Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Creative Complex: Nature Scene

Hello, Friends!

This is actually one one of my old teachers had us do in relation with poets and transcendentalism. Sit outside for at least ten minutes. (My teacher had us do it for half an hour). Write down everything you notice. Use ALL five senses: seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, touching.

Have fun!

Spruce Nogard

P.S. Do not do it in October. :)

Attributions:

Monday, August 29, 2016

On My Mind: Blog Check

Hello, Friends!

This week is an "extra" week. Since my blog revolves on a four week schedule, and I want to keep my blog posts on a monthly basis, this week is extra. Today, I want to address a problem with my blog. Lots of people have been saying that they can't write comments on my blog. This is disappointing, because I would love to hear from you all. If you are having this problem, please email me at sprucehnogard@gmail.com. I will then contact someone who I think can help me with this. Thanks for your cooperation!

Spruce Nogard

Saturday, August 27, 2016

Genre of the Month: Magical Realism

Hello, Readers!

Magical realism is a somewhat odd genre. It is almost completely realistic fiction, but there are just a couple of things that are too coincidental, too out of the ordinary, for it to qualify as realistic fiction. I have read very few magical realism books. Actually, I have read two, but one's a manuscript, and I can't tell you about it till it's published. Sorry!

The other one is called The Boundless, by Kenneth Oppel. It is about a boy who takes the Boundless, a giant, fancy, train, on its first journey, but someone is mysteriously murdered. As much as the one-sentence description sounds like Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express, the two books are completely different.

One magical realism element in The Boundless is the presence [SPOILER ALERT] of a witch. The witch is surrounded by superstition, and even though she does have a part in the story, you can't be sure if she real or is a dream. [SPOILER ENDED] I really liked The Boundless, and it demonstrates magical realism quite nicely, until the end, where it gets into a little bit of low fantasy. It's kind of a mash of genres.


Have you read any magical realism books?

Spruce Nogard

Attributions:
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-boundless-kenneth-oppel/1115553202

Wednesday, August 24, 2016

Monday, August 22, 2016

On My Mind: Musical or Play?

Hello, Friends!

I recently went to an amazing musical, and that got me thinking: which do you like better: musicals, or plays?

I like both very well. Musicals, obviously, have wonderful music. Some of my favorite musicals are: Les Miserables (to listen to), Fiddler on the Roof, and, some happier ones, like Disney princess plays (Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, etc.), and of course, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

My favorite songs from musicals are probably all of the songs in Beauty and the Beast. But, then again, all the songs are very different types of music. . . I think I just like them all. :)


One of my favorite plays is A Christmas Carol. It seems I go to musicals more than plays. :)

What are some of your favorite plays and musicals?

Spruce Nogard

Attributions:

Saturday, August 20, 2016

Recipe: Chocolate Fondue

Greetings, Friends!

Chocolate is one of my favorite foods ever. No matter what kind it is, it's delicious.

Chocolate fondue is pretty self-explanatory, but here are some ideas.

First, if you don't have a chocolate fondue pot, warm up chocolate in the microwave and make it ahead of time. This method is also easier, albeit less fun.

Second, use multiple types of chocolate. It's fun when you have dark chocolate fondue, milk chocolate fondue, white chocolate fondue, and bittersweet chocolate fondue, as opposed to just chocolate fondue.

Next, have a variety of fruit. You can also use marshmallows and other things, but I prefer fruit.
Some ideas for fruit you can use are:
  • Pineapple
  • Strawberries
  • Apples
  • Raspberries
  • Whatever you want!

Finally, have a variety of toppings. Some topping ideas are:
  • Nuts
  • Coconut
  • Sprinkles
  • Whatever else you can find! 

I hope you like chocolate fondue! If you do make this or have made it, post in the comments!

Spruce Nogard

Attributions:

Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Creative Complex: Wilderness

Hello, Pioneers!

Today, actually, tonight, you are in your one-room cabin in the middle of the wilderness when you hear a howl outside. Then, you hear shuffling. What happens next?

Spruce Nogard

Attributions:

Monday, August 15, 2016

Dragons: Dragon Breath

Hello, Dragon-Lovers!

