Tallyn's Bard

So much has happened or it feels like it anyway! I haven’t had time to write on my blog. So here’s an update.

First the National Open. It was amazing! It was like living in a dream because everything happened and it was all amazing. Almost… that’s what made it real life instead of a dream :)

The worst thing that happened at the tournament was on the first day. It was after the last debate round. Paul Adkisson said good bye to Beth and I. I asked him why he was leaving, because there was still another speech round left. Beth said that all the speech rounds were over and then I completely freaked out because I’d only done my DI once that day and I thought I must have missed a round. Then they showed me that the DI pattern was only once that day. But while it lasted it was the absolute worst moment. I felt like I was dead

I wonder if anyone’s actualy done that… skipped their speech, just like that…

There so many best moments that I can’t think of just one. Most moments were best moments. Katy and I both broke for our first times and it was awesome!!!!! I was so happy:) The whole tounament was amazing. When Avery won it was even more amazingness.

So after coming home from the most amazing tounament ever my sister had her birthday party. She’s ten and I’m still in shock

The next day it snowed and that was really fun. The snow makes everything different. It’s just like everything any book has ever describd it. It’s like a blanket. It covers everything ugly and it makes places I’ve known all my life look new. It crunches under your feet and it lands on your toungue and eyelashes. It’s realy cold too! We built a snow fort. We had a snowball fight. We attempted to build a snowman, and we made lots of snow angels all over the yard. It was really fun

It was four inches deep but it doesn’t look like a whole lot because my Dad took those pictures when it first started snowing.

Other than doing lots of school that’s what’s been happening. I covered that in a realy short blog post. I’m impressed. Well until I post agian… God bless you!

                                     ~Anna =)

As I’m getting ready for the National Open, I thought I would post some of my favorite Winnie the Pooh quotes.

Just because an animal is large, it doesn’t mean he doesn’t want kindness; however big Tigger seems to be, remember that he wants as much kindness as Roo.
– Winnie the Pooh
Tigger is probably my favorite Winnie the Pooh character because he’s so BOUNCY

Promise me you’ll never forget me because if I thought you would I’d never leave.
– Winnie the Pooh

If there ever comes a day when we can’t be together keep me in your heart, I’ll stay there forever.
– Winnie the Pooh

If you live to be 100, I hope I live to be 100 minus 1 day, so I never have to live without you.
If ever there is tomorrow when we’re not together.. there is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. But the most important thing is, even if we’re apart. I’ll always be with you.
– Winnie the Pooh

Some people care too much, I think it’s called love.
– Winnie the Pooh
I used to believe in forever . . . but forever was too good to be true.
– Winnie the Pooh

People who don’t Think probably don’t have Brains; rather, they have grey fluff that’s blown into their heads by mistake.
– Winnie the Pooh

It is more fun to talk with someone who doesn’t use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like “What about lunch?”
– Winnie the Pooh
 Oh I love Winnie the Pooh…

My spelling is Wobbly. It’s good spelling but it Wobbles, and the letters get in the wrong places.
– Winnie the Pooh

Don’t underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering.
– Winnie the Pooh

I am a Bear of Very Little Brain, and long words bother me.
– Winnie the Pooh

If the person you are talking to doesn’t appear to be listening, be patient. It may simply be that he has a small piece of fluff in his ear.
– Winnie the Pooh

When late morning rolls around and you’re feeling a bit out of sorts, don’t worry; you’re probably just a little eleven o’clockish.
– Winnie the Pooh

When looking at your two paws, as soon as you have decided which of them is the right one, then you can be sure the other one is the left.
– Winnie the Pooh

When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it.
– Winnie the Pooh

You can’t stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes.
– Winnie the Pooh

Sometimes, if you stand on the bottom rail of a bridge and lean over to watch the river slipping slowly away beneath you, you will suddenly know everything there is to be known.
– Winnie the Pooh

Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day.
– Winnie the Pooh
I don’t see much sense in that,” said Rabbit. “No,” said Pooh humbly, “there isn’t. But there was going to be when I began it. It’s just that something happened to it along the way.
– Winnie the Pooh

I LOVE Winnie the Pooh. He is so awesome!

