Author: Kelly Page 2 of 8

I am a feminist! I believe in rights for women everywhere. I don’t think women should be oppressed or downtrodden. That’s wrong. I am not, however, a feminist in the colloquial sense of the word. I am painfully girly. Modern feminists don’t seem girly to me. Like at all.  I’m probably just repeating a cliche, but modern feminists seem to be trying to prove they’re just as strong as men by becoming more like them. Can you say ironic? They’re upholding women’s rights and putting men down, while adopting a faux-man macho attitude.  I’m envisioning a future full of unisex clothing departments and a booming daycare business.  Or maybe not so booming. Anyway, boys and girls are different!  It drives me bonkers when boys treat girls like they’re one of the guys, and girls go along with it.  This happens a LOT with my friends. I know we’re not living in 19th century America, we’re not supposed to act like we’re living in the 19th century, I wouldn’t like to be living in the 19th century, but there are some morals and parts of the culture that I wish we could have kept with us. Men and women have like, zero respect for each other anymore.  Even many of my Christian girlfriends have some weird ideas about feminism and women’s roles in our culture.  I don’t have it all figured out, but I do know this. When in doubt, think pink*!!

*not the feminist group pink, or Victoria’s Secret Pink (although I do adore their T-shirt and perfume line!!!), or the singer Pink, or communists, but just the plain old girly pink color.  I don’t know any boy who likes that.

So Dad is reading aloud the social-skills book again, and I have to admit that I’m getting a lot out of it.  I’m inclined to think that my people skills are immaculate (far, far from the truth) or that even if they aren’t immaculate my bubbly (self-appointed adjective, people) personality will make up for my social faux pas.  Wrong, wrong, wrong.  Bubbly often equals overbearing and loud in my case.  The book that we are reading has some wonderful suggestions for overcoming this however. One tip that had never occurred was to emulate the other person’s attitude.  This makes the other person more comfortable/non-awkward around you.
This is how conversations with my peers usually go:
Margaret: Hi I’m Marge, nice to meet you!

Me:Oooohmywordit’ssogoodtomeetyouI’veheardsomuchaboutyouandIjustknowthatwe’regoingtobesuch
goodfriendsthatwhenwegrowupwe’llbebridesmaidsateachother’sweddingsandourchildrenwillgrowup
togetherisn’tthatjustwonderful?!?!?

Margaret: Ummm… bye.

This is not appopriate.  It makes people wonder what kind of meds you’re on. Imagine what would happen if I mirrored her attitude and made a civil response

Margaret: Hi I’m Marge, nice to meet you!

Me: Hi Marge, I’m Kelly! Nice to meet you too.

Margaret: Isn’t it a beautiful day out?
 
Calm and collected and peaceful, with a conservative amount of exclamation points. The conversation can then continue with some calm and collected and strategic conversational questions. However, if someone greeted me with

Them: HIIIII!!!You’rekellyright?oooohmywordit’ssoooogoodtomeetyou!!

I would heartily respond with:

Me:Oooohmywordit’ssogoodtomeetyoutooI’veheardsomuchaboutyouandIjustknowthatwe’regoingtobe- suchgoodfriendsthatwhenwegrowupwe’llbebridesmaidsateachother’sweddingsandourchildrenwillgrowup-
togetherisn’tthatjustwonderful?!?!?

Isn’t that smart?  Emulating other’s attitudes. I struggle with this year in and year out, but my bubbly/manic-meter reaches a high during the August-September convention season.  This is because there are more people that I know and love and haven’t seen in a long time in one place than at any other time of the year. Plus there are gobs of opportunities for meeting new people, and since I love people, I get very, very excited. Excited can turn into manic faster than a pat butter melts on top of broccolli. Again, this is not appropriate, especially since a side effect of manic-ness is saying weird things like ‘our children will grow up together’. 😀 Anyway, I KNOW I know I know this is wrong. Convention is supposed to be refreshing and peaceful and about the fellowship. But it’s hard!!  So my new year’s resolution is going to be to work on my manic-i-ness so by convention time I can focus on the important things.

I’ve been listening to lots of Christmas carols lately and they have reminded me of some of my all-time favorite emotional songs.  Here, a song qualifies as ’emotional’ if it makes you feel inexplicably happy or if it makes you want to cry, jump up and down/run around the house, sing loudly or do all 3 at once. Unfortunately these are not technically sing-along songs so I’ll usually stick with the crying and the jumping up and down.  I have other favorites, many of them non-classical, but I think the classical ones are the best.

