A Summary of my 3 day weekend (9/6/18 - 9/8/18)

On Saturday I woke up to the sound of my sister playing with her toys. It was a toy bird that can record what you say and say it in a more high pitched way. So I woke up, and I just read my kindle for around an hour. Then at 10:00 I had to leave for Chinese school. My Chinese class ended at 12:30, so I waited for my sister's class to end which started at 1:30 and ended at 3:30. During those two hours I waited for my sister, I read my kindle and also had a burger from the Habit Burger. After I finished eating because I hadn't had lunch I read my kindle again and waited for her. Then my sister's class ended. We went home and that was about all that happened that day. Then on Sunday, I literally read my kindle book for around 2 or 3 hours, I mean for me, weekends are usually boring. At  1:00, I went to my friend's house for her birthday party. But it only started there, we went on a bike trail to a community park and ended up doing activities there. We drew marbles of a certain color, red or blue and I pulled a red marble. The first activity was water balloon toss, which our team lost even though we had 1 extra person. We were supposed to toss the water balloon at a person from our team and the person had to catch the ball, and we gradually backed up. The next game was football, a lot of us weren't really paying attention so we didn't win either. The blue team had 2 points and my team, the red team, had 0. The next game was rock stacking. Each team was split up into two teams. The two blue teams versus the two red teams. My team was the first to stack, we had to put a rock in our own little area, and after we placed down one rock we had a choice to either place down a rock on one of the two opposing teams or just do nothing. We sabotaged a certain team a lot, so they did the same to us. In the end, the team we sabotaged was eliminated, and the other blue team knocked down their tower. The two red teams both still stood! That was 1 point for us. It was 2 - 1. The last game was capture the flag (the flag was a single soccer ball). Whichever team won capture the flag would get 1.5 points. The field we used was huge, and we were allowed to hide our flag anywhere in the boundaries that the referees agreed to. We hid ours in a bush, and it was approved. The game had started. One of my teammates spotted their flag which was very obvious because it was a white, yellow, and blue ball in a green bush (they also hid their flag in a bush). We all tried to get their flag, but we ended up in "jail". I saved a few people from jail, and some people saved me from jail. We captured a lot of people that went on our side. In the end we got their flag, but it was a pretty long process. So first, a person from my team got the ball out of the bush and went a few feet before getting tagged. Then another person from my team picked it up and ran pretty far and handed it off to someone. They were both tagged. Then the flag was left at a point very close to the line diving the two sides. Someone from our team got the flag over and we won. We won capture the flag and also the entire event 2.5 - 2. After that we had cake and pizza. On Sunday morning I wake up to my sister singing and screaming, and I read my kindle for majority of the day. Then at 1:15 I had piano class, after piano class ended we went shopping. Then after shopping I read my kindle for a long time, but I am writing blog now.

Lily and the States Test

She woke up to the sound of breakfast and other things cooking. 

"Wake up!" she said to her younger sister.

"But I don't want to!!" Amber replied.

"But you have to! We have school today," Lily exclaimed.

"Fine, first you get out of the room because your face is too ugly," Amber said smugly.

"Don't talk to me like that! You're three years younger than me, I'm beautiful!" Lily replied

After a weird chaotic morning they rushed downstairs and ate for 20 minutes. Since their school started at 8:05 A.M., they had to get to school quickly. At 7:50, they were on the car and going to school. "Can you help me study for my test?" Lily asked politely. "Since I'm so nice I will!" Amber replied. "Lily, you should have studied earlier," their dad said. "I did study, I just need to get this into my brain because I studied yesterday and I don't remember!" Lily said. So on the 15 minute drive to school Lily studied, and her second grade sister could recite almost all the states like Lily had to for her test. In fifth grade, Lily had to do a states test and her younger sister was already prepared! Then they ran quickly and got to school right before the bell rang. The bell rang and everyone was supposed to be in class. "Okay class! We're going to be taking our final states test, get your offices up!" Mrs. Morris said. The class replied with a series of murmurs and said "awws..." 30 minutes later Lily had finished her test, and double checked it, she had answered all the questions except for some of the extra credit. She quietly took down her office, put it back and started to read. Then it was recess. She just talked with her friends for 15 minutes and they went back to class for math. After a long boring session of easy math, it was lunch time. Lily ate with her friends for 20 minutes and then after lunch they had lunch recess for 20 minutes. Lily and her best friend Hailey played basketball with some other people. Then it was time to go back to class. They learned some science, and then they left school. That was the day of the final states test for Lily. Turns out she got everything right expect for making a silly mistake and spelling Connecticut wrong. With some extra credit points she scored a 107 percent.

