Yippieeeeeeee!

   I took my AP Psych test today and I think I did awesome! :D I'm so happy. Maybe I'm just being overconfident, but oh well, I'm happy about it for now :P. I'm so happy because now all I have is Guitar and my WISE Project :))). The time is getting closer for my presentation and I'm getting more nervous. Even though I didn't want other kids to be at my presentation I decided to let them come to see anyway :S. On the day I'm going to think, WHAT WAS I THINKING!?! But it's best for me because then people can see what I've accomplished and it would be an even bigger accomplishment if I could play in front of other people! It's stressing but I want to make it fun. Ahhhhh! So nervous...I'm going to count how many people signed up for my presentation right now......... Ok good only three people signed up and they're cool..awesome haha 


   I just found out my mom might be going to the Kentucky Derby this weekend with our family friends (which means she's going to be hanging around all the jockeys).....I'm sure Coach Love would like to hear about this haha.

Another Show...

   :) Hermetic's going to play a show on May 7th. I'm going to try to go and maybe use it for more of my project, but since it's late at night, I might nto be able to see them perform too much. Even though I'm nervous for graduation and college, one thing I'm looking forward to is not having a curfew or a limitation on where I can gooo. Finally I can get to do what I want! Hopefully the world doesn't get boring within the next year haha.

   After today, the only classes I'll have to focus on are AP Psychology, Guitar, and WISE. That should give me planty of time to prepare. My AP test is this Monday, so after that I should be able to plan a lottttt because I'll have a ton of free time. As long as I can get home -_-...I hate staying at school for uneccesary hours. Hopefully everything works out and I plan everything smoothly before my presentation!

It's Almost Over! :S

   I am soooo scared for graduation and everything's coming so fast. My presentation is going to be Monday March 16th at 1:30pm to 2:15pm...I think. I'm so nervous and it's so soon! I have so much to prepare. AHHHH I'm so nervous. Mr. Bautista's been teaching us an Irish folk song and I like it. I hope I perfect it by tomorrow :). It's really funny that I've noticed that I can never get a song perfectly until after it's been graded haha. When I have nothing to worry about is when I play it my best. Who knows how I'll be when I have to present in front of people for my presentation :S. I have to practice so much. At least it's something I want to do!
   I'm going to try to plan what I'm going to talk about mainly in the presentation because I have so much stuff about guitar. I have to pick out key points that I thought were most interesting. I'm really nervous, but I'm excited to talk about my love for music and guitar!...I know it's not part of the project but I'll probably mention my avid karaoke singing haha. It was a pretty big part of my WISE experience.

Getting Down To Business

   I made my business carrrrd woopwoop! I also signed up for my presentation day...hmmm maybe I should have wrote down the date hehe. Woops. I forgot it for now, but I'll remember soon :p I think it's May 9th...maybe the 16th hmm.
   I figured out two songs on my own! :D I'm so happy because one of them is the theme song I used for my video, "All The Small Things" by Blink 182. I figured out the song, "Say It Ain't So" by Weezer. I'm so excited because I've always wanted to find out songs with chords on the guitar :).

Work To Do..

   OK! I gotta make my WISE business card...that'll be done this week but I'm kind of reading a lot for my psychology class because my teacher's cracking down for AP week. Yay..not! I have so much reading to do, but whatever, I'll get my WISE stuff done. OH and I also got my prize from guitar today. It was a ..... KITKAT BAR wooo! haha.

   I have a little present for my mentor woohooooo. I would have brought it today if I knew I wasn't leaving school! But no, I'll just have to bring it tomorrow.

   Welllllllllll, today I apparently won a prize :D. I don't know what it is but Mr. Bautista told me I get a prize for being the first to finish all the songs on our paper that he gave us :). Woohooo how fun :P. I played them all right and they were good songs to play. 
   Today Coach Love showed us his WISE project...it was amazing! He puts soooo much effort into everything he does and it seems like hard work to me, but he finds it fun haha. He just tried to explain to us what our project should be talking about. His presentation helped me a lot with what i should be doing. I hope my project turns out good! But first I have to make an outline -_- boo. It's ok though...I know it will help me with my presentation!

