What a Friday

Today Christa and I began a monthly blog feature called "Christa Talk to the Teen". It gives people the opportunity to ask a young adult who read YA questions. It came out really nice, please go check it out! Christa is funny and wonderful, and you should go see what she has put together with me!

I must make this short because I need to throw everything into my suitcase and get in the car RIGHT NOW.

My aunt is having her baby today. She's two weeks early, so I have to quickly drive the 6 hours to her house and skip all of my plans today. I wanted to see my friend for the first time in months, but I really don't mind! I am so excited! I'll get to be with Ruby while my mom is with her mom helping her have a baby boy. I am really, really close to my aunt and am thrilled she is having another baby.

I need to go now. I won't be up there for months like I usually would be because I have classes starting soon, so I will be back home sooner this time. I actually have no idea how long I'll be there for. Probably a few days to a week.

I'll keep you posted! Let me know what you think about "Christa Talks to the Teen"!

Finally Back

Long post coming, but then you will be updated and I won't be posting anymore this big since I'll update more consistently. Because I am finally back from my trips. Back in Maryland to stay.
I think I'll start with a few things unrelated to my trips and more blogger/book related.

On Friday the 29Th I (well, Christa, her idea, her blog) will be starting a monthly feature "Christa Talks to the Teen" with my wonderful friend Christa! It gives YA writers the chance to ask a teen reader (Me!) questions. Pretty cool, right? Be sure to check out her blog, she's really entertaining!

I came home to books! I won The Billionaire's Unexpected Heir by Kathie DeNosky from Ashley at The Blogging Book.
I won The Liar Society by Lisa and Laura Roecker from, again, Christa.
I won Fourteen by C. M. Smith from LibraryThing Early Reviewers, although, it's an ebook, so I didn't come home to it.
Yani was really sweet and sent me an ARC of Witches of East End by Melissa de la Cruz! You can find Yani at The Secret Life of an Avid Reader.

 Now to talk about my trips. I was with my family in Pennsylvania, off of Lake Erie, for about 5 weeks, came home for three days, and then went to the beach in Delaware for 9 days.

We had family in Pennsylvania from Vermont, New York, New York City, another place in Pennsylvania, and Maryland. Every night was like a big party with so many people and great food! On the 25Th was my great-aunt Karen's b-day. On the 26Th was Karen and Gary's anniversary, my aunt and uncle Amy and Michael's anniversary and my Mom's b-day. The 27Th was my Nana's b-day. The 28Th was my aunt and uncle Dina and Brian's anniversary. Long weekend. My Dad's b-day was on the 4Th of July.

New tile
And my sister

We put tile in my Grandparents kitchen and dining room. I played with all my little cousins for hours and hours. Babysat a lot, too. We played in the lake, in the pool, in an epic river with a rock face. We drove the mule (it's similar to a little Jeep). I got my 37yo second cousin to drive for the first time in 20 years. My sister drove a real car for the very first time.
I can't even remember everything we did. It was crazy...

I painted this on the wall!

Sadly, I had to say goodbye to everyone. I had stayed there for a long time (like I always do), and it was especially hard to leave Amy and Ruby since I had lived with them for so long. Ruby is such a fun 3yo.




So I came home for three days. I saw some friends and got a few things done before I left to the beach in Delaware. Oh, I love the beach. I love sitting on the balcony at any hour of the day and reading. I always watch anyone who walks under my balcony (it's a busy place) and I see the funniest things. One guy freaked out and threw a chair at a fence after midnight. I enjoy reading on the beach more than playing in the ocean. Although, I do get it in the water and love to play Frisbee and paddle ball. I had ice cream almost every night.

Yeah, me and my
sisters were those dorks

A lot of people I know happened to be there at the same time as my family. My violin teacher of 11 years. My friends I've known since birth (although, we planned our trip to the beach together, as usual). A friend from my neighborhood. I got to see everyone! I saw my neighbor when we went to see Harry Potter. Okay, did you see it? Did you love it? I did! Ahh, so good! I'm glad my Dad is as into them as me. Oh, oh! Does anyone watch soccer? The World Cup? It was amazing! I watched as many games as possible (which was a lot). The USA was AMAZING! And so was Japan! And my violin teacher is Japanese, so we watched the Japan vs. Sweden game with her and her husband.

I came home from the beach this morning in time to see the USA vs. Japan game. It was going to start later than we initially thought, so we went out and got me an iPhone! It's nice. *smiles happily* Then we watched the game. Japan won! I'm happy for them, but I wanted USA to win. It was so intense. o.o I was shaky afterwards from all the adrenaline. Just so you know, I watch a lot of live action Japanese TV. With the subtitles. Their comedy is way better than America's comedy. And I want to speak Japanese. I like Japan. I am happy they won, but very sad my girls lost. I know the girls now, I've seen them live. Oh well, there's always next time.

Many, many pictures. I've shared some with you, but there are so many more. I better stop now. Ahh, back to my life. I'll blog a bunch about books soon. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about my books.

