Nearly Christmas!!!

Its nearly Christmas again! I am heading to Nelson for the Christmas holidays this year. We head to Nelson every second year, and spend Christmas with my grandparents. Every Christmas in Nelson, we all (all of us being my parents, sister, grandparents, Mark and Kim and my cousins Hailey, Sharni and Chelsea) stay the day in my grandparents house, and give each other funny nicknames and tell random stories.

We have a few traditions in nelson for Christmas. We always have Italian Christmas food, like meatballs as well as turkey. We also wear our Christmas hats all day (the ones we get in the Christmas crackers). And on Christmas eve, me and Katie end up staying up really late talking, reading and playing games. When we wake up in the morning at about 6am, we wake up our parents and grandparents and we run down the stairs. Katherine has her presents on the left side of the room and I have mine on the right.

When we celebrate Christmas in Wellington we do things a little bit differently. We have two courses of food, an English course (Turkey, potatoes and yorkshire puddings) and then an Italian course (MEATBALLS!). Our Nan comes over and the five of us spend the day together. Me and Katherine open up presents early in the morning and we spend the rest of the day doing stuff with our presents. We always open up our presents first before playing with them/eating them.

This Christmas their are a couple presents I really want like...

• Lots of manga!!! (Hetalia, Alice in the country of hearts, bleach, black butler, pokemon, attack on titan, etc...)
• Rune factory 4, for the 3ds
• Homestuck books
• New Converse
• Chocolate!!!

I hope everyone has an awesome christmas :)

Term 4 Highlights

Hi guys! Its nearly the end of the year, we have just a couple more weeks to go! So, like we usually do at the end of every term, its time for the term 4 highlights. This term we need to make a list of our highlights for others, as well as the usual double page spread.

My term 4 highlights are.......

Japanese: I enjoyed our Japanese topic, and learning more of the language (Because I already knew a lot of words)

Dodgeball: I always enjoy playing dodgeball, its a really fun game that everyone should play!

Passion Project: I loved doing my passion project this term. I decided to create an RPG game, because I love video games and want to be a video game designer

Tech: I enjoyed going to tech every Monday. This term we did sewing and we are still doing cooking (This week is masterchef, me and Samanalie are making my favorite food!)

Research Project: Earlier this term we had to do a research project of a subject of our choice. I chose nintendo, and did a essay on the history of Nintendo, a video of comparing gameplay from multiple gaming systems against nintendo systems. And the last project I did was a powerpoint on the different Nintendo systems (Which I had to accompany with a speech from the top of my head, about each slide, which was easy cause I knew a lot of information)

Speeches: I did my speech on How to Survive the Hunger Games and it was fun to make up my speech.

These are my six highlights for the term. I hope I have given everyone else some ideas they can use too.

Nearly 2015

Next year its 2015 and what does that mean? It means I'm going to college. This was my last year at St Bens (where I have been for about eight years). It seems like this year has gone by so quickly, and I'm not sure that's a good thing.

I will miss everything at st Bens, like the teachers, my friends who aren't going to Wellington Girls and even the school grounds. It will be weird not going to st Bens everyday, even weirder than the first day of school every year (when we are in new classrooms). Its hard to imagine not being here, and even harder to imagine not seeing my classmates everyday.

About half of the girls are going to Wellington girls, so I wont have to miss them too much besides the fact I might not see them as much as I used to. But I will also miss the year sevens that I will no longer see all the time. I'll miss most of the boys too (some more then others lol) because over the years I have become pretty good friends with some of them. Next year at Wellington girls I will have to memorize the layout of the school, and figure out where all my classes are. It might be hard to get used to it.

I am hoping I will have some of my friends in my classes, and I am hoping I can make new friends. I am also hoping I can stay in touch with everyone. I will try and get all my homework done in time next year, as well as trying to manage everything else that I have to do. I'm going to also try and keep updating this blog next year too.

Speeches (Continued)

The week for speeches has come. My speech is written and is about 1 and 3/4 pages long. The speech is how to survive the hunger games, which is actually my third idea for my speech. I thought of it when some one misread the title of my speech as the 'hunger games' when I had wrote horror games (How to survive a horror game).