BTW… Scribefire is being lame and won’t let me put up videos or links so I’m just going to post the URL.

1. Carol of the Bells. For running around the house and jumping up and down.
The Trans-Siberian Orchestra version is not my favorite (although it is very good), and neither is the Mannheim Steamroller version, but I couldn’t find the one that I wanted so I’m just going to put up the TSO one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alIcwofkrS8

2. Pachelbel’s Canon in D. For crying.
The man was a genius. Who doesn’t like this song?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZHw9uyj81g

3. Handel’s Messiah. For just being happy + singing.
Handel was also incredibly talented.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnHksDFHTQI

And this one’s not emotional and you’ve probably already seen it, but since I’m a fan of men’s acapella, Christmas carols, and familiar songs gone crazy, I’m going to put it up anyway:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Fe11OlMiz8

Driver’s Ed was a blast! I took it at the local private Christian school with 20 other kids my age. Most of them were a year younger, but there were 5 other sophomores, and one of them was homeschooled like me! Oddly enough, I had sat next to him during my PSAT two weeks before. He was nice, but he always pushed the desk in front of him halfway across the room to be funny. I would not have had a problem with this, but, being a homeschooler, I had to sit in front of him on most days. I found him less than entertaining. Our instructor was great. He was actually the school’s chemistry teacher, but he taught Driver’s Ed on the side. His five grown children provided him with lots of good driving stories with morals. We were constantly warned not to drink and drive, not to take drugs and drive, not to take drugs and drink and drive. We learned about parking. We learned about U turns. We learned about driving in snow and rain and night and fog. We watched sad, violent car crash videos. We learned about the sordid costs of insurance. We learned about how immature and self-centered our age group is (He didn’t have to tell me that. I had first hand experience from the kid behind me). We learned about tires. We learned about all sorts of different drive-y things, but the hard part is yet to come. The actual driving is scheduled for late December. I’m getting into a little white car with a little white sign on the top and I’ll be driving in the evening, during the Christmas rush-hour, with two passengers, on the freeway, on my second day behind the wheel. Phew!

Mexico: is awesome. Always has been and always will be. Whenever we visit, I always notice something new that American should have, but doesn’t. This year it was the panaderia. They have Mexican bakeries in the US too, but they’re not real Mexican bakeries. They are posers. They don’t have wonderfully greasy fresh-from-the-oven, sugar-coated donuts, churros, enpanadas, cake or puffy bread in America. America just has Dunkin’ Donuts and garlic bread. What’s up with that?

America also doesn’t have good tortillas, good carne asadas, good guacamole, El Pollo Loco, 45 cent giant glass bottled Coke, Toronja, LaLa Leche, good tamarind candies, saltine crackers in adorable packages, or Wiwichus. Wiwichus are a Pepsi-sponsored Mexican toy. They are little white plastic snowboarding men with funny interchangeable snowboarder hats. They come in clear plastic ornament balls, with festive gold strings attatched. Their catchphrase? Wiwichu a Meri Creesmas an a Japi Nu Yir. Spelled just like that. Coca Cola has stiff competition going on here.

The cousins are great 🙂 I love them all to pieces. There’s Brandon (aged almost 2), then Luis Leonardo (3), then Marlon (4), then Valeria (almost 5), Lynnsito (5), Jorgito (9), Laurito (12), Dayanita (14 yesterday), Christian (14), and last of all, me (15). It makes me kinda sad to come here and be the oldest cousin. I remember being the entertainee, not the entertainer! Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE LOVE LOVE playing with my cousins. They are all really creative and smart and fun and beautiful and handsome… but nostalgia sets in. I feel old. 😀

I will keep you posted on what we are doing here! Mostly we’ve been eating and sitting pretty and hanging out with family. We did go to Wednesday night Bible study the other day. That was great. I was again reminded that no matter where you are, Oregon, Texas, North Carolina, or Mexico… meeting and the spirit of God is always the same.

They say ‘amen’ here though. I like that.

Here are the long awaited pictures!!

We had lots of fun cooking with Grandpa Milo while he was visiting.  We made chicken cordon bleu, berry trifles, baked apples, fancy pasta, and Cornish game hens! :

Chicken Cordon Bleu cooking in the oven

Garnished with basil from the garden

Baked apples!! My new favorite dessert. We just cut up some apples and put them in a baking dish with water, cinnamon, brown sugar, raisins, and a little pat of butter on top!

