Keeping Up With Juliette

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, Recently, I went to the Cambridge Open Studios and visited a house that I've driven past a lot of times but have never actually been in before. It's called the Wooden House and there's a big yellow tower that you can see emerging from the trees. At first, I thought it was a house full of crazy people because it was quite an out-there place. However, when we parked up and began walking up the garden path, we were welcomed by a overpowering view of colour and art.  Everything that was made had reused parts to it. There was a fish outside made out of scrap metal and inside it, it had old harmonicas so that when there was a strong wind, the fish would make music. Inside, we were met with a lady who made a living by selling her beautiful homemade crockery. She showed us how to put coloured pieces of transfer paper onto plates and fire them in a kiln to produce a beautiful art-deco style. Whilst she was talking, I couldn...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, A couple days ago, at dinner, me, my family, and the Dutch girl, Aline, were all sitting around the table talking about our favourite past moments. We somehow got onto the topic of Christmas and we started talking about when me and my sister, Alice, found out that Father Christmas didn't exist. It all started when I was just casually "snooping" in my parents bedroom when I walked past it and I decided to look into my parents wardrobe. When I opened the doors, I saw a whole pile of presents wrapped in Christmas wrapping paper. I then went over to my sister in her bedroom and told her what I had found and after that, we both concluded that Father Christmas didn't exist. I think, the next day in primary school, I went over to my friends and declared that "Father Christmas didn't exist!." Most of them agreed and started talking about how they found out that he didn't exist. However, there were stil...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, When I was choreographing the routines for work experience, I made sure that I was coming up with something that was original and something they've never really seen before. Too many times have I seen the same boring routines over and over again. You may have recalled me talking about the school show we did back in May. Whilst some of the contemporary routines that the year 11s devised at the time were great, many of them I felt, didn't push themselves and didn't create something new that would have probably got them higher marks. People always give the argument that they don't do something new because they want to focus on the technique. However, most people that have chosen dance at my school do not do it outside of school so that means the only time they learn technique is for 2 hours a week so it's probably not as strong as it could be. By coming up with something new, you can add a level of interest in yo...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  Yesterday, my friend Aline who is from Holland, came to stay around ours for a week. She arrived from the airport late in the afternoon and her and her aunt decided to stay for dinner. We had a barbeque with chicken and roasted vegetables and it was delicious. While we were eating, we had a conversation about what we wanted to do in the future. My sister Alice, was saying that she wanted to continue doing art after her A-levels but there's so many things that you can do with art that it would be difficult for my sister to choose. My mum suggested going on a gap year abroad so that she can figure it out but she is still unsure about what to do. Aline was the same because she wants to continue doing something with science but there can be so much to choose from when you're taking on that path. I however, have kind of an idea about what I want to do in the future. After doing my work experience placement at my old dance stu...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, Yesterday, I went into Cambridge with my mum to go to the market and get some food to eat. We walked around the market square for a bit and looked around to see if there was anything that we liked. We walked passed and stall called Mac Daddy's and it served really nice mac and cheese in a pot. There was a big queue outside the stall so we decided to come back later. In the mean time, we walked around and saw a really nice coffee stall that sold authentic ground spanish coffee as well as coffee drinks. Again, we decided to come back later. We walked out of the market square and into the street where there was the Waterstones book shop. We decided to have a look around to see if there were any books that we liked. I've been recently watching the detective series, Vera, with my parents so we decided to go into the crime section of the store. I found the ABC Murders by Agatha Christie and my mum found some modern detective bo...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, On Thursday, I finished my work experience at my old dance studio. I was given a bouquet of flowers by my dance teacher to mark the end of my placement. I was really happy with how it went overall.  I took part in baby ballet lessons in the mornings of some days. It didn't involve anything particularly technical since they were only little but we got out a few teddy bears from the box and they jumped around and demonstrated what you needed to do with them by pointing their toes etc. We also used the bears as our pretend audience and the children really enjoyed it. I also taught some of them a routine to the song Rainbow from the movie Ballerina. They really enjoyed it, even though they found it a bit difficult. In the end, we performed it to the parents and they loved the routine. I also got involved in accelerated ballet lessons with some of the more older students. They were practicing their own little routines that the...