These are just a fewww pictures from the show...

   

No Hermetic Show?!?!!

   JK! Luckily I got to go! I was SOOOOOO upset on Friday because I was almost positive I wasn't going to end up going to the show. The girl that was supposed to take me couldn't go anymore so me and my friend had no way to get there. I asked my other friend to take me but he had no space in his car because of the band equipment. And my friend Martina was going to go, but because my friend wasn't going anymore, she didn't want to -_-. That upset me a lot because she only wanted to go because of her. Supposedly we're best friends but if I had a best friend I wouldn't act that way to her. In the end, she texted me saying her and her friend would pick me up....yea if she didn't we wouldn't be friends right now. When they came for me, she was still treating me badly and acting weird. I don't like the way she's been acting so ohhhh well..I just won't be asking her to hang out as much, which means we'll probably never be hanging out. (That's the short story).
   Besides that, I got my pictures and videos of the show. I'm sooo happy that I got to go because it would have ruined my whole plan for my project haha that would have been terrible..... my bfs brother, Lucas took me home thankfully, because sometimes he's not thaaat nice haha. I'm just glad that everything worked out. Time to upload pics!.......

OH btw... the Bach song is being graded for sure -_- I guess I'll just have to learn it hahah.

Weird Song...

   Well I think I avoided doing the Bach song, but I'm not sure yet :S I hope so haha. Today we did a new song (more like a rhythm) and a scale. It wasa reaaaaaaally hard to focus in class because this kid wouldn't stop playing his demonic guitar -_- I hate his guitar. It sounds TERRIBLE and I can't hear myself playing. Luckily I focused enough to learn the work but I didn't get it graded today. Maybe I'll do that tomorrow.

   I'm so excited for the Hermetic show tomorrow! :D it's gunna be so much fun. I gotta remember to bring my camera :). Oh and today was my last class of dual enrollment :D so I'll have a lot of time to do more for my WISE project.

Hermetic Show!!

   Yayyyyyyyyyy this Friday I'm going to go watch Hermetic perform at a fundraiser :D. And I know I'll be able to go for the whole thing since it's not at an ungodly hour! I never get to watch the full show but this time I will :)))) yippie. Too bad Tadeu's not here to come with me :( but it's ok. My friend Priscila and Carlos (one of the guitar players) actually moved reaaally close to my house :D so they'll take me with them there. We get free food and we get to sit in the Hermetic section haha how fun :P.

   Anyway, I'm going to try to film some of the show so that I could use it for my project :). I'll take a bunch of pictures too so I can make a slideshow and stuff. "Prevent Child Abuse America" is the name of the fundraiser that they're performing at. It's called Sigstock because it's hosted annually by the sisters of Sigma Delta Tau Sorority at NSU. This is their 4th annual fundraiser :).

Yayyyy

   It's so freeing to have no more research that's required :D. I still do my research when I need to I guess, but I've been working on my presentation more than anything else. I'm thinking of showing a couple videos of people who inspire me to play the guitar. And I still gotta cut out that guitar with my exacto knife. I guess my project is going to have technological help :p. I'll play a couple videos, maybe have a slide show, and have my poster etc.......planning, planning, planningggggg. And today we had no lesson in class because of FCATS....BORING. But it's ok, I played on my own. But what stinks is that Mr. Bautista didn't forget about the Bach song -_- blahhh that means I have to learn it :( ew.

   I don't know why but recently I've been into languages a lot. I started studying more Portuguese this weekend and I finished the first level of Rosetta Stone :P...I know I'm not doing a project on languages but whatever! I'm using my time to learn as much as I can haha. I think it's really funnnn and I want to go to Brazil reeeeally bad so I can actually learn how to speak fluently (how cool would it be if I went for the World Cup in 2014!??!!). But that's not gunna be anytime soon, so in the mean time I'll just learn it from my computer :P.

Subs...

