Thursday, May 24, 2018

Greek Day/Slice Of Life #12

     On a Friday, I had A-Day Block 3 Greek Day with my Social Studies teacher Mr. DellaCroce.  It was pretty fun, but everything seemed... shorter.  It went by pretty fast and we didn’t get to do everything that was planned.  Still, it was fun.  I’m just going to talk about one thing, though... Poseidolphin!

     First I walked into the classroom and saw my classmates holding their Greek crafts or letting them sit on the table, there were all kinds of crafts.  Helmets, floral crowns, mini chariots, instruments, li’l drawings, etc.  I came over to my table with my “Poseidolphin”.

     The Poseidolphin was a drawing of a bottlenose dolphin I drew on a baby blue paper and cut out.  I had a sticky note on it with some information.  “Poseidolphin: Poseidon’s Pet” and “A dolphin is the national animal of Greece.”  There’s no such thing as Poseidolphin, it’s just something I made.  I sat at my desk with the Poseidolphin on my lap.

     Surprisingly, even though it was kind of rushed and I made it the night before, it seemed pretty popular!  Later on, during  the trading with the Greek crafts everyone made (it represented the Agora), I think at least three people wanted to trade for my Poseidolphin.  They thought was cute or something, I guess that’s true.  I hope I didn’t seem selfish, but I just didn’t really want to trade it for anything.

Alright, so that’s everything I can think of to say about my Poseidolphin.  Maybe you can tell me about your Greek crafts in the comments!  See you (not literally) in my next blog post!  Thanks for reading!  Have a good day.

Wednesday, May 23, 2018

What Is Poetry?

     What is poetry?  First, I’ll ask Google.  “literary work in which special intensity is given to the expression of feelings and ideas by the use of distinctive style and rhythm; poems collectively or as a genre of literature.”  Now I’ll put it in my own words...

     Poetry is a style of writing to make ideas more exciting and fun, it often using rhyming.  Some other common characteristics of poetry are onomatopoeia, alliteration, personification, repetition and metaphors/similes.  Poetry is almost always written in lines that would go into stanzas.

     I definitely know what poetry is, but it’s kind of hard to define.  What’s your definition of poetry? You can tell me in the comments!  If you want, you could also stick a poem you like or a poem you made in the comments.  Thanks for reading!

Tuesday, May 22, 2018

Pick A Poem

     Here’s a poem I like.  It’s a prophecy from a fantasy book series about dragons called “The Dragonet Prophecy”.  The book series is called Wings Of Fire and it’s by Tui T. Sutherland.  I’m sure it sounds pretty confusing, but it makes more sense if you read the first five books of the series.



The Dragonet Prophecy 


When the war has lasted twenty years...
The dragonets will come.
When the land is soaked in blood and tears...
The dragonets will come.

Find the SeaWing egg of deepest blue.
Wings of night shall come to you.
The largest egg in mountain high
Will give to you the wings of sky.

For wings of earth, search through the mud
For an egg the color of dragon blood.
And hidden alone from the rival queens,
The SandWing egg awaits unseen.

 Of three queens who blister, blaze, and burn,
Two shall die and one shall learn 
If she bows to a fate that is stronger and higher,
She’ll have the power of wings of fire.

Five eggs to hatch on the brightest night,
Five dragons born to end the fight.
Darkness will rise to bring the light.
The dragonets are coming... 

Mario’s Italian Lemonade

     This is a pretty late blog post, but it’s better than nothing, right?  So, my topic for the Chicago History Project was Mario’s Italian Lemonade.  Mario’s Italian Lemonade is a family owned stand in Chicago that sells Italian ice.  It’s owned by Mario DiPaolo Sr, his wife Dorothy and their children.  It’s been around for over 60 years!

     I chose this topic because it’s sort of personal.  Also, with all those weird murderers being studied, I thought I should lighten the mood a bit.  Anyway, the sort of personal part is I used to go there with my family when I was a lot younger.  We’ve never really gotten a chance to go since.  But, that doesn’t mean anything bad happened to the shop, or something bad happened with my family to stop us from going again.

