Collage

To all those concerned, this is what I've been up to lately.

I'm currently obsessed with multimedia collages, we'll see how long this lasts.

These are the ones I have made in the last few weeks.

Materials used: just kidding, that would take too long to list.

Now, in addition to the paint that is on all my clothes, there is glue. Lots of glue.
Worth it.

Update: another thing that's been taking up my time lately would be the misspelling of collage.  I've been working on college applications.  Ew.  Scholarship applications are even worse. 
(If any of the teachers who are writing me recommendations are reading this: If you don't tell them how obnoxious I am, I won't write bad things about your classes on my blog.  Deal?)

-Kelly L.

This is a filler.

I haven't written anything in a while, because... (this is the part where I got distracted and started scrolling through pinterest for 7 mins) ... I've been busy, of course.

The volleyball season was pretty time-consuming, and it just ended on (opens up Calendar) Monday, Oct. 21.  Highlights of the season were the few wins we had, our loss against Cook County in which we played incredibly well as a team, some of the bus rides, a spontaneous after-game ice cream run with friends, and evaluating other teams' warm-up playlists. (checks Facebook involuntarily)

side note: I'm a senior so this was my last volleyball season.  I started in eight grade so here, look at these pictures.  It's like those old pictures recreated years later, except there's only five years difference, which hasn't accounted for much.  If this were a 'spot the differences' game, there would be about 3:

1. Change of jerseys (because I switched schools)
2. The braces (hallelujah)
3. Wait never mind: there's just two.

 

(checks email even though I can see that the number of messages in my inbox hasn't changed since I started writing)

Besides volleyball, robotics has finally started up again.  At this point we're just meeting Monday mornings at 6:00.  We have about 6 or so new team members at this point.  I think this season will be a great experience for everyone who has decided to commit to it, and I can't wait to see what we will accomplish.

(checks twitter)

In other news, basketball is starting soon!  We had our first team meeting with (2/3 of) the coaches, and we just need a few more players to have both varsity and JV teams.  (makes a list of players to see how close we are. One maybe two players away) If we don't get enough people, we'll just have a varsity team.  Which isn't the best because everyone will get less playing time and we won't have all of the games that were originally on the schedule.  Needless to say I really hope we have more girls join the team.  Either way I think we will still have a fun season.

Orchestra isn't the biggest time-consuming activity, but it still counts for something.  We had our first concert of the year last Saturday (checks calendar again) the 19th.  It was a Halloween concert, (the secular, it burns! 0_0  )  but it was alright.  We played music from Pirates of the Caribbean and Phantom of the Opera. (looks up how to properly write the titles of films, etc.)

Yeah, I think that's just about it.
Oh wait no, I also go to school, that's kind of a big deal.
And I've been working on college applications. (ADSDFGKJSAJHJFSLDJBAHF----send help)

-Kelly L.

This One Time In High School...

• Our volleyball coach said in part of an inspirational "play your best now; you can't do this later" speech that in ten years we would all have jobs and kids.  Sorry Coach, no guarantees.  There are a lot of variables there that I cannot control.
• I went to school camp, aka the "High School Retreat," which means being stuck with all of the other little chilluns who I see every weekday, but on the weekend.  That of course makes it a much better bonding experience.  Normal weekends away from school are certainly not to maintain our sanity, that would be a ridiculous concept.  It's really a good thing we have school camp.  I might not be friends with the people who were already my friends if we didn't.  It also helped me stay acquaintances with my acquaintances, and even "who exactly is that?" with my "who exactly is thats?"
• The Student Government Association decided to let me be their secretary this year.  No one else wanted to be, but still, they could have voted me down.  This means I get to take notes and not be considered a nerd--oh wait, still a nerd.  but a sanctioned nerd.
• (speaking of which) On the way to a Junior Rotarian meeting, we were told that it would be a good idea to take notes.  My friends said they didn't bring notebooks. "It's ok, I have three."  Let's just say I also had enough pens for everyone in the 8-passenger vehicle.

-Kelly L.

Life is Crazy

This post will bring an end to the unintentional summer hiatus of my blog.

I started school on Tuesday, Sept. 3.  It was not fun.  I am really looking forward to this school year being over.

On Saturday, August. 31,  my mom and I were in MI visiting my grandparents.  I may not have mentioned this on the blog yet, but in May my grandma was diagnosed with a brain tumor.  They had said a few weeks ago that she only had about a month or so left.

So we were going to visit, and my mom wanted me to help work on a slideshow for the funeral.  I hadn't added funeral slideshow making to my repertoire of skills yet, and I really was not looking forward to doing so.  It's a much more emotionally difficult task than usual slideshows.  Nothing I wanted to ever have a reason to try.

