My Night at the Theater

Hello Again!

The other day, my Dad and I went to our local community theater to be volunteer ushers and to see the play, Up the Down Staircase. It was my first play that I've ever seen (that I remember that is) ! and I loved it! It was so cool! :)
I borrowed my mom's black skirt and shirt to wear(I didn't have anything fancy enough to wear. hahaha!). The theater isn't very far away from where we live, so it was a quick drive for me and my dad. When we got there we met Harvey, the guy that is in charge and he showed us around and what our jobs were. Our jobs were to help people find their seats and hand out programs. My dad told people where their seats were, which was the perfect job for him, because he's so tall and his voice is loud and I kept teasing him about his head being shiny (my dad is bald by the way ;-D ) from the lights on the ceiling. Hahaha!

And then during the intermission I stood behind a counter and handed out cookies to people and Harvey collected money and sold drinks. And my Dad held the door open for people to come out and when they were coming back in, he made sure no one brought food into the theater. Towards to the end of the intermission, a guy came up and wanted to buy a soda, and Harvey told him that there were only four minutes till the show started again, and soda isn't allowed in the theater either. The guy hesitated and thought about it for a minute then said "Shoot! now I've wasted another minute trying to decide!" and we all laughed. He did end up buying the soda and drank most of it before the show started again.

The rest of the time Dad and I got to watch the show! We were very lucky, because two seats right next to each other in the front row were left open, so Dad and I could sit next to each other and watch the play! So lucky!

I Loved it! The play was called "Up the Down Staircase". It's a comedy about an English teacher who goes to work at a new school, but she has a very hard time getting to know all the kids in her class. It's a bit hard to explain, but it was VERY good. There were some scenes that were really funny! I really enjoyed it and I can't wait to see another play! I wonder what i might be able to see next? I'd LOVE to see Roger and Hammerstein's Cinderella live some day. I have the 90s version of that play on DVD. It's my favorite!
Anyway, Dad and I got back home around 10:00pm! As soon as I got home I jumped into my jammies and told Mom and Thane about it. Then when I went to bed, I was asleep by the time my head hit the pillow ;)
I can't wait to do that again!
Peace! ☮
~Rhanna

Mother's day!

Happy Mother's day(or as my 3 year old cousin would say, "Happy Muddah's day" ;-D )! 

Wow it's been a while since I've last been on here. I'm reading 'The Last Enchantment" by Mary Stewart. It's book three in a series all about Merlin and his whole life. It's are really good! I love how it is are written. It's so easy to read, and to imagine all the places that Merlin describes :-)  I've also read the two books that came before this one, "The Crystal Cave" and "The Hollow Hills". but besides that, I haven't done too much reading lately. :)

So for my mom, today, we went to Big Sur State Park for a lovely lunch of goat cheese, lunch meat, crackers, and cookies. It was BEAUTIFUL there today! Sunny, warm, with a little breeze! We had such a nice time there. I love driving down the coast to Big Sur, because I really feel like I am on the very edge of a continent! It's the coolest feeling! Seeing the ocean, and how it just goes on forever...So cool! :-D We had to get gas for the car first, and while Dad was washing the front window I said "I love watching squeegees" which made everyone else in the car laugh a lot. it was kind of funny ;-)

Half-way there, mom asked me if i remembered to bring knives and a cutting board. (I forgot to bring any!) but thanks to my trusty purse i HAD two plastic butter knives and we were saved! haha! I felt so smug, when i pulled out those two knives ;-D

Our favorite place to go is Pfeiffer State Park, in Big Sur. it's the most beautiful place in all of Big Sur, I think. There are huge, old redwoods everywhere. the Sycamore trees and the river make the whole place smell amazing.I wish I could bottle it...;-) Every time we get to Big Sur, we always roll down all the windows and breathe in the fresh air! 

It was strange. There was no one there, where we went and had our picnic. Only the blue jays and the chipmunks, which seemed to be stalking us, waiting for us to drop a crumb for them to eat. It was really funny to watch them hop around! One time we walked over a bit to take a quick picture, and in two seconds the birds had flown over and were sitting on the benches making cheese and cracker sandwiches, drinking our iced tea, eating the middles out of our chocolate sandwich cookies and talking about the high-rise in bird taxes. ;-) Hahahaha! 