They were delicious warm with some heavy cream

Cornish game hens with garnish. The garnish is always very important.

The chef at work!!

Setting up the table

Sorry for the blur! This is to show the whole spread 🙂

Diced angel food cake + mixed berries + whipped cream = berry trifles. Almost as delicious at the baked apples!!

Grandpa with his scrumptious dessert

Thank you for coming and showing us how to cook again Grandpa!! We love you 🙂

Oops sorry!!! The redone post is above 🙂

We had a few of our friends over the night before Halloween for a party. We roasted marshmallows, sang hymns, played sardines outside, played parlor games inside, ate hot dogs, ate candy, carved pumpkins and had a blast! Here are a few photos:

I was the Cat in the Hat

Hunter and Sterling came dressed up, along with Bowen

The three musketeers!

Our festive table

A few more of our friends

We hope to do this again next year because we all had a ton of fun! Christian is already dreaming up 2010’s inanimate object costume.  He appreciates any ideas… 🙂

By the way… pumpkin carving photos and the long overdue photos of Grandpa and Grandma’s visit will come up ASAP!!

Please forgive the lax posting as of late!  It has been a very full month in the Chapman household. In addition to school, work, gym time and visitors, we have had PSATs, parties, more visitors, eye exams, rescheduling of music lessons, and an upcoming trip to Mexico to plan for! Grandma and Grandpa Chapman left for Oregon early yesterday morning, leaving behind plenty of leftovers. While they were here we made chicken cordon bleu, baked apples, Cornish game hens, fruit and angel food cake trifles, macaroni and peas (a Grandma and Grandpa classic), plenty of baked bread, and a fancy pasta dish made with grandpa’s own dried tomatoes.  The pasta leftovers have been a lifesaver since we’ve been running around so much lately.  Pictures will come soon!

I got my glasses last week!  I don’t know how I could ever have lived without them! I feel, dare I say it, rather like Sarah Palin. In the course of obtaining the glasses, I told five people that I was going for the attractive Alaskan ex-governer look, but no one laughed.  Liberals.  Anyway, it turns out that I’m a little nearsighted in my right eye, and more than a little nearsighted in my left.  The glasses will definitely come in handy once I start going to school, and will be mandatory once I start driving.

School is school.  I have heaps of reading to do, but the books are interesting which really helps the reading move along.  The Ancient History book is exteremly absorbing.  It’s like a novel, but more in depth.  It’s really helping me see more of the big picture. The Biblical history is especially interesting next to it’s contemporary secular world. Intellectuals by Paul Johnson is quite salacious.  Sometimes when I’m reading it I get a guilty feeling, like I’m reading People magazine, but then I remember that I’m doing homework. 🙂

Everyone born during or before March, 1994 has their driver’s permit.  Everyone except me. 

A driver’s license is a necessary tool of survival in the United States.  Driver’s permits are the necessary step to obtain the necessary tool.  In North Carolina, you are eligible for one if you are at least 14 and a half and have taken the special Driver’s Ed class at your local school.  When I was 14 and a half, I was young and naive.  The thought of a driver’s permit never crossed my dense little head.  When I was 15 and a half I started waking up to reality, and realized that all of my friends had something that I didn’t.  I was behind the times.  Mom and I began to frantically search for driver’s schools and driver’s manuals and driver’s ed.  I am now 15 and eight months old, and at long last am enrolled in a driver’s education class at the local private school.  Which means that I won’t be able to get my actual license until I’m most of the way through my 16th year.  But that’s OK I guess.  It’s a learning experience.

Things are getting cold here in North Carolina. The tips of everyone’s toes and fingers and noses are all chillier than a Dairy Queen Blizzard.  Mom and I are pulling out the plaid skirts, the long-long skirts, the footless tights, the thick tights, the fuzzy socks, the cable sweaters, the knee length coats, the knee high boots, the furry boots, the fashionable scarves, the unfashionable scarves, the winter hats, the rain coats, the fuzzy-lined coats, the long sleeve tees and the gloves that never seem to be able to keep your hands warm!  We have an extensive collection of winter clothing from all those years living in Oregon.  In fact, when we moved to North Carolina I remember only having one pair of shorts! I now have five.