I have decided to begin a new section on dragons. Instead of looking at how they are portrayed in different books/movies, I will be looking at different features: scales, wings, etc.

For this post, I am looking at breath.

Dragons breathe fire. Everyone knows that. It is also fairly common to hear of dragons breathing other substances, like snow.

But did you know the substance a dragon breathes varies as much as the types of dragons you can create?

For example, dragons can breathe fog, light, and, one of my ideas, black holes/galaxies.

Dream of it, and it's true. Just. Like. That.

So, what will your dragon breathe today?

Spruce Nogard

Attributions:

Saturday, August 13, 2016

Gardening: Types of Gardeners

Greetings, Friends!

Today, I have wonderful news about my plants! They are flourishing! I have had 18 beans and two cucumbers so far. However, no tomatoes yet. Apparently, they are ginormous varieties, so it makes sense they haven't ripened yet.

I was planning to just give you a quick update on my plants, but then I got to thinking about the types of gardeners. There are three main types: the Perfect Gardener, the Careless Gardener, and the Happy Gardener.

1) The Perfect Gardener

The Perfect Gardener wants their garden to be perfect. Not just to look nice, but to look absolutely spotless. The minute it isn't perfect, they freak out, and try to make everything perfect again.

2) The Careless Gardener

The Careless Gardener plants their garden, and promptly forgets about it. These gardeners's plants usually end up dying.

3) The Happy Gardener

The Happy Gardener cares for their plants, and wants them to flourish and grow, but does not freak out if their garden is not absolutely perfect. However, they may get very worried if their garden is not doing well. :) Although this gardener aspires for their garden to be beautiful, they do not force it to become beautiful.

I am mostly the Happy Gardener. Sometimes, however, I know I am closer to the Perfect Gardener, because I stress out about the tiniest things in my garden. Usually, however, if I look them up, I find out what's normal and how to dispose of the non-normal things. About the types of gardeners, though, I feel like we all are gardeners, whether we grow plants or not. See, we are all gardeners in the giant garden of Life, and we all garden differently. I believe in life, though, there are more types of gardeners. :)

What type of gardener are you?

Spruce Nogard

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

Creative Complex: Wise Women

Hello, Friends.

Today's Creative Complex is a regular one. :)

You are walking through the woods, and first one, then another, then another, old lady walks up to you. Why? What happens next?























Spruce Nogard
Attributions:

Monday, August 8, 2016

Books: Favorites: Sherlock Holmes

Good day, Friends!

Today, I am going to explain in more detail why I love the Sherlock Holmes series. There are three main reasons I love them:

1) Logic
Sherlock Holmes uses an enormous amount of deduction and logic. This leads to thinking and realizing things I would not have otherwise realized because of Sherlock's unusual thought process.

2) Enjoyment
Watson's retelling, and the highly unique variety of cases Watson chooses to write about, makes for good reading.

3) Familiarity
I've read all of the Sherlock Holmes stories Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote twice, and some three or four times. Even though it is odd I read them repeatedly because they are mysteries, and some are murder mysteries, it is always comforting to return to 221B Baker Street.

Almost everyone has heard of Sherlock Holmes, but if you haven't, look him up. :)

On a side note, Sherlock Holmes is popular today because of many shows, like the BBC Sherlock, and others. However, I do not prefer these shows because they never depict how I imagine Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, or anything else accurately. I believe if you want to know what the real Sherlock Holmes is like, you have to read the original stories.

Do you like Sherlock Holmes? Have you seen any of the Sherlock shows?

Spruce Nogard
Attributions:
https://www.amazon.com/Adventures-Sherlock-Holmes-Arthur-Conan/dp/0486474917

Saturday, August 6, 2016

Books: Fairy Tales: Hans My Hedgehog, or the Compilation of Tales Based on and Similar to the Greek Tale of Cupid and Psyche Part One

Hi, everybody. I should not have let Dragomir name it. I promised him he could, though. Also, sorry this post is late. I got too busy to do it last night. :(

Greetings, Readers,
The purpose of today's plot chart is to engage the minds of our readers and ponder the similarities and dissimilarities of these texts. Prior to us beginning, you must harbor adequate knowledge of the Greek Tale of Cupid and Psyche, or, one of its many similar narratives. 