My Weekend of Nothing

Yesterday was a Saturday, I went to Chinese school at 10:30 A.M. and my Chinese school ended at 12:30, my brother's Chinese school was at 8:30 A.M. and ended at 10:30. My sister's Chinese school was at 1:30 P.M. so we had time to eat lunch. We ate at a place called H-Mart, it is a market with groceries but there was a restaurant and a bakery inside of it. It was a really good restaurant, we had yummy beef with rice and some spicy tofu soup. It was super good in my opinion. Then, we dropped my sister off at Chinese school, and we went to the library. After we left the library my mom sent me home and I didn't do much for the rest of the day. At night after I showered my dad asked me if I had played piano, and guess what I hadn't. So I played piano and I had a huge headache. I went to sleep at around 9:10 P.M., and my brother's math class ended at 9:00 P.M., and he got home later so I actually fell asleep before he got home. I slept horribly, I have a cold right now. I remember waking up because it felt too warm and going downstairs. Well, I woke up and I played piano and now I'm here writing my blog. Well, my weekends are always boring!

Fablehaven: The Complete Series Book Review

Fablehaven (Book 1): Kendra and Seth are siblings that go to their grandparents house because their parents are on vacation. Grandpa gives Kendra a set of keys, and the clues lead to her drinking some milk, it was sweet, and she and Seth are able to see fairies after they drink the milk. Since Kendra and Seth solved the mystery their Grandpa tells them about the place, it is a secret preserve for magical beings named Fablehaven. Seth captures a fairy, and when a fairy is left indoors overnight she becomes an imp which is a fallen fairy or an evil one which is also ugly. The fairies punish Seth and he becomes a walrus, and he is turned back by a witch named Muriel who will be freed if all her knots are used to grant wishes, after that wish to bring Seth back to his normal state she only has one knot left. They found a message and it said that their chicken was actually their grandma, and they set Muriel free with the chicken turning back to their grandma. After Muriel was free she set Bahumat free (a demon) and all of Kendra's relatives were captured. She went to the fairy queen's shrine and asked for help, she was given a recipe for a potion, and all the fairies drank it and they turned big. Bahumat was destroyed, and was sent underground. Kendra realizes that without drinking the milk every day she can see fairies.

Rise of the Evening Star (Book 2): A year later, Kendra is in school and she sees a goblin at her school, and she is the only one at school who knows who he is because she could see fairies, it's called being fairystruck as she was told. She meets a person who helps them get rid of the goblin, but in the process a demon bites Seth and then he is followed by the demon. They realize that the person who helped them get rid of the goblin could not be trusted and then they are saved by a person named Vanessa who brings them to Fablehaven. There are three people who are helping Fablehaven Vanessa, Coulter, and Tanu, among them there is one traitor. Kendra and Seth see The Sphinx who they trust until later, Kendra turns out to be fairykind which is the maiden of the fairy queen. The traitor turns out to be Vanessa and she puts everyone in the dungeon. Vanessa also can control people in their sleep. Since Fablehaven is a secret preserve there is a secret artifact there, Seth goes and he faints after taking out the talisman of the creature guarding the artifact. Warren is catatonic after trying to do what Seth accomplished and because Seth did it Warren was back to normal and he and Kendra went for the artifact. They are at the last obstacle when they meet Vanessa. The guardian was guarding the artifact. They end up working together to get the artifact, and it is something that can heal anything. It is called the Sands of Sanctity, but in the end the Sphinx takes the artifact.  The Sphinx takes out a prisoner and puts Vanessa in so that she cannot use her powers.

Grip of the Shadow Plague (Book 3):  Kendra and Seth are back at Fablehaven. Kendra becomes a full fledged Knight of the Dawn which is against the Society of the Evening Star. She goes on a mission to another secret preserve called Lost Mesa with Warren and some others, one named Gavin Rose who is a dragon tamer and is only 16. All of them are Knights of the Dawn. They go through all of the obstacles including speaking to a dragon nicely, and they see no guardian guarding the artifact, and there is no artifact at all. Being fairykind, Kendra can see fairy language (silvian) and she reads something that talks about the artifact of the Lost Mesa being brought to Fablehaven. She tells no one but Warren, when they go back to Fablehaven they find the artifact which is called the chronometer. The chronometer controls time, so Seth brought Patton Burgess to the present for 3 days. He was actually a past owner of the preserve. Fablehaven had been taken over by a plague, it turns light creatures into dark creatures with one bite. Kendra goes to see the fairy queen again and she gets advice, she is told that it is with another demon named Kurisock. That demon had taken a form of a tree naiad who had lost her tree. She became immortal, and her tree had the talisman that was spreading the plague and also that talisman was the one that Seth pulled out. Seth went to a demon called Graulas and he was told that he was a shadow charmer because he pulled out the talisman (which was a nail). The fairy queen also gave Kendra another talisman that would destroy the nail and itself if in contact, and if the nail was destroyed so would Kurisock. In the end Patton's wife named Lena sacrificed herself and the nail and the talisman was destroyed.