Autumn is such a beautiful season. Here in North Carolina the leaves haven’t fallen yet, but they are beginning to develop just a tinge of color and brittleness. The sky is blue and the wind is blowing. It’s not cold enough for scarves, but it’s just cold enough to make soups and stews. Gala apples are more delicious now than any other time of the year (in my humble opinion). It’s definitely not summer anymore, but fall isn’t yet in full bloom. We are in between seasons and I am loving it!

I feel slightly disloyal to my birth season, spring. But please take into account that I’m from Oregon. Most of the springs that I’ve seen have been wet and gray and cold. Also, when it’s not a cold spring day, it’s a sunny spring day, and when it’s a sunny spring day that means hay fever! In Oregon Mom and I always suffered horribly from hay fever. It’s a shame, because a sunny spring in Oregon is just about the most beautiful thing since a sunny fall in North Carolina. Summer, of course, is wonderful. I don’t know why it’s not my first favorite season, but fall is just so hard to beat. Anyway, everyone likes summer. Explaining why summer is so wonderful is not at all necessary. Winter is nice, excepting January and February. There are probably 3 things I like about winter:

1. Christmas
2. Snow
3. Fireplaces ablaze and all the associated cozy feelings

But fall, fall, fall is always full of cozy feelings! October is especially nice because you are past the beginning of the school year and you have your routine down pat. Thankfully that’s the case this year because this October is going to be very busy for our family. Having a routine down pat is pretty much going to be required if we want to keep up. Like Dad said in the post below, we have a lot of scheduled interruptions, but it’s all good. Busy is good!!

Several things have happened in the past couple of weeks that merit serious thought and gravity.  In a way, the fact that these things happened is good. It is difficult to stress how easy it is for me to fall into self-centeredness, self-pity, vanity.  The things that happened are very sad, but they help to snap me out of myself.

On Friday I learned of a friend of a friend who was terribly injured and burned in a freak car accident. She is just sixteen. I know we would have been good friends if we lived closer.  My thoughts have not left her or her family for the past four days.  We are praying for her swift recovery!  Also, two of my good friends have very recently lost a loved one. I don’t personally know the girl who was injured, or my friend’s loved ones, but their lives have impacted my life a little in a good way.  Life is much, much, much too short to worry about the outside, to be caught up in silly physical things, to be caught up in yourself.

Well Dad’s gone for the day so I’m taking over the blog for a bit.

Christian and I are going to start our videocast up again now that we don’t have anything going on during the weekends.  The floodlights in the living room are already set up, as are the coasters and ice water. The only difficulty we’re going to have is thinking of a subject. We don’t know if we should be serious, funny, musical, dramatic or weird.  Our friends are a always good source of help though, so we decided to ask them what they would like to hear us talk about. The answers were varied. David thought we should say something funny or talk about Obama.  Erik thought we should talk about music, specifically alternative and emo types. Brooke thought we should talk about how brand names affect people’s purchases.  Dana (and Lyle) thought we should talk about technology. Ana thought we should talk about sports, Duke, UNC, NC State, celebrities or vampires. Cousin Julia thought we should argue over the merits of Delilah, discuss Christian’s legendary 10th birthday party, list the pros and cons of Facebook, make a music video or talk about fantasy football.   All of the ideas are workable.  Delilah, Facebook, and music are easy for me to talk about.  Christian would be good at talking about technology, his birthday party or music. We will decide on something eventually. 

Another source of inspiration: these guys. I got an e-mail from Dad yesterday with a link to that video.  After clicking the link and watching the (utterly ridiculous) video, I surfed around their YouTube channel a bit and discovered that Rhett & Link live like 20 minutes away from my house! They also went to NC state (Go Wolfpack!), have a live videocast every Thursday night (I would love to do that sometime!), and make really entertaining, and really ridiculous videos. I don’t know if that’s the style that we’re going for, but there are definitely some things there that would help us.

Anyway, if you blog-readers have anything that you would like to hear, please drop us a line. We’re not quite there yet, but we’re getting very very close to desperate.

