AHH! It hurts...

Can you hear it? Oh, it's like fingernails on a chalkboard... only worse. Daddy likes to play it and watch my face contort in agony. =P

Created by Train Horns

The Homeschooled Review

I started a review blog! I decided that I should because I do so many reviews on here, and I actually would like to do more, but I always think that I do too many as it is. Especially since I get so many complaints for my negative reviews... and lots of my reviews are.

So anyway, this is the address: thehomeschooledreview.blogspot.com

If you would like to write to it, just check out the guidelines I posted in the introductory post. Yes, that is an obvious ploy to get you to look at the blog. And also save me typing it all out again. Or just copying and pasting it...

I'm excited!

~Lizzie

The Way We Live Now

I know I've gotten complaints before about my negative reviews. But I figured out why I prefer negative reviews: I like to give spoilers when I review, and out of respect for the movies I really like, I avoid spoilers. For movies that disgust me, I have no scruples spoiling the plot for two reasons; out of spite for the movie, and in confidence that no one would want to see the movie after I share the spoiler. So with that said...

"The Way We Live Now" was horrible. I'm sorry to say it about an Andrew Davies movie, but there it is. It was an interesting movie, I have to give it that, but the ending is such that you just think, "Wow, I just blew 5 hours of time that I could have spent watching the long version of Pride and Prejudice instead."

There are several interwoven plot lines. First, there's the young lady, Henrietta, who lives in England with a mother somewhat like Mrs. Bennet and a jerk brother (played by Matthew MacFadyen! Mr. Darcy! I'll never be able to watch the new Pride and Prejudice again. Ever). She "falls in love at first sight" with her cousin's ward, Paul (who's in charge of the construction of a railway in America). Paul "loves" her too, and her cousin, Mr. Carbury, is also in love with her. So the two men are at odds because they both want to marry her. Paul has a problem though: he's already engaged to an American woman.

Henrietta's brother, Felix, is a gambler and a cad. He has a woman he flirts with in the the country, and a rich woman in the city that he wants to marry, but only for her money. The woman in the country has a good man who wants to marry her, but she won't marry him because she thinks she's in love with Felix. And the woman in the city, Miss Melmotte, is starved for love and rather odd, and falls head over heels for Felix. Her father, Mr. Melmotte, is a greedy, rich Frenchman who is heading the board for Paul's railway. But Mr. Melmotte doesn't actually intend to BUILD a railway, he just wants to get people to buy the stock and then take all their money.

So. Felix proposes to Miss Melmotte, and tries to get her father's consent. He will NOT consent, because Felix gambled away all his money and is basically penniless, and Mr. Melmotte could get much richer men for his daughter. Miss Melmotte tries to convince Felix to run away with her, because she really loves him, but he only wants the money that she won't get unless she marries with her father's blessing and will not run away until she mentions that she has a lot of money of her own. She steals some money for a train ticket and ship passage, which he spends gambling and getting drunk. While he slouches off home to his mother (who dotes on him in a sickening way) she is trying to meet him. But she is "arrested" for stealing, and taken back to her father, who won't allow her to see Felix. Miss Melmotte manages to get a note to Felix's sister, Henrietta, who delivers the note to her brother and then returns with his message to Miss Melmotte: "he is giving her up. He doesn't love her, and never did." Miss Melmotte is heartbroken.

Paul tries to convince his fiancee, Mrs. Hurtle, to release him so he can ask Henrietta to marry him, but she refuses, and claims that he cannot break the engagement because "only the woman can dissolve an engagement." Finally, she tells him that if he spends one more night with her and takes her to the beach before he goes to Mexico (to oversee the railway) then when he comes back he can choose the woman he really wants. While they're at the beach, they run into Mr. Carbury, who is none too pleased to see his competition in company with another woman after all the trouble that Paul took to "steal" Henrietta from him.

Felix's country woman comes to the city to marry him, but he has no intention of marrying her. He just uses her for a little fun, putting her off about getting married, "Oh, of course, sometime..." He finally blurts out that he never intended to marry her, and she storms off. He chases her, and just then, the good man that STILL wants to marry her shows up and lays Felix flat with one punch. (That was good! Best part of the whole movie!)

Paul comes back from his trip and asks Henrietta to marry him, and she accepts. But Felix knows about Mrs. Hurtle and when Henrietta announces her engagement, he tells her the whole story. She talks to Paul and he tells her that he was trying to break everything off with Mrs. Hurtle, and that he thought it was already over between them when Mrs. Hurtle showed up in England claiming otherwise. Then Henrietta visits Mrs. Hurtle, and Mrs. Hurtle leads her to believe that she and Paul are still involved. So she breaks off the engagement.

