♥Alex’s Blog♥

For wearable arts, I am making a dress made out of recycled materials. We got to choose if we wanted to be in partners and one of us model or we can make it individually. I wanted to make it myself, so I am doing it individually.  The category it will be under is Evening Wear. I would like it to be white with black or green stripes going diagonally across the dress. My shoes will be made of foam for the sole and a thick strap of material to hold it onto my foot. Using tinfoil and string, I will make a necklace with a pendant. The dress will be about knee length and under it will have bread bags to make the bottom of the skirt puff out. My handbag will be made of some black material and a white strap for the handle. On the stripes of the dress I will put some sequins and beads. However if I can’t make this I will make a dress entirely out of bread bags. On the night of wearable arts, most of the students that went to Jump Jam leadership day and I are doing one of the new Jump Jam songs. It’s one from hairspray and we have to dress up for the dance. It’s going to be fun and nerve wracking!

On Tuesday the 19th of August, my Great Uncle died from skin cancer. I didn’t know him that well but I’m sure he was a very caring man. He was a teacher and has taught in Japan and Korea. Apart from his love of teaching, he and his wife had the opportunity to travel around the world. They had lots of plans to travel more but unfortunately he was diagnosed with skin cancer and couldn’t finish his dream of travelling. He and the rest of his family knew he was going to die, but we thought he was going to get better. I’m sure his family are devastated by his death. Rest In Peace.

Cautiously, we creeped down the dark hallway, listening for noises. We clutched our pillows and made our way to the door. The door opened and everyone broke into a pillow fight. Hayleigh, Alexandra and I, ran back down the hallway, screaming and giggling. We hid in the laundry room, until we thought the coast was clear. Quietly we whispered our plan amongst our selves and tiptoed to the door of the boys room. It was opened a crack and light poured out of the room and into the hallway. We put our ears to the door to hear what they were saying and suddenly everyone started screaming again. Seven boys run out of the room, shining a torch around the place looking for us. We were safe in the room next door though. Still laughing and shrieking we all made our way to the boys room. Suddenly the lights turned on, our fun was over, but not for long.

Fun is feeling happy, so happy that you could burst. Fun is when you are with people you know and enjoy being around. Fun is laughing so hard your stomach aches. Fun is doing something new that makes you feel nervous, but you laugh. Fun is in our lives, everyday.

Today my grandparents leave to go to Canada and England. They leave today and return in November so they are gone for about 3 months. My mum got to choose one person that could go to Auckland with her and my little brother got choosen. He gets out of school half an hour earlier then he usually does and has to drive up to Auckland with mum and my Grandparents. My sister and I get Mcdonalds for dinner though. Since I won’t see my Grandparents until November I want to say; Goodbye, I will miss you!!

While looking for some information for my China Inquiry, I found a video on U Tube that I think you should watch.

Now I know that their could be simple explanations for this. The ‘Dying slave child’ could be a normal child sleeping and ‘The slaves at work’ could just be people working. Even though there is a possibility of this all being false, I felt my heart ache. Nobody should be treated like this. Watching this I felt a mixture of emotions; sad because of what is happening to these innocent people and angry for the Dalai Lama treating them like this.

I have a fear of bridges. It sounds silly but I just hate them. I also think that it is going to break and I will drown. When we are driving over the Auckland Harbour bridge I literally scream. I am also scared of small places which is being claustrophobic. I overcame my fears (sort of) in the holidays.

While we were in Rotorua we went to the museum. If you go down the stairs you are in the basement and the ceiling is really low. As you continue on walking it gets really warm and I get scared I won’t be able to breath. I was breathing heavily but when I got to the really warm part, I freaked out and ran out of the basement and back up the stairs. After we had lunch in the cafe, we went back into the  basement and I made it to the end. At the end the ceiling is high, but it is really hot. I felt proud that I had made it to the end, but when I got out of the basement I felt relieved.

My Mum’s friend had moved house so we went to see her. You have to drive over a bridge to get there so I kind of freaked out. We went inside and from the window you could see the bridge and in the paddock beside the bridge was a digger. I really wanted to go see the digger and what it was doing so I went by myself since no one else would come with me. I slowly walked across the bridge to the middle of it and realised it wasn’t that scary. I’ve overcome my fear of being scared of small bridges but I am still scared of the Auckland harbour bridge!!

To accomplish level 2 in my sailing and to get started in racing. I can do this by listening to my teacher; take all his tips on-board and use them as often as possible.

I have achieved this goal and have passed level 2.

I want to be able to finish work before the day it is suppose to be handed in, so I don’t have several tasks on my hands. I will be able to do this by sticking to one task at a time and doing some work in my own time.

I have achieved this by doing one task at a time and have been starting my work at least a week before it’s due so I don’t have to worry about it.

I want to be able to know all my 6,7, and 8 times tables off heart my the end of term 1. I  will be able to do this by practicing in spare time at home and school.

I have achieved my 6 times tables off by heart but still need to practice my 7 and 8 times table.

I want to read in a greater variety of books and to understand most of the words. I will be able to do this by picking books with  authors I have never heard of, or read and if I don’t understand some a word I will ask.

I have not yet achieved this but have asked my mum or dad if I didn’t understand the sentence. I have also been reading books with author’s I’ve never heard of but still reading in the same genre.

I want to try to understand more in maths and to finish it quickly. I will be able to do this by reading the examples to try and understand something and if that doesn’t help, I will ask the teacher.

I have achieved this by doing maths at before school and haven’t been sitting by my friends so I don’t get distracted so I am able to finish it. I have also been asking the teacher if I don’t understand an equation.

A fire which is supposedly started by the five year old boy and his three year old brother was playing with matches. Neighbours noticed the smoke coming out of the central Whangarei house at about 8.45 am on the 20^th of June 2008.

By the time the emergency services arrived, the five year old was dead and the three year old was flown to Auckland’s Middlemore Hospital suffering from burns to 20 per cent of his body.

“Northland police spokeswoman Sarah Kennett told NZPA “initial indications” showed the fire had started in the children’s bedroom and matches had been found in the room.

Ms Kennett said the cause of the fire was still to be confirmed, but it was not suspicious. She said there were four smoke alarms in the house but none of them had batteries in.”

The two adults in the house during the fire weren’t seriously injured but had some smoke inhalation. 

I find this very sad and shocking but also the parents irresponsible for leaving matches in the boys’ rooms. In addition to leaving matches in their rooms and not keeping an eye on them; there were no batteries in the smoke alarms.

Information written into own words but information source from

http://www.northernadvocate.co.nz/localnews/storydisplay.cfm?storyid=3776636

http://www.stuff.co.nz/4590949a10.html

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?_id=1&objectid=10517379

 After doing all my experiments, I found out that warm water boils faster than any of my other substances I used for my experiment. The slowest was salt and sugar with a average time of 6 minutes and 23 seconds. Warm water’s average time was only two minutes and 53 seconds beating all the other substances by at least 2 minutes and 50 seconds! In second place was 3 pebbles with an average time of 5 minutes and 43 seconds. So remember next time you need to boil water in a hurry use warm water or a couple of pebbles!!