I did my speech today and was third to last at saying it. The reason being, I was sick yesterday. I felt like I had rushed my speech, because it was only two minutes and forty eightish seconds. I usually speak fast though. Throughout the speech I felt like I was going to muck it up. I was shaking as I started the speech. I tried to keep my voice clear and I tried to vary my voice style as I read my speech. At one point I nearly dropped my cue cards, but I didn't luckily!

I was glad to go near the end, because people would remember my speech in the voting. Lots of people did really good speeches. I really enjoyed Will's ' How To Survive A Zombie Apocalypse', Elizabeth's 'Why I Cant Suvive On 30mins Of Computer Time' and JMK's ' Why Books Are Better Than Movies'. I cant wait to see who gets in to the speech competition!

Book Reviews

This weeks task is to do a book review. I have read so many good books it was hard to pick just one. I have decided to do it on Vampire Academy. Vampire Academy is about a girl called Rose and her friend Lissa, who is a Moroi princess.

There are three types of vampires, Moroi the full vampires who drink blood, avoid sunlight and have magical powers. The second type is Dhampir, who are half Vampire and half human. Dhampirs are stronger than the average human and are to protect the moroi from strigoi. Strigoi are evil, undead, vampires. Moroi can become a strigoi by killing another person by drinking all their blood or a strigoi can turn them.

Rose and Lissa get taken back to an academy called St Vladimir's Academy which they had previously escaped from. Rose has to do extra training sessions to get her strength and fighting techniques back up with a guardian called Dimitri who her fellow class mates call "a god". Mean while she has to protect Lissa, using her bond, which allows her to feel Lissa's emotions and sometimes is able to see what Lissa sees. Lissa isn't coping very well with her unique powers and Rose must help her before its too late.

Rose Hathaway is my favorite character in the series because she is strong and can handle herself. She is annoyed by various girls and takes care of them in her own way, which usually involves some yelling and some smart comments. Rose has thick dark brown hair, brown eyes and is 5"7.

In conclusion you should read Vampire Academy cause its a awesome book series.

Speeches

Every year at St Ben's we have a speech competition. Year 7 and 8's have to write a 3 to 4 minute speech. My speech is called How To Survive The Hunger Games.

I have written about half of my speech. I am kind of excited to give my speech, because I think my speech this year will be good. I am looking forward to saying my speech but I am slightly nervous.

One aspect of presentation I want to focus on is slowly my speech down. I usually speak quite fast so I will need to practice saying my speech slower.

I hope my speech goes well and that i finish it soon.

Cats Eye Nebula

Every second year we do Space as our topic. We had to do a research project on a space object and another thing that was on the scale of the universe 2. I chose the cats eye nebula and charm quarks.

The cats eye nebula is also known as the NGC 6543. It is a planetary nebula, which means it is made of gas not stars. The cats eye nebula is part of the constellation draco which means dragon. This nebula is one of the most complex nebula ever discovered. In the middle of the nebula there is a burning hot star that is suspected to be a binary star. The star lost its outer layer about 1000 years ago which created the nebula.

William Herschel discovered the nebula on the 15th of February 1786. It was the first planetary nebula to have its spectrum investigated. It was investigated by William Huggins in 1864. The nebula is estimated to be about 3300 light years away from earth.

Veronica Roth

We have been doing another research assignment recently and we have to present our information in two different ways. I decided to do a blog post for one of them. My research assignment is on Veronica Roth. Veronica Roth is the author of the divergent series which was published in 2011. Divergent was her first published book. 

Veronica Roth was born in New York in 1988, August 19th. Her mothers family was polish and her grandparents were concentration camp survivors. She grew up in Barrington, Illinois with her older brother, sister, mum and dad. Her parents got divorced when she was five and her mother, Barbra  remarried a man called Frank Ross. When Veronica Roth was in high school she learned about christian religion and has stuck with it since then.

Veronica married Nelson Fitch in 2011, which was the same year she published divergent. Her older siblings lived in Chicago which was an inspiration for where divergent was set. Now she is 26 years old and has recently published her fourth book called Four: a collection of short stories. Her other books include Insurgent which is the sequel to divergent, and Allegiant which is the third book in the series.

