A note to the reader:
I had always been choppy during my journal writing – I’d miss a week or two and then write a paragraph about each day over the weekend, and sometimes I’d accidentally skip recording a day altogether. This is not realistic fiction. It is non-fiction and every ounce is true. My thoughts, my feelings, my family and the events.
I started this journal originally on paper, and then decided to transfer it to a word document so I could write more details and journal more often. I encourage others to start journaling because once you grow up, you forget things, or simply want to immerse yourself more deeply and often in your past. It is never too late to start. Find a book at the store, or even a school subject notebook will do, pick up a pen, and start writing. But, of course, don’t forget the computer can be a good tool. To those who already journal consistently: I applaud you.
To my family, children, my best friends including Mary-Michael LeClaire, Megan Newville, and Brandilyn Newton; to the first, Rowan Gartner, and myself.
Part One: School and Surprises
Age: 15yrs, 3 ½mosGrade: 10th
LDS Location: Kuna East Stake, 11th ward
8 – 16 – 12 5:40PM Monday
So here we go, another summer flew by, and I’m counting down from one week until school starts. These three months weren’t exactly wasted, I spent more time outside, I baked, got into good personal habits (including working out) took a couple trips and within the first month of vacation I got *this* close to being official with the guy.
I’m duel-enrolling with IDVA and KHS this year. It will be the first time I ever step into a public school building to take the classes. So, being Mormon AND homeschooled will basically label me as “weird” and “innocent.” I’m going to try not to announce it for the first 2-3 days. That’ll give me time to (try to) make a good impression and get some friends started. Here’s my schedule:
In IDVA I’m taking Algebra II, American Lit, and Spanish II. KHS starts three days before my online classes open up so it’ll give me a nice ease-in. I might move my work-out till after lunch. Or choose one part in the morning. I’m going to read scriptures in the morning, and write just before bed time (which shouldn’t be later than ten.)
We already went supply shopping at Shopco last week and organized our stuff into the cupboards (or, as I like to call them, “lockers”). It was pretty annoying with the kids running around and saying: “I want this” “I need this” “I’ve wanted this my whole life” “This is so cool!” -_- I tried not to be like that and stay *mostly* on task.
I’m going back there next week to get a poster I saw. It’s of a guitar with the word music in bold letters on the top. There’s a bunch of other words around the poster that finish a sentence, like, “keeps my heart beating,” “says all the things I’m to scared to say,” “makes me tap my toes” etc. I love music (mostly country) so I thought it would fit my personality. Not to mention I have more than enough room for it, considering there’s a whole light green wall next to my closet. It’s just so boring… like, it’s just… there…I also found some cork boards and Sadie and each got one for our room. After our eye appointments this morning, I found some sort of wall-Velcro so we won’t have to put holes in the wall.
~ 8 PM
So I had to take Kyle to football practice. I’m not old enough to drive him by myself so we had to ride our bikes. He was really whining. He’s been like that all week (he’s ten so I suspect it’s the pre-teen stuff) so it took awhile to find out he wasn’t feeling great. I mean, every other day he rolls on the floor and complains about not wanting to go, so why should this time be any different, right? We made him go to practice anyway. I stayed for a few minutes to make sure he was ok. The boys were lined up in two groups that were facing each other, one boy from the right group would get the ball, and the other would try to tackle. They crouched down in their hiking positions and when the coach blew his whistle, the boy with the ball would have to run to a certain point and avoid being smashed by the other one. Sounds like fun. Kyle is one of the shorter on the team but he has a lot of power behind him so he tackled someone once and just barely made it away when it was his turn with the ball. He looked fine to me so I left and got back in time for beef tacos. :D
Mom really goes all-out when she cooks. She kind of has to, considering I can’t eat wheat, Sadie has a limit on sugar, and Dad is having some stomach problems. I’ll just leave it at that. Mom has a bunch of her friends over for a co-op meeting.
Since we’re homeschooled, we meet with some other families at a Lutheran church to do a few lessons with other kids our age. Well, I don’t go any more obviously – my other friends left too although they’re still in IDVA. Last year was pretty interesting because at the most I only had two other girls in my class… which was really study hall. Mary-Micheal decided not to go this year because she needs to get some work done without siblings running around her. Not to mention last year we really distracted each other from our work at most times. Oops.