Toodles!

Ramblings About the Trip

Hello! I am here to tell you about how busy I am. That I don't have the time to write blogs posts, which I am unhappy about because I only just started blogging! Now I will ramble about my busy trip.

I came to Erie, Pennsylvania about two and a half weeks ago, the end of May. I will not be coming home to Maryland until the 4th of July weekend. I have a lot of family up here, and my pregnant aunt is a kindergarten teacher (actually, I have two aunts who work in the kindergarten wing of the school... Plus, many friends there.), so I am helping her close her classroom since she will be taking the next two years off to be with her children. When she had the first kid, Ruby, I came to stay for a month each visit every six months or so. Sometimes I stay longer. I love it up here! I have cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents. I get passed around and enjoy everyone's company. I babysit, I go to the Amish auction with Nana, I take kids on bike rides. But, mostly, I stay with my aunt Amy and cousin Ruby.
Here's a some stuff I've been up to.

Kildaer nest

There's a kildaer nest at the farm (where my grandparents live), and kildaer are birds. They lay eggs in gravel or dirt. The mothers run away from the nest and ruffle their wings and act as though they're hurt to distract you from the nest. Don't let this fool you, they are very stupid. We have some hatched kildaer at Amy's house and they will be chased down the very long driveway and into the road before they will go into the grass. I have a picture of the nest!

Weirdly enough, a deer was walking around the house on a Saturday afternoon. It appeared confused. Wasn't eating, just walking around. A couple hours later, still too early for it to be out, the deer was back!

The oddest animal came the next morning when we looked outside at 10am and saw a coyote! My uncle Michael got excited and opened the door, and then he ran upstairs to grab his gun, but he had already scared it off. We explained to the 3 year-old cousin that they are not dogs, and coyotes are mean, STAY AWAY. That evening I was in the graveyard with Amy and Ruby where my friend Caleb picked me up (Caleb is my only friend around here my age. I hang with his Mom, too.) We came back to the house, and then got a call from Amy saying the coyote was in the yard staring at her. She ran up a neighbors driveway (really long driveways) and we went outside. Michael had his gun. He took a shot at it! Though, he missed. It was very exciting!

Also, there was a raccoon on the deck, again, in the afternoon. Ruby calls them catroons. What's with these animals being out in the middle of the day?! Enough about the animals.

Lake Erie



Ruby in Lake Erie



I've been going to the lake. It's freezing! That doesn't stop the little kids, or me. I also go hunting for sea glass, surprisingly, there is quite a bit to be found.

The first week of being here I completely packed Amy's classroom. She was still teaching, and the kids were already familiar with me since I come and help at the school when I can, so they were hanging all over me while I packed.

All I want to do is help when I'm here. If anyone is going anywhere I always volunteer to join them. Not usually the case at home. When I do spend time reading or on the computer I feel that I should be spending time with someone. I end up with little time to write blogs and such.

And then, on Monday, I got sick. Headache, stomachache, stuffy nose, sore throat, too tired to do anything but lay in bed watching TV and sleeping. Miserable for a couple days in which I rarely left my bed. I missed Waiting on Wednesday, too. Thankfully, I'm feeling better now!

Today I went to the Amish auction! I love going there. My Nana and I get to spend time together and they have fresh donuts! Everything is better Amish made. Nice people over there. The guy sounds like he's yodeling as he auctions off plants and veggies and fruits and flowers. It's a neat experience.

Anyhoot, I believe I am done rambling. I should go play with my cousins, Emmy and Brother, since they're over here to play. I think we'll go drive the mule around! By the way, the mule is similar to a mini jeep, not an animal. Though, there are horses here.

How is everyone? What's new?

School's Out for the First Time

My first semester of college is over! Yes, I only took one class, but it was all very new and stressful for me. I took English 101, and I loved it. I excessively stress over everything, so I am glad it's over. My big research argument paper was on the effects of Twitter on language, so then I joined Twitter and found authors and fellow book fanatics. It turns out that they all have blogs. o.o This new world of tweeting and blogging is wonderful! Now that class is over I intend to join this world! I had my last class about 3 hours ago and now I'm starting this blog. I'll quote, review, ramble. This is only the beginning! Ah, I'm looking forward to this summer. Here I go!

I'm considering having my friends and family take bets on how many books they think I'll read this year. Sadly, it will definitely be less than the past two years. 2009 was 131, 2010 132. I doubt I can make 133, I'm way behind and know I'll be very busy the rest of the year. I'm at 44 so far, and it's May! Wanna take a shot at it and guess how many you think I'll have read by Christmas? (I go by Christmas, not New Years, because I get new books and Christmas, so I make sure I'm not in the middle of a book on Christmas, unlike New Years.) I'll write down guesses and check them at the end of the year. This is probably too soon to announce my plans, because nobody knows about my blog. I'll just have to re-announce this later.

I really hope somebody reads this... Maybe comments... I shall continue with this blogging later. MY FIRST RAMBLING! WOOT!