A Christmas Story

Only a week until Christmas Eve! In honor of the occaision, I'm posting a little snippet on what it one of my favorite Christmas movies of all time- A Christmas Story. While not every childhood is like Ralphie's, it does bring up those memories about Christmas when you were about 7 or 8. There was always that anticipation for that one certain gift that Santa would bring- you spent all month dreaming about what you were going to do with that toy. For Ralphie, of course, it was always his "Red Ryder BB gun with a compass in the stock and this thing that tells time." This BB gun is legendary, and essentially is Ralphie's constant throughout the story. Of course there are other things- the quirks of the family. There's Rudy, who (quite literally) eats like a pig, his mother, and as always, the Old Man. This is the Old Man who was an oldmobile man, who mourned the loss of his leg lamp, and absolutely hated the Bumpuss's dogs. This the old man who "worked in profanities like other artists worked in clay. He was a master." And yes, this is THE movie which made (in my world at least) famous THE leg lamp. It always makes me laugh to see when people have strings of christmas lights that are leg-lamps, or have one in their living room window, just for christmas.

The movies we get to watch at Christmas, like The Grinch, Rudolph, The Polar Express, and A Christmas Carol are always such highlights to this season, but this movie especially is what makes it so much fun for me. I can't wait until I finally get the chance to sit down and watch the whole thing from beginning to end.

Return of the Cupcakes

Well, I'm back with the images of my venture into the cupcake-making world. Obviously, my skills are, as yet, unhoned. Technically, it worked. You see the green triangle in the middle of the one I spliced? That is my success. True, you can't really tell it's a Christmas Tree unless I tell you (by the way, it's a Christmas Tree), but you couldn't really tell it was a christmas tree when I put it in the cupcake anyways. The ideas was actually simple enough. -Make any sort of a sponge-cake batter. -Spoon out about 1/3 of the batter. Cover the rest and put it to the side or in the fridge; you'll need it later - With 1/3 in front of you, mix in several drops of food coloring. -Bake the 1/3 at the suggested temp. until the batter is just firm enough to hold it's shape. Take it out and allow it cool COMPLETELY. - Use VERY small cookie-cutters to cut out the shape you want. - Make a foundation from the remaining uncolored batter. Gentle put in your shape, then spoon more uncolored batter around it to make walls around your shape and support it. Your cupcakes should be about 2/3 full. -Bake until done. Be careful; the center is already mostly baked, and the rest of the batter will cook at a different rate then your cake recipe says it will! IF you actually try this, I wish you luck with getting a better shape then I did! I'll have to try this again and see if a simpler shape works better. And I'll have to practice my icing skills a bit more before then. We'll see, I'll try it until I get it right!

Holiday Baking Plans- Forestalled....

Well, sure enough, I'm back again! I'd had a plan- I was going to take pictures of these amazing cupcakes I was going to make yesterday and make you drool over their deliciousness. However, my honors and a.p. teachers had other ideas, so instead of making these objects of salivation, I worked hard to get my homework done. The good news is that I got all of my homework due this week done, so all of my homework from here on out won't have to get any new homework done until Saturday or Sunday. I'm not too grieved by this delay to my plans; I thought up a new scheme pretty quickly. My new plan is to make said cupcakes when I get home from the endocrinologist's tomorrow (ironic that they'll ask me if I'm eating healthy, isn't it?). So, hopefully, either tomorrow or Friday, I'll be able to take pictures of these delicious little creations so that you may be hungry with me.

The Holly and The Ivy

Well, I'm still obvioulsy in my Christmas mindset. I'm just excited! I love this time of year, despite it's being the busiest time of year. Last night was one of my many Yuletide performances, which I'm glad to say, went fairly well. One of my favorite pieces that we performed was the Mannheim Steamroller arrangement of The Holly and The Ivy. It was a bit odd to perform this in an orchestral setting (if you listen to the original, it's a wind piece), but it was a gorgeous piece, just the same.
There are times I could swear that out of all the months of the year, December is the month that my instruments see the most use. However, I'm far from complaining. I love Christmas, and I love music! Put the two together, and it's twice as awesome. So, I'm still very excited to perform all of these pieces over again, since we don't get to play them all the year through!

The Holiday Season

Wow, it's been a long time since I was on here. However, that may change. In the past few months, I've discovered several blogs that may get me posting my own thoughts and ideas more and more. So, here's the warning, you may suddenly be getting lots of alerts for random pictures, clothes, and recipes that I've fallen in love with, and don't want to post to facebook.
However, that's not my main reason for posting today. My main reason is that in the past few days, I've had thoughts bouncing around my head about Christmas and Thanksgiving as we transition from one to the next. I've decided I'm not nearly grateful enough for what I have. Christmas is not just a time of giving and joy, it's a time to give thanks for all that you've been blessed with, and I've been blessed in so many ways. Particularly in the last year, I've felt the guiding hand of the Lord so many times, as I transitioned schools and friends, and as my health declined and then got better. I'm grateful that I've got some of the most amazing friends and family in the world, and I know that they'll always be there for me. I'm grateful for the amazing friends that I had in Junior High, and that we are still friends, and I'm grateful for my new friends in High School. They are some of the most amazing band nerds you will ever meet.
I'm also grateful for my new day-to-day challenge. Diabetes isn't necessarily easy to live with, but it's manageable. I'm grateful I've been given this chance to reassess my entire life and see what needs a change. I'm grateful for the love I've found from everyone as I've adjusted, and for the support they still give. I'm grateful that I'll probably end up being the worlds greatest health freak, and that now I'll always have a reason to take care of myself. I'm grateful for my family, I couldn't do this every day without them.
Above all, at this special time of year, I'm greatful for my Savior. He's been there to support me through this time of trial. The past year has probably been the hardest of my life so far, and I know that if not for my testimony of Him, I would have fallen by the Wayside about a year ago. His Spirit continues to build me, and I'm grateful for this time where we're given the chance to celebrate His birth, and that for one month of the year, we are all able to focus all of our energies into loving our fellow man and learning of the Savior.
Merry Christmas! I hope you all are blessed with peace and joy this season!