Rowan and I were just talking about journaling. And when I say talking, I mean facebook chatting. He’s all like:
“Oh, I need a journal. :\”
“Me: Well then why don’t you get one..?”
“Him: Well because no one would be able to read it. ”
(ok, background story, he has Apraxia, that means sometimes the signals from his brain don’t quite make it all the way to where they’re supposed to go. And sometimes he literally spazzes out. It happened one night on trek in Wyoming. He and I sat up late next to the fire with his legs and hands twitching and us trying to hug each other.)
“Me: well, no one would read it anyway, right?”
“Him: well, no, but one day I want someone to read it.”
“Me: Oh I see. Well at least you could try. a couple sentences each day wouldn’t hurt.”
“Him: I guess… :\”
“Me: Well, we could go get you one on Saturday or something.”
“Him: but, I don’t have any money.”
“Me: Well I do. I’ll buy it and we can call it an early Christmas present.”
He just turned down the offer nicely, but now I know what I’m going to get him for Christmas.
I worked on my tumblr page tonight and I’m pretty happy with it. I think it looks nice; it has a creamy background with darker brown links for the “Ask me anything,” “about me,” “Home,” and “theme” tabs. It has my homecoming picture from last year on the side bar just above my quick description section. Rowan likes it. :}8 – 17 – 12 10 PM Friday
I hung up our cork boards today and one of my oil paintings. A couple summers ago I went into a painting phase and got some oil paints and a class from my grandparents. After that I did another one at home on a canvas that my aunt Ursula gave me (yes, we tease her about her name sometimes.) Those two things have just been sitting on my desk and above the fireplace forever so I figured I’d give at least one of them a place to live. The one I hung up is an autumn setting, it has two orange trees, a creek, snowy mountains in the background, and great big fluffy clouds in the sky. The vegetation at the base of the mountain looks a little like lolly-pops but whatever.
Mom and I had to talk to Sadie about what a cork board is. She was all like: “I always wanted to put a big picture of our family on the board.” So, I figured that she meant a printed 3 x 5 photo amongst other drawings and notes. So when she hypervenalating when I started talking about things to put on there I was confused. The little hormonal imbalanced girl was almost to tears when I asked her to explain.
“I thought like the picture was going to fill up the whole thing, you know?”
“Like… a picture frame?”
So we got that figured out. She ended up drawing a picture of our family on a piece of poster board that took up the whole area so happily ever after I guess.
It was kind of a long and boring day. I had to tell people to quit touching my stuff. Including my radio. I almost tripped on it coming into my room about twice, once I found it in the playroom, and another time I heard loud music coming from the boy’s room. I played online to try to calm my nerves and went to my piano lesson in the afternoon.
Mom did a lot of school prep and I packed up my school bag. The first day has this weird schedual where they make all the classes about half an our shorter so they can fit all eight periods into one day. Mom stopped by at BVAAC and got me another inhaler. She had taken me to the doctor to get me checked for asthma just before trek. Because walking about six miles every day in the high-altitude desert of Wyoming merely sounded like a recipe for disaster, considering my previous history of hiking half the distance with my family. Let me just say, I think those tests are the cruelest thing on earth. I mean, of course we’re going to have a kid with symptoms run on a tread mill and then breath into a tube.
We just finished watching Mary Poppins. It’s pretty cute and I must say, Nanny McPhee is a total copy-cat... well, not totally I guess, but pretty close. My favorite scene was when they were all laughing and floating in the air. They couldn’t think of anything sad until Mary said, “Well, it’s time to go home.”
Everyone watched the movie except for Wyatt because he was out on a scout camp. He was having the crap scared out of him by his leader who was pretending to be a cougar. Haha. They said the only way they found out it was Brother Haus was when a car drove by and they saw his silhouette against the tent. I really missed Rowan tonight. I was all curled up on the corner of the couch, just trying to imagine his arms around me, and trying to decide if I wanted it or not.