After our picnic, we took a walk to our favorite place to throw rocks into the river. I took a lot of pictures of everyone and the sunlight streaming through the trees. I can't believe how nice it was yesterday. We threw rocks into the river for a bit, then when we walked back, I carried Gwynnie on my back for a little while, which made her happy, because I was bouncing around and making silly nosies. 

Oh and I pet a lizard! When we were waiting for Dad to get the car, there was a cute little lizard on the stump I was standing by, and s/he(?) crawled out of a hole in the stump. and I reached down slowly and petted his(her) back, then s/he ran away. it was really cool though, and Gwyn loved seeing the lizard! It was so cute! :-)

On the way back everyone fell asleep. Mom, Gwyn, Thane, and Emrys. Dad and I were the only ones who stayed awake. When we got back, Mom and Gwyn went in the bedroom and slept some more, Thane drew, Em and I play solitaire for a little bit. Then dad and I worked on a VERY fancy dinner of, (AMAZING) steak, mashed potatoes, grilled corn, artichokes, asparagus, and sparkling apples cider. It was SO good! and then I made GF brownies, and mint-chip ice cream(dairy-free) for dessert, and we watched the Amazing Race finale! 

I think that we all had a fun day! I think going to Big Sur for lunch is my favorite thing to go out and do.

Gwyn had a lot of sand in her cloths that she just dumped on the floor...I think today will be clean the floors day ;-) lol!

Peace out and Happy readings! 

~Rhanna~

Happy Valentines Day ♥

Happy Valentines Day Everyone! (I've discovered how to change the color of the text. And who knows what I'll do next. Haha! :-D )

I hope you're all having a lovely day! I've caught a cold and it's at it's worse today. :P Not much fun. I was planning to make a pink breakfast but I was too tired this morning. Oh well. So I thought I'd do some writing. It's a perfect day to write when you have a cold. It's gray and windy outside and I have my Artemis mug full of Jasmine tea, I've got a warm sweatshirt on and I have my music on. :) I almost feel like a real writer. Haha! the only thing that would make this more perfect is if I had a heater on under my feet. Brr!

I was looking at the Map I have on this site, that shows all the people who have looked at this blog. WOWIE! I can't believe so many people all over the world have looked at this blog. It's so exciting! Hello to everybody all over the world!!! ((Jumps up and down and waves)) It's super cool! :)

I wonder how people celebrate Valentines day around the world...We've never done too much for it. My mom makes pink food (pink pancakes, pink tuna sandwiches, pink mashed potatoes, etc.) And sometimes my dad will surprise us in the morning with chocolate. This year my grandmother sent all of us kids cards.
I was planning on making pink pancakes, pink hash browns, and bacon (which is kind of pink) for breakfast, but I woke up very tired and stuffed up. I'm feeling much better so I'm going to make dinner. We're going to have roast beef (pink in the middle) pink mashed potatoes (I'll cook a beet in with the potatoes and when I mash them together it'll be pink) and red Swiss chard. YUMMY! I think that will be good. :)

What do you, my lovely readers, like to do on Vday? What are your traditions?

I'm going to go eat some lunch for now. Goat cheese, lunch meat, and GF crackers. Mmm! Happy Valentine's day everyone! :) I'll write more later.
See you later people! :-D
~Rhanna~

The Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder by Joanne Fluke

In which Hannah Swensen, the middle-aged owner of The Cookie Jar, is running her bakery smoothly when one day she finds the Cozy Cow Dairy delivery man dead. Shot in his truck surrounded by her Chocolate Chip Cookies. When her brother-in-law, Bill, a detective on the police force, asks for her help solving the case she accepts. During her investigation she goes garbage searching, deals with her persistent mother, bakes cookies, meets the local dentist, bakes more cookies and when the owner of the Cozy Cow Dairy goes missing suddenly, Hannah's suspicions grow. Will she solve the murder in time and live to bake more cookies??  

