Second Post

Life and Death
       Life
Life is like a tree,
Blooming and full of joy
Sharing happiness with those who will see
Until it has had its first grief
And every death is a fallen leaf.
        Death 
Death is like a rainbow
And life is like the rain;
Full of grief and foes
With an abundance of pain.
But after life there is the Paradise,
No more rain and ice,
It is like a rainbow
Where all will want to go.

    - Isa D. Curtis

I found this poem about 3 months ago. I don't think Isa D. Curtis' poetry flows very well, but I see her point and I agree with her. Life is like a tree. Eventually you lose all of your leaves and die. And I think life is like the rain, because death is like a rainbow.

My friend, Dan Robinson died June 3rd, 2008 at the young age of 13. He was riding to basketball practice with his older brother, Tom  and their two close friends, Schuyler and Sam. They were hit at an intersection in the country. The other driver had been drinking and was on his cell phone. Dan died instantly and the others were hospitalized. When we heard there had been an accident, Moo and  I went to the Robinson's house to watch their sister, Jami's younger kids so the family could go to the hospital to see their boys. We stayed overnight, waiting for recent news. We had a few 'false' alarms, that scared us to death. But in the end, they were true. The entire time I was too tired to move, yet awake enough to run around the house. Those two days were easily the worst days of my life.

I love taking pictures, especially of flowers. A couple years ago I babysat 2 dogs for a few days and earned $200 dollars. I bought a nice digital, purple Casio. That year I took so many pictures, and that year was 2008. The flowers were so amazing that year. The day before the accident, Dan came over and extended our garden and planted some flowers. We were very dedicated to our garden that year. Flowers are so beautiful, and as soon as you see one you immediately feel a little happier. In one corner of our simple flower garden is Dan's Salvia. The flower salvia has long stems with purple petals. This year we have worked on our back yard.
Before-  There was hardly any grass. Weeds covered most of the area and it looked very dirty. People did not feel very welcome.
After- A new brick sidewalk leading to the back porch adds a welcoming feeling for the visitor.(by the way, I never want to see another brick again) Instead of crabgrass, there is a brick-outlined mulch area. In the middle of this area is a sophisticated vegetable\herb garden on a raised bed made of pallets, which are made of recycled wood. The 4 boxwood trees add an elegant touch to this cottage-style house.

Our house is a 2 bedroom bungalow with carpet everywhere. It is very good carpet, but the colors aren't so good. There is pink, pink with blue dots, green and there used to be blue. Our house is about 60 years old, but it was renovated in the 80s. So now we have brass door knobs, brass handles, brass faucets and brass outlet covers. We are now in the process of replacing all of these fixtures with bronze. Also all of our walls had wallpaper. We have painted about half of the house. The kitchen is sort of a dark calico. The dining room is a yellowish orange. The first bathroom is undecided and the second bathroom will be a pretty grey. And yes, I spell grey with an e. My room is a light, creamy orange and the outside of the house is a dark yellow with dark red shutters. There are a lot of built-ins in our house. And I have a cute little alcove in my room that always gets in the way.

So all in all, we have charming house with a lot of character.

Dado is a graphic designer. Moo cleans a house every two weeks to pay for our fitness center fee. The Fitness Center is about 2 blocks away and we occasionally go there a few times a week. (We, in this case refers to 'Moo and I') We want to go often but we don't.

For about 6 years I took dance at Margene's Dance Studio in Mattoon. I took ballet, tap and jazz. Emily decided to do ballet again and she introduced me to Richland Community College's ballet classes. I went to one of her classes and my legs were killing me the next day. I was never sore after Margene's classes. I decided to take only ballet at Richland. I soon discovered that I should have been farther along for my age and that I did enjoy ballet. Margene's is a good place until you are about 10. Amy Little was my ballet teacher at Richland. For 2 years I did ballet 4\5, and I have improved so much. This year I am going in Nancy's class. DUN DUN DUN!!! Nancy teaches 2 ballet classes, intermediate-advanced and advanced. This is big step up and I am completely thrilled about it. I started pointe last year and the hardest thing I can do in pointe is a developpe. I need to do more roll-ups to increase my strength.


We are starting school September 6. These are my subjects, Algebra II, Biology, English I, Speech (writing speeches), Debate, Ancient History, American History, Italian, Art, Music Theory and Latin. And I am teaching a ballet class and a Music Appreciation class. I think I will be very busy this year! I do need to get more serious with my school as I am going into high school. I am an only child, but my cousin  is also homeschooled. I went to public school until 4th grade and at first I thought I would hate homeschooling, but I was wrong. We went to some homeschool classes twice a week. I loved it. There were many people making me feel welcome. Mostly Dan and Emily though.

Very recently (today actually), we completely switched to almond milk. Once upon a time, when I was about 9, I was lactose intolerant. So I bought special kind of milk without lactose. 2 years later I wasn't. Then all of a sudden, 6 months ago, Moo was lactose intolerant. So we bought soy milk. Then we discovered that scientists put a little, tiny bit of pig DNA in the soybean DNA. Do you know why? Because the farmers spray some stuff all over the field to kill the weeds. But the stuff started killing the soybeans, too. But if the soybeans had a little bit of pig in it, then the stuff wouldn't kill it. So we switched to almond milk. We recently tried almond butter and it is very good. So is Nutella, which is a hazelnut spread with some chocolate.

