Books You Must Read at Least Once Before You Die #1

I thought I would write a series of posts about Books You Must Read At Least Once Before You Die! Sounds good? I hope so.

I will write a post like this every week or two, depends on how popular they get to be! I hope they will go down well though.

Today I will tell you about a series I read. There one of Olivia's favourites. The Samurai Kids. The first book in the series is called White Crane. It is about these boys and one girl, named I think it was Kyoko, who are training to be Samurai.

You can read the books separately, they don't have to be read in order. We haven't read all of them yet and we have read them all out of order. I read White Crane last.

 

My favourite character was Taji, Olivia liked Nezume best. I like the idea of an awesome blind boy being a Samurai!

 

 

Another character I like a lot is Sensei. I don't know how to explain it. His lessons, the way he is so secretive. It just adds up to a great character. I bet you will like him too.





 

So yes, this is a great series to read and defiantly worth reading at least once!

Please tell me if you like this post!

Memories of Being Ill

Don't you hate it when your sick and you don't feel like doing anything? Well recently Riley has had a tummy bug and she hasn't been feeling too good. That's why I am writing again.

I remember once when I was sick I had to stay in the bed the whole day and wasn't allowed up. All I ate was soup and all I did was read.

Another time I thought I was over a tummy bug enough to go out and then I started feeling sick again in the super market. We had to get me out quick before I vomited on the floor.

Riley once went away to a friend's house and while she was there she came down with such a bad cold she had to come home again early.

I also remember a time when we were little when Riley and I got really sick. To cheer us up Mum bought us a Jessie and Woody doll which we had been wanting for ages. We still have them! I will have to go find them for Riley.

Riley has spent all of today lying on the sofa watching Lord of the Rings and reading Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters. I think she is feeling a bit better than yesterday.

Sorry this post is short, but I have to go see how Riley is faring.

Happy Birthday Patterson!

My turn to write again, wow! How time flies, luckily Google gave me something to write about. Apparently it's Banjo Patterson's 150th birthday today. Happy Birthday!!!

Banjo Patterson () is my favourite poet. His poems make me crack up and laugh at every turn. I can imagine just how much time he spent over writing them.

My favourite poem of his is The Man From Snowy River. Jackie French (an Australian author) wrote a book called The Girl From Snowy River which is part of a trilogy. It was the middle book, but you can read it alone if you want. I really enjoyed the book and I suggest you read it.

Another favourite poem of mine is the one that must be his most favourite, Waltzing Matilda. If you are interested in the series I mentioned earlier than I will tell you that the first book in it is called A Waltz for Matilda.

As you have probably noticed, Jackie French is one of my favourite authors of all time. She writes amazing books. Though I do like fantasy a bit more than history most of the time.

One thing I bet is that you didn't know that Banjo Patterson is on the Australian ten dollar note or that part of his poem, The Man From Snowy River is written on it in his own handwriting.  I checked to make sure that it was true and not just made up. If you look very closely you can just read it with a magnifying glass.

Well, happy birthday Banjo Patterson! I love your poems.

Do you like Banjo Patterson? Who is your favourite poet?

Channeling YouTube

While surfing the internet we found this amazing YouTube channel. Its called MissJenFABULOUS. The name doesn't give much away about what it is about, so I will tell you. It has nail art videos, make up tutorials (We don't wear any) and I think some hair stuff, but yeah.

What really caught our eyes was the Easy Nail Art For Beginners series that Jen has been doing. They are totally amazing. Being hopeless at nail polish and stuff, this has really made me excited. I am going to start doing my nails.

'Easy' made me at first think it was just a boring video on how to put on nail polish. There not though. They tell you how to do amazing designs on your nails with only a few tools, if any. I have found other videos by other people on how to make some of those tools so that shouldn't be a bother.

Another video that caught my eye was one on Jen's hair routine. I never bother with my hair that much and it made me think I should take more care of it.

I remember once the hair dresser told Mum that girls with blond hair, have really dry hair. Or something like that. She was right, our hair is super dry and Mum is always going nuts about it. So I am going to try and make my hair healthy.

After being inspired I thought that I could do more still with my hair. It being pretty long is a bit annoying, but I never take the time to tie it up. But now I am going to learn how to do my hair beautifully.

 

 

To do this I have found another YouTube channel. Its called Cute Girl Hairstyles. Mindy shows you how to do a million hairstyles. Some of them you would need someone else to do for you, but Olivia would help me.

So yeah. I have a lot of things I am going to do.  By the by, Mum thinks this is a great idea and says these channels are amazing and totally safe. So don't worry.