I read this book a while ago, so I forgot some of the plot, which makes it hard to write a review. Haha! I really like this book though. The murder scenes weren't at all gory or gross, which was nice if you don't like gory stuff. The book includes about 7 recipes for cookies that are in the story. I think it's cool! Hannah is a fun character to follow. She's smart, funny and somewhat sarcastic. and Norman, the local dentist, is very lovable and sweet. The only thing I didn't like about it, was that Hannah gave her brother-in-law all the credit for solving the murder when she did all the work. And there's one woman who is being beaten up by her husband which was annoying (don't worry! If you don't like that part  of the story the husband goes away soon). I still really liked the books. They have sort of a Nancy Drew feel, just with more murder and cookies. It was fun for me to see what it was like running a bakery. I also like Hannah's cat, Moshie.

This book is in the Hannah Swensen series.

Recommended for people who like: cookies, murder, and Minnesota winters.

Happy Belated Imbolc!



A Really cool Brigid. :)


Happy...err Belated Imbolc Everybody! It's spring time! and boy is it beautiful here! It's been in the 70s the last two weeks here. Just gorgeous!  It's January...wait...it *was* January. Now it's February. Duh! Haha! ;D

 Sorry I haven't been writing more! We moved again! but I won't get into too much detail. ;) We moved about 10 days before Christmas about 20 miles south... south?...or its it north?....or west?....or east...?......We moved 20 miles in some direction from where we used to live. ;) Haha! This house is lovely! So much bigger and less moldy. And since then I have just forgotten to write on here (plus I have been doing a lot of reading ;) )


Ok, I just want to do a quick what-books-have-I-read-lately-check-up and then I have something cool to talk about!

Blueberry Muffin Murder
the 3rd book in the series.

So I got a few books for Christmas, that I'm still working on! Mostly they were Cozy/Murder mysteries, which I love! I have been going through the Hannah Swesen mysteries by Joanne Fluke very quickly. They are about a woman named Hannah who runs a bakery in this little town, with no crime but lots of murder (What?!). Hannah likes to solve the cases (She is always the one to find the body with some kind of baked good that she made around it) and ends up getting trapped by the murderer in the end, but narrowly escaping with her life (kind of like Nancy drew, but with more murder and more baking ;D). The first book is called 'The Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder' and the rest of the series has names to do with some baked good.

Terrier, the 1st book in
the Beka Cooper series.

I also read 'Terrier' by Tamora Pierce. It's in the Beka Cooper series. It's about Beka Cooper, a young girl who is training to be a 'Dog' (police. trainees are called Puppies, and bad guys are Rats) in the Lower city of Tortall. Beka is the great-great-great-great-(you get the idea ;D)-grandmother of George Cooper. George, as in Alanna's husband in the Song of Lioness quartet. Eee! :D It was VERY good! Beka is so awesome! :) I can't wait to read the next book 'Bloodhound'



The Cat Who Played
Post Office. The 6th
book in this series.



My Mom and I are listening too 'The Cat Who' series by Lillian Jackson-Braun. They are GREAT! It's about a middle aged journalist, Jim Qwilleran (Usually called Qwill) and his two cats Koko and Yum-Yum who solves murder cases. He's really funny! I'm half way through 'The Cat Who Played Post Office' It's very good!

And finally, I have been skimming through the Mythology books I got for Christmas: Bulfinch's mythology, Ovid's Metamorphosis, and some other non-fiction books. Though it takes a lot of concentration to read Bulfinch. Hahahaha!!

So now to my big news! :)  I'm going to go to this year's Not Back To School Camp!!!!! Yay!! :D I'm VERY super excited! And another cool thing is, I paid for it all by myself! I have been saving up money for years, from watching neighbors' pets, to birthday money, and I didn't know what to do with it! One time I was saving up for a horse, then I thought maybe I'd fly to the UK to see my friends, then I started saving up to buy a bakery. But now I know what I'm going to spend it on! So then my Mom had a great idea. I'll make things (wire fairies, and crafty stuff like that) and sell it to make enough money again, to go to camp again next year! I think it's a great idea! So I'm learning how to make fairies out of wire and silk flowers. I might do other stuff too, like watch neighbors' pets, make some cat toys, or something like that to sell too, and maybe (Hopefully) I can start sell my baked goods. :) That would be awesome!