Holidays!!!

The Holidays are over and school has started again. It is now term four which will be my last term at St Bens. This reflection is about something we did in the holidays. I'm going to write about going around Westfield and to the movies with my friend Samanalie. First we picked her up from her house and then we drove to Westfield. We all headed to the movie theater first to buy me and Samanalies tickets for the giver. My Mum, my Nan and my sister Katherine went off to look around the shops and stuff, so me and Samanalie went in the opposite direction.

 We started of by heading to EB games. At EB games we looked around at the games and I decided to buy a game for my PS vita called Danganronpa 2:Goodbye despair which is the sequel to one of my favorite games Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc. We then headed to smiggle, where we entered a competition to find these pictures hidden around the store. Once we did that we went to nature discovery, where we looked at all the dinosaur stuff (Because Samanalie is obsessed with dinosaurs). We left after a while and headed to the food court for lunch. We waited in a really long queue for Mcdonalds and we found a table and sat down. We talked about random stuff and we noticed that some of our Mcdonalds food cartons had sticker things on them. There was some sort of monopoly game thing on these where if you collect a whole set of monopoly properties you win a prize.

 We hurried to the movie theater so we could get popcorn before the movie. We noticed my Mum was there and we found out that she, my nan and Katherine were going to Planes: Fire and Rescue. We said goodbye to them and headed upstairs where we sat down trying to avoid a group of kids from a holiday program. We started playing on my phone while we waited for the cinema to open. Once the cinema (Cinema 7) opened we headed in and sat down. We talked about the book version of the giver while we waited for the movie to start. The movie was awesome. Its about a boy called Jonas who lives in a Dystopian future society. In this society peoples lives are decided by the government and they cant choose anything. Jonas is assigned a special job titled the Receiver of memory. He learns about what happened before the society was created. Jonas then plots to run away with a baby called Gabriel to find elsewhere.

When the movie was over we left the cinema and went to the arcade. In the arcade we played many games like motorbike games, air hockey, a submarine game and we played a doodle jump arcade game. We headed to Wendys for some icecream before we headed home.

Production- Final Reflection

The production is now officially over. We had tons of fun learning all the dances, practicing our lines and making our costumes. My favorite bit was acting in room tens flashback scene. I really love acting so I had lots of fun. I hoped I did okay on both nights. On one night Mini Argon and Neon were Grace and Lawrence and the other night it was Niamh and my sister Katherine. Some people were telling me that some people in the audience cried.

This blog post is shorter than normal, mainly because most of it was deleted without me knowing how. I dont remember what I wrote last time so this is it for now.

Production part 2 -Agents of S.P.A.C.E

This week is production week. We are holding it at the theater which is located in Victoria University. On Wednesday, we are going to the university to practice all day because on Wednesday and Thursday night we have our performances.


There are two scenes I am in, in the production. I am in the Cantina scene, which is the first scene. During this scene I am an alien. My costume is a white t-shirt and shorts as a base with a blue top that is cut in places so that it looks alieny. I have different type of blue fabrics tied to my arms and legs to make tentacles. In my other scene I have a black and white dress that is actually my mums and I have her black boots, that she wears everyday.


 My Parents are both coming to the Thursday night show, because my sister is being Mini Neon on that night. My mum is also coming on the Wednesday night to hopefully film it for everyone. I think this might be our best production yet. It is my fourth and last production (My first was Uno's garden, then remember the days, then not another fairy-tale) I have enjoyed learning my lines and acting/dancing in the scenes. I hope everyone that watches us enjoys it as much as I do, doing it.

Elections

The elections are happening soon. So to get ready for the elections we are learning about the elections and politics. New Zealand has its elections, for the party in charge, every three years. Any person over the age of 18 can vote. They can also sign up to become the prime minister. The party officially chooses the prime minister. The national party is in control right now which means that they got to chose the prime minister. They chose John Key as their head of party so that meant he is in command till another party is elected or National decide to change who their head of party is.