That morning, I was getting ready for church, and decided to wear makeup.  I usually don't bother with mascara, but for some reason I did that day.  The moment I brushed it onto my left eyelashes, I immediately regretted it.  I thought of how I was supposed to work on that slideshow after church, and decided it was a bad day for mascara as I followed through and brushed it onto my right eye's lashes.

Sunday, Sept. 1 was the last day we got to be with grandma.  It really seems unbelievable.

I went to school the next two days in a bit of a daze, skipped the third day and most of the fourth day of school to go to the funeral.

It's been a week, and every day has been a terrible day for mascara.

I miss you.

-Kelly L.

two more weeks

My hair is drying as I write this. 
Two days ago I let my hair dry under the sun of South America.
I miss Ecuador.  I miss the friends I made there.  I had an amazing time being there, and it ended too quickly.  In a few hours, I'll get on a plane and leave again.
America, you have nice water.  I'll miss that, but see you later.

-Kelly L.

1000 pageviews!

After I had been blogging here for a little while, I set a goal for myself to reach 1,000 pageviews.
Yesterday I reached that goal, 36 posts later.   **does some vague mathematics... who needs accuracy??-- it's summer**   That's kind of close to 30 views on everything I write.  If I subtract the views from my parents, that's probably more like 3 views on everything. 

So, dear 3 readers, thank you.

I hope you want to keep reading and see more of my future adventures?

Unless things go drastically wrong, I should be going to Ecuador tomorrow.  The plan is that I'll get back in two weeks, and then leave the next day for some more places.

Whenever I get back to the land of daily internet usage and computer screens and being inside more than is probably healthy for me, I will share stories with you. 

Have a great time without me, internet!

-Kelly L.

"Can I touch your hair?"

I hear that question a lot.
It's not completely normal, but I'm used to it.  Or what I mean to say is, I'm used to friends and new acquaintances asking me if they can touch my hair.  I may just have weird friends, but then they do  too, because they have me. 

Since my friends are so...quirky... I'm reasonably accustomed to people asking me such questions about my hair.  However, I don't really like when people go ahead and touch my hair without asking.  It may just be vanity, but I'm still not a fan of uncalled-for hair-touching.

On my way to Washington, D. C. last week, I had to walk through one of those security body scanners which make you feel all kinds of violated.  After that, I was gonna keep walking and get my shoes and backpack.  I was feeling awkward after the scan dealio and just wanted to keep going right away---no such luck.  The TSA agent has me stop so she can wait for the scan image to load---I can deal with that.  Then she walks up to me and says she has to touch my hair.  She proceeds to pat down my hair before letting me leave.

Well, that happened.  As I collected my shoes and repacked my flight-friendly 3oz bottles of everything into my carry-on bag, I was thinking about the rules and regulations of airports.  Sure, I'm happy to have my hair searched if it keeps people safe.  But I just don't understand what about that keratinous rat's nest couldn't be seen by their scanner.  I have super-hair.

That is all.

-Kelly L.

fangirling happens

If you know me pretty well, you'd know that I'm a bit of a nat-geo magazine nerd.  You know, one of those crazy people who carefully opens the plastic packaging and flips over the magazine to see the cover without any glare and distortion from the package.  Then I read the geography quiz questions on the insert before I turn the first page.  If someone else in my family starts reading the magazine before I do and opens it differently, it feels like a sacrilege. 

For a while, I really wanted to be a photographer for Nat Geo "when I grew up." A few years ago, the question of what I want to be when I grow up changed to what I wanted to major in, etc.  It got a lot more real-life at that point.  I know that you have to be amazing to actually be a photographer for Nat Geo, and I understand that it's basically an unrealistic goal.  Still, little-kid me still says that's what she wants to do.  So for me it's just, "I wish..."

Even though I probably won't ever work for Nat Geo, I still envy people who do.  Today I had the opportunity to listen to Meghan Reese, a producer who has worked on TV shows for Nat Geo (and other companies).  Since I don't have TV at my house, I'm not really that into National Geographic's TV programming, due to not really having much exposure to it.  But still, hearing her talk about what she does was incredible.

From her presentation and Q&A, she shared what she does as a producer and how she has gotten to where she is in the industry.  She lives the life of a creative, working almost nonstop for months or years at a time, then being off for a few months in between job opportunities.  I really enjoyed hearing her talk and answer all of our questions.  So jealous of her for working for Nat Geo...so jealous.

-Kelly L.

Newseum

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to visit the Newseum in Washington, D.C.  It is a museum that displays the history and evolution of journalism and news media from the books of news in the 1560s to the instantaneous news medias of today.  They had artifacts from important events, and original copies of newspapers and magazines from every time period since the dawn of print news. 