Good luck at the tounament. If you don’t find enjoyment inreading pages of quotes… well good luck to you too!

      ~Anna

They’re funny things, Accidents. You never have them till you’re having them.
– Winnie the Pooh

I know this is a little late… but better late than never, right?

ARC performed and was outstanding! Yay ARC!

Paul the Bear

This is from Nathan’s camera… He has amazing skills with catching “the moment.”

     The moisture from our breath gathered on the car windows, enclosing us, so that we couldn’t see the shapes of cars and people outside, only the lights of a police car flashing red… blue… red…blue… It almost looked purple inbetween the red and the blue. The moments seemed to crawl by as I tried to stop myself from falling asleep. A climactic ending to the stress, joy, excitment, nervousness, and hyperness of the past few days at the tournament.

     So now that I have your attention (hopefuly). It was an AWESOME tournament! I actually remembered to bring my camera too, but I didn’t take any pictures… no not one It was a very fun trip up and I got to see Josie who I haven’t seen in a very long time.

       First day of the tounament was awesome, and so was the second All my debate rounds were really fun and I never didn’t have something to say; but sometimes I didn’t have enough time to say it all; but I usually did. They were some of the most fun debate rounds I’ve ever done so that was fun. Impromptu was fine filled I up my time for the first speech, almost filled it up on the second, and the third was two minutes under time, but the third was the only one that I got something other than fifth and below on! Anyway I thought that was weird, but maybe they were just happy that I’d stopped talking and wanted me to know that. All my other speeches went fine. I didn’t break in debate or speech but oh well at least it was a fun tournament Though I would have liked it to be a fun tournament and broken! So I did get a speaker award and I was really surprised. It was the 32nd which is the lowest one you can get That made me laugh.

     ARC did really well! All these awesome people broke and made it to double octafinals, octafinals, quarterfinals, semis, and my awesome brother made it to finals! And Toni came the second day which was so cool! So it was fun and I could repeat those four words in a continuous line for a long time but I’ll save you the trouble. If and when some nice person sends me pictures I’ll post those! =)

So my Mom and I were coming back from the tournament (my brother was spending the night with some friends in Houstan) abd we stopped at a grocery store and then when we were pulling out of the parking lot a car sped up right behind us. It barely touched our bumper and then swerved into a tree at the side of the road. Forgeting we were in Houstan my Mom pulled into the parking lot to get out and help them. The driver pressed on the gass and sped off down the road out of sight with the whole front of the car crushed in. So we decided to just keep going on our way since there didn’t seem much else to do. A few blocks up we came upon the car pulled up at the side of the road, smoking. My mom pulled up a ways in front of it and called the police. The police came and it turned out that they were two drunk drivers. So we spent about two hours waiting for them to be done with their investigation and all. We went to bed at three in the morning and I was completely exhausted the next day. Thinking about it, we came really close to being hit.

So some cool things that have happened recently that I haven’t blogged about:

My violin teacher is letting me borrow her mandolin and I’m so very happy!!!

There is the March for life on Saturday and you should go to it if you can =)

Then there is also a youth group retreat on Saturday!

Miriam gave me a sea star she got in Florida and thinking about it makes me happy… *sigh* 

I’ve been playing a lot of music recently.

I have an HI to write before another tournament next week.

Come to think of it the fact that we have to go to a tournament next week should be a point all by itself.

I’m completly lost at the thought of debate.

I don’t know what to do to prepare for apolegetics except write more cards which I very well may not use.

Here is a brilliant idea for impromptu: write a list of all the books you’ve read recently and then write out all the scenes, incidents, intresting events that happened in them and read it over before you go in to every impromptu room.

I read my really short NaNo novel from this past November and I love it! I think it’s the best story I’ve ever written even though it’s only seven pages long as of yet…

I also did a lot of school this week and I just wrote two essays (rather short ones)

I am finished with my ramblings for the time present!

Have a wonderful week! God bless you!