Voting is a rather large topic. New Zealand always has its voting day on a Saturday. When people vote they go to a polling booth, which is in usually a school or a hall. People place their votes and at 7pm the votes are counted up. These scores aren't always what they end up to be. Sometimes they do a recount if the votes are close and sometimes people that couldn't make it to the voting booths votes are counted up late. Usually you should wait a few days before celebrating that the party you voted for one, just in case.

Reading Challenges

Every term we get a new set of reading challenges. This term our challenges are to read a book recommended by a family member, to read a book set in space, to read a Classic book, to read three books in a series, to pick a random book off the shelf without looking and read it, and our normal twenty book and ten book challenges.
The first challenge was to read a book recommended by a family member. I started reading the last thirteen series a while ago when my sister started buying the books. She told me to read the next one in the series and I did. Then there is the series challenge. Last term I read Among the Hidden in our book groups. There is actually a lot of books in the series and this term I found them in the library and I started reading them. They are quite short so I can easily finish them in a day but I keep forgetting to bring them to school so I can return them and get the next ones out. I have already done the 10 and twenty book challenge. I can usually finish a medium sized book in a day (like divergent). I read a lot in my spare time and I usually end up rereading my books many many times. It wasn't hard to read more than twenty books by this week (week five) especially since we were allowed to write down five books we read in the holidays on the reading log.

Netball

What is the funnest sport in the world? Some might say basketball or tennis,but I say netball. In netball there are two teams of seven which include a Centre (C), Goal Attack (GA), Goal defense (GD), Wing Attack (WA), Wing Defense (WD), Goal Keep (GK) and Goal Shoot (GS). Both girls and boys can play netball, but it is more common for girls to play netball. You can start netball in year four, which is when I started. When you are younger your position rotates so you can try all the positions, defense and attack ones. As you get older your position becomes a set position. I play goal keep, which means I defend the other teams goal to stop them from getting goals.

The game is split up into four, seven minute, quarters. At the beginning of the game there is a toss. One teams captain picks which hand they want and if that hand has the whistle in it they get to pick either ball first or they can choose which goal they want (these goals swap every quarter). If they don't pick the whistle the other teams captain gets to pick what they want. Once the game starts the team, whose captain chose the ball first in the toss gets the ball to start with. The center starts center circle with the ball they throw the ball to their team mates and they try get it down to their end so they can shoot. Once one of the teams get the ball in the goal post, the other teams center gets the ball and they get to start in the middle.

The court  they are in is split up into three thirds with each of the thirds on the outside containing the goal circle. Only certain positions can go in certain parts of the court. For example Wing Attack cannot go in the goal circle wheres Goal Defense can. Your teams Goal attack cannot cross over the line to the other teams third, this is also the same for a few other positions.

The game wins after the final quarter has had seven minutes and the bell in rung. Once you are finished you do your three cheers for the other team and you line up to high five the other team. Most teams do player of the day after it. Player of the day is a certificate with a voucher to somewhere like a restaurant or a sports shop.

I hope you are considering playing netball after this. Netball is a great sport to play and it helps with your reflexes, teamwork and shooting skills. If you play netball I guarantee you will enjoy it (even if you are a boy).

Production

Every two years we have a production. This year our production is Agents of S.P.A.C.E. I am in two scenes in the production, an alien in the Cantina band scene and The mother in the flashback scene. The Cantina band scene is the first scene. I am working on my costume at the moment. Because I have been away nearly everyone else has already finished. We have already started the dance and we have four more weeks to finish learning it and perfect it. For my other scene I am the mother of Mini Argon and Mini Neon. I have nearly learnt my lines off by heart. This is also my sisters class's scene. I have practiced my lines a lot. I cant wait for the production (which is in four weeks). I will try and help people practice their lines so that they can prepare, as well as me practicing my lines. I will also try to practice the dance with the others so we can all get it perfect.