Top 3 questions I get asked about Betty Blonde

3. How did you come up with the characters?
Answer: A condensed version of this)

2. What’s the website address?
Answer: H-t-t-p colon, slash, slash, w-w-w, dot, bettyblonde, dot, com

1. How do you come up with new ideas every day?
Short Answer: I don’t.

Nearly every evening Dad and Christian and I will gather around on the couch, sometimes with a bowl of popcorn, always with paper and pencils and whatever book we may be reading aloud at the moment. Dad will read and Christian and I will ink and draw quietly. Or at least semi-quietly. Dad is interrupted several times in the midst of his declamation and asked any one of the following:

“What should I draw?”
“I don’t know how to end this!”
“Should Spike be rolling his eyes or frowning?”
“Is this too cliched/politically correct/stereotypical?”
“Should I put Big Wilma in this one?”
“Do you think this will offend anyone?”

Dad says 5 PM is the time for reading aloud. But I know it’s actually focus group time. Nearly all the comic strip storylines, punchlines, and ideas have come from this little gathering.  No matter what, we’ll always come up with something to draw.  A good example of this is yesterday’s comic strip (yes I drew it on Monday, yes I am behind, yes I need to get ahead) about all the people showing up to Betty Blonde’s pink party dressed in blue.  I was desperate to finish that storyline because I couldn’t think of anything more for it, and it seemed a little overused to me anyway. Thankfully Dad thought up a suitable finish just in time! Christian and I rounded out the idea and we decided to add some color. Now it’s one of my favorites.

So it’s not just me. I don’t think I could come up with an idea every day if it weren’t for Christian and Dad.  I have no idea how syndicated cartoonists do it.  They are supermen.

The other day I received a handwritten letter in the mail from one of my best friends in Oregon.  It wasn’t very long and it’s contents weren’t particularly exciting, but I loved it. I read it three times. I felt like Queen Victoria or Anne Shirley or one of the March sisters. There is just something special about receiving a handwritten letter just for you from a good friend. It’s better than a thousand notifications or friend requests or e-mails.  It’s definitely on my Favorite Things list, right up there with the Lord of the Rings and homemade Mac and Cheese. The only problem is that handwritten, just-for-you letters are so uncommon now.  Maybe that’s what makes them so special, but I think that if snail mail was the only form of communication I would still be just as excited to receive one as I am now. 

I love reading old books, where the characters write extremely long, detailed letters to each other. It inspires me. I know it’s so much fun to receive a nice long letter that will last for a while, so I try to write really long (non-boring) letters for other people. That’s almost more fun than getting a detailed letter.  In the online world however, I fail miserably. My typical (boring) online correspondence will go like this:

Hey!!!! What’s up?
Nm u?
Sammmee… lotsa homework
Bleh. Me too 😛
So are you going to _____?
Ya, maybe if I can get out of school. Hope so!
Kewl 🙂

Bad spelling, lots of smileys (that’s not such a bad thing actually), and nothing to talk about. I know better! I TRY not to be a stereotype, but hey. I’m a teenager in a texting world. It’s tough.

So I’m going to start writing a LOT more letters to other people. Interesting, informative, timely letters. Emphasis on timely… I often write the letters, but fail to send them. But if I do make my letters interesting, informative and timely just think! I could start a fad! Plus, if I wrote to two or three people a week, and they each responded and sent a letter as soon as they received mine, I could receive at least one letter a week!  That would be awesome!

I am sorry to say that I’m not a big fan of non-fiction.  I like it when Dad reads aloud non-fiction books and I will occasionally pick up a practical non-fiction book. But non-fiction just for fun? Never. Why read dry books about ancient Rome or engineering or the life of Paul when you can read Agatha Christie?  The only reason I would ever pick up a non-fiction book would be to feel self-satisfied and intelligent. Very sad. My views are changing now though.  After finishing The Victory of Reason, I can honestly say that I am very excited for my next scholarly tome. It’s not that the book wasn’t a drag to read, because I did have to slog through a lot of tedious material, but it was extremely interesting. Extremely interesting.

Rodney Stark explains why Christianity is the force that thrust the ancient world into modernity. Because of it’s fundamental doctrines and values, Christianity gave birth to modern capitalism, progress, freedom and enlightenment. Belief in progress is intrinsically rooted in Christianity, making practical innovations, logic and learning quite natural, even compulsory to Christians.  When tyrannical rulers were in power, the serfs and peasants under their rule had no reason to increase their productivity.  Why produce more if it was all going to be taken away? There were no banks for their money, no investments to make with what little they had, ergo no motivation. The logical (and Christian) alternative to this problem was freedom. When there is individual freedom and free trade there will be progress, learning, and prosperity.

