01.21.08
Posted in Books at 12:26 am by Meg
We went to see this over the weekend. It’s been on our ‘to see’ movie list since it came out but between sickness and college applications, we didn’t see as many movies over the holidays as we had hoped.
Umm, let me give you a little background about me and this book.
I read it first when I was about Girl’s age. I’m not sure, but I know I picked it up off of my brother’s bookcase and he went off to college when I was 12. So, it was probably that year that I went into his room and started looking for things to read on his shelves.
I really, really liked it. In fact, in the 30ish years since I originally read it I have periodically cleaned out paperback books and gotten rid of them, but of the (maybe?) half dozen that I have continued to haul around, this one is still with me.
I’m not sure, but it probably gave me my love of vampire stories. (And if that statement doesn’t make sense from seeing the movie, then you can probably guess where I’m going.)
I introduced the book to Hubby. He was flying somewhere and wanted a smaller book to slip into a shirt pocket. He came home talking about all the people who had seen the title peeking out and had stopped him to tell him how much they liked the book.
Boy read it a few months ago when we first heard about the movie coming out (and it never came back to my shelves) and Girl has it now.
So we saw the movie. Now I have a love/hate relationship with movies made from books I know and like. I love that they are doing it/I hate what they end up doing.
Okay, stop here if you haven’t seen the movie and plan on it, and you’d probably ought to stop if you plan on reading the book.
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
01.20.08
Posted in COLLEGE, The nuts and bolts of it at 10:46 am by Meg
Boy has a bad habit of not opening mail that isn’t connected to family or his hobbies. The mail gets dumped on the edge of our fireplace (it’s raised off the floor) unopened.
So, I’m trying to do some picking up and collecting college stuff into the folder we set up and I ask for the acceptance stuff from IU (Bloomington - we are in Indiana, so it is our state university). “What?”
He had received an email from them telling him that they were accepting him for next year, so he NEVER opened the offer!
It turned out he had both a letter from IU and their incoming freshman packet - unopened.
The freshman packet included the expected acceptance, but surprise, surprise - they were offering him a 4 yr. - $8,000 per year (which is about in-state tuition) merit scholarship!
The letter was an invitation to join their honors college and an application to apply for special honor scholarships (with a due date of Feb. 2).
Am I a little frustrated?
Anyway, for anyone still trying to wrap their brain around ‘doing’ high school. I want to make clear that he received these offers based on SAT scores (he missed Indiana merit semi-finalist status by one point on the PSAT), 2 AP scores, and a thorough description of what he did for each high school course. He had only 3 ‘graded’ courses on his transcript - two of them were with a local homeschool group (while we were in NM for that one year) that paid people to teach classes and the other was driver ed. Everything else was listed pass/fail.
Permalink
01.17.08
Posted in Meme at 3:12 pm by Meg
I saw this over on Jane’s blog and it seemed like fun.
Let me know if you care to do it.
Two names you go by: Meg and Margaret
Two things you are wearing right now: Jeans (you rarely see me out of them) and a yellow sweatshirt with pink flowers on the front.
Two of your favorite things to do: Talk with my family and read
Two things you want very badly: healthy kids and more time
Two favorite pets you have had/have: Pirate Gold, my horse during high school, and Hunter, Boy’s dog
Two people you think will fill this out: Probably Kim, maybe Frankie
Two things you ate today: Bagel and a Dove Chocolate
Two people you last talked to today: Girl and Boy
Two things you’re doing tomorrow: taking Girl to her music lesson and going to the library for our group’s regular get-together.
Two longest car rides: Providence, RI to Pomona, CA in 1989 and Maryland to San Jose, CA via I-10 (going through Fl and across the southern route) in 1996 or 97
Two favorite holidays: Christmas and Easter
Two favorite beverages: Alcoholic–a white Russian. Non-alcoholic: Coke
Permalink
Posted in Life, the Universe and All that Jazz at 10:10 am by Meg
For anyone who likes looking at old pictures,
The Library of Congress has set up a Flickr account and started downloading their catalog.
It’s pretty darn neat.
Permalink
Posted in Scholarships, Contests, Reading programs and the like at 8:50 am by Meg
Any high school aged kids want a chance to get published?
Sylvan Dell Publishing is hosting a 2nd annual Picture Book Writing Competition for Homeschooled Students!
Sylvan Dell owners, Lee and Donna German, homeschooled their three daughters and, inspired by their own experience, wish to continue nurturing creative freedom among homeschooled students. This competition is open to any homeschooled student at the high school level. The winning author will receive $200 and serious consideration for publication.