   Ok...in class today we had a sub. That means, play the guitar and be bored. We were supposed to learn a song by Bach but I really don't like the song. I think more than half the class agrees that it's a pretty boring one. The song has no melody that I could remember so it sounded like random notes thrown in a rhythm together. BORING. So we all decided not to do it hehe. Hopefully Mr. Bautista just forgets about that song.

   jhjiogasdhgl;ksd I don't wanna write anymore wahhhh.. Ok whining over. I perfected the song "Jammin'" today :). So now I just have to sing it while playing. It's a bit harder because of the way it's played.

Bar Chords

   Yay I learned how to two strings down with one finger today. Yea...it hurts a little but I'll get used to it. I thought I  couldn't do it because  my fingers are small but I guess I can :). It's just going to take some practice. I learned how to play the song, "Jammin'" by Bob Marley too. Mr. Bautista taught us that song with bar chords. 
   I neeeeed a new guitar. Ok, not really but I want one because my guitar feels so hard to play. The strings are really tough and I just want a better guitar. Maybe I should get one for when I go to college :))). Yes, I think I will. Especially since I won't have my Xbox with me, I'll need something haha. I <3 Music :P.

Working On My Presentation

   Today I got a big card board poster and I outlined a guitar on it. I tried to cut it out because I want to make a poster in the shape of a guitar but I think I'm going to need a bigger scissors. The board is a little too thick for a normal scissors. I hope my idea works out as planned but I don't want to give too much away.
   I'm excited that Coach Love is going to show my video in the New York presentation. And apparently they might see some of my journals too :S ! Oh well :P I think they're fine to read.
   More about guitar....today we learned how to play the G scale on the guitar. It's super easy and every scale makes you better at knowing the instrument. Although there are some kids in class who don't want to learn and are distractions, I try to ignore them so that I can learn on my own while the teacher tells them to be quiet (which is probably about a half hour added up together). At least I can still focus.

Guitar Rising/Rocksmith

   There's a new game coming out that is like Guitar Hero except it allows you to play a real guitar! The game teaches you how to play cool songs and lets you go at your own pace. You get scored on your performance just like regular games. It's so cool because you get to actually learn how to play the real instrument. Unfortunately I don't think it's coming out very soon :( so that means I'll have to wait a while.

   My friends were talking about this guitar teacher named Mike. He's supposed to be reaaaally good  and he only teaches people who are more advanced. They told me I should try to get lessons from him because apparently he takes girls at an earlier level of experience since they generally don't play as well as the boys haha...well that's good for me anyway :P. I'm considering it but I'm not sure yet because I might be getting a job, but we'll see how that goes.

Good Times :)

   Welllllll I have two good stories so I'll start out with the one that happened first. This weekend I was hanging out with my friends and we were forming our own band haha. We each played an instrument taking turns on the keyboard, and two guitars we had. It was really fun and we all sang at a point. Tadeu realized I was singing while I was playing the guitar and he thought it was really cool :D. That made me feel cool ;). Music is fun :P. 
   Second, today Coach Love said my preview was phenomenal and wants to use it for his WISE presentation in New York...I was shocked :P and happy. So tomorrow I'm going to give him the thumb drive with the video on it so that he can put it onto his computer. 

Bye Bye Nails :'(

   It's taken me quite a few weeks to make my nails grow long and unfortunately I have to cut them. They keep getting in the way of my guitar playing :( so I gotta do it....

*A few moments later*

As you can see...I left my green nails long because...why not. 

Ok actually, I have to get rid of the green nails too. BOO.

   I finished my preview for my project and turned it in today. I hope everything works alright. Maybe I'll be able to post it on my blog. It was so hard to choose a song, I chose about 10 by the end haha. It was a hard choice.

Notes On The Guitar :)

   I'm reeeeeeally happy because I learned something cool today in class...well more useful than cool. But still! I haven't been able to understand how to find notes on the guitar and today Mr. Bautista taught us :D. I was so happy because it's been a problem I've had with the guitar. I never wanted to learn it because I thought it was really hard but now that I know it, it's so easy :D. Each note is two frets up or down from one another except for B,C and E,F. I remembered that by making up my own pnemonic but it's kind of mean......maybe I shouldn't write it. Hmmmm....I'll consult with my mentor first :P. Anyway, that was a good lesson for today and it's going to help me a lot :).