8 - 17 - 12 9 PM Saturday
I slept in until like eight today. Mom came into my room and shook me awake. After I stared at the clock for a while it registered. I practically rolled myself out of bed. We took Kyle to his first football game down on the BSU field and oh my gosh was it smokey. There’s been a bunch of wildfires going in the mountains. The smoke is a lot worse downtown Boise than in Kuna. I’m just glad I wasn’t the one playing football in that smog. Not to mention the parking lot was hectic. Football teams stood all around the stadium and pedestrians were everywhere. Other cars tried to squeeze into the closest spots they could find and were pretty much forced to get along to avoid accidents. We were lucky to find a spot pretty close to the enterance where Kyle’s team was. It was a pay-spot but it was worth it to not have to walk a long way with the little girls plus it had some grassy-area right in front of it for our pic-nic lunch.
We had Mercedes with us (my little cousin. she’s Sadie’s age.) so the picnic was loud with the two little seven-year olds. One of them found a praying mantus next to the curb and they started screaming. So Mom’s and I’s ear drums were blown out. After that they couldn’t stop turning around to look at the little green creature that seemed to be staring into their souls.
When we were done eating we found some good seats in the shade and watched the last couple minutes of the game before Kyle’s. The big feild was split so two cames could go on at once. They had like 129 teams to go through today so they gave each team fifteen minutes to play their game. Kyle’s team won against their opponents. Our Kuna team only got one penalty, and that was when someone moved before the ball was hiked. Kyle was a great defeder; he was holding back two boys a whole head taller than him at the same time, then knocked them aside to bump the quarter back off-balance. Kyle lost his at the same time and ended up sitting on him to end the play. Duna destoyers gaind ten yards to the touch-down once because the other team gave their quarterback a horse collar. I can’t remember the exact score but our team won so that’s good, right? :D
When we got home the girls played out in the pool and read while I ran and lifted. After a shower then I rode to the library. I checked out Bambi, Snow White, and a primary/hymns song guessing game for a Sunday activity. I swear those guys must know me by now... I went really crazy over the summer and checked out a bunch of things every day. The funny thing was, I would have a wide range. For example, Hunger Games, Captain Underpants, Tiara Club, Edgar Allen Poe stuff, and disney movies. We’re a big supporter too, given all our late fees. The boy who usually checks me out is tall with black hair, he has a bit of darker skin tone and he looks pretty cute. One other boy once helped Wyatt find something he wanted. He’s also tall, but has curly brown hair. There’s a lady who’s a bit bigger with short, light-blonde hair who occasionally had to help me find things. But now I can find my way around like the back of my hand and kind of get my pride hurt when in the very rare times I can’t find what I”m looking for. When I got home from the library I shucked corn and then Aunt Karlene, Uncle David, their boys; Evander and Brodie, and Grandma and Grandpa Fife came over. Baby Brodie has grown a lot since he was born almost two months ago. It took a while for them to come up with a name but they finally did it. XD
All the kids played the Star Wars dancing game, thought dance moves that the men do are pretty gay... and the girls are just a lot of down-below shaking. I actually like playing that kind of stuff but not necessarily when half the family is over.
We had a great dinner of corn, stake, and fruit. Which, by the way, Grandma Terry showed up to pick up Mercedes and stayed to eat. Mom made ice cream and waffle bowls for dessert! Yum! Because I can’t eat wheat, Mom basically makes everything from scratch... and it all tastes soo good!! She has something that looks like a waffle iron, but she uses a different recipe so they cook all thin and crispy like, and when she takes them out, she can either roll them up and let them cool to look like the cones, or form them around a bowl to make... well, waffle bowls. XD
I left the room soon after because they started talking about complicated extended family and funny things they did in the past.
8 - 19 - 12 4:30 PM Sunday
Today we went to church and we actually got there almost on time! When we walked into the foyer, mom explained that it would be ok for me to take the sacrament if mom brought some gluten-free bread and dad blessed it while the other bread was being. :D Even though Bishop Andrus once offered to have gluten free bread be blessed for me by the young men, Mom didn’t really think they could handle the job and was afraid I would get sick. One time we tried having Dad bless some bread and have me eat it before we went to church, but for some reason there was a problem with that so we stopped that method. I’m so excited for this though!! One up side of me not taking the bread is that I get to confuse the twelve-year-olds. Basically you can’t take the bread and water for a while if you’ve sinned really badly. So when the boy comes back around with the tray of tiny cups, it blows their mind when I reach for it after refusing the bread. XD by the time they figure it out they move from Deacons to Teachers and end up holding the doors or something.
