This is a late announcement that I'm going to take a small blogging break. I thank you so much for all of your lovely comments and support they mean a lot to me. And don't worry nothing wrong I'm just tired and don't want to feel guilty for leaving you all with out a word. So I'm not. :) I'll try to be back soon with lots to share. I love you all!

Love, Clara

christmas time

This post is going to be a bit random I think, it's almost Christmas and I'm finally finding the time to remind myself what that all entails. Mostly knitting like MAD, which I'll show you more of later. It's snowed a lot lately, keeping the bare trees delightfully frosted.

Here's the cygnet picture, I'm the one in the glasses and Odette is the one in the center back. All of the shows went well, except for the Saturday matinee, the music didn't turn on so we did our whole variation with just one of our teachers snapping the time for us backstage. But now we can at least say we did it! Dance is done for the year, and I must say I'm welcoming the break, I hadn't realized how tired I was until I stopped.

The sun rises late and sets early, Monday (when I took this) was winter solstice, it was a little after ten. We had four hours of light, I think. Some people here hate how it's always dark, but I don't this is one of my favorite times of year just because it is dark, and when it's light... well you can see from the photo.

I'm reading Emma for the first time, I've never seen the movie either so it's completely new, which is wonderful.

Here's my most recent purchase, Value Village for $7, more than I usually pay, but I figured for this it was definitely worth it.

don't you agree?

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas, I might be back before it comes, but probably not for there is so much to do! We've been baking all sorts of delights, Russian tea cakes, rugalach, sugar cookies, ginger bread, fudge. And today we're building a ginger bread light house. It's so exciting and I've been away from it all far too long. I wish you all magical Christmases filled with sugar plum visions and popcorn chains.

Eskimo kisses,

Clara

I made it! and after Thursday(art final) I should be able to resume a semi-regular online life. This past week has been so unbelievably wonderful, I got my first pair of pointe shoes! I had to send them back because they were too big, but I should be getting the perfect ones today or tomorrow. Also, I got moved up to ballet four! I think things are finally taking a turn for the better, my hopes for this coming year are soaring high.

I got to help work on this tutu for the sugar plum fairy the picture is blurry, but this tutu is absolutely exquisite. Some more good news is that I'm going to be doing a self designed costuming class next semester with a focus in dance. Kristen and I are going to do it together and each of us will make our own tutus.

The Swanhilda tutu is one of my favorites, it's for the wedding variation.

Here's some photos I took during the dry tec, they changed the backdrop before the show, that's why it's rather strange. Enjoy!

Odette from Swan Lake

Swanhilda from Coppelia

The Lilac Fairy from Sleeping Beauty

The Sugar Plum Fairy from the Nutcracker

Giselle from Giselle

I wish you could have watched the show because the photos don't do these girls justice. I'll be back soon!

bouquets,

Clara

a little note, please read

This is just to say that I don't have time to answer all your wonderful comments and I'm so sorry, I will try my hardest once everything thing calms down. But please don't stop leaving them, :) I read them all and they make my day to no end, I just want my replies to be well thought out and heart felt, which I just don't have time to do now. Tonight was our first show and it went beautifully. I'll try to post some pictures soon, just not sure when. I love you all!

Love, Clara

Dance is taking over my life! For the next ten days I will be dancing a minimum of an hour a day, usually more. So, this is just to say that I probably won't be able to post much. But I promise to take lots of pictures and do a very big post about my lengthy week once it's all over okay?

This is my bosom friend Kristen, I thought I would introduce you and also show you what the top of the mazurka costumes look like. There will be better pictures eventually, would you mind if some time this week I just post some dance pictures and a tiny bit of words? I might be able to manage that.
I've been working on fixing up some clothes, here's one of my most recent completed projects, I just added the little collar/trim. Right now I'm hoping to finish up a nice backpack style bag, I carry so much stuff around that my typical hobo style purses are really messing my back and neck up, so hopefully my the backpack will fix that problem.

Christmas is coming too! This Saturday I'm going to watch the Nutcracker and I can hardly wait, I haven't seen it for seven years and I now that I know so much more about ballet I feel like I'll appreciate it better too. Eight years ago I was in it as a little elf at the beginning, I had so much fun. Well I really want to post this tonight because I won't have another chance for quite a while. So I hope you all have a marvelous weekend I love you all and will hopefully be back next week.

Eskimo kisses,

Clara

I got tagged by the ever so gifted Sarah, off in Wonderland, and I'm ever so thankful and excited about it. Thank you Sarah!

So I get to answer these questions and I hope you enjoy this as much as I do!

What is your mood? I'd say it's something like this, comfortable clothes, and a dreamy heart that is ready to either be swept away in a book or my own stories

Where did you grow up? I grew up here in Alaska for the most part, but when I was three we moved to Missouri (which I still can't spell) and lived there for five years. I'm so glad that we moved back though, for while I'll always love the farming parts down there, but it was the first place where my imaginative little soul was attacked. I still have to fight off the ghosts of those days. My mom says she's finally seeing the little girl she lost fourteen years ago come back.