 It's a camp for unschooling teens in Oregon. It's one week long (or if you want to you can stay two weeks. I'm only doing one week since it's my first time) and it has from 70 to 100 unschoolers. This is my first time going. It's in August and I'm staying for a week...by myself...for the first time ever away from home. I am nervous about being so far away from my family for so long! Golly! 

I learned about it last September from Idzie on I'm Uschooled. Yes, I Can Write.(Great blog! Idzie's a wonderful writer!)  and I got very excited when I watched this video. It gave such a warm feeling, to think what it would be like to be surrounded by people like me (not that I'm not, since I'm with my family all the time...but you know what I mean. With new people who have some of the same views as I do) Wow! So I signed up yesterday. and I can't wait for the next 6 months to go by! Haha!
I'm going to dye my hair before I go (I'm going to do it soon, but I want to save the leftover dye for August, since I never use it all at once. I've dyed my hair twice before. My dad helps me do it.) This time I want to go a big more crazy! I want to do all my hair in this color  and then I'll put my hair into two ponytails and dye just a little streak this color . Like two streaks at the bottom of my hair. Won't that look so cool! I can't wait! :D And then we're going to order some crazy purple tie-dye tights, that I can wear with my new blue tie-dye skirt. I want to start going with a colorful-hippie style. :) Or just try it out for a while. ;D

More later!
Happy readings!
~Rhanna~
 xxxxxxx

Random Thoughts. . .

Cool Winter Fairy.
I'm using it as my FB
profile pic at the moment.

Hello Dear Readers! I hope your stories are all ending well?

I finished reading 'In Mozart's Shadow: His Sister's Story' by Carolyn Meyer.  It is about Mozart's Sister (obviously!), Maria Anna Mozart (Nannerl). It was quite good.

Today was another doctor's appointment at 9:30 in the morning(!!!!) for Emrys. My dad just got back from a three day work trip to Virginia around midnight, and then my dad, Em, and myself all got up at 6:00 in the morning, piled in the car and started off to San Fransisco. We assumed it would be better for just the three of us to go instead of bringing everyone, because it's a lot a driving and it gets hard on everyone when both little ones are crying to get out of the car, and everyone else has a headache. We assumed right.

I saw a few weird cars while we were driving. . . one was HOT pink, and one car had been in some sort of wreck, 'cause the front bumper was missing and you could see some of the car's insides.It was kind of like was a car would look like if cars could be zombies ;P (Haha)...It was kind freaky. . .

Anyway!

San Fran Zoo.
It's my favorite zoo :-)

We arrived there 10 minutes late, and had a simply marvelous time visiting with our doctors ("one lump of sugar or two doc?"). . . Not really. . .but it was pleasant enough. Anyway by the end of the meeting Em was VERY ready to leave. Dad thought it might be fun to go walk around the San Francisco Zoo, and it was.
We rode on the little steam train, and Emrys had the best time on it. His face literally 'glowed with happiness', he had so much fun! It was adorable! Then Em and Dad got some lunch at the 'Leaping Lemur Cafe'.
We walked a bit longer after that and, at Em's insistence, we got a polar bear mask for him, a tiger mask for Gwynnie, and a monkey one for Thane.
(Oh! I made some AMAZING puns tonight with those masks. . .*Cackles* {It's really hard to tell jokes over the Internet 'cause you can't hear the person trying not to laugh while they tell it, or really get how hilarious it is, but I'll have a go}
*I put on the Polar bear mask*
Me: "I can't 'bear' to stay up any longer! ((cackles))"
*everyone else rolls their eyes*
*I put on the monkey mask*
Me: "Quit 'monkeying' around! How are you 'ape'le to do that?"
*groans from Thane and dad* 
*then I put on the tiger mask*
Me:"I'm so 'tiger'ed out!"
*I, then start rolling on the bed in a fit of laughter, unable to breathe from laughing so hard. Emrys and Thane jump on me and tackle me*
Gosh that was fun-ny! ;-) 'Tiger'ed out! Instead of 'tired' out? 'ape'le instead of 'able'! Mwhahaha!! . . . *crickets* Mwheehee...*clears throat* anyway. . .)

