My White Knight

"As knights in shining armour on white chargers go, mine seems to be the lowest of pages clad in a rusty tin can, and rides a black donkey.

Okay, okay.  Maybe that's not quite fair.  Maybe my knight hasn't gotten here yet, and all I've run into is his advance entourage.  Maybe I just need to be a little more patient.  But if this is the case, then what it means is my knight is hopelessly, irrevocably and forever lost in the forest.  Probably fell asleep astride his horse, got the reins tangled in a thicket, and hasn't been able to extricate himself yet.  Now there's a comforting thought."

~excerpt from my latest attempt at novel-writing, "My White Knight".

Cole Porter

As I mentioned singing in my last post, I thought I'd put this up for you!  This was with the jazz band at my college this May - it's not opera, but it's a start ;-)  

This is Cole Porter's classic "I Get a Kick out of You" (with all references to champagne removed because it's a Baptist college!)  I had a blast singing with the band and I hope I get the opportunity again! 

Honest Scrap Award!

Clare gave me this award - thanks Clare!  I'm sorry it took me so long to get to it, but here goes at last!

The Rules:
* Thank the person who gave you the award
* Post 10 honest facts about yourself 
* Pass the award on to 7 others  - we'll see if I can find 7!

1.  I am first and foremost a musician (after, of course, being a Christian!  Which is so much a part of me that I almost forget to mention it...).  Specifically a singer.  I cannot imagine life without song... and I want to pursue that passion to the opera stage.  We'll see!

2.  After singing, my other great passion and delight is writing.  I write fiction, and I write all sorts - from fantasy to historical fiction to "romantic comedy" type stories.  I'm nearly finished with - not my first novel, for I started 3 before this one! - but my first that has any promise at all; I'm pretty excited about it!

3.  Anyone who's spent any amount of time with me knows I can't go without needlework - whether it be knitting, crocheting, or sewing!  I knit whilst I read, during Bible studies, in college classrooms... I sew every chance I get.

4.  Historical fashions fascinate me; particularly Tudor fashions, the "Romantic" period, early 1900s, and the "Swing" era.  I've done a lot of historical sewing and plan to do a lot more!  My friends think I'm peculiar but I couldn't care less ;-)

5.  I'm so close to 6 feet tall that I call myself that.  (This is very useful sometimes - as when one needs to reach the back of a top shelf - and very, very frustrating other times, as when one auditions for a play and is relegated to the chorus because all the men are 6 inches shorter!)

6.  I can sleep anywhere, anyplace, anytime.  Apparently it worries my friends - I fall asleep in the car even on short trips, in the dorm sitting up... (Maybe this would be less likely to happen if I slept more at night?)

7.  I decided I wanted to sing opera before I'd ever seen one performed - but I certainly didn't change my mind after that first performance...!  If anything I fell more in love with opera as an art form.  (La Boheme and Le Nozze de Figaro are probably my favourites.)

8.  I was born in Greenoch, Scotland, though I'm a U.S. citizen.  Related: my birthday is in July, which I always used to like because it meant no school on my birthday!  Now it makes me a little sad, because it means none of my friends from college - dear, dear friends! - are around to celebrate with me.

9.  I get really irritated with people who bash the Harry Potter series without ever having read them.  No, it's not a perfect series.  No, the writing is not deathless prose.  But please, please, please give them a chance and don't just write them off on hear-say!  

10.  I firmly believe that the little twinkling lights visible on summer evenings are not, as popularly supposed, fireflies, but rather fairies come out to dance.  Nothing will ever shake this belief!

And now for the tagging!  Most people I know who have blogs have been tagged already... but:

1. Becoming Janel

2. Bobby's Backyard

3. The Hermit of the Southern March

4. Out of the Ashes

5. Humble Beginnings

6. Romantic History

7. We Read to Know We're Not Alone

Have fun!

Thoughts on Clothes

Reading through my blog subscriptions, I came across this post (http://amaidenswreath.blogspot.com/2009/07/be-beautiful.html) by my friend Clare.   Read it.   You'll get something out of it.

I hope you've read it now - my post was sparked by it.

I've experienced something of the same thing Clare did... when I went to college two years ago (a small, conservative, Baptist college, let me add) I was a little nervous about "fitting in".   So I wore all my jeans and little knit tops and things for the first couple weeks, leaving all my homemade skirts and Regency dresses buried in the back of the closet.   A little ashamed of them perhaps.

And then one day I said "Ah, who cares.   I want to wear a dress today."   So I pulled out one I'd made, pink and flowery, full-skirted, using a vintage 1950's pattern, and wore that.

And I got the same reaction as Clare and her friend did.   *Everyone* looked at me.   People I'd never spoken to in my life stopped me to say how they loved the dress, how great I looked.   I hadn't worn it to get compliments, certainly - in fact I'd expected strange looks and ridicule.   But the day I work a cute, modest dress was the first day anyone at school told me I looked good.

That made me think.   I'd worn jeans, and some tops that maybe didn't quite fit my standards of modest, so that I could "fit in" and look like everyone else and not be called a freak.   And I was invisible - I fit in so well that no one noticed.   I was sacrificing my ideals essentially for nothing.   But when I dressed as I wanted to, I brought smile to others' faces and happiness to my own heart.    People thought it was "cool" that I still wore skirts and dresses.   People said "wow, I wish I had something like that."

I didn't enjoy that day because I got attention.   I enjoyed it, and remember it still, because it showed me that I can make a difference.   Not by following modern fashion and dressing to the norm, but by following my standards, and God's, and showing girls that it really is possible to be cute and attractive without sacrificing modesty. 

Happy Independence Day!

I feel that I ought to write something profound today... but I am not good at profound, so I'll merely say that I am glad that our founding fathers built this country on such a solid foundation... and God help those who are trying to govern it now!  God bless America!

I seem to have a knack for not being home on the 4th.  Two years in a row now I've accepted house or pet-sitting jobs over this weekend.  Last year was great - I'd just gotten my driving license, and I had a job, and I borrowed the car, so all in one fell swoop I acquired a car, a house, and a dog!  Independence day for sure ;)  This year the experience is not quite so thrilling, although it is novel - I'm sitting for a family with a dog, a cat, two guinea pigs, and somewhere on the order of 50 chickens.

I really love house-sitting.  I get a chance to be completely alone for a period of time - just overnight, or a whole weekend.  I get time to write, to sew, to read, all interrupted; most importantly though I have time completely to myself: just to be quiet, or to pray.  This I prize.  Can I house-sit every weekend?

'Scuse me while I go gather eggs.  This weekend, I'm a farm girl.