Paul finally finds out about the railway scam, and leaks to the newspapers. Mr. Melmotte is ruined and commits suicide. Miss Melmotte, however, is still rich from the money in her own name that she refused to share with her father and goes off to live her life, hardened by Felix's betrayal.

Mrs. Hurtle comes to see Henrietta and confesses that she deceived Henrietta, and that Paul had been faithful to her, at least for the past 2 years. Henrietta still refuses to forgive him. He stops by one last time before he leaves for a second railway opportunity, and she hides on the stairwell while he give her mother all sorts of "I'll always love her" and "I wish her the best" messages. And then he leaves. And she runs after him. And we can only hope they live happily ever after.

And the last shot you see is Felix, with a new conquest in sight.

Miss Melmotte should have found someone to really love her, Henrietta should have married Mr. Carbury, Paul should have been devastated and gone crawling back to Mrs. Hurtle, Mr. Melmotte should have been put in jail instead of the escape of suicide, and Felix should have been left miserable in some way. Or at least shaped up and acting like a man. I didn't like it. At all.

However, the filming was spectacular, the acting was very good and if you don't mind a more "real life" kind of ending, then it's a pretty good movie. Personally, it left me feeling disgusted. But maybe that's just me.

~Lizzie

First Day of Spring Eve

It feels like Spring... really like Spring. Not like "Oh, it's 75 degrees outside in the middle of winter, gosh, this is like Spring already" fake Spring, but real Spring! Even when it started raining in the middle of our baseball game, it still felt like Spring. And I'm so ready for it.

I got a few flower seeds out shopping about a month ago, and yesterday, Mom got me a starter tray and lots more seeds! So I've got a nice start of six pods for each different kind of flower.


You can see the row of seeds that are uncovered... I didn't know that there were seeds that aren't supposed to be covered. But apparently Achillea (or Yarrow) seeds need light to germinate.

So all the seeds I have in my tray are Achillea, Snapdragons, African Daisies, Forget-me-nots, Carnations, Moss Roses, Black-eyed Susans, Shasta Daisies (like the boy in "The Horse and His Boy! Shasta... I wonder if that's where C. S. Lewis got it. I think it's a good girl's name. :P ), Johnny Jump Ups, Salvia, and two rows of Zinnias. And then I have two kinds of Sunflowers, Lupine, Foxglove and Nasturtium to plant directly in the ground sometime in late April.

And Mom just got the book "Lasagna Gardening" at Goodwill. I'm so excited about starting my flower gardens with the "lasagna" technique! And for those of you that know our front yard... don't you think it'd be nice to have a big gazebo surrounded by flowers in the middle of our front yard? (We have a pretty big, nearly empty front yard.) Vines of Moonflowers growing up the sides of the gazebo, surrounded by all kinds of flowers... and especially a rosebush or two... *sigh* I think it would be lovely. Now to get Daddy and the boys to build the gazebo... :D

Holding on for 3rd

And Middleschool and JV lost their games for 3rd place also. We left to come home after the JV game; Daddy decided that we wouldn't stay for the Varsity game, much to Sarah's dismay. (I was ready to come home, except I would have liked to have seen the game too. I just didn't want to hang out in VA for another 4 hours waiting and then have to drive home in the middle of the night.)

So SOME one was supposed to call us if Varsity won the game for 3rd place last night (*cough, cough*) but didn't, so we assumed that they lost too. (It's okay, someone. We forgive you and the other someone who probably won't read this.) But then Daddy found on the internet this morning that we won! I wish the game had been earlier in the day so we could have watched it.

I'm so glad that they got 3rd at least. We needed SOMETHING. Everyone was so disappointed, winning the 3rd place trophy for Varsity is comforting.

~Lizzie

Sitting in a hotel room...

And for the third time today, we sat in horrified and stunned silence, watching the other team scream, jump around and wildly celebrate their victory. The semi-finals at the East Coast Homeschool Basketball Championship and we lost. And lost. And lost again.

Middleschool and JV had to play at exactly the same time (for the second time in the tournament) and Middleschool lost a close game just 2 minutes before JV lost an even closer game. They played well, and it was SO close both the games, but the other teams just pulled it out.