Nails=RUINED

   Ugh my cool GREEN nail polish is chipping too fast and i have a feeling its because of guitar! -_- Oh well...
Anyway, I feel like I'm getting better at guitar. My friend who I first interviewed taught me a song that's made up of bar cords and I play it good :D. Ugh my nails are still depressing me though..........move on!
Anyway he taught me a song called "Creep" by Radiohead (I knew it from Rockband :P).
   I've been singing karaoke all day and my sister made a new Karaoke CD, soooo....yea I'm going to go now :D hehe bye!

Bye Bye Spring Break

   Yay first day back from break, and it's just like I remember...boring.

   So far I've filmed a couple videos of myself playing and put them into video...but ughh I just don't know how to do it. I'm trying to add music into the video but then you can't hear my playing, which I guess is fine but I kind of wanted some to be heard. I might have to change my trailer into a powerpoint but I don't know yet and the deadline is pretty soon :S. I wanted to make a few things in my video funny, I'm going to be finishing it up during the week.

   My friend got back in the band by the way..............we'll see how long that'll last. I hope long, but my boyfriend thinks he's going to give up fast. It's kind of true but I hope not.

Kicked Out! :O

   I interviewed my friend a few days ago for the Interview we had to do for class. It was really good because I knew that he liked guitar a lot and was really good at it. We spoke about his being in the band Hermetic and how they were supposed to be recording soon....wellllllllll, yesterday he got kicked out of the band -_-. (here's a link to one of the band's pages http://thetalentfarm.com/Hermeticfl/)

   Seriously why!!! It's because he didn't want to try anymore. The one thing we all know he's good at is music, and he just didn't want to do it anymore because he's like that sometimes. It really stinks because it was cool to have the band being all my friends but I guess he just didn't want to do it anymore. I havea feeling he might go back if his sister forces him haha but who knows.

   Aside from that, I got a hundred on my Pachelbel's Canon song today in class. I was so happy because it's such a hard song to play and I was surprised I did it right :D. We've been learning how to use eighth notes since yesterday and it's really frustrating because, since about last week, the class has become really rowdy. Barely anyone wants to actually learn so I'm being held back a lot which is pretty frustrating.

Pachelbel's Canon

That's the name of the song! Pachelbel
Canon...we've been playing it in class and it's one of the most
challenging songs I've ever played. Since I couldn't upload myself
playing the song in mp3 form, here's a link to how the song should be played, 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=652TVINBr6M&feature=related.
What we're doing in class actually does not sound like that...I guess
ours is a very simplified version haha. But it's still hard!!!!

Anyway, this week I'm going to be practicing that song a lotttt. It's
a fast song to play (at least for me) but I think I'm playing it pretty
well so far. Maybe I can perfect it by tomorrow :D I'm going to try.

Videos

   Over the weekend I made a buuunch of videos of myself playing the guitar, just in case I need them for future usage! Especially for the trailer we have to make. I've been planning mine and I'm going to get it done over Spring Break. I hope it comes out good, if it does I'll post it on one of my journals. I'll probably do that if it's good or not anyway :P.
   Today in class, we tried to play an old classical song. I forgot the name but I'll find the name so you can hear it because I know it's recognizable. I just recorded it on GarageBand because I wanted to try to upload it onto here but I guess I can't do that. Anyway, I'm going to have a lot of practicing to do this week because that new song is pretty hard if I want to play it well.

Leave My Guitar ALONE!---(Tadeu :D)

   Ok Tadeu (my boyfriend) is bugging me! Ok not really haha but he said the guitar I have isn't good anymore because the strings are too far from the neck. I feel like it's always been like that and it is hard to play but I don't care if it's harder. But he made it sound like it's noticeably terrible/unplayable. It's like, if you don't like my guitar then don't play it! Haha...I just don't like him dissing my property! :P.... It's not really a big deal, I just felt like writing it.