What was your dream last night? Prepare yourself for something very strange. I was driving past the university, (only it didn't look like the university, but it was) and part of it was on fire. One of my friends who joined the Air Gard was there and he said that someone (a bad guy) had shot a flaming arrow at the roof, after dropping a baby down the chimney. (don't ask) anyway, my friend had saved the baby and it was really the most beautiful little boy I have ever seen, he had golden eyes and the sweetest smile. So I took the baby and ran away with him because the bad guy, which was now a dragon, wanted the baby dead and was chasing us. I ran into a house and we went down and down all different stairs and trap doors and the dragon kept fallowing us. Finally we got down to a grating that lead to the water system under the road, which we went into. And then I woke up, fell asleep again and had another dream, but I won't bore you with that one too.

What is your favorite store? The Antique Shop! I've spent hours upon hours there and hardly noticed.

What is your hobby? oh goodness, I have so many, there's knitting, ballet, writing, drawing, acting (on occasion), reading, researching, baking. Maybe these aren't all hobbies, they're just things I love to do. Does that count?

What is your fear? A cage. To not be able to be impulsive or wild or free. To be stuck in some dull grey office doing things I hate, unmarried, and never loved.

What is on your wish list? A typewriter, wouldn't it be wonderful to curl up with tea and a blanket in my room and type out my story? I would stack up each page as it was finished and then, when I took a break, I would put them in one of my suit cases to be read later after the dust had settled on it for a while.

And a carpet bag, this one here isn't exactly what I'm wanting, I imagine one larger, like the one Mary Poppins has.

Your friends? Are books mostly, I have one extremely treasured friend at dance and I feel so blessed to have her, we've been though some hard things this semester, but our friendship has stayed strong, she is my bosom friend. All so all of my dear and wonderful friends here, you are all so sweet and encouraging you have no idea how much you mean to me. I appreciate you all very much.

Where do you want to be in six years? Here. Or some where like it, my own nice little cottage in the woods, either married or alone, but writing every day and making all sorts of beautiful things. I'd like to make my own clothing line, kind of, but it be where I gather up used clothes and remake them, vintage, and maybe new clothes I've designed, all with a common theme and sell them in my own little shop, either real or on etsy. But mostly I want to happy, where ever I am and what ever I'm doing I want to be happy and content.

Your life? Is good. I'm satisfied with it for now, things have been very hard this year, but I'm convinced they'll get better, and I've been working my hardest to focus on all of the blessings I have. There are so many, I have a wonderful family, and while many aspects of dance have been hard, I'm going on pointe in January. The list is very tedious and long, so I won't bore you with it, just believe me I'm grateful for what I have and I plan to enjoy it to it's absolute fullest.

Okay, now I get to pass this on,

I'm going to give it to Sara of we are dreamers for being so sweet and a very good friend and leaving such wonderful comments. :)

Marisa or the little Miss Thumbelina who always leaves such deliciously long comments that are so fun to read, not to mention she's a fairy.

If any one else wants to do this tag please go a head, I just wasn't sure who else to give it too, sorry! I'd say more, but I'm a bit sickly this weekend, so I'm going to go rest some. I love you all!

glitter snow,

Clara

how

A poet's meanings are never clear and the author's heart is hidden. the ink that bleeds, the veins in paper, the heart of soul that beats. what gives life to words? what fills their shells with flesh and blood? is it passion? is it tears? is it thought or time? what puts the beating heart inside? what makes the meaning flow? how does the hope and despair, the life and the death, the wonder and blindness happen? how does the ink stained author pour reality into fantasy? how do they make you feel another's pains and joys, how do you breathe at the same pace as they? how do you hear the cries of their soul louder than your own? how can letters and words, mere ink stained in patterns, portray a whole life or a whole other world, when we, here, can't even understand our own? what makes this wonderment possible? what gives black and white figures life?
there must be reasons, there must be answers. how? how? how does the sun stay where it is? how does the lover know that he loves? how does the ocean hold its self in? how does the bird decide to come down from the sky? how does the dreamer find her dreams? how does the snow stay white and how does the rainbow bend? how does this questioner never want answers and how can the earth really spin? where is the answer to all these things? I think the book must be burned, for while some answers are sacred others are blasphemy.
the sun sets so early this time of year, which I suppose is kind of sad, but one good thing is that, the sky is always a beautiful color.

I want to fly away on my Pegasus, galloping, flapping, floating,
across a powder blue-berry peach-purple sky.
I want to shake the down blankets, the watch it gently snow,
on all of the resting little train-town below.
I want to harvest candy canes and build a castle by the sea,
I want to hold a ball in my candy cane castle, right next to the sunshine sea.
I want to dance and paint sugar plums so that all of the world can spy,
me fly away on my Pegasus across the powder blue-berry peach-purple sky.

I wrote all of this in my journal earlier, with a dip-pen, I think it was for that reason I was unable to stop. I hope you all have a beautiful Thanksgiving or just a beautiful week.

Love,
Clara