The drive back was much easier. Emrys feel asleep leaning on my lap for almost the whole ride, Dad had a few work calls, and I read.  It was so nice to get home and I could barely feel my legs when I got out of the car! After cleaning out the car a bit I, very happily, started dinner! ;-) I love making dinner. I made my specialty, breaded/baked chicken with potatoes, and broccoli. YUM-O! it was really good!

And while I was getting dinner dished up, I finished listening to a very wonderful, fabulous, Amazing story called The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale. It's one of the best stories that I have ever heard, it was amazing. Everyone should read/listen to this story (listening was really fun with this story because each character was voiced by a different person, so it really came to life!) it's really good. :-)

I finished the last Harry Potter book last week. . . It was AMAZING! I really enjoyed it! Probably one of the best series I've read so far. Mom and I are watching the movies, half a movie almost every night when everyone else is asleep. They are too scary for Thane, Em, and Gwyn to watch, so mom and I wait till they're asleep and then we've been watching them! They are really well done, and I now want to go to see the new movie coming out with mom in the theaters. We finished watching the third movie a few nights ago and I think it's my favorite so far! It was SOOOOOO cool, and I am now really scared of Dementors! Ack! ;-) It's lots of fun!

That's all I've got on my mind at the moment. Oh if anyone knows of any good resources to read about Queen Guinevere (her past and her whole story) let me know please! I've had an idea, but I would like to know more about Queen Gwen a bit more. Don't ask why. It's a secret ;-) Thanks!

Happy reading!

Peace and love,

~Rhanna.

Happy Samhain and Halloween.

My favorite witch drawing.
Isn't she cool?


Happy belated Samhain and Halloween! :)

It was a beautiful day here on Halloween. Clear, sunny and perfectly warm. Much different from where we used to live, where it almost always snowed while we were trick-or-treating. That was a fun time :D

So for this year both of my brothers were dressed as black, harmless ninjas with wooden swords and masks up high over their noses. My little sister was a VERY cute pink flower fairy, with two sets of wings and a pink tutu, who was fearless of walking straight into an oncoming crowd of adults and children. Both the boys had a fabulous time and insisted that we go again later that night. Haha!

We went to a shopping square in the afternoon, where they were holding a sort of trick-or-treating activity. It was more for the younger kids, who would be too tired later in the day, or who would be scared out of their wits by the gross, disgusting, and nightmarish zombie, vampire, blood-covered costumes that, for whatever reason, a lot of people are wearing lately. I really don't understand why people like to dress in such scary and gross costumes. What is the point of doing that? It's made my mom upset about how disturbing it is. "We're supposed to be honoring our ancestors, not making fun of them." Is what Mom said the other day and I totally agree with her. We should honor and worship the loved ones that have left us, not mock them. I think why we do it, is because we don't have any idea what happens after death, and dressing as zombies is a way to try deal with death. To cover up our scared feelings, by making it more scary and for some people entertaining. But then again I'm pretty sure that when people talk and dress like zombies, what they're doing is subconsciously addressing their fears about death. It's hard to put into words what I think.

But anyway, after all this talk about zombies, I looked up the etymology of the word Zombie and I learned this: "1871, of W. African origin (cf. Kikongo zumbi "fetish;" Kimbundu nzambi "god"), originally the name of a snake god, later with meaning "reanimated corpse" in voodoo cult. But perhaps also from Louisiana creole word meaning "phantom, ghost," from Sp. sombra "shade, ghost." Sense "slow-witted person" is recorded from 1936." From this site. Isn't that cool? Gosh I LOVE etymology!



So continuing with Halloween. . .
 


