An Adventure Through Life

One of the things I'm greatest at is reading. I absolutely LOVE books. In grade 7, I read 75 full books simply during school hours throughout the year. I also have a mile long wishlist on Chapters/Indigo. And my favourite series is (a classic) Harry Potter. Aaah, Potter. My first true series. I'd curl up with a cup of hot chocolate and one of those books and be there all day. In fact, I first read the series (all 7 books) in grade 5 over the span of about 2 1/2 weeks. I have a snitch pocket watch and an interactive (reed) wand. My house is Gryffindor, my Ilvermorny house is Thunderbird, and my patronus is an otter. And of course, the queen is JK Rowling. She's the best. Pottermore is one of my favourite sites and I've read everything she's written there. But what did Miss Rowling do with the millions of dollars in book sales? She started Lumos. Lumos is the nonprofit organization created and run by JK Rowling to help children stuck in homes and institutions ...

I'm a super-intense booknerd and I'm always hunting for a great new read. I came across Shatter Me on Indigo's website and was naturally intrigued. I mean, come on! Look at that amazing cover art! Shatter Me is set in a post apocalyptic America. Food doesn't grow. Birds don't fly. Air is barely breathable. Weather is an unpredictable weapon. And The Reestablishment controls everything. The main protagonist is 17 year old named Juliette, a girl who's been locked up and bounced around from prison to hospital to asylum for most of her life. A girl who's legally insane. A girl who's feared and hated. A girl capable of killing with her touch. But Juliette longs for freedom. So when The Reestablishment recruits her to use as their weapon, she has her own plans. She won't be anyone's weapon. Okay, so the book starts off somewhat lacking and slow. She's afraid of absolutely everything . Things begin to pick up when she's transferred...

            I run as fast as my legs will take me. They are chasing me, and though I don’t know why, I know I must escape. I see the dark forest up ahead and I know it’s my only chance. It’s almost pitch black and I can barely see, but still I run. My lungs burn and my legs ache, but I keep going. The brambles catch the skirt of my violet dress and threaten to trip me. I must not trip, I must not fall, I must not stop. The tree branches reach out like long fingers and grab my coppery hair, but still I do not stop. I cannot see now, and run blind through the forest.             A tree root snakes out underfoot and I trip. They will catch me now. I’m sure of it. But ahead I see a glimmer of light. It is not much, but I can see by it. Quickly, I stand and run, ignoring the newfound pain in my ankle. Now it is I who chase that bit of light. It will save me. It must save me...

So this was a very popular recipe at work. All the campers loved them (many of them tried -and failed- to get an extra one) and they're fairly easy to make. Ingredients 1 cup of margarine/butter 1 cup of brown sugar 1/2 cup of white sugar 2 eggs 2 teaspoons of vanilla (I usually added an extra teaspoon) 1 teaspoon of baking powder 1 1/2 cups of flour 2 cups of rolled oats chocolate chips (I found that 3 1/4 cups was a good amount, but it all depends on how much chocolate you like) Beat the butter and sugars together until you have a good creamy mixture. Make sure that everything is well combined before moving on. Then you beat in the eggs, one at a time (it doesn't make much of a difference in the resulting brownie but I found that the batter was easier to mix if the eggs were done one at a time). Stir the vanilla in. Once you've done that, add in the dry ingredients. The finished batter should be closer to a cookie dough than a brownie mix in term...