Olivia is going to do this with me. Hopefully we will soon have some pictures to post of our nail art. Then again, maybe it won't be good enough to show.

Please check out these channels and tell me of any good ones you know of.

What do you do with your hair? Do you take time over it? Or whiz like me?

Where School Work Meets Blogging

I meant to post this yesterday, but we got a bit busy. Sorry! Well onto the post...

"Girls, you should each make a school blog," Mum told us. "A blog to put all those bits and bobs on that you have been learning. Photos, recipes, YouTube video links, book reviews, all that stuff."

Riley and I thought it was a great idea. We got together all our bravery and clicked the 'New Blog' button.

I called my blog 'Whispers of a Different Girl' and Riley called hers 'A Princess in the Making'. I am quite proud of the names. I thought them both up.

Next bit was Riley's domain, because she is better at that sort of thing. She went around some of our favourite blog background sites and free image sites until she had all the things she needed to design us two totally awesome blogs!

Then we wrote our first posts. Our blogs were done.

Please visit them! If you are interested in the kind of things we write there, please feel free to follow.

Also we have a bit of other news. We have just joined DIY.org. If you are on there, please follow us. My username is Ann Mega and Riley is called Ultra There.

We don't have much up as of yet, but more is coming. Watch out for it!

Plants Vs. Zombies

Yesterday Dad came home with a present for us. It was a computer game called Plants Vs. Zombies.

Now we are not big computer game fans. No way! I haven't played any in ages, but we do sometimes like to curl up with our computers and have a bit of fun.

My first thought was Zombies??? We don't usually like zombies. We find them horrid and revolting. We asked Dad about it.

"I hear it isn't that bad," Dad told us. "Just try it."

We installed it and then started playing. To our surprise Dad was right. It wasn't bad, it was fun! We enjoyed ourselves a lot.  They aren't normal zombies.

In the game you have to set up a defence in front of your house using plants, to keep zombies out so they can't eat your brains. Brains don't really come into it that much, unless a zombie gets to your house and then it says they ate your brains and you try again.

I really would suggested this game for you to play. You wouldn't want really young kids playing it because of the zombies, and I know different families have different ideas at what age children should be allowed to play these things, but me and Olivia think that nine and up is a good age limit.

Have you played this game? What did you think of playing it? Are you like us and don't like zombies?

Super Treats for Everyone

How hard is it to make a yummy treat? Not very. We have heaps of favourite, simple treats that we would love to share with you.

Riley and I adore greek style yogurt. We love it's tang. It is so much better than the sweet stuff you can get. At least we think so. It has a nice real taste to it, unspoiled!

Here are some things you can do with it or any other plain yogurts:

Dollop some into a small bowl, drizzle honey all over it and tip plenty of rolled oats on top of that. Don't skimp on the oats! Mix everything together, add some more for whatever you think you don't have enough of and then eat. Warning, more honey is better than less. Make sure you can taste it!

Chop up some fresh strawberries, sprinkle with sugar and put them in a bowl of yogurt. I like more rather than less strawberries, but Riley doesn't like the juice getting all through her yogurt. You can do this with any berry or you could buy some frozen mixed berries.

What is better than rice pudding? Well we all love the really creamy rich taste. For days we are in a hurry we have quick recipe.

Here is what we do:

Cook enough rice for however many people are eating, put it in a saucepan and tip milk in so your spoon can go around the pan, but not so much that it is all milk. Just a bit.

When it is bubbling grab some sweetened condensed milk or just cream if you don't have any. Tip in a good bit and then mix up. Put a tiny drop of vanilla essence as an extra if you like.

There are a few good toppings for this. One is cut up chocolate. We also like honey and cut up almonds. You can play around with what you want.

We love fruit. The best way to have it is for dessert. This is the second easiest dessert on this post.

If you are using canned fruit like peaches (which we adore having) drain them and tip them into your bowls. If you are using fresh fruit like strawberries or mangos cut them up and put them into the bowls. If using canned fruit, tip a little juice into the bowls for an extra yummy taste.

Get a bottle of cream and put a good bit in each bowl and eat. Nothing easier. We all know this recipe!

Last of all is the easiest. All you need is a bar of chocolate of your pick and some hungry people. Break up your bar of chocolate and pass it around, yum!

I hope you liked these super easy recipes and that they are easy enough to follow. Thanks for reading and please try them out!

I would have given you some exact measurements for ingredients in the rice pudding, but there aren't any. It is just what you want to have.

Do you know any great recipes I would like? Where can I find them?