Canada Trip 2015

This past week, I attended the Stratford Festival with my best friend Kianna and her family. After months of planning the trip, we finally left Monday afternoon and arrived in Stratford, Ontario Tuesday morning. It was a long six hours in the car that was filled with Disney sing-alongs and trying to fall asleep while driving through construction.

Tuesday was the busiest day. We had two shows scheduled while also trying to unpack and eat. The first show we saw was The Sound of Music. I love the movie version of this and have watched it numerous times. I know all of the songs and I was really excited to see the stage performance. It did not disappoint. All of the actors and actresses were incredible. They hit all of the notes in the songs and the story was beautifully told. They had one main set and then different props were brought in to make it seem like there were multiple rooms around. My favorite part of the performance was the actress who played Maria Von Trapp. I lost my program so I don't remember her name but she was incredible.

The set of Sound of Music 

The second show we saw was Hamlet. I read Hamlet in my Humanities class my senior year of high school. My teacher is obsessed with Hamlet and she passed her love and obsession onto her students, myself included. I've only read a few plays from Shakespeare, but Hamlet is my favorite. I had high expectations going into this show and it was fantastic. The actor who played Hamlet was the perfect choice. He could be moody, angsty, and mad all at the same time. I didn't know whether to love or be annoyed by him. My other favorite character was surprisingly Polonius. He was incredibly sarcastic and fun. He had a few great one-liners and expressions that drew laughs from the audience. Although I would have preferred to see Hamlet first and then The Sound of Music, both were incredible performances.

Landline Book Review

4.5/5 Stars

Landline follows a character named Georgie who is a comedy writer. She is married and has two kids. Her husband Neal is the one who does all of the cooking, cleaning and taking care of the kids because Georgie seems to always be working. For Christmas, the four of them are supposed to fly out to Nebraska to visit Neal's mom. Georgie decides she can't go because one of her shows that she has been working on has been given the opportunity to become a pilot. With her marriage seemingly crumbling, Georgie tells Neal that she can't go to Nebraska, causing Neal and the girls to leave without her. Georgie is so upset and winds up going to her mom's house. It's in her childhood bedroom that she finds an old phone. She later learns that this phone is magic. It allows her to talk to Neal from 1998, right before they got engaged. By talking to this version of Neal, Georgie realizes what she really wants in life and why her marriage may be crumbling.
Like all Rainbow Rowell books, I fell in love with this story. The characters were relatable and the story was fun but also semi heartbreaking. It was addictive, as all of Rainbow's books are. My only problem was that both Georgie and Neal could be annoying at times because they weren't communicating but it's easy to look past that small detail and love this book.

**Spoilers ahead. Don't read if you don't want to be spoiled**

An Ember in the Ashes Book Review

5/5 Stars

An Ember in the Ashes is a debut young adult fantasy novel by Sabaa Tahir. It follows two characters, a scholar turned slave girl named Laia, and a solider named Elias. Their society is sort of based on ancient Rome. There is an empire who has taken over these different groups of people. Laia is a part of the scholar group and her people are attacked by the soldiers. They kill her grandparents and take her brother to prison. Laia barely escapes. She goes in search of the resistance, a group of rebels who are trying to fight against the empire and bring order back to their world. She believes that they can help her save her brother.
Elias on the other hand is a trained soldier. He is a Mask which is the most deadly of all of the soldiers. He has been training since he was eight years old but he knows that he is different than the other students. He believes that what the empire is doing is wrong and he doesn't want to hurt people. He tries to escape but then is chosen to participate in a set of trials to become the new emperor. As one can guess, Elias and Laia cross paths and work together to figure out how to escape the empire.
This book was fantastic. I went into it with very high expectations because there was so much hype surrounding it. It was an epic fantasy story that was much darker than I anticipated. I found the pacing to be perfect and the characters to be interesting. The plot was fast paced but there was a lot of world building and information being thrown at the reader but because the story was so engrossing, it's hardly noticeable. This book was marketed as a stand-alone fantasy which was kind of annoying because the ending of the book left off at a cliff hanger. Thankfully, its sequel was announced a few weeks ago and that can be expected in 2016.

**Spoilers ahead. Don't read if you don't want to be spoiled**

Summer Bucket List

Summer has officially started for me! Even though I have technically been out of school since May, my family is now on summer break as well. Each year I make a list of things that I would potentially like to do or accomplish this summer. The list consists of little things, like finishing up a book series, to larger things like going on a trip. Summer is my favorite season because it seems like the possibilities are endless! I already have some summer plans but here are some of my "bucket list" items that I hope to accomplish!



1.) Go to Chicago: I live in Michigan so Chicago is about a 2 1/2- 3 hour train ride. I love exploring the city because there always seems to be something new to discover, plus the food is delicious. I want to either take a day trip with some friends or even go for a few days with my family!

2.) Spend an entire day at the beach: Last summer I participated in beach week which is an entire week where the seniors camp out at the beach. My friends and I had such a good time going out to the beach every morning and staying until sunset. I love going to the beach and even though camping out for a week might not be possible, spending a day there with some friends sounds great.

May Favorites

I'm a little late on this but here are some of the things that I loved in the month of May!

Once Upon a Time Season 4B Finale: Throughout the second half of season 4 of OUAT, I was really annoyed with all of the characters. They were acting without thinking things through and the episodes were boring. The finale completely made up for the crap that has gone on this past half season. I don't want to say much because of spoilers but let's just say that I am so excited to see how season 5 plays out now that some of the character's roles in the series will be changed.

Pitch Perfect 2: When the first Pitch Perfect movie came out, my friend Hannah and I went and saw it multiple times in theaters and since then I've watched it so many times that I can quote the entire movie. I was really excited when it was announced that a sequel would be coming out but I had high expectations. Although Pitch Perfect 2 wasn't as good as the first one, I still enjoyed it. This one follows the Bellas in their senior year of college and they seem to have lost their way. Everyone is trying to figure out what to do after they graduate while also focusing on winning the world a cappella championship. It was cute and funny and I loved that we got to see how the characters have developed through their years at Barden.