     I think I did pretty well with my project in the end.  The class seemed interested enough, and I put a bunch of information.  If you have any questions about Mario’s Italian Lemonade, you can ask in the comments.  I’ll try to answer.  Thanks for reading!

Wednesday, May 16, 2018

4th Quarter Goals

     My ELA goals for this quarter are to get the blog posts for this quarter finished, start and finish a book called Winter Turning from the Wings Of Fire series, finish the poetry book in time and get my ELA grades up.  I’ll hopefully just get 3’s and 4’s for the quarter.  Right now I’m working on finishing this quarter’s blog posts, (I am writing this post right now, after all) I really hope I’ll make it in time.  There’s a lot of work to do!

     How will I finish all those recent blog posts I’ve missed?  Well, I think I’ll have to make them a lot shorter...  I feel bad doing that, but it’s just there are some posts I’ve done drafts of and I feel like they’re way too short to publish.  Short for me is two or three paragraphs and decent is seven or eight.  The “short” bit I make for those posts is only the beginning of the story!  I know I can’t finish all those old ones, so when I make these Q4 ones I’ll have a new idea of how long they should be: what I think is short.

     I’ll try to sum up anything as quickly as possible.  I’ll still put details, I’ll just make it more of a summary than a whole story.  Again, I really want to finish these in time, so I hope this new method works!  Ms. Haury, if you see this post you can comment and tell me your thoughts or suggestions.  Thanks for reading this “short” post!

Two Of My Poems

Here are two of my poems.  The first one is the nature poem I called “An Ocean Fantasy”.  The second one is the rainy day poem, I didn’t really think of a special name for it.  It’s onomatopoeia.


Drifting through endless blue
Eyes peek out to stare at you
They go back into the sand
A misfit here; a lubber of land

You keep flying, through all the coral
Blooming colors; almost floral
Seahorses gallop on and on
Slowly, slowly, then they’re gone  

Dolphins swirl and leap and glide
Riding invisible water slides
Clicks and whistles bounce about
Chatting ‘bout you without a doubt

Staying here in a fantasy
Water for infinity
Sinking down, you close your eyes
Taking the path of ocean tides




The drizzling rain pitter patters lightly on my shoes as they smack their way across the ground to my house.  It’s getting harder, each raindrop almost splashes onto me now.  Lightning zips, thunder cracks.  I get to the gate and unlatch it as it clinks, the gate creaks open.  Each raindrop is now a big plop onto my shirt and face.  The leaves on the tree rustle loudly.  My shoes are bonking down when I run up the stairs.  I thrust the door open and slam it closed.  I sigh.  Phew!

Thursday, April 26, 2018

My Favorite Song?!

     Okay, there is no clear song that I like most.  I do really like many songs, so how can I chose one?!  It’s so hard!  I guess I’ll just say one song I like that isn’t my absolute favorite.  Here’s a song I like, but isn’t my favorite song.  Octopus’s Garden written by Ringo Starr/Richard Starkey from the Beatles!



I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden in the shade
He'd let us in, knows where we've been
In his octopus' garden in the shade

I'd ask my friends to come and see
An octopus' garden with me
I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden in the shade.

We would be warm below the storm
In our little hideaway beneath the waves
Resting our head on the sea bed
In an octopus' garden near a cave

We would sing and dance around
Because we know we can't be found
I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden in the shade

We would shout and swim about
The coral that lies beneath the waves
(Lies beneath the ocean waves)
Oh what joy for every girl and boy
Knowing they're happy and they're safe
(Happy and they're safe)

We would be so happy you and me
No one there to tell us what to do
I'd like to be under the sea
In an octopus' garden with you.



The last part where it sounds kind of lovey I’m just thinking of being friends with the octopus.  I like octopi.  They’re very intelligent and cute.  🐙  Very cute.