What I found particularly fascinating was the fact that even in the times of kings and despots, early forms of democracy and political freedom could be found in parts of Europe, especially Italy. Medieval Venice was far ahead of it’s time with it’s five level pyramidal government.  An elected duke with limited powers at the top, then a six-member elected Ducal Council, followed by the Forty and the Senate.  The Forty were basically a court of appeals, the Senate was composed of sixty men who concerned themselves with issues of commerce and foreign policy. These hundred were elected from the Great Council, who were in turn elected by the General Assembly. The General Assembly consisted of all the voting Venetians. Participation in Venetian politics was limited to a few elites at first, but became much more inclusive over time, especially when guilds became more powerful.  Venice was also in a comfortable position physically, surrounded by marshes and water, so being attacked was very difficult.  They grew in sea power and trade and began to produce textiles, dyes, shoes, eyeglasses, crystal and much more. Rodney Stark explained:

The “rebirth” of freedom in some parts of Europe was the result of three necessary elements: Christian ideals, small political units, and within them, the appearance of well-matched interest groups. There were no societies like these anywhere else in the world.

Another interesting point made was that contrary to popular belief, the Dark Ages were not a time of superstition and ignorance. In fact, Stark postulates that during the Dark Ages revolutionary innovations such as fulling mills, renovated horse collars, eyeglasses and clocks were invented and put into widespread practice in Christian Europe. Real science, not alchemy or astrology, but real, organized, practical science, also came about in Christian nations.  In the beginning science and religion were inseparable because Christians were the only ones to not only observe, but theorize. Only in Europe did alchemy develop into chemistry, and astrology into astronomy.  Stark says this is because Christians “believed it could be done, and should be done” (emphasis his).  Christians believed that their God was a rational God, and so he made a rational world that they could work to understand. Other religions and cultures, including Islam, Greece, Rome, and China did not have this same belief in rationality. Their gods were mysterious and aloof.  The Greek gods were subject to natural cycles, and were not conscious creators. The Chinese Tao was a formless impersonal essence, unable to do anything.  The Muslim Allah on the other hand, was a very active participator in the world, thus creating a major theological obstacle. Natural laws were Muslim blasphemy, as they did not allow Allah freedom to act in this world. There was no room for science!

It seems that most modern scholars would like to forget about their Christian roots.  The Victory of Reason provides enough reason to forget about forgetting.

Christian and I are doing weekly video-casts now! Here is the first one. It’s about the origins of Betty Blonde:

We will definitely be working on the professionalism and quality of the videocasts. We’re very excited to see how this, like Betty Blonde and this blog, progresses.

We’ll have to skip next week as we will be at convention, but we’ll stay on schedule after that!

Enjoy!

Some differences (and some similarities) noted while vacationing on the west coast.

North Carolina lacks sidewalks, soda can eating machines, gas station attendants and Douglas Fir trees. Oregon lacks sweet tea at convention, accents and y’alls, churches, and square rocks. North Carolina has BoJangles, Biscuitville and Chick-Fil-A. Oregon has Baja Fresh, Burgerville, and Elmer’s. North Carolina is humid. Oregon is wet. Oregon does not have Kitty Hawk, but North Carolina does not have Crater Lake. North Carolina houses have garages on the side. Oregon houses have garages in front. North Carolina rednecks are loggers. Oregon rednecks are loggers. North Carolina hippies live in Chapel Hill (or so I’ve been told) Oregon hippies live in Oregon. Real Oregonians are Beaver fans. Real North Carolinians are into Nascar or something. I’m not sure. All I know is that they’re definitely not Tar Heel fans. Barbecue is a specialty of North Carolina. Marionberry jam is an Oregon specialty. Harris Teeter and Safeway are very similar, but Safeway has better Chinese food, and Harris Teeter has free cookies.

Alberstons and Fred Meyer are Oregon stores. Food Lion and Lowes are North Carolina stores. Ginger Rogers and Beverly Cleary and Herbert Hoover are from Oregon. Dolly Madison and Andy Griffith and Michael Jordan are North Carolinians. Krispy Kreme was founded in Winston-Salem, but Nike’s headquarters are in Beaverton. They cancel each other out, don’t they? Oregon state motto: She flies with her own wings. North Carolina’s motto: “To be rather than to seem”  Both Oregonians and North Carolinians seem to like country music.  Oregon has mountains. North Carolina has hills. North Carolina is very neighborly, only all across the state, not just in the small towns like in Oregon.  Both North Carolina and Oregon grow great peaches.  North Carolina has a history full of pirates and explorers and indians. Oregon has a history full of cowboys and pioneers and indians.