Dragomir's basically saying you have to know the basic story. If any of you have watched the Disney movie Beauty and the Beast, you should be pretty well off, although there are minor differences throughout the stories.

If you would prefer to acquaint yourself with the original tales, here are the entire texts of each edition.
Hans My Hedgehog (Grimm): http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm108.html
 Jim Henson's "The Storyteller," by Anthony Minghella, seems to give a  moderately dissimilar account. This is taken into consideration in our plot chart.
Cupid and Psyche (Greek Myth): http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/cupid.html
East of the Sun and West of the Moon (Norwegian Fairy Tale): http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/norway034.html
Numerous present-day novels revolve around this fairy tale. Spruce has read one entitled Sun, Moon, Ice, and Snow, by Jessica Day George.
Beauty and the Beast: http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/beauty.html

Exposition

1) Cupid and Psyche: Aphrodite hates Psyche because everyone says she is more beautiful that Aphrodite, and she must get sacrificed to a monster

1) Hans My Hedgehog: Hans is born, part hedgehog and part human, and his father doesn't like him

1) East of the Sun, West of the Moon: A girl is very poor, and a bear offers her family riches if she will go with him
(I'm not including Beauty and the Beast because you already know a version of that story.)

Rising Action

2a) Cupid and Psyche: Cupid falls in love with Psyche, saves her, and takes her to a palace where she has everything she wants. However, she does not know who saved her, but every night, a man gets into her bed.

2a) Hans My Hedgehog: Hans leaves on a rooster, and goes into the forest. In one version, he sits in a tree, in another, he has a palace. A king gets lost, and Hans promises to show him the way out if the king promises to give him the first thing that greets him when he gets home. The king promises. The first thing to greet him turns out  to be his daughter. A year later, Hans comes to collect her. She becomes his wife (to her disgust).

2a) East of the Sun, West of the Moon: The girl is taken to an ice palace, where she has everything she wants. At night, however, a man gets into her bed.

2b) Cupid and Psyche: Conflict: Psyche gets homesick, so Cupid sends her home. Her sisters see how many riches she has and become jealous. When she reveals to them that a man is sleeping in her bed, they trick her into agreeing to light a candle to see who he is.

2b) Hans My Hedgehog: Conflict: (Anthony Minghella version) Hans's wife discovers that by night, Hans is a normal man. He makes her promise not to tell, but she tells her mother, who says she needs to through his hedgehog skin into the fire the next night.

2b) East of the Sun, West of the Moon: The girl gets homesick, and the bear brings her home. At home, her mother makes her tell the whole story. Then, she tells her daughter to shine a candle on the man in her bed.

This is how it would look on a plot chart:
Ignore the climax to the end part. We will cover that in our next fairy tale post. Also, we have some questions for you.
Which story do you like the best so far? Why?
What are some similarities you notice? What about differences?

Sorry about the title, and Dragomir didn't explain much. . . we ran out of time for Dragomir to explain one or two of the stories like we originally thought. With all the emailing back and forth, it is kind of a pain. I should just make Dragomir a contributor. I hope you enjoyed our fairy tales, though! We will continue with this post next month!

Dragomir Volkov
Spruce Nogard
Attributions:
https://pixabay.com/en/bear-polar-bear-zoo-animals-1141015/
https://pixabay.com/en/animal-world-nature-hedgehog-garden-79823/ 
https://pixabay.com/en/beautiful-beast-characters-963893/

Wednesday, August 3, 2016

Creative Complex: Build-A-World Part 5

Now for the final Build-A- Bear World installment!

Today, all we have to do is put all the previous Build-A-World installments into one. If you missed the previous parts, here they are:

Creative Complex: Build-A-World Part 1
Creative Complex: Build-A-World Part 2
Creative Complex: Build-A-World Part 3 
Creative Complex: Build-A-World Part 4

Part 1
Time of Year: Early Summer
Seasons: Fall, Windel (windy), Winter, Rainur (rainy), Spring, Summer
Environments:
Woods
Farms
Cities
Caves
Mountains
Deserts
Valleys