Music

TH This weeks task is to write about a song that is meaningful to you or a song that you like. I had a hard time on deciding a song to write about because I love listening to music. I listen to it everyday. I finally decided a song called People like us by Kelly Clarkson. I only heard this song a little while ago when I was on a plane from Hong Kong to Auckland. Everyone else was asleep but I was still awake because I have a hard time getting to sleep on planes. I was making a playlist on the little TV in front of me, near the beginning of the flight like I usually do. I was just adding all music I know and I accidentally added a song called 'people like us'. When I went to listen to my playlist when everyone was asleep I heard this song. I listened this song (and a few others) while I read by the light of my torch.
When I had got home (after another hour long flight) I searched up the music video. In the music video its all in black and white except for one girl. She is experimented on because she is the only one in colour. Then a lady comes along (also in black and white) and reveals she is wearing black and white make up. Then they run away. The song is basically saying that people that are different should stick together. I thought the song is really catchy and I have it on my list of songs to buy on iTunes.
 These are the lyrics
Hey… everybody loses it,
Everybody wants to throw it all away sometimes
And hey… yeah I know what you're going through
Don't let it get the best of you, you'll make it out alive
Oh
People like us, we've gotta stick together
Keep your head up, nothing lasts forever
Here's to the damned, to the lost and forgotten
It's hard to get high when you're living on the bottom
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
We are all misfits living in a world on fire
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
Sing it for the people like us, the people like us
Hey, this is not a funeral
It's a revolution, after all your tears have turned to rage
Just wait, everything will be okay
Even when you're feeling like it's going down in flames
Oh
People like us, we've gotta stick together
Keep your head up nothing lasts forever
Here's to the damned, to the lost and forgotten
It's hard to get high when you're living on the bottom
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
We are all misfits living in a world on fire
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
Sing it for the people like us, the people like us
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
You've just gotta turn it up loud when the flames get higher
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
Sing it for the people like us, the people like us
They can't do nothing to you, they can't do nothing to me
This is the life that we choose, this is the life that we bleed
So throw your fists in the air, come out, come out if you dare
Tonight we're gonna change forever
Everybody loses it, everybody wants to throw it all away sometimes
Oh
People like us, we've gotta stick together
Keep your head up nothing lasts forever
Here's to the damned, to the lost and forgotten
It's hard to get high when you're living on the bottom
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
We are all misfits living in a world on fire
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
Sing it for the people like us, the people like us
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
You've just got to turn it up loud when the flames get higher
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
Sing it for the people like us, the people like us
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
We're all misfits living in a world on fire
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
Sing it for the people like us, the people like us
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
You've just got to turn it up loud when the flames get higher
Oh whoa oh oh whoa oh
Sing it for the people like us, the people like us

Pompeii

Today we went to Pompeii. It was the eight of us , Trisha, Niki, Grandma, Granddad, Mum, Dad, Katherine and me. Wee got our train tickets and headed to the train tracks. There were no more seats left so we stood in the area by the entrance carriage. The train was supposed to be 20min long ride and was to stop at 14 stations before it got to Pompeii Scavi. The train ride actually ended up to be about an hour long and it was really stuffy.

When we arrived in Pompeii we waited in line for the tickets and maps. As we entered Pompeii we ended up getting accidentally split up (we found out later that Grandma and granddad were together and Trisha was by her self, though they joined up later). Our group went down to five people, Niki, Mum, Dad, Katie and me. We wondered through the old ruined streets, in and out of roofless buildings and through archways that were crumbling.

One of my favorite things we saw was the Great theatre. It was a round building that had seats (that were like the ones by the stage at school) all around and stairs went down every few metres. To the side of the building there was an arch that led to under the seats. I found some stairs and climbed up to find a platform a few metres in the air. As I walked back down I tripped and collided with the wall. I didn't get (badly) hurt though.

Near the end Katherine started complaining so dad took her to the café by the entrance. Me, Mum and Niki went to visit the Amphitheatre. We walked inside and saw a giant circle surrounded by a wall with seats on top. It reminded me of the Westpac Stadium. I decided to stand in the middle of the Amphitheatre and do a 360 panorama. I got my feet a little wet but that was ok because the water was really warm and it was a hot day so my shoes dried fast.

We also saw the bodies of the people that tried to escape Pompeii thousands of years ago. It's hard to imagine what these people must of been thinking  when the volcano exploded. There would of been 20,000 people living there before the volcano exploded in 79AD.

