I am NOT a Color (part one)

     I wrote this poem a while ago because I felt the need to express myself. When I shared it with a friend, I pretended like I didn't write it until she said she liked it. I always want to write more poetry about stuff that applies to me, but it's hard to find time and then become inspired. It's also hard to articulate what I mean. 
     I was totally going to share the poem with you, but I honestly believe that it's garbage, so I'm not going to post it. I just want to share something personal with you. 
     

OregonDOT / Foter / Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0)

My mom is white and my dad is black, so obviously, I am biracial. This, however, makes me appear more 'black' than 'white' because I have darker skin than some people. It's a struggle everyday because I feel 'white' because I was raised in a city full of white people who know very little about diversity, but I look 'black' because of my skin. I am not 'black' though, I'm brown. It's actually an issue that I've had to deal with on my own because neither parent fully understands; my mom thinks people stare at me because I'm beautiful, but I know it's because I have one of the only afros in our city or because of my skin. My dad doesn't really comment on the issue.
     I don't like talking about this because I'm afraid that if I bring up how I feel about racism and things like this that people will respond negatively. I'm so scared that if I bring it up, someone I trust will turn out to be racist. I had a friend of mine do that to me. We were decent friends for a few years, then he tells me that he wants to burn a cross on my yard and hang me. It's funny how everyone knows I hate him now, but no one really knew why. Some people tell me to get over it, but it's because they don't understand. No one will unless they've been in my shoes! 

I am NOT a Color (part two)

     I started this blog post with one thing in mind, but I completely forgot and started going on this tangent. 
     My mom runs a school, and she has these creepy dolls that the kids love to play with in her office. They're all different races and some are disabled, and my mom likes to tell the kids to put them into families. One thing she's noticed is that the families always change, and they're never ever separated by color. I just think it's interesting that the children are color blind in a sense.

The multicultural dolls

They don't think about what the skin colors are  or if one is deaf or not. They just arrange them in a way so the dolls can be happy. This is so important to me because adults and teens hardly ever do this; we always have to put people in these categories and box them up, but we don't need to do that ever. When meeting a new group of people, it's way easier to find similarities than it is to find differences. 
     I just wanted to put it out there that people shouldn't be view as colors. I know it's fun to joke about race and stereotypes, but in all seriousness, I think that we shouldn't; it's just going to make it that much harder to break the molds we're supposed to fit into.

Drake University, Here I Come!

Here's the yarn

      I was at Michael's (the craft store) because I wanted to start a new knitting project, and I could not decide what to pick because of all the yarn that they have. My sister, Kara, pointed out one that was dark blue with white stripes, and said, "Hey! This has your new school colors!" so I went with that one! 

Making progress

     I wanted to give you an update of my college plans since I haven't really talked about it too much on my blog. I will be attending Drake University in the fall, and I cannot be more excited! My major will be Environmental Science, but I'd like to double major with Biology, so I can do Marine Biology. I'd also like to minor in French, Music, or Theatre, or maybe all three! I'm so excited to start the next chapter of my life. 
     I recently joined a Facebook group for the class of 2018, and I had to post a little paragraph about myself, basically so I can start to make some friends. For me, it's so nerve-wracking to make new friends at this age! I was so nervous to even post, so I didn't for about a week. I finally got the courage to put myself out there, and a girl actually liked my post! And so did another boy! 
     I was really happy when the girl added me and started Facebook messaging me. Then she gave me her number and we've been texting nonstop for about 4 days now. She is so cool and fun, and we have a lot in common. We like a lot of the same music, which is very important. If she wants to, I'd love to room with her, but I don't want to come on too strong, so I'll wait until she asks. 
     I'm really looking forward to my next visit to Drake, which is over Spring Break for an Admitted Student day. I love what Drake has to offer, and they even send out a schedule of all the things you can do in Des Moines while you're there. I know that I'll want to go shopping! There are so many options and things to choose from. 
     So those are my college plans, and I'm so excited that I got into my first choice and I got a great scholarship! 

Mid-Winter Break

Snowy roads at my Grandma's House

     I've decided to take my blog in the creative direction. To be honest, I don't consider myself to be that creative, although I love doing art projects or making things. 
     Now when the weather looks like this, you're going to be stuck inside for a while. I decided to do something I've wanted to do for a long time: bake macaroons! 
     This was before I got really sick, but I was inspired by a YouTube video on how to make macaroons. The lady in the video made it look easy, so I said to myself, "Why not?"
    
 You only need a few things:         For the frosting you just need:
Three egg whites                           a stick of butter 
1/4 cup of white sugar                   and powdered sugar
2 cups of powdered sugar
1 cup of almond flour
and a pinch of salt

     I didn't really know what to expect, so I just went for it. The first thing you have to do is sift the powdered sugar and the almond flour to get rid of all the lumps, which at first I didn't think was necessary, and then I saw how many chunks were left, and I was very glad I did it. 

Sifting the almond flour

Left over almond remains

   

Getting fluffier!

Mixing the egg whites

     After all the dry ingredients are combined, you can move onto the egg whites and sugar. I have never done this before, so I was nervous that I'd mess everything up, but it said mixed for eight minutes, so I did. 



     I added pink food dye because I thought it looked pretty. I was worried that my macaroons wouldn't be perfect circles, so I traced the bottom of the salt on the parchment paper, and then flipped it over so none of the graphite got on the cookies. The perfect circle thing didn't turn out so well, but that doesn't affect the taste!

My attempt to be neat

Not so perfect

Lookin' good; all 19 of them

     After the cookies sat for 30 minutes to form a skin, I put them in the oven for 20 minutes at 300˚F. I made the butter cream for the filling and that was so easy, and it tasted great! I let the cookies cool for about an hour before I touched them because I was nervous that they would break. I paired up the ones that were similar in size. And of course, I accidentally made 19 instead of 20, so I didn't have perfect 10, I had to settle for 9. 

The finished product was so beautiful that I didn't want to eat it! I shared them with my family, and they were very impressed with my first try making macaroons! I was too, to be honest. I needed to be a bit more confident in my baking abilities. And that was how I spent one of the days on Mid-Winter Break, of course I should have been doing my homework, but this looked like more fun!