Secrets of the Dragon Sanctuary (Book 4): Kendra was kidnapped by the Society of  the Evening Star, and is brought to the Sphinx who turned on the Knights of the Dawn and was actually the leader of both sides. The Sphinx forced her to look into oculus which could see anywhere and she managed to get out of the trance while most others went catatonic. Kendra escapes by using a bag called a knapsack, it has a lot of space and people can go in there, if a person goes in the knapsack and the knapsack is thrown they will not feel it. To be able to recover the key for the Obsidian Waste which houses the translocator. Warren, Gavin, Kendra, and some others that are part of the Knights of the Dawn go to Wyrmroost. Wyrmroost is a dragon sanctuary, and they need a unicorn's first horn to get it, so they ask the centuars they say no. In the middle of the night, Seth goes to Graulas and Graulas tells him that he can slink through the shadows, and because of that he manages to steal the unicorn horn. Kendra leaves and Seth is supposed to stay at Fablehaven but he hides in the knapsack; warren also leaves. They meet up and on a helicopter get to Wyrmroost. They get into Wyrmroost and meet a wizard named Agad. They stay at a camp for a while, and Kendra meets a tiny dragon named Raxtus who helps them. They go into the Dragon Temple and finally make it to the end and acquire some things and find the key. Dragons go for them, and it turns out Gavin is the person that the Sphinx let out of the prison that Vanessa went into. Gavin is really a dragon so evil that he is considered a demon, his name was Navarog. Navarog killed someone named Dougan who was a lieutenant in the Knights of the Dawn. Navarog burns the knapsack while Warren is in there and injured. Kendra corners Navarog in his human form so he cannot transform and the tiny dragon named Raxtus ate him. Then they barely managed to get out of Wyrmroost and back to Fablehaven.

Keys to the Demon Prison (Book 5): After Kendra and the others had gotten the key that would open the Obsidian Waste, they headed off to Australia to get the Translocator, which was inside of the Obsidian Waste. The translocator would bring three people to a place where at least one of them had been to before. They go in and are being followed by people from the Society of the Evening Star. They finish all the obstacles and meet two guardians. They were mechanical animals, the mechanical lion had a keyhole on its chin. They manage to escape with the Translocator but Seth is captured in a gaseous state. Kendra saves warren because she had been inside the knapsack before. Seth was brought to a prison in a secret preserve that everyone really  didn't know about, only the Sphinx and some others. Seth meets Bracken who was a unicorn but his third horn was taken away so he couldn't revert to unicorn form. Kendra thought her mom's side's grandparents were dead, but they really weren't. They used the Translocator to get to the secret preserve named Living Mirage to save Seth. All of them end up getting captured though. Seth finds the Sands of Sanctity and the Translocator; he goes back to Fablehaven and finds Graulas. Seth heals Graulas and then the demon takes the artifacts and goes to Living Mirage. The Sphinx is no longer the enemy, and he ended up helping them. The Sphinx helped Warren, Bracken, and Kendra get out of the prison. They find Raxtus who helps them get to places. After Seth had escaped he when to the Singing Sisters who gave him advice, and he went to find a sword of light and darkness called Vasilis. He ended up getting it, and he also got items from a leprechaun. They get to the demon prison; the artifacts were to open the prison. There is a fight and Kendra ends up taking Vasilis and slays the demon king, all of the demons are put into the fairy realm since the fairies had evacuated. After that, Kendra and Seth's four grandparents and their parents were released.

REVIEW: I really loved this series, I think it's my new favorite. I read this book over vacation on my kindle and it was 34 hours long. I just figured out today that there is a sequel; I can't wait to read the sequel! My sister was bugging me the whole time I was reading the book because on the road trip she wanted me to play with her.