Bubbles

I'm still going on my philosophical binge. Not that anyone much cares, but that's perfectly alright with me, I rather enjoy this!
The older I get, the more I feel that I have lived in a nearly impenatrable bubble, and that now, that bubble is ready to burst. There are so many pressures on that puny little bubble: music, school, friends, surviving in the real world without my parents. Having lived in this bubble all my life, seeing these near intrusions is a step beyond terrifying. Sometimes, I yearn to reach out and pop the bubble from the inside, but then, a face is twisted hideously by the beautiful dome of my home, and I strink away again, prepared to sit in my bubble for a while longer.
In a way, this always saddens me. From the right angle, I am able to see the beauty and wonder of life outside the bubble, but when a pressure blows against my bubble, the world shifts, and everything is distorted once more, leaving me uncertain that the beauty I had seen just moments before truly exists.
Now, the bubble is floating higher, up into a clear blue sky, leaving me reaching for the ground. I see so many things sliding by as others emerge from their bubbles. But fear easily keeps me inside mine as the higher I go, the farther the distance I may fall. The fear always seems to precede my actions, the fear that I will fall and be unable to get up after falling from such a great height. If I wait much longer, I may never be allowed to leave this home that could so easily become a prison or a death-trap, but even as I tell myself this repeatedly, I continue to shrink away.
I watch the others as they break free of these beautiful, floating homes; I see their joy as they meet the world below, and see that I truly haven't anything to fear. But I continue to worry. What if I am not strong enough? In my bubble, I barely have room to stretch now, my limbs are weak- what if I'm not even strong enough to burst the bubble? And if I do, then what then? Will just as wonderful a life be waiting for me down on the ground as I have seen through these gossamer walls?
For the time being, the choice is mine, whether to emerge or withdraw into the shadows. Very soon, however, the choice will be forever outside of my control, and I'll be at the mercy of all the pressures on my life, hoping that they will leave my delicate little bubble free to float its way and not burst through the walls I must believe are safe and that they wil not send me free-falling down to what could be death or joy.

The River

Well, I've come to doubt anyone will read this, but that's alright. Sometimes, you just write for yourself, and not for anyone else. And if you happen to have an audience, that's alright too, because you give them the chance to understand a small piece of you for a time.
And really, that's all life is (sorry to my pinprick audience that has to listen to my sudden philosophical urges). You see a person in the hallway, and you smile. You laugh with your friends, hug your family, sob over your latest catastrophe, and all the while, life keeps going by at the speed of light.
There's nothing we can do about it; like a tireless river, life continues to cascade by, sweeping along everything caught within its billowing currents. Sometimes, it's all we can do just to keep afloat, and others, we feel as though we are safely kept dry in a boat. But the river will always flow onwards. That, in and of itself is reassuring. Life will go on. No matter how much it hurts, you have to go on. There will be moments that are both better and worse than what you're going through at that point in time. It's alright.
The river is also one of the greatest paradoxes ever known. Though it's reassuring that life will go on, it is moving very, VERY, fast, and sometimes, it's going on too fast for us to enjoy it. So, life will go on, but we must inversely live now, not in the distant future, or in a past we wish we could change. Because sometimes, we don't smile at someone in the hallway, we don't laugh with our friends, we don't hug our families, and we always keep our tears for later, and that's wasteful of the precious time slipping by. "Life isn't about waiting out the storm, but about dancing in the rain."
So, what's your excuse? They might reject my work or opinions, I'm too busy, I'll do it later, or something else? No matter the excuse, it doesn't matter. In life, what you don't do usually won't amount to anything, but what you decide to do can have an impact that lasts for centuries. Even if you don't become a fabulous celebrity, what do you have to loose? Nothing tried, nothing gained. And human beings are selfish by nature, so it's to our advantages to live our lives to their fullest.
Yet, so often, we let this slip us by, not realizing that we have the greatest gift we'll ever recieve in the palm of our hand. Instead, we squander it, not seeing how it shrinks and shrinks until it can no longer be seen. And then it's gone. Wasted. Useless. Nothing accomplished, nothing worth celebrating.
It's fragile, but vibrant, vivid. Life is like a river, but it's also like the most beautiful flower, or the flight of a butterfly. It's so easily destroyed or gone unnoticed, colorless, tasteless, and seemingly undetectable, when really, it acts as a mirror as you observe other lives showing what yours could be if you only choose to accept this brilliant gift.
So, live life as best you know how, without regrets for what you did or didn't do, instead, moving forward with a bright hope for the future.