                           ~Ness

I was awarded! Thank you Katy

The rules:

1. I practiced violin yesterday for a long time

Walking through the city down the sidewalk passing by stores, T J max, Justice, Target. Making my way through pushing shoving crowds of people. Christmas shopping. There was someting about everyones faces something I’ve always seen in the faces of people in the city. A blankness, off in their own world. Brooding on the past or worrying about the future, I can’t tell. But I think that the main thing is they aren’t in the present.

I notice this expression a lot among shoppers in the city but really I’ve come to realize that I see it everywhere to some degree, and I’ve felt it on my own face. So many people don’t live in the present.

Thinking about the future. A busy schedule, trying to figure out how everyone is going to get the party: who’s going with who. Other times we are dreaming, imagining, lost in our future dreams; traveling the world.

Sometimes it’s the past. Replaying a scene over and over. Hurting inside about something that happened to you, lacking the ability to forgive.

Both thoughts of the future and thoughts of the past go hand in hand. A thoughtless act, what will those people think?

So many minutes out of our life we are not living in the present. As people grow older they are less and less in the present. Remember “Become as a little child” ? Maybe part of that is living in the present. Not taking things for granted but enjoying every moment.

It’s really much harder than it seems, to live in the present.

It takes the faith to trust inGod.          

It takes the courage to forgive and forget.

It takes the concentraition to control your own thoughts

It takes the strength to pray

It takes the ability to love people the way God loves us, even if we can immitate him to only the smallest degree.

The future is coming no matter what we do, we can’t change that.

 Can’t make it go faster: thinking of the future.  Can’t make it go backwards: thinking of the past. . As C.S. Lewis put it:                                                                                                                    

“The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of 60 minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is”

Thinking in the future is a habit. If all we think about is being a teenager when we’re ten then when we won’t have enjoyed being ten, and when were a teenager we will only think about going to college, instead of enjoying highschool, and when we reach college we won’t  be enjoying it, rather we’ll be thinking of when we get married, and when we get married we’ll only think of when we have children, and when there are children we’ll only wait till they are old enough to speak and not cry and when they are older we can’t wait till they are out of the house and we don’t have to worry about what time Sally’s basketball and Bobby’s piano lesson. At some point as an old man or and old woman it will catch up to you: a wasted life. A life of always looking ahead and never enjoying the moment.

In the Bible it says:

This is the day the Lord has made let us rejoice and be glad in it.

psalm118:24

Have you ever met someone who lives in the present 100% , who laughs, who hears, who speaks and thinks as if this may be his last moment here on earth?

I have and it was inspiring, it inspired this post.

Live as though this may be your last day. The Bible calls us to be watchful. For the second coming will be when no one will expect it.

Again another quote from my favorite author, C.S. Lewis. “Where except in the present can the Eternal be met?”

Certainly not in our broodings of the past or ponderings of the future.

Living each moment as if it was the last: that is what changes lives for the better.

Happy New Years!

God Bless you!

                   ~Ness

Good bye 2009!

You were a truly amazing year!

I’ve made so many friends and had so many good times, I’ve learned so much, I feel so old =)

Happy New Year!!!

Welcome 2010!

   ~Ness

Christmas time is so busy. We’ve had two concerts and my piano recital as well as going to my friend MIriam’s voice concert. She had a beautiful solo with the highschool choir, it was an awesome concert. We also had another orchestra concert we went to as well as our annual church play which I got play music in =) I don’t have any pictures from that because they all came out blurry.

This is a picture from our Christmas orchestra concert.

Here’s a picture of the Messiah concert. I’m all the way at the back of the violin section on the outside

Piano recital, my hands are all blurred

My piano teacher and I, afterwards.

That’s all for now!

Merry Christmas!

 ~Ness

It snowed!

Rather it’s snowing!

I went outside and this little tiny snow flake landed on me and I watched it as each little bit of it melted on my sweater… If you lived anywhere else besides Texas you wouldn’t think twice about it. After all it was a snow flake here and a snow flake there… but it’s snow!!

We went out back, the kids had left the sand box open and when it rained a couple days ago it had filled up with water. Now it’s frozen over with a layer of ice. I’m so excited. Well I have to go but I thought it was worth a blog post.

There I’m happpy!

Now you know.

                 ~Anna