Part 2
Gov: Depends on area
Forest is not governed by a government.
Some areas: Monarchy (partially constitutional)
Has minor problems:
  • Common people do not always have a say in government
  • Supplies not always distributed equally
  • Multiple levels of society (gap between rich and poor)
  • And more (too many to list)
Part 3
Races of intelligent beings:
  • Dragons
  • Elves
  • Dwarves
  • Fey folk (Fairies)
  • Humans
  • Werewolves
  • Vampires
  • Centaurs
  • Brownies
  • Gargoyles 
  • Nymphs
  • Mermaids
  • Fauns/Satyrs
  • Pixies
  • Sphinxes/Manticores
  • Sprites
  • Shapeshifters
  • Naiads
  • Dryads 
  • Talking, poison-spitting, fire-breathing, cats with bat wings
  • Probably more, not counting spirits, and of course, non-intelligent creatures (In this case, I'm not considering Unicorns etc. as intelligent)  :)
I don't think I'm going to include spirits like ghosts and things, although Dragomir would be excited about that. . .

Major Characters:
1) Elf
-Male
-Round
-Unsure about static or dynamic
2) Fey
-Female
-Round
-Unsure about static or dynamic
-Type of fey: feyish

(I'm not doing minor characters.)

Part 4
Main character: Revenelil
Gender: female
Race: Feyish
Description: long, dark brown eagle-like wings attached to back reach heels, brown hair the same color as wings, tall, pale-skinned, forest green eyes with gold flecks in them, wears soft, gold and green dresses the color of eyes, loose fitting, does not wear shoes, has strong magic, does not have many friends from intelligent races (elves, humans, etc.), is an adult
Background: lives in enchanted forest, has no restraints/class like kingdoms do, has no parents (knows nothing about them), lived in forest entire life, grows garden,
Personality: slightly mischievous, kind, loving, caring, has a temper,dignified, imaginative,
I could go on, (type of magic, stories about her, etc.) but, alas, it's only a snow globe.

I'm only including my main character. I hope you had fun with this exercise! Post about it below!

Spruce Nogard

Attributions:
 

Monday, August 1, 2016

Mental Library: 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Person

Hello, Friends!

Today, we are learning about 1st, 2nd, and 3rd person, obviously.

Let us start with first person. First person is where the narrator uses "I," "we," etc. This is like the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. How many of you have read them?












Second person is probably the one you see the least. It is when the narrator uses "you" etc. Pretty much the only books I have read using 2nd person are the Choose Your Own Adventure books. I've read very few of them. I remember my grandparents had one (I can't remember which one it was; maybe The Forbidden Castle?) and I didn't like it very much. I always died in different, horrible ways. Anyways, in Choose Your Own Adventure books, they always say something like: If you decide to go with the hunter, go to page 37. If you decide to continue on your own, turn to page 80. This is second person.

There are two to three-ish types of third person: third person limited, third person omniscient, and third person multiple viewpoint. Let's start with third person limited.

Third person limited is where an outside narrator tells the story, but only knows the thoughts of one character. This is very hard to find. It's kind of like first person, because the narrator only tells you one character's thoughts (so, if the character jumps to a conclusion about someone they are talking to, you don't know whether or not the conclusion is true), but it uses "he/she" instead of "I."

Third person omniscient is where an outside narrator tells the story, but knows, and shares, at his/her discretion, the thoughts of all the characters. Using the earlier example, in this case, the narrator might tell you the conclusion the character jumped to, and then what the actual conclusion is. This is also pretty hard to find.

Third person multiple viewpoint is where an outside narrator tells the story, and uses different viewpoints (who's thoughts we are hearing), at different times. This is most common among third person. Examples of this would be: The Harry Potter series, The Lunar Chronicles, and many more. Also, you could make an argument that third person multiple viewpoint is a subset of third person omniscient.

Okay, this all sounds really complicated, but here's how you can remember the differences between the main three: 1st person uses I, which looks like a 1, 2nd uses you, and 3rd uses he/she.

The differences between the 3rd person ones are:

Limited has two ones in it,
Meaning the thoughts shared with you are from one head.

Omniscient is efficient,
And knows all things, at all times, like a god.

Multiple Viewpoint uses two or more sets of eyes
Meaning you know the thoughts of many characters, but at different times.

I hope you enjoy putting this in your mental library!