And promise not to promise anymore…

We just discovered something really cool around here. Miss B. can play Ingrid Michaelson’s songs on piano by ear! Ingrid has really simple and repetitive arrangements, which makes them easy to decipher. (They still sound really pretty though. Simple does not mean it doesn’t sound good! It basically means she plays piano like how a guitar is usually used, just for chords. So all Miss B. has to figure out is what chords she is playing in what pattern and it’s usually the same for the entire song.) I am SOOOOOOOO excited. I don’t play piano but now I want to learn, considering I can’t sing. Sam refuses to sing the lyrics which I think is mean. I think she is just doing it to spite Miss B. though, just to get a reaction. Hopefully!!

She can play “The Chain” and “Sort Of”. When she was trying to figure out “Sort Of” some random guy came up and decided to play this intense arrangement by ear… but Miss B.’s accompaniment was correct. Um, score. Piano hogs are annoying.

So – “Sort-Of”, an example of how Ingrid’s new songs are mastered and basically how she can’t play piano. But, she’s still amazing and that makes it way easier for us. You can hear the notes really well in this video.

In other news, we finished our latest album. -A Knock at the Door-

OMG LEISH. My favorite disease… MB asked me for a weird favorite so of course I had to bring this one up! Leishmaniasis is kind-of awesome because I can pronounce the name and recognize it and it’s rare AND a tropical medicine diease so doubly awesome. Don’t look it up if you get squeamish.

Portrait Time

So over the past week or so, Miss B. has been learning more about how to use her camera, which is pretty exciting for us. I think our pictures have been decent, but we always had a lighting issue. Miss B. figured out some solutions to that problem: she adjusted the White Balance on her camera so it photographs according to the kind of light we have in our room, she played around with the Fill Light adjuster on Picasa, and most importantly, she was able to figure out a way to use some boxes to steady the camera while it is on the non-flash mode (before, the box shaking had been an issue, but perhaps the ones she used are more sturdy).

Here are our portraits! Personally, in mine, I have to say my hair looks a little messed up, but I just got back from skating practice so you can’t blame me!

Piper

Piper

Emily

Emily

Sam

Sam

Me!

Me!

Miss B. made a playlist…

… and it’s awesome. I recommend you listen to all of these songs.

So I Tried a Little Freddy
1. Grace Kelly by Mika
2. How Lucky We Are by Meiko
3. The Remedy (I Won’t Worry) by Jason Mraz
4. Raindrops from the Sun (Hey Hey Hey) by Imani Coppola
5. Fidelity by Regina Spektor
6. Better by Regina Spektor
7. Everything by Michael Buble
8. Answer by Sarah McLachlan
9. Boys with Girlfriends by Meiko
10. Mercy by Duffy
11. They Can’t Take That Away From Me by Frank Sinatra
12. On the Radio by Regina Spektor

Like an angry apple tree, I throw my apples when you get too close to me.

Honestly Ingrid… what else throws apples?! I love this line from Ingrid Michaelson’s new song, “Locked Up” off her new album. Okay, it’s not really new to me because Miss B. heard Ingrid play it at her concert last year and showed us a youtube video of the song, but this was its first release. It’s one of my favorites. Miss B. got the CD with some of her friends on iTunes (they split it). It was really exciting; usually we don’t get music the week it’s released.

This week has been… not too great. Well, actually just today. Last night I felt like I was coming down with a cold or something, or maybe my allergies were acting up. It’s definitely a cold. I feel MISERABLE. I went to skating practice because I didn’t have a fever, and Sam totally chewed me out for it. I know my body, okay? I know when I can and can’t skate. I skated fine. I’m used to skating under any condition. It’s basically like if you would be able to go to school or not. I would definitely be able to go to school (thankfully, we have a 3-day weekend) but I wouldn’t feel great. Same with skating, although I guess I can see how you are supposed to rest and not do physical activity. I just conveniently forget that. I’ve never gotten pneumonia in my life, Samantha! Then Piper freaked out because she thought I had swine flu. Which, I don’t. There’s a difference between the way a cold and the flu feels, and plus with the flu you have a fever, which I don’t.

Okay, normally this wouldn’t bother me, but I guess the laying around and contemplating made me even more annoyed. Em and I did have a good game of checkers, though. She won.

And I got another weird letter from Lindsay! What the heck?! This one said “Look to the western sky!” which Sam said was a Wicked reference. I’ve only seen the show once so I didn’t get that right away. Neither of us could think of anything that would mean, though. I don’t know if I like this club thing. All the secrecy/mystery is kind-of fun but frustrating too!

