My Karate Story

Today I thought I would blog about karate and each of my different schools. My first karate school was Mercer Academy of Martial Arts, in Ewing, NJ. I started in this school when I was 3. Up until I was 6, me and my family (then my mom and dad) lived in Pennington NJ. So I would take a 30 minute drive down into Ewing for karate lessons in the Little Dragons Class. Little Dragons was a class made specifically for 3-5 year olds. I excelled fast, and though the games were fun, I was moved up into the older kid's class. I left with a blue belt. It was a completely different system- Tang Soo Do, which is traditional Korean fighting.

When I was about 6, me and my family moved to NH. I found my first school there, Evan's Kenpo Karate. I had to start over my training from white belt. I achieved my blue belt there too before we quit. We quit because the karate system that Evan's had was very unfair to homeschooled kids like myself. The way you earned your belt was by bringing in good report cards... Not by doing GOOD karate. There were a few arguments between my parents and my sensei, resulting in us quitting to find a better school.

Then, we found USA karate. I remember me and Dad going in for an interview with Hanshi and I remember being super nervous. But we got in, and Hanshi let me keep my previous belt! I then went on to make a lot of new friends, and only 3 years later, earn my black belt at age 10. I am still at USA karate, and it is the best karate school I have ever been in. There are also a ton of fun tournaments to compete in. Neither of my old schools had this.

This is about it for this post... wait. One last thing to do.

Thank you Mrs. Armenti for the kind comments on my posts on baking and singing :)

Bye for today,
Maddie

My First Train Trip!!!!!

Yesterday, I went on my first train trip with my Dad! It was loads of fun. We went from Fitchburg, MA, to Metropark Iselin NJ! The entire trip took 7-8 hours. Now, while this blog post is going to be short, I am going to try to make up for it by posting some of the pictures I took from the train. Here we go:

Me and Dad left from the Fitchburg train station.

The inside of our train!!!

Me and Dad on our first train

Our train's second stop

Somewhere along the line we saw THIS weird house....

And right next to it, this one!!!!

AWESOME mural done on the side of a train station platform

We switched to the Amtrak train in Boston.... Only 40 minutes before the bombs went off.

We completed our trip safely, but boy did we get lucky. If those bombs had gone off before our train came, we would have been S-T-U-C-K stuck!!!!! 

Well, that's all for this blog post, and I promise that tomorrow's post will be longer. 

Bye for now,

Maddie

P.S. My tournament went well- I placed 1st in all of my divisions, at black belt level! First time I have ever done that!!!! :)

Coursera at it's end :'(

Coursera just finished up this week. I only have one more assignment to do, and then I will hopefully get my certificate! YAY! But I am sad too... I really enjoyed taking this course. I will miss writing songs.

 It was one of the funnest assignments that Dad has ever given me. I will continue taking courses online on different subjects and will keep my readers up to date on what I am learning. Since I have already given out links to my songs, I am going to move forward.

I would like to thank Dad. He helped me all the way through the assignment and made me laugh while doing it. He helped me come up with song ideas, and helped me find fitting music loops. Dad always finds a way to make my learning fun for me, whether it's blogging, or online math, or a songwriting course. Thank you SO much Dad. I love you.

Today I am going over my friend Caitlin's house! It should be really fun. Caitlin is a very fun person to be around, and can always keep you laughing. Tomorrow is a busy day too, because I am going to be in a karate tournament! I am very excited about it. If you happen to live in NH, come see the tournament at the Jaffrey High School! After the tournament, there is an Italian supper at a nearby school which we will also be attending. YUMMY!!!

Well, I am ending my post here, because I need to go get some laundry out of my room.

Maddie

Sports Jersey Junction

Are you a major sports fan? Do you like collecting signed sports memorabilia? Then Sports Jersey Junction is the place for you! With HUNDREDS of jerseys from every sport for you to choose from, PLUS a weekly newsletter on the sports specials, how could you say no? And it's not just jerseys- it's signed hockey sticks, pucks, etc.! So head on over to www.sportsjerseyjunction.com right now to get your sports memorabilia!

Alright, as you probably guessed, I am publicizing another one of my Dad's sites... but honestly, he does put a lot of hard work into them, so even if you aren't going to buy something go check it out and spread the word to your sports-loving friends. It would mean a lot to both me and my Dad.

Here is a part of one of my Dad's posts. To read more, please check his site.
Thanks,
Maddie


I’ll be the first to admit that I am not a Phillies fan. Growing up in Central New Jersey, you were either a Mets, Yankees or a Phillies fan. While I rooted for both the Mets and the Yankees (they were in different leagues after all), I could never stomach rooting for the Phillies. With that said, I can still appreciate some of the great players they had in my youth…Mike Schmidt, Steve Carlton, Larry Bowa, Greg Luzinski. I’m sure there are others too. Philly was just too far away though so I never bothered with them. For you Phillies fans, here are a couple of great deals to keep you coming back!

I'm On Buy Buy Momma!