An exhibit that impacted me personally was the room full of Pulitzer Prize-winning photographs.  Each of the photos there was an iconic photo from its year, and they were full of so much emotion.   Many of the photographs documented social injustices and awful occurrences that the world needed to know about.  If each of these photographs had been chosen for symbolizing so much, imagine a room full of them.  Everyone in the room was very sobered by what they saw, and many were crying.   It was a real eye-opener for me to see so much of history all at once, in gruesome, unforgiving detail.

The Newseum also had an exhibit on the Berlin Wall.  Videos about it were playing on the walls, people were scurrying around, the room was full of motion, but one thing was static.  Four tall, graffitied, concrete segments of the wall stood lined up on one side of the room.  They helped give an idea of what it would be like to be separated by the wall.  You couldn't see over it, there was only an expanse of wall that was almost impossible to breach.  This segment was from the free side, so that is why they were able to graffiti it.

The Newseum had many other exhibits showing important events in news and the spread of ideas and information.  I am really glad I got to go there.
-Kelly L.

Thoughts En Route

It's kinda rough flying early in the morning.  You never know how to act.
Some people are incredibly energetic, some people don't want to be talked to, and I don't care too much either way.

But if you're going to ask me how I'm doing, you are probably thinking that I will ask you the same question.  I don't generally appreciate people spreading around their bad days (being sad is totally different, don't get me wrong), unless they can be funny about it, of course. 

So when the shuttle driver asked me, "How are you?" of course I said the same back.
 He responded with the brilliant answer, "I'm boring."  No smile, just boring.
  That really put a damper on the mood, since he gave a variation of that answer to everyone else, poisoning his shuttle-environment that he would have to be in all day with his own bad attitude.

I think that the other people who got on the bus after me felt a bit put off by what he said, too, and there was no friendly conversation on the ride.  Everyone looking down at their hands, thinking about the boring life of the bus-driver.  Maybe that's what he wanted; someone to think about him as who he was and not just where he could take them.  Maybe he just really thought he was boring.  Maybe he was having a rough day, I don't know.


As boring as he said he was, I still remember him.  In that situation, being "boring" was being unique, in that he didn't use everyone else's canned response of, "I'm fine."  His answer was typical for him, but not the rest of the people there.  In a world where we see so many different people, it's easy to lose track and give less attention to people we deem "boring." How many "boring people" do I forget about every day?

-Kelly L.

The Week Ahead

#WJMC2013

Yes, I know that serves no purpose but to be obnoxious when used on my blog.

But it is the twitter hashtag for the Washington Journalism and Media Conference at George Mason University, which would be completely arbitrary information if I was not there.  I may or may not (which means I will definitely) be blogging about that this week.  So be prepared for a week of me writing about or using styles that are not necessarily typical for this humble blog of mine.

I have had 5 hours of sleep, been awake since 4:30 a.m. and it's about 11:30 p.m. ... so my mind is shutting down.
Hope you don't mind sharing my adventures!

-Kelly L.

This is how I get closure on a crazy school year.

The end of June is a pretty good time for an "end of the school year" post, right?
I've only been out of school since May 29, and it's June 29, so that's not too bad.
     I do have some excuses for not writing sooner, though...

• The week after school I had to recover from all the stress of finals week... or maybe I just had to get some closure on the year by making a paper mache bowl out of my History book. 
• Then the next week my sister graduated from high school.  I may or may not be extremely jealous of her.
• Then the week after that, I started taking an online class.  So much for having a summer break.
• The same week I started taking driver's ed classes which were a total drag, and I am so glad to be done with that.
• Then the next week I went to WI camp meeting at Wakonda.  That is the best week of the year. Always.  I could write about it for ages, which I may do later this week...otherwise just talk to me if you want to hear about it.
• Then this past week I came home again and finished driver's ed, passed my permit test, and have been practicing driving with my dad.  I think he's reconsidering the wisdom of letting me drive on a road with a speed limit of 55mph on my second day behind the wheel. 

So the 2012-2013 year was a great cliche school year.  It had its ups and downs.  I learned a lot, mostly from people, not textbooks.  But I did learn some new things from my books, too.  I was pretty busy most of the time, and my friends just started to assume that I would bring my homework with me if we were going to hang out on Saturday night.  I got to participate in volleyball, basketball, robotics, and the city youth orchestra.
         The most sleepless parts of my week were Monday nights in January and February.  I would go to basketball practice right after school, and head straight to orchestra from there, get home around 9, and have robotics at 6am.  Homework happened somewhere, probably.  Enough about school, though, I only have two months left of summer.

I'm going to be pretty busy (I use those words together a lot) the rest of the summer.  I will be home for a total of 9 days this July, and hopefully I will be able to fill you in later on my adventures.  Pictures will accompany my ramblings, if all goes well.

Kelly L.

