Hi my dears. In about an hour I'm leaving for the airport to go to Nebraska, where I'm spending the rest of my break. The reason is that I'm going is to visit my grandparents, and if you think that I'd be happy to see them after going two years without it, you'd be wrong. By way of a vague explanation, my grandparents and I disagree on almost everything. But I guess that's how it should work, seeing that I've grown up in the middle of the U.S.'s most diverse city and they've spent their whole lives in a town in the middle of nowhere with a population of 1200. I always start these trips trying to avoid any drama, but forget it after they insult my views enough. They just have this idea of the way it's "supposed to be" and get really pissed off at me when I act like an "elite northerner" (yeah they've actually used those words). And I just learned that my dad told them a couple of things about my past that I didn't want him to.. it's not like I was pregnant or in jail or anything, but it's things that I didn't want told to my grandparents who don't really care about me and are definitely going to change the atmosphere of my whole visit. So I know it's going to be a horrible trip, I'm just trying to figure out ways to keep it from getting even worse.

I doubt I'll be able to post in NE, and if I am I doubt I'll have anything to post about. But then again I could be totally wrong, my grandparents could let me blog and be totally supportive and understanding of me and this trip could be the best ever! Pigs could fly or whatever. I still am not setting my expectations too high though.

Hope you're all enjoying your winter breaks! I really really appreciate all the new comments and will be commenting back as soon as I have time.

the day after

Afternoon dears, hope you all had spectacular Christmases. I definitely did! It was nice to see everyone in my family so happy. Even my cat shared the looove by sitting on my lap, for the first time ever!
Also, my father is a dork who enjoys wearing Christmas light necklaces.

After opening presents we basically just cooked all morning and afternoon until dinner was ready. Lots of baked squash and gingerbread cake were eaten. Then we got to play with our presents! I didn't get that many this year because I didn't ask for that many, which is fine by me. But a few of my favorites are:

Wii Fit!
It's so fun and addicting, even if it's a bit rude sometimes. It said my fitness age was 36, not nice!

Sealing wax.
Am I the only person who thinks that this is the coolest thing ever? So antique and nostalgic. I'm bringing back the art of letter writing.

This skirt!
As I said before, I couldn't really think of much I wanted this year, so I just gave my mom the link to my Etsy favorites page. She picked out this skirt and another necklace, excellent choices. The color combination on the skirt is sooo perfect, she knows me well!

Now I'm left with that sinking feeling I get every year after Christmas is over, so I'm trying to stay distracted. If any of you want to tell me how your Christmases went that would be great, I'd love to read them!

advent calendar adventures!

Hi blog land, merry Christmas eve! Today's post is going to be about the advent calendar that my sister and I share. Each part of it was handmade by my grandfather, down to the tiny little ornaments and shingles. He gave it to us about eight years ago, I think, back when he didn't have arthritic hands and wasn't as.. up tight, as he is now. I shouldn't have waited until the 24th for this post, since this advent calendar is one of my favorite parts of Christmas and has a lot of memories behind it.

Most of the time my mom fills the drawers with your typical Christmas chocolates and mints, but on some days she puts little notes in them that give clues as to where our treats are hiding. Today I got a note which said, "Could Ponce de Leon have been right? Let's go see..." So that left me thinking, What? Who? Who is Ponce de Leon? But then I remembered that a couple years ago when we went to Florida, we learned that de Leon was this Spanish guy who founded Florida while looking for The Fountain of Youth. My mom and I refused to buy a bottle of water that was supposedly from the fountain at the gift shop; instead we were rebels and bottled our own directly from the fountain. And under the bottle is where I found...

My next clue! It said, "It's a little too squishy under here. I think I'll go check out the radiant horologe instead. Look down to find me." This meant I actually had to get out a dictionary to find out that a horologe is a time keeping device. Which led me to this atrocious sun clock left over from when my dad was in college.

Underneath the clock is where I found my last clue, which said, "You know, I'm really in the mood for some tubers. Let me check out their usual stoarage area. I'll be lurking in the dark, waiting for you." And I knew that tubers = root vegetables, so look what was waiting for me in the sweet potatoes!
Haha. I love my mumma.

I seriously doubt that I'll be posting tomorrow, I want to spend the day with my family and not the computer. Wishing you all very merry Christmases, hope Santa gives you lots of surprises!

WOWW #3

Yeahhh you guys, it's that time again! That time being Wednesday. Meaning that this post is Word of the Week on Wednesday. This week's word is...

TINTINNABULATION- tin·tin·nab·u·la·tion. n.
1. the ringing or sound of bells
2. a jingling or tinkling sound as if of bells

I don't even know where I heard/read this word, it's just been floating around in my head for the longest time and I love it! It's so fun to say and fits perfectly in the whole Christmas theme. As in, "The tintinnabulation of the keys in my pocket reminds me of the bells on Santa's sleigh that will be flying over my house in only two days!"