I’m sure there are many more differences and similarities. Feel free to add anything you like!!

Today my schedule was very vague on what I should write in the blog. It said: Craft, Fashion, or Girl Stuff. I get the feeling that Dad thinks that those three words sum up all of my extracurricular activities. He is mostly correct to tell you the truth, but ‘Girl Stuff’ can cover a broad range of things. Anyway, I’m going to follow my schedule and tell you everything that’s been happening in Crafts, Fashion, and Girl Stuff lately.

Crafts
I made most of a tiger amigurumi on the plane ride but it doesn’t look very good and it still needs legs. I’m also planning to make some of these cute headbands . I already found a great idea for handmade Christmas gifts for the year on Martha Stewart.com.

I’m not too crafty as of late actually. I have craft highs and lows. Right now I’m sort of medium. Outside of Betty Blonde, I’ve actually been drawing quiet a bit. I made my third annual convention drawing and put it on Facebook. It’s six pages long since there were like 45 kids that I wanted to draw. Very epic.

As for fashion, I’m afraid I’m not much of a fashionista. I like to look nice and I think shopping is fun as long as I have something in mind that I want to buy, but that’s about it. I suspect Dad put it in my schedule because fashion is to girls as football is to boys. 😉

Girl Stuff. I think I’ll just write anything I want here, because I’m a girl, and so naturally when I’m writing about stuff it will be girl stuff.

I think Dad already wrote this, but I’m reading The Victory of Reason to review on the blog later. I wish I could review it now because I have been enjoying it so much, but I’m not even through the second chapter. Because of it, I’ve been thinking about things that I never would have even considered before. It’s answered a lot of historical and even a couple of spiritual questions already and it’s given me a healthy list of vocabulary words to look up. And I thought non-fiction was a drag!

Also, I started Rosetta Stone French today! I’ve learned how to say how girls, women, men and boys can eat, run, read, write or swim! I feel very smart and culturally savvy at the moment.

La fille (moi) mange!!
Lunchtime 🙂

Yesterday morning we got up very, very early and went to the Portland airport to get on a plane back to Houston and Raleigh. The plane ride was uneventful, except for the awesome little breakfast they gave out and the cute little sandwich they gave us for lunch. I’ve always thought food tastes better 30,000 feet up in the air.

Oregon was fantastic. It was great to see all of my old friends! One thing… It’s a really odd feeling to say hi to all of your old pals expecting them to be the same as always, and then they say hi back and they sound like Darth Vader. Creepy.
Anyway, we had a great time. 🙂 Monday evening we went over to Aunt Jean’s house and took some awkward family photos and had some funfetti cake for Christian’s birthday. Funfetti cake is like sugar cookies on steroids. It definitely helped with the awkward family photos.

We had a wonderful convention. We heard lots of lovely things, made starburst chains, took walks in the woods with the gang, sang hymns with everyone, and got jobs. Christian washed dishes as he always does, and I got to serve bread in the food line for the first time ever!!! I felt very important in my apron and gloves. It was great.

Today I started 10th grade and Christian started 8th grade. All of my friends thought Dad was crazy for making us start school the day after we got home from Oregon, but it’s actually not a huge adjustment. My schedule has been working really well. I’ve already finished Bible, Chemistry, Pre-Calc., both CLEPS, and Spanish. I was going to install Rosetta Stone French, but realized that it would take quite a while so I decided to do that after I had finished everything else. Betty Blonde has been kind of wonky because of the trip, so I’ll be working on straightening that out today as well. I’ve also got to study the PSAT book and the driver’s manual. Everyone else my age has their driver’s permit except me, and it is making me feel behind the times!

Here are a few pictures of our time here in Oregon (so far) There are descriptions below the pictures if you click on them!

We have picked the winner of the first monthly Betty Blonde t-shirt giveaway!  We will tell you who the winner is as soon as she or he responds to our e-mail.  If we don’t get a response within a week then we will pick again!  There are still eleven more chances to win a t-shirt of your favorite cartoon characters this year, so keep on reading and tell your friends!  Remember, you have to be on the e-mail list to participate in the contest.  Click here to subscribe!

-Betty Blonde and Co.