Then for Varsity, we played the Forsyth Hawks. The same team we just beat two weeks ago for the State Championship. They intercepted at least a dozen of our passes, got most of the rebounds and played a really awesome game. One of our guys was injured pretty bad (got kicked in the knee and then fell on the same knee). We hung on, and were down 3, had the ball, tried and missed a 3, got the rebound and then they intercepted another pass. They went down, made a lay-up and buzzer.

Our Varsity was the defending East Coast Champions, and I really think they should have had the title again. Of course, I would, being a loyal fan. But we beat them for the State tournament! We CAN beat them! Our guys were a little upset about the seeding. Apparently it was done by how many points you won your qualifying games by, so we got seeded 3rd, instead of 1st. If we'd been first seed we would have had an easy game and made it to the Championship.

It's a real bummer. Our whole teams/fans group is just moping around now. It could have been a great week. It's surprising what a few sad basketball games can do.

~Lizzie

Spring break!!

This past Thursday was the last day of swimming for a whole week... which I unfortunately missed because I managed to get the cold that the rest of my family already had. *frown* So anyway, we're going up to VA for the East Coast Homeschool Basketball Championship and won't go back to swimming until March 17 (3 days before our meet! Yikes!) and besides getting sick for the break, I tried fake plastic fingernails for the first time in my life (because now I can actually wear them for more than a couple days before they fall off in the pool or get ripped off [ouch] playing water polo) and got my second set of ear piercings (because I've been wanting them and now they'll have a chance to heal before I go back to swimming... funny how it all relates to swimming...). No need to deride me, my brothers have already adequately criticized my "stupid" fingernails and earrings. And sadly, even Sarah thinks my second piercings are "gaudy" and the fingernails "really look fake." Mom likes both (she did the piercings... don't worry, she's a nurse) and Daddy hasn't said much either way, besides consenting to both.

I'm not sure what I think of the fingernails. I think they look pretty good, besides being a little shiny, and with very white tips. I like how they tap on the keyboard and flat, hard surfaces... but it's really hard to grab things!



Pardon how weird I look. I'm sick, I can't help it. I suppose I could have waited until I looked normal, but I felt like doing this post today.

I've really enjoyed spending yesterday and today outside, it's SO nice and warm! And so obliging of it to be warm when I'm sick! The only thing worse than just being sick is being sick and COLD.

State Tournament pics

Lizzie's already told y'all all about what happened, so I'm just gonna add some pictures of it.

The JV game.

#2 in the state!

Anna & Lizzie

Varsity starting five

tip off

#1 in the state!!

haha

The All-Tournament Team

Adam, Devin, Nick & Anna with the trophy

Anna, Kara & the trophy

Most of the girls and the trophy. :)

So, there y'all go. Congrats, Hawks!!!!!!!

YEAH!!!!!!

Our Varsity boys won the NCHE State Basketball tournament!! And our JV boys got 2nd!! We drove up to Greensboro last night to watch them play. The games were sooooo tense.

JV should have won... the game was really close until the end, when the refs made 3 really bad calls, and the other team made their free throws. The guys were so disappointed, but 2nd is good!! They just knew that they deserved to win... that makes it so much worse. If it had been a lucky break that they made 2nd, then they would have been happy. That was pretty frustrating.

Our Varsity opponent apparently expected to beat us... Before the game, Sarah overheard two of the moms from the other team talking about how easy the game was going to be. It was pretty close for most of the game. We were down by about 10 at one point, and the other team was down by about 20 at another point, but at the end we went into TWO overtimes. At the end of the 4th quarter we were up, and then the other team got the ball, went down and made a shot RIGHT before the buzzer. But at the end of the second overtime, we beat them by 4 points.

I considered trying to take pictures for about one millisecond, but dismissed that idea because in my anxiety, I probably would have destroyed my camera... if I didn't crush it with my bare hands, I would have dropped it, slung it onto the court or at the very least cracked someone in the head with it. Anyway, Sarah took pictures, and she's going to put them on here once she's finished putting them on Facebook...

And of course, we went out to eat afterward to celebrate. We were going to go to Chili's, but they couldn't seat us all together, so we went across the street to Ham's.




They wrote "Hawks" on a napkin for a banner... isn't it great??

The little kids... except for Anna. Don't worry, Anna, we know you were just supervising.





We took up a whole section... this is almost all of the "kids."

A picture of some of the G's... but, Mr. G, where did you go? He *was* in the picture... Oh well. A good picture of the G girls.

Looking at pictures on a camera.

We left the restaurant at about 1 am to drive all the way home... we got home at 2:30 am.

Congratulations guys, you did it!!! w00t!!

~Lizzie