So yay. Hope you've all been feeling the Christmas spirit and eating lots of gingerbread!

do hedgehogs hibernate?

Hello hello, today I had a snow day since we got about two and a half feet of snow on Saturday, yipee! And yes, a snow day was actually necessary because unlike everyone else in the WORLD, I don't get to start my Christmas break until the 24th. Yeah.

I had a soopa cozy weekend, consisting mostly of playing Christmas carol cello-flute duets with my mom, baking, reading, and otherwise being lazy. For my friends' presents, I made toasted almond and cherry chocolate bark and caramel popcorn balls.

I made this hedgehog hair clip too! LOVE hedgies.

Aaaand I have a tumblr now. Here! I'm not sure how much I'll use it; it's just that sometimes there are things that I want to share without many words that I would feel weird about posting on blogger. But anyway, if any of you have tumblrs, follow me pleaseee.

Happy almost-Christmas.

let it snow let it snow

Bonjour. Sorry for extreme lack of posting/commenting lately. This past week was really draining school-wise and I just wasn't feeling too creative. But! Today I'm in a really good mood because, as I'm writing this in my bed, it's a snowin outside! Snows days are preferable on weekdays, yes, but they're still so cozy on weekends too. My parents don't like to drive when there's snow on the roads, so I'm going to stay home all weekend. My to do list:

1. have a baking extravaganza with my mom and sister to make yummy gifts
2. make a tumblr
3. study for AP government test (hahahahahahahahaha)
4. craft some new hair clips
5. build a snowman
6. drink hot cocoa with a candy cane straw
7. listen to Christmas carols nonstop
8. practice my origami

We might get up to two feet and it's supposed to "thunder snow" later today. Very curious to see what that's like.

The one with Odysseus and stuff

So in my English class, we're reading the Odyssey (which I actually don't hate!) and were assigned to make a visual representation of one of the books. My friends and I chose to make a movie out of Book 22, Slaughter in the Hall. We actually planned for it to turn out really professionally, but we didn't take into account how hard it is to memorize a script and play thirty characters with five actors. And film everything within four hours. And not leave out any really important scenes. And not die from laughter in the middle of filming.

Now that I've set your expectations so high, enjoy! Oh and just something to keep in mind to help keep characters straight: Most of the time, the suitors have black beards/staches and Odysseus's side has brown. Except for Odysseus, who always has black. Yeah.

Hahaha I swear I don't sound like that normally. I am such a horrible actress! But at least we did a good job on those outtakes!

old sweater

I like clothes with stories behind them. I guess that most of my wardrobe is made of mass produced, brand name clothing, but I have a few pieces that are really meaningful. Case in point, this sweater.

Today I was going through my closet, trying to avoid wearing 'the usual' when I came across it. My great grandma brought it back from Scotland for my eight year old mom, many many many years ago. Then after my mom outgrew it, she kept it to give to me when I was about eight. I loved the pattern and color of it when I first got it and wore it a lot, until it became too awkwardly small. I'd forgotten about it until this morning, and I realized that it's now the perfect size for me to wear as a cropped sweater. Made my day! And now it's my turn to keep it and pass it on to my daughter!

because making lists is fun

The bookmarks tab of my browser is obese. I'm really quick to bookmark any webpage that I like, and I sort all of them into categories like cute, pretty, happy, musical, and artsy. Lately so many bookmarks have built up that I have trouble finding which page I'm looking for, but I can't bring myself to just delete the old ones! That would hurt their feelings, I can't just let them become forgotten because they're a few months old! So now I'm going to share a random selection from the 'cute' folder to reassure myself that even though I'm going to delete them, they aren't left out because now like 20 people are going to look at them.

1. Vintage flower plates, which would look perfect in the kitchen of my future apartment.

2. Hello Kitty waffles! I wonder if it's too late to add a HK waffle maker to my Christmas list..?

3. Sugar cookie beads? Ahhhhh soooo adorable! Gets me in the book for baking real cookies too.

4. Hedgehog notebook. Hedgehogs are the best, I think they're actually my favorite animal now.

6. Tangerine shoes. Enough said.

7. Holiday dollhouse. I wish I had tried to make dollhouses when I was younger, it seems like a really good way to spend childhood to me.

Okay, I feel better now. And my internet will probably run a bit faster too!

WOWW #2

Yesss friends, it's time for Word of the Week on Wendesday part 2!

This week's word, kira-kira, is actually Japanese for 'glittering'. I learned it when I was ten or so from the book by the same title by Cynthia Kadohata. The main character in the book uses kira-kira to describe everything she likes or thinks is pretty, and now I do the same. Snow, stars, blue pens, and wrapping paper are all kira-kira. And to me, people can also be kira-kira, or have kira-kira laughs and smiles.