We headed over to the café were Katie and dad were. Soon all 8 of us were sitting at a table. I had some chips a couple of pieces of chicken and a sugar donut. Then we left for the train.

I thought everything was amazing especially the artwork on the floors, walls and ceilings.
I'm sorry there are not any photos but I am now in Rome and the Wi-Fi here is not that great. You don't now how long it took to load blogger. When I can I will post photos.
I hope everyone is great over in NZ.
-Rebecca

Italy

At the moment I am half way around the world in Sorrento, Italy. When I left last Friday I left to go to the air port at 8am. We headed to Auckland (2 hour flight) then waited around Auckland airport for about an hour and ate Mcdonalds. Then we went on the 12 hour flight to Hong Kong. When we arrived in Hong Kong we had two hours of time to waste so we had Mcdonalds again. Then we had to go on a 15 hour flight to Rome. Rome was beautiful and had copper roads and old fashioned buildings. A few trains, buses and a shuttle later we made it to Italy on Saturday. Just to let you know the time difference in Italy is 14 hours (e.g. if its 5am in NZ its 7pm here).

On our first day in Italy me and my sister Katherine had a bet that whoever sees grandma and granddad first gets a high five (from me). I won this bet (at least that's what I think). We went around saying high to everyone one that day (Andrew, Sanne, granddad, grandma etc...). I also had the most delicious Italian cheese pizza.

On the second day we looked around the town. First we headed to a restaurant in the square where I had a really delicious chocolate chip cookie. Then we headed to a shop that sold these lovely music boxes with intricate patterns and paintings of Sorrento. I chose one with a castle like building on it. I also got a blue leather bracelet with a big bead in the middle of two, small, crystal rings. After wandering around for a while I spotted a Gelato shop (icecream in Italian). I chose a vanilla (vanilla) gelato. It was about 12pm then so we got lunch at a café across the road. I had steak and chips.

Then there was today which is my third day here. Today was my Uncle Andrew and his fiancée Sanne (who is Danish). At 3pm I got in my purple bridesmaids dress and did my hair up into a French plait. The wedding planner came and knocked on the door and gave me and Katherine the bouquets.
It started spitting a bit as we walked to where the wedding was to be held. My mum and dad went inside and Katherine, Sanne and me waited outside while we took photos and were given instructions. All we had to do was walk down the isle in front of Sanne. The music started and Katherine and I walked down the isle slowly while Sanne walked a couple of metres behind is. The ceremony was really sweet ♥. After Andrew and Sanne signed the papers we had like one HUNDRED photos. My face started to hurt after a while. We headed over to the hall for the reception party. The speeches were hilarious especially Ricky's one (which was read by Francis).

When Sanne and Andrew cut the cake Sanne put a bit in Andrews mouth and Andrew put a bit on Sanne's face. Everyone was laughing and taking photos. When it was 10pm the music started and the first dance was Sanne and Andrew. It was a Danish tradition that people would stand in a circle and clap while the Bride and Groom stood in the centre dancing and the people in the circle will slowly make the circle smaller then the bride and the groom would kiss. This is what they did but when they finished a someone picked Andrew up (I have no idea how...) hung him upside down while another dude took of his shoes and cut holes in the bottom of his socks. Then about five people started throwing him into the air.

It's 10:48pm right now and there is a lot of thunder and lightning. For some reason this has happened every night I have been here.
I hope you guys are all good. Please tell me about everything that is happening at the moment and stuff that I have missed (in extreme detail).
See you guys in a month
-Rebecca

What I have learned this week

For this weeks task's I needed to write about something I have learnt this week. I decided to write about the new rules for angles that we have learnt in geometry.
The first one is that corresponding angles are always equal. This means that if there was a straight line with two lines going through it a few cm apart, The angle just under the top line on the right side would be the same as the angle just under the bottom line on the right side.
The second rule we learnt were alternate angles. So there is the line with the two lines going through it again. The angle on the bottom of the top line on the left side would be the same as the angle on the top of the bottom line on the right side.
The third and the last rule we learnt about was co-interior angles. We have that line with the two lines again but this time we have the angle on the top of the bottom line on the right and the angle on the bottom of the top line on the right. These angles should add up to 180 degrees.
I will most likely remember these but I may forget the names. I usually remember stuff if maybe I was listening or thinking of a song while doing something about the thing I need to remember. Then whenever I think or hear the song it reminds me of whatever I needed to remember.