   Also I interviewed my friend Carlos today who's been playing the guitar for a while and he taught himself how to play. He's really good and he's been playing for about 5 years. Well it's cool that I get to interview some of my friends for this project but I'm going to try to interview people I don't really know too if I feel like they're just THAT good. He told me to try to play a couple songs that I might be able to do. I'll probably try them this week.
   I'm going to the Renaissance Fair this weekend too probably, and that reminds me of the song "Green Leaves". It always sounded very Renaissance-ish to me so I learned how to play it by ear a couple months ago. Today in class.....we got that song to play which I thought was really cool. I also play "Sweet Home Alabama" by ear a looooong time ago, and we learned that today too! How weird.

Boo Journal

I don't want to write my journalllllllll bleh.

   Ok time to write... Well I learned how to play the chords for the song, "Scar Tissue" today. I played a bunch of Rock Band songs today too. I just started playing that game again :P. I still have to do this week's Newsletter. I think I'll interview my friend who's in Hermetic.

   I wanna go on VACATION. Ugh maybe over Spring Break I could do something :D. I should plan one haha. In the mean time I'll just be doing my normal school day, and playing guitar. I played a bunch of different songs today in class because we didn't do anything new today.

4th String

   I did my fourth sting test today and got 100 :) yay. I want to start learning some popular songs now. I've done a few and I played the Lion King song (In The Jungle) Mr. B showed us. I learned some more of it after class because it was pretty easy to figure out. I have actually been trying to grow my nails...unfortunately that doesn't work with the guitar because your nail gets stuck on the string! Ugh oh well. Maybe I'll start using a pick.

   Everyday Mr. Bautista has been showing us new chords. I always try to play them in different ways to come up with songs I know. I want to learn how to solo randomly in different parts of songs. I'm going to try to play a lot on my own so I can learn how to do that. It's really cool to play randomly and to make it sound good. It has a lot to do with knowing what notes play the sound you want, and I'm relatively good at that when I go slow. Hopefully if I practice I'll become good enough to do it quicker.

Progress!

   Skipping a day of guitar class actually slows you down more than you'd think. I caught up with the rest of the class but it took more focus than usual. Mr. Bautista is teaching us the 4th string songs. I only learned one of them out of the three. I like feeling the challenge though. The songs that we have to play are a lot harder than the ones before because we even have to learn how to read chords. The chords on a staff are hard to read because you have to process all three notes in your mind before you can play it. It's interesting though, and I feel like I'm learning something.
   Today I have to do my Historical Newsletter. I looked up the history of guitar and I found this article on http://www.guyguitars.com/eng/handbook/BriefHistory.html. It says that guitar can be traced back to about 4000 years ago. Of course the standard model has changed multiple times throughout history, but the basic mechanism has been used for a very long time.

Free Dayyyy

   Ok senior skip days aren't really fun if you have NOTHING to do! I actually considered going to school a lot last night but that's when I realized something was wrong with me, so I needed to do this. Welllll I've just been watching T.V, because old shows are on at times like this (like the RUGRATS), and playing guitar. No one's here so I recorded myself on Photo Booth to see how I sound to other people.....TERRIBLE. Ok just kidding but still. I sang a bunch of songs while playing the guitar. It's fun and I'm going to continue to do that for a while until I have to leave for dual enrollment.
   I'm playing songs off of the Ultimate Guitar website and I've able to play most of the chords...maybe I should try to read tab now. Yea I will...
   Hmmm tabs aren't as hard as they seem :D I'll probably work on them a lot more now haha. As long as I know the song, it's pretty easy to play but it takes some time depending on how hard the song is. I;m going to start off with some easy ones for sure. I hope it becomes easy for me haha but that won't happen for now.