Morgana from the TV show Merlin.
My cloak looks a lot
like hers. :)

 For Halloween, my WONDERFUL Mama made an awesome dark blue cloak that flows behind me when I walk in such a magical way, it's SO cool (I'm going to wear to the super market, the fabric store, my surfing meetings, and all around the house.) I also wore a dried eucalyptus-leaf-flower crown that I bought at the Northern California Ren Faire on my birthday, and my wooden sword. I decided I was Morgan le Fay.
 
 
 
But for some reason, I didn't get the same excited, happy, feeling that I usually get that makes me feel super jumpy and excited for Halloween.
Trick-or treating lost is excitement for me.
I totally was lagging on decorations this year.
I didn't think much about costumes or candy.
It was weird and I was a little disappointed at my lack of enthusiasm for the holiday.
I know why. I feel like I've started going through a growth spurt of the mind (as well as body!). I've started thinking about things as a adult, more than I did last year. I'm starting to change and grow up.
 
I still want to celebrate that day , just differently. I want to start celebrating Halloween, not as Halloween like a little kid with candy and scary costumes and not like a lot of adults with scary movies and parties, but as Samhain. I'd like to start doing more Pagan stuff. I'd like to start celebrating all the Sabbat days, with more things to celebrate than just fairies bring gifts in the morning. I'd like to bake food for that day, go outside and celebrate the day, whatever it is, like the Celts did thousands of years ago. I'd like to read stories about the day and learn as much as I can. I want to try being more Pagan than we are now. I think it would be lots of fun for every one. :-)
 
So anyway that wraps up Halloween. It was still loads of fun and I now cannot wait for Thanksgiving! my 2nd favorite holiday (Talk Like A Pirate Day and my Birthday are on the same day, which makes it my favorite day out of the whole year ;) Hahaha!)
 
So now to my readings:
 
I'm pretty sure that nobody is very much interested in what I have been reading lately. I'm mean if you're not a big reader it's just going to seem very boring I'd guess.  But I've been using this blog to help me keep track of how many books I've read, when I read them, and what the books were. You understand? Since I read so much, it gets quite confusing to remember all that. And I like to see how long it takes me to finish a big book.
 
I'm now about a quarter way through the 6th Harry potter book, 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince'. It took me four days to read the 5th book, 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix', which was 870 pages long. ;) It was REALLY good! (also this will explain that lack of reviews and posts. I have had my nose in the HP books non-stop for the past two weeks. Hahaha!)
 
I've been listening to Anne of the Island by L.M. Montgomery. There have been a few really sad scenes (one scene gave me the chills it was so sad). But the rest has been totally Anne.
The Anne of Green Gables stories get better and better with each book! They are very enjoyable and a nice change from the 'omg-they're-going-to-die-next-page Harry Potter or Percy Jackson series. Haha!
 
I received a new book from the sugar sprite (a little sprite that comes on the night of Halloween and trades our unwanted candy for a gift *wink wink wink* ). It's Adam Hart-Davis's book 'What the Past did for us'. I have only read the introduction, but even that is great! I love how Adam writes his books. It makes history exciting! :D In it I'll be learning about the history and inventions from
The Britons,
The Mesopotamians,
The Egyptians,
The Indiaians,
The Chinese,
The Greeks,
The Romans, 
The Arabs,
and The Mesoamericans.  
 
Isn't that GREAT?!? I'm so excited! It's going to be filled with the little tid-bits I love, from all over the world! *Sighs*
 
And I'm going to read The Teenage Liberation Handbook, this time from the beginning. Mom and I read about half of it last year, but not straight through.
 
That's most everything I want to say for now. I'll be back soon though, I have a feeling! Mwheehee!
~Rhanna~
xxxxxxxxx

Today's Hospital Trip.

Hello Readers. Enjoying your books? :-)

I have just finished reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling. I am now half way through the 2nd book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.
They're very good :) I am enjoying them very much, and I think I will like the movies too. My mom is very excited that I have started reading these. She's a HUGE Harry Potter fan ;-D I guess the next movie is coming out next month, and she wants me finished reading all the Harry Potter books and watch the rest of the movies to we can go to the movies together. I think I can do that. I'm almost reading one book a day. It's almost like the books have a real spell on them that makes to read them very fast! Hahahahaha!