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, Recently, I watched a YouTube video about a girl who was born without any arms or legs. She said that the woman who gave birth to her was worried that she would miscarry her so she took some medication to prevent that from happening and the doctors believe that's what caused her to be born without all 4 limbs. It's a rare condition that only affects a few people worldwide because most people are born without 1 or 2 limbs not all 4. I was therefore shocked to find out that despite this, she sews, puts on her own make up in the morning, she does public speaking, and she's an author. In order to sew, she uses a sewing machine and controls it with her mouth and shoulder. She also does her own eyeliner by resting it against her dressing table and shoulder and opening it using her mouth. She also lives with her loving family that adopted her when she was young and they support her with her new YouTube channel, where she sho...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, Yesterday, I went out to London with my sister, to go to have lunch and visit the V&A. When we arrived in London, we took the tube from Kings Cross, all the way to South Kensington which took us about 20 minutes. When we arrived, we used Google Maps to find the cafe. It was called Mauriel's Kitchen. The food served was really nice and the staff seemed really friendly. I had a full English breakfast and my sister had banana pancakes. We both decided to have a berry smoothie to drink along side it. After lunch, we walked down to the V&A, since my sister needed to take some photos for her art coursework. On the way there, we took some photos and we walked past the Natural History Museum. I need to go there next time! The V&A overall, was amazing. The entrance way had a massive sculpture of snakes hanging from the ceiling and it kind of looked like pulled sugar. We also saw a lot of Arabian artwork like calligraph...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, This week, I did a work experience placement at my old dance studio. It was a lot of fun. I got to choreograph a contemporary routine, a ballet routine, and I even taught a samba routine to the students. At first, I choreographed the contemporary routine to Sia's song Bird Set Free but when I arrived at the studio, they didn't have the song so I ended up doing it to Dangerous by David Guetta. If you follow me on Instagram, you'll have probably seen the routine on my stories (I'll link it below). It worked beautifully and the students really enjoyed the routine and they wanted to add it to the show. I also taught a ballet routine to the song Rainbow from the movie Ballerina, to 4-5 year olds. A few of the found it difficult but the ones who were more advanced in ballet picked it up quickly and they all really enjoyed it in the end. On Wednesday, I taught samba to a group of 9-12 year olds during their tap class. Th...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, On Thursday, I celebrated my 15th birthday with my family. We opened the presents first thing in the morning because that was when we had the most time during the day. I got a lot of books like The Homage To Catalonia by George Orwell and The Choice by Edith Eger. I really liked the sound of the second book because it's about a dancer who survived Auschwitz. Don't worry though, I didn't only get super "depressing" books. I also got the following memoirs of James Herriot's second book. I got Let Sleeping Vets Lie and It Shouldn't Happen To A Vet. As well as books, I also got a neon yellow bikini for the summer when we're going to Portugal. I also got a yellow, wrap-up crop top and to pair with that, I also got some black shorts. I wore this outfit with a black sparkly belt the next day when we were going out to eat. As well as this, I got some new pyjamas since mine are kind of old and are getting...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, Last Sunday, I had a dance exam for my ballroom and street routines. I did street first and ballroom second. For my street, I danced to 1999 by CharliXCX and Don't Call Me Up by Mabel. There were perhaps a couple sections that could have been neater but on the whole, I think that it went well. I think that I did well in ballroom too. I did forget, I think once, the lock step in the quick step but I didn't stop and I managed to complete the routine. I didn't forget anything in the jive and I think I performed the routines in both styles well on the whole. In comparison to last time, when I did samba instead of paso, I would say that it went a lot better this time!😂 Starting Monday, I'm also beginning my work experience at my old dance studio. It's great because in comparison to all my other friend's jobs, I only work for a short amount of time. On Monday, I start at 3:45pm and finish at 8:00pm so I get t...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, I wanted to take a little break from the fascinating history of the Vietnam War, today, and I wanted to talk to you about and show you what I got in my mock exams. Overall, I'm really impressed with my performance and although I thought I did badly in some of my tests, because the grade boundaries are taken on the year average, my overall grades were a lot higher. I also just wanted to show you my grades because I thought it would be inspiring to others to not be afraid or ashamed of what they got and to really be proud and own your strengths and weaknesses. If you've put in the effort outside of school, then you can't really be disappointed in yourself because you know that you've tried your hardest. If you didn't put in the effort outside of school, perhaps that's what you need to work on next time. But, I know that year 10 can be quite challenging and stressful so I just wanted to show you what hard wor...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, Recently I've been re-watching the hit documentary series, Blue Planet, by David Attenborough. I personally find this documentary series really amazing because it highlights how animals act and behave towards our ever changing environment. However, what I find most shocking is that this documentary was filmed 4 years ago and if we look at all the things that have been achieved in those 4 years, there would be very little to talk about. Sure, the government has been shaken slightly by the warming of the planet and plastic has been a hot topic but apart from that, nothing has really happened. To me, this is really frustrating. There is so much to be done and people are choosing to sit down and do nothing because it's the easiest option. Well, it may be the easiest option but it's certainly not the most effective what so ever. People are going for the easiest option of telling people what the world's problems are on ...