Long Day

   Today I didn't do much with guitar other than the regular playing for fun. Since we didn't have school today, it was kind of like my break day from guitar. I went to Gulfstream Park to go support my family friends. I watched my friend Rajiv ride in about 5 races, it was fun to watch. Even though he didn't win any races it's always fun to see him ride :). We stayed at Gulfstream for about 2 hours and then I played some volleyball at the Y. I'm so tired from being active all day haha.
   Yesterday I actually applied for a scholarship. It was to write about an activity/talent that we have and how it's significantly in our lives. I wrote about music and how I'm doing it about everyday for the WISE program :). I thought it was something cool that I could write about and before I knew it, I went overboard on the words and I had to take out a lot of what I wrote :P.
   Alsoooo, tomorrow is another Senior Skip Day that I won't be skipping (as usual). Ugh if only we were actually allowed to skip.....then MAYYYBE my mom would let me. Hmmmm, let me ask her right now just in case!!!............................

SHE SAID YEEEEEEESSSSSS! ...maybe it's cuz my dad's not here but still! She said no first but I persuaded her. Hmmm should I go though. :S ok I think I'm going to take this opportunity because I have a feeling it won't happen again any time soon. WOO I still have to go to dual enrollment class at 11:00am but at least I get to wake up late :)))) ok a good end to my day :D.

Busy Day

   It stinks that I have a busy day today because I wanted to play some guitar! But no...I have to babysit. I mean, I played guitar earlier but I like playing on my own everyday too just for fun. Usually I get to leave school early but today was a full day. I hope i have more free time tomorrow which I know I will :). I kind of want to get a new guitar for myself but I don't want to waste my money since I already have one :P. Plus I'm going to college and I don't think I'd bring it with me. Maybe I could buy one when I go to live there :) who knows. 
   We're still playing the same songs in class and i can play them without reading the notes, but unfortunately i get nervous when I have to be tested. I'm going to take my test tomorrow I think. Hopefully I get 100% :P. I want to learn new songs so badly right now but i have to go to Publix and do so much stuff and it's really bugging me -_-. Oh well...I hope I get some good sleep tonight though because I don't want to be too grumpy to play guitar tomorrow. I also happen to be sick today which is great. Blehh tomorrow's going to be a bad day haha. I just want it to be Friday already.
   

Getting Better :)

   My chords have gotten so much better. I never thought that I'd learn how to do bar chords as quickly as I did because I always thought my fingers were to small. Luckily the chords sound fine. It's really good that I'm learning them because I can play sooooo many more songs now. It's kind of late so I can't try them too much tonight :(. Tomorrow I have to babysit two girls and their baby brother until 11:00 p.m. so I don't want to be tired for that.

   Ugh I really feel like playing now but i can't, oh well. I'll play tomorrow anyways. Today made me like guitar more again because it's letting me play so many more songs :D like the 90's rock songs that Mr. Bautista is showing us. I think I'm going to go on ultimate-guitar.com on Thursday to try out new songs. I don't think I'll have enough time tomorrow but I'll probably be too tired for it anyway. Plus i have my WISE mentor meeting tomorrow so I'm going to have a long day. I wonder what Mrs. Hurst is going to say about my hair! We'll see :P.

New Hair

   Ok so I got my new haircut from Locks of Love today. It looks good but I still like my hair better longer :P. I like it anyway though, except the hairdresser messed up! Kinda...it looks fine anyways but I didn't want it soooo, I don't know what to call it. Either way it's fine. I should put a picture up of it. Hmm fine! I'll go load one...............

   Well I haven't played guitar since last Friday so when I started to play today my fingers felt sore. They do that sometimes from playing too much but i guess that this time they just weren't prepared for the strings. The strings are actually a lot harder to play than people think. That's what turned me off about guitar when I was little, but then I got over it :). We aren't really doing anything new in class, just a new list of songs. 


   Oh! I also forgot to say that I got into UF on Friday :D ugh...I don't want to leave so soon but I'm going for Summer B. My mom is super excited, it's pretty funny. I'm really nervous and excited but more nervous :P. I'm just hoping that i like the school when I go to visit the campus and I'm going really soon. I'll be sure to write about that!