Anyway, today we played the hymn/children songs guessing game, which, by the way, is stupid and stressful. The note pitches sound off to me and it’s hard to tell how long they’re held for. Plus, they don’t give you enough time to answer the question before it maxes out. Mom and Dad said they vaguely remember playing the game a few years ago and that it was just as annoying then. So, I am never going to check that DVD out again…
I made nachos with black beans, jalapenos, green chilies, olives, pineapple, and a bunch of melty cheese on top. :} It was great! We call them super nachos and Aunt Ursula got us introduced to it one time she babysat. They really fill you up and taste amazing with all the different flavors just bursting on the tongue.
Mom’s been baking since then. Bananna muffins and bread, yum! The rest of us played guesstures and now we’re on phase ten. It’s so funny watching my family play something, we’re all too competitive and a few are sore losers… it’s pretty obvious it comes from Dad though, haha. Sadie’s drawing something and I’m pretty interested in doing some of that stuff myself. I’m definitely going to read a book from the library. I’m currently working on Fablehaven and have Among the Impostors waiting to be sarted. I like reading; it gives me something to do, and, all too often, even an alternitave to crying. I just put all my emotions into my stories, I channel them for the character, and that’s what makes the stories come alive for me. A couple years ago all the books were about either the end of the world, fantasy, or romantic vampires. Now, thanks to things like the Hunger Games and The Giver, it’s moved into futuristic governments. The scary thing is, that it’s possible. Especially with the technology being developed and how easily the human mind can be tricked. Like in 1918 by ___, it’s scary, because it’s all-too-possible, it was based on the chance that America might not’ve won the war.
I sat next to Rowan in church today and he didn’t talk much. He looked pretty tired and later he messaged me. Apparently he’s having a bad day and not feeling very well. :\
I’m going to make these last two summer days good. I’ll have Rowan come over with his Hunger Games DVD, write more, draw, read, and work out. J I also need to make sure my sleep schedual is good. :P I have a feeling this new year might kill me if I don’t do it right.
Mercedes is also coming over.
I love the smell of baking banana bread. <3
I love my mom. She works so hard. Sometimes I wish I was an only child so she would have more time for me and I wouldn’t have to chase people out of my room. Not to mention sibilings are just annoying. If I’m the oldest around when something goes wrong, I’m usually the one who has to report it. Apparently I’m supposed to be patient. Which I guess having more of that patient stuff wouldn’t be too bad, (even Rowan said he noticed I didn’t have much), but it’s kind of hard when no one listens to you.
8 – 20 -12 8:30 PM Monday
This morning we went to Grandma Terry’s house and picked some black berries. It was pretty fun. Everyone was restraining themselves from eating all of them, I’m pretty sure. The berries were so big and jucy. Sometimes one or two would fall off the vine when we picked one nearby. I got juice all over my hands and started chasing Sadie. It kind of freaked her out but Mom made me stop because she didn’t want her falling and stuff. Which, you know, might be a good idea in some universe. Mercedes and Sadie went into a grape tunnel thing and pretended like they were princesses, until they saw the cobwebs. Kyle was loving it and working hard, he’s such a fruit lover. Wyatt was a good help to and they kind of traded off playing a bit with Buddy. Buddy is Grandma’s dog. He’s a __ dog. I don’t know how old he is but he’s been at that house for as long as I can remember and Alex lived with him during colledge so I’m guessing in dog years he’s really old. Buddy is also pretty husky now. His coat isn’t as soft and shiny and he’s got some problems with his paw and back that keep coming back every once-in-a-while. Kyle kept having to lead Buddy into the back yard and stayed with him for a while because the smart devil found a way to squeeze into the berry area between two shacks.