I'd probably be using this word completely wrong if I were speaking Japanese.. for example, old books probably shouldn't be kira-kira because they're not glittering, but I sort of think of them of as glittering in personality. The way I use it just seems to fit a lot of things in my life.

canon

The last phone conversation I had with my grandfather went something like this:

Grandad: So Caroline, I've been cleaning out my attic these days.
Me: Oh. Why?
Grandad: Well I'll be dead soon you know and...
Me: GRANDAD!
Grandad: Ah ah, I'll be dead soon you know and I want to decide who I'm giving my belongings to so they're less of a burden later.
Me: ...Okay?
Grandad: So I'm going to send you a package of something I found up there that might help you with school.
Me: A Christmas present?
Grandad: No, don't wait until Christmas to open it, you'll probably be disappointed anyway.
Me: Um. Cool!

So yes that was rather a troubling conversation, but then again pretty much all my conversations with him sound like that. The box came for me in the mail today, and from my grandad's description I was expecting like, you know, an encyclopedia or something?

Wrong! It's a 1980 Canon AE-1! I was so excited when I opened the box that I just twirled around in circles. I know it's not the greatest camera ever, but it's in really good condition and is perfect for me because I'm still a beginner. And my photography class at school only has five cameras to loan out to twenty five students, so now I don't have to wait to take pictures until I can borrow a camera. Hooray! What a nice Monday.

Note to self: Send grandfather a really nice thank you note.

ribbons and bows

I like my hair, most of the time. It's a nice chocolate brown color, with big soft waves. And it's shiny. It won't straighten without getting fried, or get blown dry without frizzing, but it puts up with being twisted, braided and pulled back with one of my many clips or headbands almost every day. Thanks hair!

Part of my collection (I'm rather disturbed that I can't remember where I put the other part when I was painting my room):

My rule for hair accessories goes like this: If it's anything you can stick in your hair (but it's not actually sticky), there is a 99.9% chance that I'll love it. For example, today I'm wearing a paper crane clip.
I used to be really self conscious about wearing things like that in public, I thought people would judge me. But now I've gotten over it, because I always get complimented by random cashiers and grandmothers and women walking their dogs (true story).

Hope you've all been enjoying your weekends and such. I think I shall go play in the snow now!

formspring answers

So I thought I'd reply to a few of the formspring submissions I've gotten so far. They're great.

you don't talk about kaleidoscopes much
Yeah, yeah I do actually. The kaleidoscope part of my blog name doesn't really mean the toy, it means more like my colorful, ever-changing interests, ideas, inspiration, etc. Get it now?

Will you see new moon with me?

If you are Sydney, then yes we can go tonight because I love you and we can get crepes afterward. If you're not, no sorry, I'm not enthusiastic enough about it to go to see it with just anyone.

I need to hear a new band!

Ummm well I don't know how similar your tastes are to mine. But I'll just say PSAPP. Even though they're not a 'new' band they're new to me, and the album Tiger, My Friend puts me in a happy, dream like state..

Do you like poetry? I hate it

Well, I don't like poetry enough to go looking for good poems. If I come across a poem I like, in school or online or whatever, I'm not going to lie and say I hate it just because I don't LOVE poetry in general. This excludes ee cumming's poems though, I love all of those.

do your parents really speak so many languages?

Haha yes they do! Both of them were born and raised in the US but are just really interested in and good at language. They actually met at Russian language school. My mom speaks French, Russian, Cerbocroatian (not lying, I swear) and is learning Spanish. And my dad just speaks Russian and is sort of half-fluent in Greek, he's forgotten a lot.

Keep the questions coming (here), I love reading them!

Also, snow is wonderful.
Yay! Happy Saturday!

word of the week on wednesday!

Hello hello! I'd like to introduce a new addition to my bloggity blog, called (as you've probably guessed by now) Word of the Week on Wednesday. Or WOTWOW. WWW. WOWW. Let's go with WOWW, okay? Anyway, I've always loved learning new words and I want to start sharing some of my favorites. This week's is:

INSOUCIANT- in·sou·ci·ant. adj.
1. free from concern, worry, or anxiety; carefree; nonchalant.

I've been rather insouciant this whole week. I was expecting that I would have a ton of schoolwork to do since we just got back from a break, but I think the teachers have all had Christmas break on their minds since December started (?!?!?!?). So I've had a lot of free time, without worrying about needing to get x done by x o'clock to be able to start y and then z.

I have totally not spent a lot of that free time on Etsy, what NO! Justttt long enough to pick out Christmas gifts for almost everyone and decide that I want these:

Hope you've all been feeling insouciant this week as well!