra last Friday, I knew exactly where I was going, exactly who with and what for; I was informed that the venue would be fancy - you understand I had never been there before - and that I would most certainly enjoy it a great deal. What surprised me was that it was well beyond what I expected: Infinitely lovelier, far more spacious and grand, and the music above and beyond anything I could have imagined. I learned that Mendelssohn's piece 'The Hebrides Overture (Fingal's Cave)' is possibly my favorite piece of music ever - other, of course, from my favorite song, In Christ Alone, and my favorite hymn, Come Thou Fount.

    It was the best kind of surprise - better than I could have hoped or dreamed.

And this morning, one of my very best friends in all the world took me on a trip she admitted she had been planning for about a month. She had given me a card the previous Sunday at church telling me she was taking me on an adventure, and suggested some things for me to bring: Bible, notebook, camera, and (of course) adventure boots!

    She picked me up this morning and brought me to Minneapolis to a little bookstore for 'young people' (about ages 3 to at least 20). ;) It was called 'Wild Rumpus' - just like from Where the Wild Things Are. (And just for the record, I love that book!)

    We spent a few hours in that store, looking at new books, treasuring old ones we had read before, ogling various artwork, and petting the chickens. Yes, they had chickens in the store - petite little things, one black and one grey - roaming free for anyone to enjoy. Several children were chasing after the hens intermittently, and finally my friend gently caught one and cuddled with it for a few minutes. The hen did not seem to wish to leave her hand! There were also caged Chinchillas, many pretty birds, and even a small tarantula named Thomas Jefferson.

    I wish I could describe the ceiling for you, yet I am afraid I will not do it justice. The creativity raised my eyebrows and drew in my camera for a click or two. It had two layers, one of water and a lower one of ice, which appeared to be being cracked by a canoe. The sight daunted me for a moment. I was impressed by the imagination. Actually, that detail itself almost made the whole trip worth it!

    I purchased Enna Burning by Shannon Hale, a book I have read before but never owned (I wrote a review on it a couple years ago here on my blog). There were at least ten or more books I dearly wished to buy, but alas; a nanny's pocketbook is rarely full enough to purchase a whole shelf of treasures.

    Besides this, my friend and I enjoyed an unplanned but peaceful scenic drive around a lake, a visit to the beautiful Victorian-styled Lake Harriet Bandstand, the Lakewood Cemetery, and we even discovered a sidewalk 'little library' box, in which we left a secret note in dwarfish script (based on that found within the Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien). It read,

'Greetings, dear reader.
I hope you enjoy your books.
From the green elves of the north.'

And I drew a little symbol using the first letters of my and my friend's names. I hope someone finds it and takes the time to discover what it says! Simple though it is, I presume it will make a nice bookmark for its discoverer. We decided next time we came by - for I am sure that we will, perhaps this spring or summer - to bring a book or two to trade. How will I ever give up one of my books, though, even if I get one in return?? Maybe I will just pick up a random book at a garage sale and trade that instead. 'One man's trash is another man's treasure.'

    All in all, though we felt a bit rushed - I am certain we could have spent days in these places and not have enjoyed all they had to offer - the adventure was wonderful, truly worth the wait. And I am so thankful to the friend who gave this to me as my birthday gift. (Let's have more adventures soon, eh?) ;)

I realize it has been long since I last wrote - over two months, I believe! Well, I shall simply have to make up for that. After so much time, I have much to tell.

life is busy

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Reading. Writing. Weeding. Cleaning. Babysitting. Organizing. Planting. Trying. Failing.

Isn't life just beautiful? I suppose that statement deserves an explanation: God blesses us in so many ways. I can't count on my fingers, toes, and even hairs exactly how many blessings God has given us. Every leaf, every blade of grass, every cloud, every ray of sun or moonlight, every breath, every beat of our hearts . . . life is a gift, a miracle. Oh, that we could learn to not take its many and beautiful facets for granted!

I haven't been writing on my blog very faithfully, and I apologize for that. I have been busy with life. (Wow, where to begin?!)

 My church is amazing, and I'm growing closer to everyone there and loving them more and more deeply as the Sundays pass by, one after the other.

I've been inching my way through the Hunger Games book, and am almost to the end. My sister, Emily, owns the book, so I've been trying to respect her wishes about not bringing it around while we travel. This makes it a little harder to finish (I spend a LOT of time in the car), but it's nice to sit down on my bed and delve into the action.

I'm finishing school at a snail's pace. Math is my most prominent issue, (I'm done with Literature, am nearly done with science, and am flying steadily through history because I just LOVE it). The prospect of finally graduating is a light at the end of the tunnel. A lot of my friends are graduating this year as well, and their open houses are getting me that much more excited!

My novel is coming along slowly. I'm the kind of writer who has a beginning and an end already planned out, but needs to work on filling in the middle. And that's what I'm doing right now, trying to fill in those spaces to get from A to B. I'm feeling a little restless, but it's a great learning process. My hope is to have chapter three completed by the first of June.