As you see below this post, I am working on the reviews for The Song of the Lioness quartet by Tamora Pierce. It's interesting to think that it was only two months ago I started reading The Protector of the Small quartet, the third series in the Tamora Pierce books.
In those two months I have read: The Protector of the Small quartet, Tricksters (2 books), The Immortals quartet, The Song of the Lioness quartet (all by Tamora Pierce), The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan (It's amazing!), Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling, and I'm almost finished reading What the Victorian's Did for us by Adam Hart-Davis (only a few more pages left!!) and some Norse mythology.

I've asked Mom to upload The Iliad, The Odyssey, and Ovid's Metamorphous onto her Kindle, which she lets me use. I'm VERY excited to read all that. :D It will help me to learn about minor Greek gods, and some other unknown myths, which I just LOVE! Very exciting! :) I've been trying to read the Grimm's fairy tales, but somehow all these fantasy books keep overruling them. . . ;) Heehee

So today we had to go to my little brother, Emrys' hospital appointment today in San Francisco. Have I ever mentioned that I HATE hospitals?? Yes, I do not like them AT all! The whole system is totally messed up! Great Gaia it was annoying. We sat in the waiting room for over an hour and a half! Grr!
So anyway, Emrys had another seizure the other night. It was quite scary. But this trip was just a check up. It takes us about two hours to get to San Fran from where we live. So this morning we all packed up in the car and we got out around 10:00 AM. It didn't really seem like a long drive to me, because I was so immersed in my book I didn't even really hear mom and dad talking right next to me. Hahaha! When we got to the hospital we found parking easy (thanks great god of parking!) and got into the waiting room around 11:30. We made killer time on the drive! We didn't end up waiting very long in the first waiting room. a nurse called us in weighed and measured Emrys and then we went into the doctor's office at about 11:50. Then we sat, waited, fed the little ones apples, sat some more for like an hour! we were just about to leave when, finally! a nurse came in. Sadly she didn't know anything about why we were there. We answered a few questions and then she left. Then we sat and waited in that same. . .small. . .blank room for another 45 minutes. Right as we were going to leave again the doctor came in (They seem to know right when you are going to leave on them and then come in and make you stay longer. Is it some sort of scheme to pay them more or is it a test to see how long you can be bored before you start screaming with boredom? The more the patients suffer the more money the doctors and nurses make? Sounds cruel but I'm willing to believe it in this world. :P Grr!), and talked to mom and dad, but i plugged into my book and didn't hear much of what he said. ;D Hahaha! But then we lugged our tired, hungry selves down to the nearest Startbucks at around 3:00 and we all got coffee and snacks which were sorely needed. After a few wrong turns (Holy Hecate San Fran is easy to get lost in!) we got onto the highway and we were free of that awful hospital!

We stopped at a JoAnn's (Fabric Store!!! Woop!) to walk for a bit. Golly it feels nice to walk and feel the blood go to your legs after a while. ;) Turns out that this is the store that Mom has needed to get fabric for her dolls! Yay! And we bought the little ones some cute Halloween prezzies. Emrys got a flashlight that has little Halloween covers so when it shines through pumpkins and ghosts come up on the wall. Gwynnie got a C.U.T.E witch's hat that she seems to like. and Thane got a pumpkin flashlight too.

We next stopped at a BBQ place for dinner, but something is the BBQ sauce had wheat in it I know, because it made me feel yucky, so I didn't eat much. (I had a pancake and a half, the last of the jerky and some chips once we got home ;D Haha!) But Then Emrys' flashlight broke so Dad had to go find another one at Target, and with my-always-have-everything-you'll-ever-need-in-it purse I pulled out scissors to cut the flashlight out of the package and I just happened to have tape to attach the pumpkin cover onto the new flashlight. I felt very proud that me and my purse were needed so badly ;) Mwhaha! I got another chance to pull something out when mom thought dad was about to change lanes into another car. I gave her Rescue Remedy.