Book Groups

We have finished book groups now. I was in Among the hidden 1. I was in a book group with my friends Samanalie, William and Calvin. I have been sick the past few days so I have missed the last two book groups. The others have already finished the book but I will definitely finish it today. I made sure I had my book every time. We eventually unlocked crackers at the fourth to last book group. When you unlock crackers you can lose them but my group didn't lose them.

Unfortunately everyone in my book group read at different speeds. I have always been a fast reader and I am able to read books like Divergent in a day. Each chapter was only a few pages  long so when we read only three chapters I finished it in the same day of that book group. Some people had lots of after school activities too, so the amount of chapters we read decreased even more.

I really enjoyed doing book groups and I thought it was a great idea to get people to read different books. I had been meaning to get among the hidden out from the library for a now, so even if I wasn't in Among The Hidden 1 I probably would of read it anyways. I will definitely get the rest of the series out from the library and I will try finish it before I go away.

My Favourite Book When I Was Little

This week is book week so we have many book related tasks.  One task is to write about a book we loved to read when we were little. Since my favorite animal is a cat I used to read a book called Magic Kitten a lot. I only had one book from the series called a splash of forever but I had read other ones that I got out from the Library. The book was about a kitten called Flame that was really a Magic Lion Prince. Flame's uncle (who is also a lion) was trying to kill Flame so flame had to transform into a white and grey kitten and hide in the human world. He met a girl called Alice that had moved to a new school. Alice's class had been told that they were going to have a swimming gala and swimming lessons. She was a great swimmer but people at her old school teased her about it so she pretended she couldn't swim. Alice's Mum had a rule that Alice and her brother weren't allowed pets so flame used his magic to make himself invisible around everyone but Alice. Alice ends up showing everyone how good a swimmer she was because a boy had kicked Flame into the pool and Alice went to save him. Everything ended when Alice won the swimming Gala and Flame had to go back home because his uncles spies had found him.  I never got tired of that book and I used to read it constantly along with other things like Jacqueline Wilson, Rainbow Fairies and Judy Moody. Now I read more books like Divergent, Cherub and Vampire Academy.

Review

During the holidays I got a new 3DS game called Etrian odyssey IV. It was an RPG game where you were an adventure team. It sort of reminded me of Pokemon Mystery dungeon. When your playing the game you go through many dungeons to complete missions. When you step on a square you have a chance to get attacked by monsters. When going through the dungeons there are powerful monsters that roam around. They move every time you move so you have to have a strategy to get around them. The game has a map on the bottom screen which you draw yourself. Since it gets confusing the map allows you to put walls up for the ways to go and little symbols to point out things like stairs, doors and where you are supposed to go. I like this game because it is fun and strategic.

Mission Fair

Last week we had the mission fair. I was in a group with Elizabeth, Ben and Jmk. Our stall was in the room off the staff room. We were selling fudge, Popcorn, hot chips and we had a raffle. I was in charge of bringing the fudge, the popcorn machine and popcorn kernels, salt and butter, the raffle booklets, the cups and some money for the chips. I was sick for the two days before the mission fair which was the Tuesday and the Wednesday. Ben brought the prizes for the raffle as well as some of the money for the chips. Elizabeth and Jmk brought some money as well. When I got to school I asked the others if they had the stuff they needed. They said yes and asked where my mum was. I asked them why they wanted my mum and they replied that she was suppose to buy the chips. Originally on Monday we decided Elizabeth's mum would buy the chips. But Ben and Jmk couldn't remember who was buying the chips and Elizabeth was sure that my mum was buying the chips. In the end we asked Penny our Librarian to run down to the fish and chips shop with us. The mission fair was fun to run. On my 5min break I went to my little sisters stall to shoot nerf guns. We raised $148.90 for our stall. If we ever do something like this again in year 9 we should call each other up more to organize it. We should also spread out who's bringing what because i ended up bringing a lot of stuff.