    The more I get into the story, though, the more my excitement grows. After all, I've been working on the general idea for this novel for almost seven years. (Mid-July was when it all started.) I had to crawl through a lot of drafts over the years that just weren't . . . right yet. But I'm confident that the draft I have now is the one I've been looking for all this time. I'm going through it one piece at a time, chapter by chapter, paragraph by paragraph. Now, I have a lot of great ideas in store --- it's just getting there!

My older sister, Lilly has begun selling Thirty-One bags. (You can find her here.)When I first went to a party my sister-in-law was hosting for these bags, I wasn't really sure to expect, and honestly, I didn't really like them. Now? I LOVE THEM! Perhaps I just needed a little nudge, but after purchase one, it's hard to stop! They're extremely practical, as well as cute. I just purchased a special cosmetic bag that I'm going to use to carry my Bible in for church on Sundays. I have two of these adorable notebook-cover-thingies called a Fold-and-Go Organizer; it's my favorite product from Thirty-One, and I use it daily to write down story-notes. It keeps them in one neat little place (who likes scraps of paper flying around in all directions?), and besides, they're CUTE!

    I'm also expecting another bag (the All In One Organizer) and a Pinch-Top Eyeglass Case in the mail in a couple of weeks. (Yeah, I have my own librarian-style specs; I'm a little near-sighted. Probably from reading so many books!)

    Anyway, if you're a girl, you won't be sorry you checked this out! You can visit the website here.

I once started reading Jerry Bridges' book Respectable Sins, but never finished it, so I'm picking it up again and am loving it! It points out those sins we look at as 'small' or 'acceptable' --- sins like pride, or greed --- things that don't show as much as murder or adultery, but are equally evil in God's eyes. This won't be the last time I mention this book, and I'll be sure to quote from it a lot in the near future because Bridges says it all so well, so much better than I do. Really, if you ever have an opportunity to get your hands on it, this is definitely a book worth owning!

Ah, and back to the subject of math, I've discovered an interesting technique that helps me get through it stress-free, and in a slightly shorter amount of time. You may call me crazy, but all I can say is that it's great to be home-educated.

    The past three days, I've sat down to math, and once I've completed between five and ten problems, I play one of my Spyro the Dragon games for a few minutes. 

 . . .

See? I told you that you'd think it was crazy.

This is why it works:

Honestly, I can only tolerate math for a very little while. About twenty to thirty problems involving fractions is enough to give me a whopping headache, and it has been known to take me a lot more than an hour to get through just one of my math lessons. If I get stressed (and too much math definitely makes me stressed!), I begin to have a harder time thinking logically about how to solve a problem; I start blanking.

    Now, when I pause every-so-often to get my mind off of math (by playing a little bit of my Spyro game), it takes away that stress (or prevents it) and actually ends up taking me approximately half an hour to finish a lesson, instead of almost TWO hours! It really does help. And you know what? I've started looking forward to doing math. ;)

Life is busy. And that's the way I like it.

Spyro the Dragon

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Dear Readers,

First, I would like to say that I have decided not to post the rest of the series I started on the book 'Respectable Sins' by Jerry Bridges. I get the feeling it wasn't having the effect I had hoped for, but perhaps I'll add little quotes in the future as I still plan on reading the rest of the book.

And now, to the point of this post. I grew up playing a most exciting game called 'Spyro the Dragon'. I've grown to just love that little purple guy! My sister and I have been playing the fifth PlayStation game, 'A Hero's Tail', over the past few days, and I am having... wow... so much fun!

Spyro the Dragon

I don't know what it is about this little guy, but I love him. I even started writing a story about him when I was eleven, which --- although the first draft of which was thrown away a year later because I was by then disgusted with it --- has led to an even bigger project over time. (Yep, the novel I'm writing right now was inspired by Spyro, my childhood hero.)

    The story I wrote started out being a dream I had about the 'A Hero's Tail' game, but oh-ho has it changed! I've got my own antagonist, a new protagonist, and an idea for the conflict inspired by a post-it note I wrote down without any clue about what it was going to turn into. So far, I've only told one person in the world --- who is my best friend, Elaine --- about my story plans, but I promised my mom I'd let her read the first chapter when I get it done. (On the roll I am right now, that shouldn't be too far in the future.)

    Sadly, I wanted to have this story completed by the time I was sixteen so that I could have it published before I became an adult, but I had to tear myself away from that old draft because I knew I hadn't found the right storyline yet. And now, I believe I have.

Sparx the Dragonfly, Spyro's Best Friend

    Yikes, it's frustrating to not be able to tell you any details! I better get it written so that I can finally post it to share with you all, right?

Well, back to the actual game. I've won it about three or four times, so I pretty much know it by heart. I've played it so often because the story (and Spyro) are precious childhood memories I love to visit. This time, my younger sister, Emily, got me started on it again because she was in the mood to play it. We'd been listening to the music for the game online, so naturally, we HAD to play. We're calling this one Emily's game, but I'm helping her out a little, and not letting her end the game until we've completed every little detail.

This is my favorite song from the 'A Hero's Tail' game; it's called 'Stormy Beach':

Although I'm going to finish this particular post just like that, I'm probably going to end up posting more than once about Spyro over time because he's just plain awesome, along with his friends.

Blogs are for writing what you're passionate about, right?