When we got home we ate, did a couple chores and I practiced my singing. I don’t really like piano but singing along I think is a little more fun.
Rowan came over and brought the Hunger Games movie. I’m so jealous but I’m really happy he shared. My bros wer excited too because they’re reading the books now. I’m surprised Kyle was able to grasp the basics of the story line because usually his reading level isn’t that high. He basically needs to go back to sight words and practice his spelling a lot more, too.
Sadie and Mercedes played outside and drew so we didn’t have to worry about them much. Usually Sadie follows Rowan around everywhere and can’t stop talking. She asks embarrasing quesitons like, “Why are your teeth so yellow? I think they look crooked.” “What are those red things on your face?” “Are you and Alexa boyfriend and girlfriend?” “Why didn’t you kiss her yet?” So yeah, basically, I’m usually close to strangling her. He usually takes them ok and ends up joking about the answer... except for the kissing one.
Anyway, the casting, acting, effects and just, everything was awesome in that movie. I loved it. Afterwards we had parfaits!!
The boys turned on Minecraft (which, by the way, I think is silly. There’s no storyline and hardly any objective. Not to mention the graphics are pretty bad compared to other technology, like, worse than lego games bad). I listened to Disney music on my mp3 and when the little thing died on me, Rowan had me play the game. It’s ok I guess, but it was pretty stressful, seeing that I don’t usually play games and I freaked out at every zombie that came around the corner.
After that I rode hime with him but he left his movie here so I have to give it back at school in a couple days.8 - 21 - 12 8:30 PM Tuesday
I got up at six this morning. Yeah, I’m surprised I’m alive.
Last night Dad gave Wyat and me back to school father’s blessings. We all sat down for a sort of family home evening thing and we started talking about what to do for the school year. Mom mentioned things like getting up on time, being good about working hard, etc. Then she asked dad, “do you want to do blessings now?” Dad was like, sure, cool. Kyle and Sadie refused for some reason. They just kind of huddled in their corner of the couch and watched Wyatt and me get them.
It was great and I felt happy, expecially when he mentions to keep up my scripture reading and praying.He also said choose good friends, and blessed me to be organized and timely with home work.
Today I read my scriptures and worked out. I had a shower and Sadie and I watched Snow White after breakfast. Mom did lots of errands today so I was kind of free. I wrote in my story (Salina and I are doing a joint-novel. We hand off the flash drive every couple chapters because the character that’s narrating it switches for every chapter) I cleaned up, and folded while I watched Bambi. After dinner I played the Star Wars dancing gam. So now I’m in bed, with my outfit for tomorrow picked out, and my backpack ready. I’m soothing my nerves iwth the radio. I can’t believe school’s starting. All in all, it was a good last day. Technically, these last three months were probably my last of being a “kid.” If I can find a job, I’ll most likely be working next summer, and I definately will be after Jr year, then it’s the big Sr year and off to college with me.
8 - 22 - 12 9 PM Wednesday
So, for some reason, school was started in the middle of the week. All the classes were shortened and put into one day so we could get like intro and class rules down, so, basically this was my whole day, “Ok here we go kids! Introduce yourself! Here’s the classroom! I’m your teacher! Tell us something about your life! Ok, now off to the next boring class for you.” We didn’t even sing in Choir. :P Our first assignment in art was sto draw anythihng we wanted. I’m just going to turn in a shaded one of a lady looking it over her shoulder. I just did it yesterday and I don’t feel like doing one when I have a perfectly awesome file of drawings to choose from.
I went to chemistry after I got myself some lunch. My parents had taken Kyle and Sadie shopping for a bed with them so I got to turn the radio up as loud as I wanted, turn on all the lights and fill my body with junk. But, again, all we did were intros. Well, we did make name tag for our desks. We wrote our name on an index card, covered it with a little shaving cream, and swriled food coloring around in it. After we scraped it all off, it looked like we’d tie-dyed the paper... which, I don’t know I guess we kind of did. XD
8 - 23 - 12 9 PM Thursday
Today in Choir we jus warmed up, and got put in secions on he risers. All we did was sing a few notes in front of the teacher, she would point at a person, and assign. It seemed kind of petty and biased to me. I mean, like Mrs. Stienbach said I was “a strong alto,” even though I’m signing saprano in my music lessons. I think doing that kind of research and asking the kids where they would like to be would be a little more effective. I mean, maybe they could’ve done that yesterday. :P After that we played a “have you ever” game. YAY! -_-
In art the girls in the back were so annoying; they would not stop talking! The teacher might separate them on Monday, chich I think is a great idea I mean, I don’t know about them, but I came here to do something called learn. People simply sign up for things for an “easy A” and to be with their friends. Yeah, way to look out for your future, guys.