Well, I am done with my 2nd post and I will write more soon!

First Post

I made this blog for many reasons. Here are some:
#1 I might be able to help people who will read it.
#2 People I know will understand me better.
#3 It will probably improve my writing and prepare me for college where I'll be writing all the time.
#4 I think it will be fun.

This blog is called All the Fuss because my nickname is Fuss. Most of the time. I have many nicknames, such as Jack, Ally, Leela and Olivia.

But Fuss is my main nickname. When I was a baby I threw up all the time and was constantly fussy.

Fuss should not be confused with 'Fuzz'.

I've been playing the piano since the fall of 2005, so for about 4 and a half years now. I had always begged my parents for piano lessons since I was very little. I used to call it 'pianto'. I enjoy playing very much and I want to go to college for piano performance. Many people have said I'm very talented. One kind old lady said I was a child prodigy, but I know she was wrong. First of all, I wasn't that good. And also I always considered prodigies as geniuses. But for a couple years I got 'talent' and 'genius' mixed up. I tried pushing myself saying, "So and so was amazing at my age! I stink. I need to try harder."

One day I was reading Little Women again. I was at the part when Laurie goes to Europe after Jo denies him. Laurie asks Jo's sister, Amy, when she will begin her great works.

"Never," she answered with a despondent but decided air. "Rome took all the vanity out of me, for after seeing the wonders there, I felt too insignificant to live and gave up all my foolish hopes in despair."

"Why should you, with so much energy and talent?"

"That's just why - because talent isn't genius, and no amount of energy can make it so."

And so on. Genius is rare. Amy wanted to be the best artist in the world, and I wanted to be the best pianist. I then knew that would never happen. I am now okay with not being the best.

Mozart and Rachmaninoff are my favorite composers, even though their music is quite different.

Mozart was a genius. In everything he wrote, you can tell. He wrote his first symphony when he was 8. At the time his father was ill and the house had to be completely quite. So little Wolfgang wrote the symphony without a keyboard. That is just crazy.

Rachmaninoff is awesome. A lot of his works are in minor, but his music doesn't really sound sad. It sounds beautiful. I absolutely love his Prelude in C# Minor. When you hear it, it feels like it's eating away at you. It consumes you.

A few years ago I didn't want to like Mozart because everyone did, and I wanted more people to be fond of Rachmaninoff. I didn't want to listen to any of his music. But one day I looked up his opera  The Magic Flute on YouTube (out of curiosity) and it killed my previous thoughts of him. (I also said I would never like opera) I loved it. I walked around the house trying to sing like the Queen of the Night. Then I bought the CD. I pretty much memorized the whole thing.

Then I thought if I liked The Magic Flute so much, maybe I would enjoy Le Nozze Di Figaro ( The Marriage of Figaro ) I did. Then I enjoyed Don Giovanni. By then my family knew I loved Mozart, so my grandparents bought a thing of 5 CDs consisting of some of his chamber music, music for piano, concertos, serenades and symphonies. Mozart was now tied with Rachmaninoff.

I first got greatly interested in music when my Moo bought me Meet the Great Composers. It's a workbook that contains small biographies of, as you already know, great composers, and a CD. That CD made me love music so much more. Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C# Minor was on there and I enjoyed it so much, I bought some more Rachmaninoff CDs. I had great respect for anyone who could play his music. Haha.

Right now I am working on Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag, Ernesto Lecuona's Malaguena nad Robert Schumann's Papillons. In the near future my piano teacher wants me to learn Edward MacDowell's To a Wild Rose,  Ludvig van Beethoven's Sonata Pathetique and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C# Minor. I am very excited.

I call my dad 'Dado' and my mom 'Moo'.

I've never understood why people like Pride and Prejudice so much. I think it's a good story, the writing isn't so amazing. I watched the movie once, didn't really understand it, read the book, didn't really like it, then watched the movie again. Recently I tried giving it another chance. I made up my mind that I would read every single word of it, but it didn't hold my interest. I don't think Jane Austen gives her characters enough 'character'. I definitely prefer Little Women.

I've literally read Little Women about 50 times. My paperback copy looks like it survived a fire, a flood, and a handful of toddlers. I had to tape the front cover back on, or else the beginning of the book would end up like the end. The back cover is completely gone, as well as some the last pages. But I do have a very nice hardback copy that my friend Meghan gave me. That was one of the most thoughtful gifts anyone has ever given me.

Meghan is one of my best friends. We've known each other for about 5-6 years. She is 2 years older than me and is also homeschooled. Later as the blog goes on you will understand the characters of all my friends.

Speaking of friends, homeschoolers are not socially challenged! They also do 'get out in the world', probably more than public schoolers. My best friends are Emily, Meghan, Ruth, Naomi, Audrey and Aleigha. Emily's brother, Dan, was also my best friend. I will tell about him later in the blog.


Well, I am done with the 1st post of my new blog! I will write the 2nd post soon.