What I like to do at home

When I have free time at home I like to play Sims 3. I got it for Christmas with Two expansion packs which were pets and generations. I now own almost all the expansion packs including Supernatural, seasons, island paradise, into the future, pets, generations. I am only missing four. I like to decorate the houses. I find it really fun to just design rooms. It takes me forever to design and make a whole house and decorate it. I also like choosing sims outfits and hairstyles. My friend Ayla and I both like sims. We talk about it quite a lot.
 Does anyone else play sims?

Statistics

We have just finished our statistics topic in maths. We are now moving on to number and rounding. In stats I think I have improved on my graphs and charts and have learnt more different graphs like box and whisker graphs. I think writing everything down got me to memorize everything like all the new graphs I have learnt and how to do them.

OPC Camp!!!

We just got back from OPC camp last Friday.  I think the most challenging thing we did at camp was going through the small gap at the bottom of the cave while we were caving.It was half submerged in water and it was a very tiny gap and the rocks were pointy. The thing that was the easiest was the flying fox we did over the river. It was so fun zipping down the wire then flying into the air at the end.
It was really fun like I expected. My favorite moment was doing either abseiling (a 35m vertical cliff so epic), kayaking/canoeing (I had a turn with both I loved it) and the great seaweed fight (We all ended up with seaweed and mud in our hair lol ).

New Blog

If you want to check out my new blog which I will be my personal blog go to
Rebeccasveryepicblog.BlogSpot.com
This blog will stay my school one

Swimming

For swimming this term I am in canoeing . During the first week we have been working on getting out of canoe once they have been tipped over. Then we started learning how to steer the canoes with our hands by going round in circles. I think I am getting better at steering the canoe round in bigger circles instead of going round on the spot. I have only had two lessons so far because I missed the third. I enjoy canoeing because I used to do it when I was little with my grandparents in the river by their house in Nelson. I haven't done it for many years and it is great to do it again. I hope everyone else enjoys their swimming lessons as much as I enjoy mine.

Can't wait for camp!!!

Camp is coming in week 6!!! I am really excited for camp. I am most excited about caving. I have been caving  and tubing before and it was so fun. I cant wait to do it again. I am not really worried about anything. Probably the thing I should worry about most is getting carsick on the way their and back. I have been going to Kathmandu a lot lately. My sister likes to pronounce it Ka-th-man-du just to annoy me. We have gotten cool new shoes, thermals, jackets etc... I am finding it a little annoying having to do practical tasks when I am busy. For example trying to work on my blog that you are reading now when mum calls "Rebecca come set the table!" and then I forget about my blog and have to try and figure out what I was writing when I went to set the table. I also have to fit in a 15 min go on the treadmill and netball practice for the netball trials which our happening just before camp.

2014!!!

It's a new year and school has started again. We have only been away for six weeks but quite a lot of things have changed. There are only small changes but they still are changes. For instance we have new wall coverings on the walls that are blue and green. Its surprising how small things can change the room a lot. The second thing is that the rubbish bin is in a different place. I know it seems silly but I still walk over to where the rubbish bin used to bin and end up walking away embarrassed. The most weird thing about this year though is that all last years year eights are gone. Its funny how you get used to your class and you can tell who's in your class by looking at them. I have only just gotten used to this years class.

Being a year eight does add a lot of responsibility to school because we are now the oldest in the school. the best bit about being a year eight might just be sitting on the chairs. Now we no longer have to sit squashed up on the ground with pins and needle in our legs! Everyone always enjoys dodge ball during the year. I find it really fun even though we play it nearly every day it is always fun. We played the best game of dodge ball against the year sevens during the first week of school.  I guess it wasn't really fair on the year sevens because we kind of smashed them but it was awesome!

I am a little sad that it is our last year at St Benedict's but I am going to make the most of it. After being at this school for most of my life it will be weird to leave so I hope this year doesn't go by to fast like last year.