Me and my rainbow cake have gone viral... NOT. However, the rainbow cake was featured on an awesome site called Buy Buy Momma. My picture is up there with the rainbow cake. While there is no exact-to recipe, there is some light instructions on how to go about making the cake. Here is my recipe for the cake:

You will need:
1 Tub Pilsbury Blue Vanilla Frosting
1 Box Pilsbury Butter Cake Mix
4 different colored Gel Food Colorings
And of course the stuff listed on the back of the cake box.

First of all, make sure you have a circular cake pan that is DEEP. You cannot make this cake in a normal pan. Make sure you butter and breadcrumb your pan. Then, preheat the oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit. Mix up your cake mix like you normally would. After you are done, divide your mix evenly into 4 bowls.

Take your tube of food coloring and squirt one tube into each bowl. Then, stir until the colors are firm and bright. Now, dump your first color into the cake pan. It should start to spread on its own, and if it doesn't, you can help it by rotating the pan. Now, carefully add your other layers, taking time to cover over the previous layer and being sure not to mix colors. Once done, bake for about 35 minutes. Keep a watchful eye on your cake, because it may cook faster than mine did.

Finally, decorate the cake with the neon blue frosting. You can add some sprinkles to liven your cake up even more. I just used the ones that came with the frosting.

If you end up trying this recipe, please leave a comment below on how it turned out! If you want, you can also send photos of your cake to madison.scoobydoo.nef15@gmail.com. That's all for this post.

Maddie

P.S. CHECK OUT BUY BUY MOMMA TO SEE THE ARTICLE ON RAINBOW CAKE!!!!

www.buybuymomma.weebly.com

My Songs :)

I was pretty busy yesterday when I was done with my blog... I was writing and singing another song!!! I uploaded the new one onto my SoundCloud profile just a few minutes ago. I currently have 2 songs up, entitled Memory Lane and Man's Best Friend. If you would like to hear them, here are the links:

Memory Lane:  https://soundcloud.com/rosika-forn/memory-lane

Man's Best Friend: https://soundcloud.com/rosika-forn/mans-best-friend

Also, here are the lyrics for my songs. This is a part of songwriting and performing that I put A LOT of work into. I then use a program called Audacity to edit and record my singing, and play it back against a music loop. See if you can figure out what track I used for Memory Lane....  ;)

Memory Lane

Chorus:

Take me now,

to memory lane,

a place filled with happiness,

sorrow and pain,

take me now,

to memory lane,

and let all of my thoughts,

unchain.

Verse 1:

Today I took a walk,

to a place not far away,

if you take time,

you can visit each day,

it's a long winding path,

with doors shut up tight,

visit now my memories,

good, bad, wrong or right.

(Chorus) 

Verse 2:

You can close your eyes,

and dream yourself there,

or take a star,

and fly through the air,

anything is possible,

as long as you believe,

so I'll kick myself back

to the days of my dreams!

(Chorus)

Verse 3: 

The peace and perfection that lies in this lane,

is garbage to some,

and to others,

great gain,

so lose yourself now!

don't be last in the game!

Come take a visit to memory lane......

(Chorus)

Man's Best Friend

Chorus:

Your family is your kingdom and power

    They'll praise you in your moment of glory

    And stand with you in your darkest hour.

    Your family is everything, Your family is true

    You never truly have to wonder what your family will do for you.

Verse:

Man's best friend is not money,

and man's best friend is not fame,

none of these ring true you see,

for life is not a game,

it's not about big yachts,

or houses on the coast,

it's all about your family,

because thats what matters most. 

 Copyright 2013 Madison Nef

Maddie

Apology

Apologies- I think I owe all my readers (if I have any left) a big apology for not writing in such a long time. I had been in NJ for Easter, and expected to come back to NH in a week. However, my whole family unfortunately caught the flu, which lead to another week's stay- I just got back this Saturday. I am going to be writing on a regular basis from here on out (Monday-Friday), and I will try to let you know when I will be out. I really thought we were coming back the following week.

Also, I am going to change my blog's background today! It is now April, and I am going to make a birthday background for my blog because my grandma's birthday is this month!!! She is going to be 75 this year, and I am trying to organize a small party for her. My grandma is a big part of my life now, and she is going to be living with me and Dad and Ashleigh. I am going to try my best to make her feel as welcome as possible.

*Speaking of birthdays, I am going to make a new page on my blog that will list everyone in my family's birthdays, how old they will be, etc. As the year moves on, I will put a line through their name to show that the birthday has passed. There will be an updated picture every year.

Easter went very well, aside from the fact that my dad couldn't make it (he was sick with the flu =( ). Me and Dad DID make our rainbow cake, and spent about half an hour trying to layer it perfectly. Our hard work paid off, because when the cake was cut at Easter, this is what it looked like:

Pretty awesome, right? The cake looked awesome even before it was cut too. I pride myself as a good froster of cakes (and cupcakes too (= ) This is what the cake looked like before it was cut:

Here is me and my sister on Easter morning:

P.S. Big shout out to Anne, thank you for the beads and jewelry, me and my sister love them!!! :)