Sorry this sounded negative if it did. I imagine once I feel better, I may be more inclined to be positive. And are we there yet?

Here’s the album of me surrounded by tissue world:
Checkers!

Yay, me.

Yay, me.

Also, Ingrid’s new album has “The Chain” on it. Again. Just thought I would let you know since everyone in Ingrid-world seems to be obsessed with that song for no reason. She explained in one of the videos that it is a canon, which does explain why it’s so attractive. Still, I’m more obsessed with other songs.

Another MeMe

I got this from Lindsey, Sophie’s classmate.

1. What time did you get up this morning?
Miss B. is working welcome week, so we had to get up at 8:30. That’s actually late for me… I don’t have skating this week and I’m used to getting up at 3:30am!

2. What was the last film you saw at the cinema?
I have not been to a cinema here. The only people who ever get to go to movies are Kit-Kat! I want to see My Sister’s Keeper… but not with anyone else. Too many questions… And The Time Traveler’s Wife looks good; MB said it was really true to the book.

3. What is your favorite TV show?
Grey’s Anatomy. It’s bad…

4. What is your favorite dessert?
anything with apples… like cinnamon apples, apple pie a la mode, etc…

5. Favorite sandwich?
any panini. right now, I’m really loving reubens!

6. Favorite item of clothing?
Oh right now, Hope’s NYC sweatshirt that I’ve kind-of stolen. We’re not going to see her until October, so why not? Otherwise, my skates of course!

7. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would
you go?
I go a lot of places for skating…but I don’t really get to tour or anything. Probably London.

8. Morning or night person?
I have to be a morning person because I am a skater…

9. Any Pets?
None

10. Texting or IMing?
I don’t really like either. I text a lot though because it’s convenient with skating. But I don’t like when people send chain texts and stuff.

11. Any new and exciting news you’d like to share with us?
I have a great new sweatshirt! Um…jk…it’s not really mine…

12. What did you want to be when you were little?
A doctor

13. How are you today?
Well-rested. Ready to move people in…

14. What is your favorite candy?
Not Kit-Kats for sure. I’d say Twix.

15. What are you listening to right now?
Regina Spektor, which Sam is kind-of mad about…but I LOVE HER! AND… Ingrid’s new CD comes out the 25th!!! SO EXCITED!!!!!!

16. If you were a crayon, what color would you be?
Light blue… like snow :)

17. Favorite restaurant?
Panera by far

18. Summer or winter?
Winter

19. Hugs or Kisses?
Hugs, and cheek kisses (OH SKATING)

20. What is under your bed?
Oh, wait! I DON’T HAVE A BED! That’s right! Miss B. ran out of space, so me and every doll after me do not have a bed or a room! This is a major fail. Under MB’s bed? Extra bathroom supplies, suitcases, books in a shelf thing, and printer paper.

21. What are you afraid of?
Nothing really. Nothing I would tell the grand online world…

22. How many towns/cities have you lived in?
Just one, until I moved to OWT. Now I’ve lived in 3: Omaha, a town near Cleveland OH, and Kennebunk, ME

23. hearts or stars?
stars

24. Most embarassing moment?
odd questions…

25. Favorite genre of movies?
Action

Par-tay!

This party was actually supposed to happen a few weeks ago, so we’re pretending it did. But it actually just happened today because that’s when MB had time to take pictures of it. (So weird, isn’t it? Like we’re in a reality TV show.) It was a ton of fun. I love parties and meeting people and dressing up and all that jazz. I’m starting to become friends with Kailey Anema. She goes to Johns Hopkins, and she’s not sure if she’s doing pre-vet or pre-med. But what we actually have in common is our love of water. Kailey says she tends to make friends over that. I’m a sailor, while she’s a surfer, but that’s enough to get us started for hours. We’re both very determined, science-minded people too. The party was very strange. I had to leave early because of skating, so I’ll post the whole story tomorrow. And I don’t want to spoil it, but it was just…weird. I felt like I was being evaluated or something, and in a way I think I was. But who knows?

Here are some outtakes that won’t appear in the album. I just had fun with them. Sam spent the entire time doing her hair (since she needs to recurl it, she was trying to get it to “look” curly one more time so we didn’t have to take about an hour to wait for her to curl her hair while we were shooting stuff…). So while she did that, I tried on dresses. I really liked this one of Ivy’s but it was a little fancy for the party, plus it had long sleeves so it’d be more for fall or winter. (It’s kind-of got a weird glow, but ignore that. My hair was not cooperating with the flash at the time.)
Cate in Ivy's dress

And this one is of me and Kailey. I LOVE IT.
Cate and Kailey

I Will Be The Answer…After Walking the Line!

