Meeting Suzanne Selfors

Last week I read one of the best books I've ever read! -Saving Juliet by Suzanne Selfors. Here's a bit about it from the flap inside the book:

"Two Juliets, both alike in desperation...17 year old Mimi Wallingford, of the Broadway Wallingfords, has a life most girls can only dream of -complete with the starring role in her family's production of Romeo and Juliet. But acting is not her dream, and she's fighting for the right to trade her script for a scalpel and become a doctor.

14 year old Juliet Capulet of the Verona Capulets, has lived a lonely life -imprisioned by the feud that consumes her family and by her iron-fisted mother's forcing her into an unwanted marriage. She will do anything to avoid her betrothed, even if it requires faking a boil on her bottom -or something more dangerous.

During the play's final performance, Mimi's wish to get away actually comes true when she and her heartthrob costar, Troy Summer, are magically transported into Shakespeare's Verona. Now that she knows the real Juliet, Mimi doesn't want to stand by and allow the play to reach it's tragic end. But if saving her new friend means changing the ending of the greatest love story of all time, will she and Troy ever make it back to Broadway?"

I looked on http://www.suzanneselfors.com/ and coincidently, she was making an appearence at my favorite bookstore: Once Upon A Story, in Long Beach (Once Upon A Story is a great little independent book store on 4th street, inbetween Redondo and Termino, check it out sometime, you'll love it:) ! So I went today, and got to meet her, and she signed my book for me. I also listened to her read from her recently published children's book Fortune's Magic Farm and talked to the illustrator of the book. It was an awesome experience!

A Thousand Miles

My friend Mackenzie and I sang/played the song A Thousand Miles by Vanessa Carlton in a piano recital last year!

Shipley Nature Center

By Allie

we went To a Nature centir in huntington
Beach. I saw a bunny, and two lizards,and some
butterflies.

here we are in a native Indian Kiicha. It is made from willow, tule, and cattails.

This is a great place to go if you need any native plants for your yard because they sell them there.

Shipley Nature Center - Huntington Beach, California

Spontaneous Cinnamon Twists

Posted by Carly

On Sunday March 22nd, I had one of those rare free days (NO BALLET REHEARSALS!), so I invited my friend Myrella over. Whenever we hang out, we always cook something, so we leafed through my new teen cookbook, and what do 'ya know? Under "snacks" we found the perfect thing to whip up: cinnamon sticks. And what was great about the recipe, is that I had tons of left over puff pastry from my party, so we used some of it! The other ingredients are just egg, cinnamon and sugar! How easy is that? So we made some. Then we got the idea to sell them! So we packed them up in a basket, and went from door to door, selling them for 50 cents, and 1/3 of the profit went to the LB rescue mission to feed the hungry. After we were done selling them, we had raked up 9 dollars and 25 cents! Whoo! It was tons of fun to make the cinnamon twists (or sticks:), I'm definately going to make them again sometime. They were a big hit on the block too! Here's the recipe:

Cinnamon Twists -Makes 20

Ingreidents: 1 egg, 4 tablespoons sugar, 2 teaspoons cinnamon, 2 sheets puff pastry, cooking spray (or butter)

You Also Need: 2 cookie sheets, 2 bowls, measuring spoons and an egg brush

Directions: Thaw the puff pastry for 30 minutes at room tempuature. While it's thawing, you can beat the egg in a bowl, and mix the cinnamon and sugar together in another bowl. Then once the pastry is un-frozen, cut it into strips. Take each strip and brush the egg on it, then sprinkle the cinnamon/sugar mix onto the strip. Take each ends of the strip and twist. Set on a greased cookie sheet, and do the same with all the others. Bake for about 12 minutes at 400 degrees. Enjoy your yummy cinnamony treats!

Earth Hour

Last year we had a great time participating in Earth Hour. We played games and music by candlelight and drank hot chocolate. Earth Hour this year is coming up - Saturday, March 28th @ 8:30 p.m.

Join us and people from around the world to reduce your "carbon footprint". Check out:

Earth Hour US or Earth Hour for more information.

A Bit 'O Luck on this St. Patty's Day!

Written by Carly

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Here is a funny picture of me from last year as a leprechaun! The picture above is of us and our good friends at a Print Museum holding up our Good Luck papers that we printed ourselves! The Print Museum was a ton of fun. We learned about the old printing machines and how they worked. We got to see them in action, and heard a great talk about Ben Franklin and how he was a printer. We saw how the printers made the individual letter stamps and how they had to line them all up to make the sentences! The paragraph that I just wrote would have probably taken them a week to line up and to print on an old printing machine! Wow...

You can view the Printing Museum website by clicking on: The International Printing Museum: HOME

Musical Mondays

Mondays are typcially music lesson days for us. Jennifer Walton comes to teach violin lesssons for Micayla and piano lessons for Allie. Allie just started taking piano this last year and Micayla has been taking violin lessons with Jennifer since she was six. Jennifer has a fun business she just started last year: Instrumental Casting by Jennifer Walton Musicians and Vocalists - She sends musicians on auditions for commericals, movies, etc. Micayla had the opportunity to play her violin in a commercial last summer.
Sonja Fife comes for Carly's piano lesson and Janelle Barrera gives Carly her flute lesson. If you are looking for a terrific music teacher, Jennifer can be reached at violinwalton@aol.com Sonja can be reached @ sonjafife@charter.net and Janelle can be contacted at flutecat@gmail.com And of course, we had to include a picture of Nate, 'cause he's teaching himself how to play the saxaphone!
Lots of music; lots of fun!

History Comes Alive

Post by Carly
This week went on a really fun field trip to a forest lawn in Glendale to see two of the most famous artists in history, Michelangelo and Leonardo Da Vinci! They gave a wonderful talk about their lives and artwork. It was fun to learn about them and see them brought back from the past! You can get information on going to see them (and other historic figures) by clicking on: Forest Lawn Memorial-Parks and Mortuaries - Special Events And Facilities

The next day, we jumped ahead about four hundred years, and met Thomas Jefferson Mayfield. He was the main characeter in the terrific South Coast Repertory (http://www.scr.org/education/eddy.asp) production of Indian Summer. Based on a true story, Jeff Mayfield moved with his parents from Texas to California in search of gold. Instead of finding gold his family ends up farming next to the Choinumne Indians. The story, told part in song, tells of how Jeff ends up being raised by his indian neighbors. If you'd like to see a futrue "Bixby Educational Event" go to: http://www.bix-bee.com/events.html