WE learned about lines. Exciting, right? haha it was actually kind of cool. The samples of the line drawing assignment were insane! It’s basically creating a maze because you can’t create shapes. I just started with writing Love is sweet and wen from there. It turned out pretty cool and fun actually. I put a picture on facebook. It has like yellow arrows around the word Love, a heart hidden in the mix, and swirlies around the page.
I didn’t have Chemistry or Seminary, but I stopped by to say hi to the seminary teachers. I actually walked into the wrong class yesterday. XD But it was all good, because it had a bunch of the boys that I know plus Rowan so I was able to give him his movie back. It was pretty funny that day because all we did was trace our hands and cut them out; the seminary clases are already shorter than all the others to give the students time to run back and forth across the endless parking lot.
We also went to the orchard last night! I just didn’t have time to write about it afterwards. Now it’s bed time again so I’ll have to put that off untill later. :P
8 - 24 - 12 10 PM FridaySeminary was awesome! We learned about Christ’s hands, about how much he served with them. (yeah, that’s what the first day’s activity was all about). Brother Stergous is so funny! It’s an awesome guy but truthfully I don’t know that much about him. Brother Furhman, as Bro Stergeous said, “hogged me” last year. XD
Mr Fisher in Chemistry class showed us around the class room a bit more and introduced us to the eye was station and the shower. Those things are just there for emergencies and I’m praying that I don’t have to use either of them.
When I got home Mom was still at the park with the little kids so after lunch I went to 7th period seminary. Rowan and Makenzie Thomas are there. :D Kenzie is cool, she’s red-headed and is absolutely obsessed with the Hunger Games. I had her in one of my classes last year, she’s fun and really up-beat.
Being home was kind of boring. I listened to music and Tumbled. I played with Sadie a bit, so I guess it wasn’t totally wasted. :)
8 - 25 -12 12 PM Saturday
Today was awesome! I spent the morning helping Mom out and cooking a bit, then Rowan came over to hang out. We watched Pirates of the Carribean, then played Minecraft. Haha, ok see, we have this deal now, that I”ll teach him how to draw and he’ll show me how to play Minecraft. We didn’t get around to drawing but that’s ok. We’ll just do it next time.
So, the game is really weird. Apparently, you can tame wolves and treat them like dogs. Rowan named them Stinky and Butt.
After dinner I called around to find a ride to the Meridian pool party but either half of the people weren’t going, or they just didn’t pick up. I ended up staying home and spending more time at home.
8 - 26 - 12 6:45 PM Sunday
So, today I went to church, dfrew when I got home, ate an awesome lunch, made some blackberry jam and Kyle had us watch part of the foodball game. I do not undersstand that game. Sanfransisco beat Dener Broncos... obviously. That bronco team has never really been the best... and even I know that!
Oh yeah, and I played online. I looked at tumblr, talked to Rowan, and made a couple of Glogs. (Glogs are like posters. You can put pictures, animations, videos, audio and text on them to create whatever. I like making lyric glogs because music seems to just speak to me... especially certain songs.)
Kyle was being really annoying when I was chatting online. I left for two minutes to take something upstairs for mom and when I came back, he was typing to Rowan. I had to kick my brother off and prove to Rowan that it was me by telling him the first song we danced to. (God Gave Me You by Blake Shelton). He was really impressed with that. :3
Well, IDVA starts tomorrow. At least it’s an A day at KHS. Haha Mrs Tookey is my drawing teacher and she is just soo weird. She’s fun though and I like her. She has a devil skull. She said if she’s ever carrying it around one day, to
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