**I apologize now for errors in spelling/grammar...  I would proofread this... but I don't have time for that;)  **

May 21-31

I am great at starting projects.
I am terrible at finishing projects.

 I tried to put up a picture every day during the month of May, which of course I couldn't do.  The last ten days it kind of just didn't happen.

I am great at excuses.
I am bad at legitimate excuses.

Finals week happened.  I was busy with stuff because of the end of the school year.  I was away from home for a while.

The list of topics for the photos to relate to wasn't too great near the end, so I'm giving up on that.  Here are pictures for each of the days I missed.

Shameless Selfie. Sorry, it happened.

Also this.

Paper mache bowl (in progress) that I made with pages of my U.S. History book

Not that great... but I made this.

Visited the grandparents/family with my mom.

Oh I'm sorry, what was that?  My school ID?  The '12/'13 school year is over?  

Yup.

I'm a senior now.

 -Kelly L.

ps. My goal in that ID picture was to have my hair reach to the left and right sides of the frame.  

I'm thinking it worked.

In the meantime

I'm way behind on this "photo a day" stuff, it's a busy week with finals, etc.

  I'll try to catch up this weekend. 

  I'm pretty sure this bothers me more than you, though.

May 20-- in the morning

In the morning?  as in my face in the morning?  haha ok, we'll go with that.

  It's bad picture Monday anyway!

 

 Good luck surviving all of your Mondays!

-Kelly L.

May 19 -- orchestra

Today was the last concert for the 2012-2013 season of DSSO youth orchestras.

It's been a really fun year, and I'm glad I got to make memories with these wonderful people.

I would put up a different picture where Madeleine looks better, but this is just great.  Photo cred: my faithful reader, Jake. Thanks! you really ruined The Chronicles of Narnia for me, though...

 

It was my sister's last concert in youth orchestra. This is her with her conductor, Kevin Hoeschen.

 

-Kelly L.

May 18 -- messy

My "homework space" is messy.

So is my life, but this is easier to capture.

-Kelly L.

May 17-- favorite song

I haven't found my favorite song yet...
But when I do, I think it will sound like a rainstorm on the ocean, at least to me.
So here's to hoping:

 

-Kelly L.

May 16 -- skyline

This is the skyline I see.  

Wires to hold down the trees.

-Kelly L.

May 15-- outdoors

These are just some pictures I took when I was at my grandparents' house a week and a half ago. 

 I love where they live.  It's so beautiful there.  

But maybe that's partly just from the magic of visiting people you love.

If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, I think some of it reflects back on the subject.

Some people can make a dungeon beautiful just from the beauty shining in their eyes.

...but anyway, here are the pictures.

-Kelly L.

May 14-- A memory

This represents the memory of "that one time that we burnt the brown rice NISHIKI in the microwave..."  We were going to cook it normally, but my sister suggested we should microwave it instead.  Since she was older, we decided to follow her advice.
       Bad idea.
       Her 30-minutes-in-the-microwave instructions were not very good ones.  At about 20 mins it was starting to smell weird in the kitchen, so we checked on the rice.  As soon as I opened the microwave door, green smoke billowed out and filled up the room.  We rushed to open all the doors and windows as the smoke alarm was ringing like no tomorrow.  My sister quickly tried to carry the bowl of burnt rice out the door, but had to set it down momentarily on the rug.  It melted a circle into the carpet before she could take it outside.
  The well-microwaved rice looked like this:

 

We got as much rice as we could out of the bowl and into a pile in the lawn outside.  Throughout the rest of the summer, you could still see pieces of it defiling the grass. 

 Nothing would eat the brown rice NISHIKI.

((undaunted in our rice-cooking by the slight setback of completely ruining the microwave, making the house smell terrible, and melting the rug, we started again at square one.  This time, the advice of the old wise sister was not heeded, and we cooked the rice on the stove.  It was much more successful.  While the burnt pieces of brown rice NISHIKI are no longer visible in the yard, the memory is still quite vivid for all involved.))  :')
-Kelly L.
 ((photo creds, Lynsey Witherill and Tara Lorenz))

May 13-- a friend

My friends are great.  Here are two of them, don't forget the peace-signing one in the background.  These two people are pretty fantastic.  They make school survivable. We've had lots of adventures, and misadventures, together.  People say that we act immature, but we have fun, so joke's on them.  I'm so glad I could meet you guys! 

-Kelly L.

 ((photo cred... I actually don't know who took it.))

May 12-- mom

 

My mom is on the right in this picture...

She would probably say she's on the left, though, because she is a nurse, and they think differently.

She's the taller one.

When this was taken, we had just arrived at someone's house.  The car in the background was just arriving, but we left at the same time.  My mom likes to drive fast.

Happy Mother's Day!