Now everyone is completely asleep except me, because I'm writing this, obviously. ;) I'm so glad that today it over and that we didn't stay at a hotel. Holy Hypnos are we all exhausted after today. Mom and Dad are very mad about how long we had to wait, and our next appointment is with a totally new doctor who won't know anything about Emrys which is a pain trying to retell our story to every time we go there a meet a new doctor. So We're not going to go to that hospital anymore. We want to find a doctor, for when Emrys might have another seizure that's closer by. I hope that we can find one.

Great Muses it feels good to write today out. I'll prob print this out and put it in my diary, but I want to try to really write today down with some more personal thought down. I like to write by hand, and I don’t want to get out of practice by writing on the computer all the time. I'll prob do it tomorrow. Thanks for listening to my day. there's totally a difference in writing in your diary and writing on a blog where lots of people read it. sometime's it feels good to have other people read your writing.

I'm off to go sleep. Tomorrow I'll finished Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, What the Victorians did for us, and the article about chocolate in mom's magazine. ;)

Good night everyone from here!

~Rhanna~

Alanna: The First Adventure by Tamora Pierce.

In which ten-year old Alanna sneaks of to court of Tortall, disguised as a boy named Alan. She becomes a page there and befriends other pages, the prince, and the King of Thieves. During her training she fights mean bullies, battles the sweating sickness, suspects Duke Rodger the prince's cousin and court magican, and proves herself to be as good as the boys. But when she starts her period unexpectedly she goes to George, the King of Thieves, for help. He is more than surprised to find that she is a girl, but takes her to his mother who tells Alanna about womanhood. From then on Alanna and George are best friends. She is invited to join her friends on a trip to the desert to meet some of the locals, where they hear the story of the Black City, and abandoned city with has evil magic that pulls youths to it and eats them up. Alanna wakes in the night and with the Prince they ride to the city. They meet the magical elders and fight an amazing magic battle, that ends with secrets being discovered.

I LOVE this book. I love the whole Alanna series! I think Alanna has become one of my favorite heroines ever. In the beginning Alanna secretly switches places with her twin brother Thom to be a knight while Thom goes to become a sorcerer. Alanna's relationship with all her friends is so much fun to read about it makes you laugh, smile, frown, and you feel every emtion that they are feeling. I Loved all of her friends, Coram, her loving manservant who has been with her since the beginning, Prince Jonathan, George, and Sir Myles, a elderly kinght and teacher who becomes Alanna's new loving father. Tamora Pierce is an amazing writer and I love reading all her books and her heroines are a blast to read about.

This book is in The Song of the Lioness series.

Reccommended for people who like: spunky girls, magic, battles, and amazing friendship.

The Wild Girls by Pat Murphy

In which twelve year old Joan is doubting she will like living in California, when she meets the Queen of the Foxes and her whole life changes. Fox (her real name is Sarah) and Joan become fast friends and soon are spending all their afternoons together climbing trees and becoming the wild girls. When school starts, they enter a contest to write a short story and they win. They meet a writer who likes their story and asks them to join her writing class for the summer and they agree. Joan and Sarah meet many new interesting people and learn to live more freely and ask wonderful questions. The class helps Joan and Sarah deal with the hard problems they are having with their parents and brings them closer together.


It's written in first-person from Joan's view. This story was one of the best books that I have ever read. It was so realistic that I felt very much for the characters and as I got deeper into the story I felt that it was really real and I want to jump in and join them. I LOVED Sarah and Joan's relationship. They were the best-true-friends that everyone always wishes to have. Verla Volante is fabulous! I would very much love to join her class. I loved all the questions she asks and how everyone answers them, it feels like you are almost in it yourself. It was very sad to read about Sarah and Joan's parental problems, but it was interesting to read about what it might be like to have a family that was so torn. It made me feel very blessed to have my wonderful close family and it makes me feel awful for the families in real life that have these problems. I will be suggesting this book to all my friends.
Recommended for people who like: foxes, lipstick war paint, and amazing friendship.