I thought it would be cool to make a little “backstage” post about my LMPT Round 3 photo because it was quite complicated. The theme for this round was Line.

First I thought I’d use one of my favorite songs, “Answer” by Sarah McLachlan. So we set up a “photo shoot” and got to work. I put on this dress because I thought it would be cool to kind-of be part of the background.
line 1

Then we put down a line, of course…
line 2

Next we spelled out my favorite LINE from the song, get it, haha…
line 3

But as you can tell, it didn’t really read the way we thought it would. MB thought she could photograph it so it was kind-of on a down-angle and you’d read the words going towards me, but when she uploaded the photos she had to admit they didn’t read correctly. So we switched it, and this was going to be my entry photo…
line 4

It looks pretty with the color editing we did, but I wasn’t totally satisfied. If you look at the “WILL” we couldn’t get the second “L” to lay correctly, and some of the letters are so light-colored that you can’t really see them. Plus, my expression isn’t the greatest. Still, we were going to go with this photo until we noticed it looked like I was walking on the line, which is kind-of why I picked this particular shot to be my entry. (PS: I got that by leaning against a doll stand – bet you can’t see it!) Miss B. said something to her mom about this and she just said we should go all-the-way Johnny Cash.

Of course. Iconic and simple. I think part of the issue I had with this shoot is that it was a little complicated. Samantha started going NUTS because she’s obsessed with Johnny Cash. So I figured I’d try to model it after that famous pose he has…you know, this one that was immortalized in the Walk the Line movie poster:
line 5

Here’s a picture of me goofing off on set. I kinda like it!
line 6

This was my pose…
line 7

But for the final transformation, we had to make it all ’50s…very real Johnny Cash.
line 8

Do you like it? Which one do you like better? I love that I still used music as my inspiration, and still used a song LINE (“Because you’re mine…I walk the line” – duh!). I didn’t think of this originally because, well, I’m not Samantha, but I’m totally in love with it. What do you think?

The Night is Wonderful

Or “not fair”. Take your pick.

Tomorrow Miss B. is going to see My Sister’s Keeper…and she won’t take me! She said if she took me she’d have to take Harper too, and she doesn’t want to bring two dolls. She brought Kit-Kat AND Baby-Ruthie to Kit’s movie! Ugh! She says Harper should go anyway (instead of me!), since it took them forever to convince me to read that book. I didn’t even want to admit I liked it because they kept bugging me about it. But it’s so good! Oh well. I guess I’ll have to see it on DVD…or pretend I’m boycotting Cameron Dias and The Noncanonical Ending like some of Miss B.’s friends are.

You, if you were sensible,
When I tell you the stars flash signals, each one dreadful,
You would not turn and answer me
‘The night is wonderful’
~D.H. Lawrence, “Under the Oak”

This is what I spend my days doing…

Cate sewing

Except as a graduation present, I got to order an ice skating dress this year. Sweet! It’s the white one. This was my picture for LMPT Round 2, Clothing. The scene is kind-of fake, though. The leotard I’m sewing is actually the top to Kit’s new dress, and the extra fabric on the floor is actually her skirt! (Kat didn’t get one so she’s kind-of mad…) I love this sewing machine, though. Miss B. said I could have it.

And as an extra, MB insisted I post this picture of me. It was one of the ones we took for the Heroes round, but we decided we like the one of me smiling better. I bet you can tell why. It kind-of scared me. I look pretty sick!

Cate sick

Sleepover!! (PIC HEAVY!)

As I promised, here is the link to SeeJoanSew’s “How to Curl Nicki’s Hair” album, which Miss B. used to redo Sierra’s hair. And doesn’t she look good!
Here she is before…
Sierra before
And after…
Sierra after

I also took some pictures of our sleepover!

Me and Ivy
Me and Ivy


Ivy (I LOVE THIS PICTURE OF HER!)


Harper and Sam, who is playing guitar


Sam the rock star


Ivy and Julie


Harper and Sam


Me and Sam

I also created an album, which I’m going to link to on the side. From now on, I’ll put all the pictures I put on my blog in that album, as well as some that didn’t make it in so you can see more pictures of us. Here’s the link.

Sam was happily playing guitar for all of us, until I wanted her to play some Taylor Swift and she insisted some of her songs were too country for her taste ;)

« Older entries