Students wishing to submit manuscripts should follow the submissionguidelines posted on the Sylvan Dell Web site. Here’s a brief summary of the guidelines:
Eligibility: Homeschooled students working at a high school level.
Manuscripts should subtly convey an educational theme through warm, engaging story. Sylvan Dell’s current catalog focuses on teaching science and math through literature.
Manuscripts should be written for one of the following age ranges: 3 to 7, 4 to 8, 5 to 9, or 6 to 10. Authors should be mindful of age-appropriate words.
Manuscripts should not exceed 1,500 words. Picture books are typically less than 1,000 words, so novels and short stories will not be considered. As this is a writing competition, illustrations will not be accepted.
Electronic submission only. Manuscripts must be attached to an e-mail message as a Word document. Submission e-mails should be sent only to MaggieStuart between March 1 and March 31, 2008, with “Homeschool Writing Contest Submission”; and the manuscript title in the subject line. Students must include their name, date of birth and contact information in the e-mail. Do your children qualify? Read the complete submission guidelines to find out!
Permalink
Posted in The creative side of life at 12:16 am by Meg
Do you remember that our group performed A Midsummer Night’s Dream last year?
Well, I don’t think I’ve mentioned that we are in rehearsals to do another play by Shakespeare for this year. If everything goes as planned, we’ll be performing A Comedy of Errors in mid-April.
Yeah, you did hear a question in that. We are in the midst of finding a location to perform the play. Last year we did two performances - one at a local retirement home with a stage in their community room and then a second at an aged theater owned and run by the local men’s barbershop chorus.
I’m waiting for an answer from the retirement home on whether they want us to return, keep your fingers crossed! But the hang up is that the theater is excited to have us come back, but….. they want us to have liability insurance. YUCKO.
So, I’m in the midst of talking to the 4H agent (most of the kids are members and I’m fine with signing the rest up if we need to) about whether the 4H’s liability might cover us, and talking to an insurance agent about what event insurance might cost us, and looking for a back-up location.
I’ve found a back-up location at a local community center that’s run by the city, but they want to charge us to use it for one night. Not sure of the price (because they are in the midst of resetting those) but it may be as high as $300. And we have no budget.
So to cover that, or the insurance, we’ll need to collect some money some where. So, we’re discussing asking some local businesses to support us and pay our fees (the shows are free, so there’s no income there) - who wouldn’t want to support a youth-based Shakespeare company? or trying to do a bake sale or something to raise it.
Any way you slice it, I got some fun news this evening. Step-mom is making plane tickets to come up and see the show! Now I just have to get the show there.
Permalink
01.14.08
Posted in Meme at 2:08 pm by Meg
For the record, I didn’t like a lot of the options. I even skipped a question or two because neither answer was even close.
Your Political Profile:
|
Overall: 45% Conservative, 55% Liberal
Social Issues: 25% Conservative, 75% Liberal
Personal Responsibility: 50% Conservative, 50% Liberal
Fiscal Issues: 100% Conservative, 0% Liberal
Ethics: 0% Conservative, 100% Liberal
Defense and Crime: 50% Conservative, 50% Liberal
|
How Liberal Or Conservative Are You?
Permalink
Posted in COLLEGE, The nuts and bolts of it at 12:12 pm by Meg
Okay, I’m willing to admit that I’m not happy with Collegeboard over the AP test last summer, but that was straighten out and the test is finally done and over.
So now we are dealing college applications and financial aid forms.
Now I have no problems with Collegeboard charging a fee to take one of their tests. I know that getting the moderators in place and scoring the things cost time and money.
And I really don’t mind that after the 4 free reports that they’ll send, they charge to send additional reports. Processing that paperwork does take time and someone to push buttons.
But dealing with PROFILE has me grumbling at them once again.
Colleges want applicants to jump through hoops when you apply for financial aid. If they could get you send them the kitchen sink, they’d probably want it. And everyone wants you to fill out and send them a copy of FAFSA.
It’s a pain, but it’s fair.
And it’s FREE!
But handful of colleges also want you to fill out PROFILE. I’m not sure if the questions between the two are truly different, but they seem really similar (we’ve filed PROFILE, but not FAFSA yet).
PROFILE is handled by the Collegeboard, and guess what?
THEY CHARGE YOU TO FILL IT OUT ($9) AND THEN CHARGE YOU TO SEND IT TO EACH SCHOOL THAT WANTS IT ($16)
Am I out of line thinking that this is too much?
Permalink
« Previous entries · Next entries »