Summer Vacation 2018

I just came back from a 13 day vacation. It was a long road trip. On the first day (Saturday) we left for Salt Lake City on a 10 hour drive. We managed to arrive at around 9 P.M. even though normally we end up getting places at around 12 A.M. The second day we drove to Yellowstone. We stayed at Old Faithful Inn, and we saw Old Faithful erupt, in all I saw about 8 eruptions or so. The next day we went to see more springs and geysers, but we went to stay at Mammoth Hot Spring. The fourth day we went to the Mammoth Hot Springs and stayed there for around 2 hours. The water was so cold, but when you get near the sources it's super warm and fun. We stayed at The Lake Cabin and we went boating that day. Then we drove places and saw more springs and geysers, and we stayed at the Canyon hotel. We saw a rainbow in a waterfall that day too, and it was real fun. That was the sixth day and we drove to Grand Teton. That night we stayed at a hotel and although we were in a national park there was actually WiFi! Then we saw the Grand Teton and took pictures and went on a bunch of short hikes. On the seventh day we stayed at a Holiday Inn and we had spent the morning at Grand Teton. We went to Glacier National Park and stayed at Holiday Inn again. The next day we drove to Theodore Roosevelt National Park and stayed at another Holiday Inn. And then we went to Mount Rushmore and that was real cool. My siblings and I also did Junior Ranger there to pass the time, and we stayed at a place called Staybridge Suites. On the 11th day we went to Badlands National Park and stayed at the same place as the day before. On the Badlands day we had remaining time and we went to the pool at the hotel.  Then we went to Wind Cave National Park, and took a tour of the cave that had wind blowing either in or out of it depending on the air pressure. Then we drove a five hour drive to Denver, and stayed at a place called Comfort Suites. Then the next day which was the 13th day we drove to Las Vegas which was a 12 hour drive not including stops, and we stayed at a place called a Tuscany. Then, today, we drove 5 hours home.

It's Finally Here

It's finally here. Vacation! Tomorrow my family and I plan to leave super early "before sunrise" which is not too good. I don't want to wake up super early, but you know since it's a 10 hour drive to Salt Lake City I'll do it! I hope vacation is fun, I don't know why but I'm really eager to see the hotels, and not the real thing. I am looking forward to the entire vacation itself though. So after we reach Salt Lake City I think we're going to Yellowstone, I'm not sure. I thought it was a two day drive from where I live, I don't remember though. I'm not looking forward to the car drive there (did I mention that it's a road trip?). My dad said that at Yellowstone we're going to be doing a lot of hiking, and he even said that that was the main point of this trip. I would like to just go sight-seeing because I'm lazy but I'm probably going to go hiking anyway. I think hiking will be fun. I've been to Yellowstone before but it was around 3 - 4 years ago. Since I was a little younger back then, I think I only hiked a few of the trails and stayed in the car with the AC on with my mom. My dad and my brother always were the ones hiking, since my brother's a boy scout I think that's the main reason he actually went hiking. If he had a choice and he didn't want to earn badges I think he would have stayed back; but I don't know. I'm really looking forward to going to Yellowstone!

My Friend From 2 1/2 Years Ago

Around 2 and a half years ago I met a friend named Monica. She was very nice, but after the school year ended she spent one year in China and now lives in Singapore. For Summer vacation her mom and her decided to come to the U.S.A for around a month. Since I hadn't seen her in so long, the moment I saw her (at a restaurant where we ate together) I hugged her super hard. I had missed her, but now she is leaving in around 5 days. So I saw her at a nice Chinese restaurant, and we ate and then played at a park, it was about a three hour experience. Then around 2 or 3 days later we had a sleepover, since she was living with her mom's friend. It was super fun, we played a bunch of Mario Kart and other video games. On the day of the sleepover which was a Friday, we went to a park and had lots and lots of fun. At the park, we went on the tire swing, and we did other things. Then, we had a swinging competition. My favorite part of that day was racing up the hill and then rolling down the hill and seeing who could finish the obstacle first. After a few more swing races, we went back to her temporary house. The funny thing was that we actually managed to stay up until around 12:30 A.M. I didn't get a lot of sleep but it was worth it. We did a bunch of pillow fights and everything. On Saturday morning, I played a bit more with her, and then I went home. Then one or two weeks later, we played together again at the same park that we went to on the day of the sleepover. On that day, we did more obstacle courses and we were timing each other, and my sister was there too. We also did the fun hill rolling obstacle, and I gave both of them a 6 second head start but I still managed to win or get 2nd place! Yesterday, which was a Wednesday we saw each other again and ate dinner together. The dinner was incredibly good, and her mother was such a good cook. After dinner we played like an hour of video games, and then I sadly had to go home. It was really fun playing with her.