Keeping Up With Juliette

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  Sometimes you just have one of those days where things fall apart quite quickly and you wish you never got out of bed in the first place. Thursday was one of those days. Me, my mum, and my sister Alice were at home alone together whilst my dad was away in London, and we were all pretty tired when a pretty major power cut hit our village and we also received some pretty sad news. All at once and all at the wrong time!  If you've been following me for a while now, you would know that Thursday is one of my busiest school days so when I came home last week, all I wanted to do was some stretching and then I wanted to have a shower. I was able to do my stretching but as soon as I went upstairs, my bedroom light started going dim which I thought was a bit strange. Then all of the lights in the house went dim altogether and I knew immediately that we were about to have a powercut. I checked the water to see if it would be still w...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  A couple of weeks ago on Tuesday, I took an urban dance class at my school from a few of the members of the IRIE Dance Theatre and it was a lot of fun. If you've been following my dance blog posts recently, you would know that I haven't really been doing a lot of practical dance sessions at school. This was because my teachers decided to prioritise the IB Dance Investigation, our coursework, instead of our practical sessions which was quite inconvenient. As a result, I've been itching to get moving again and when I heard about this workshop, I jumped at the chance of going. IRIE Dance Theatre is a dance school based in London that offers courses at degree level in African, Caribbean, contemporary, and urban dance styles. It's incredibly diverse and looks really interesting but for me personally, I just went to the workshop for a bit of fun and I really enjoyed myself overall. There were quite a few people there as ...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  Recently, I've been seeing a lot of people talking about the verdict of the Kyle Rittenhouse case which was viewed as a rather contentious verdict by many people. If you are unaware of the Kyle Rittenhouse case, the now 18 year old Rittenhouse was charged with attempted murder last year after he shot and killed two people and seriously injured another, at a Black Lives Matter protest held in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Rittenhouse claimed he fired his gun out of self defence but the prosecutor, attorney Thomas Binger, attempted to make the case that Rittenhouse was being unnecessarily violent at the protest. After watching a few of the videos on the case concerning Kyle Rittenhouse, including the cross-examination of Kyle himself, I have collated the main facts that I think are important to share. Yes, Kyle arrived at the riot with an AR-15, which he quite clearly held beside him. However, Kyle arrived in Kenosha with the aim of helpi...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  No challenge is ever over but at least yesterday I was able to enjoy the victory of another battle. On Monday and Tuesday, I will be writing my TOK essay and after that, the bulk of my IB coursework should be complete. All 7 of my essays for all 7 of my subjects will be written and a few will need re-drafting but things are gradually being ticked off of the list. As I wrote at the start of year 13, I was really worried about my IAs and I wasn't sure if I would be able to complete everything that I needed to. I was so worried in fact, I created mini backup plans for myself in case I fell behind schedule. However, now that I can see the end, I'm looking back and wishing that I had a bit more self-belief. Because I was organised, I did work hard, and I asked for no extensions, which is something to be proud of. There were times when I thought things would not work out. For a long time, my maths IA didn't seem to be coming...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  Last weekend I didn't quite get the chance to watch Strictly Come Dancing properly as I was busy doing my babysitting on the Saturday evening. However, on the Sunday I did get the chance to watch one very special performance on YouTube and that was Rose and Giovanni's Couple's Choice dance to Symphony by Clean Bandit and Zara Larsson. If you are unaware of who Rose Ayling-Ellis is, she is an actress who plays Frankie on the BBC soap opera, East Enders, and she just so happens to be the first deaf celebrity contestant on BBC Strictly Come Dancing too. Last Saturday, she delivered a very powerful performance, in which she brought the whole audience into her world, showing people what it was like to dance as a deaf person. I didn't quite realise just how powerful the performance she gave was until I watched the performance again with my sister and I was able to take the time to really focus in on that moment of silenc...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  It's been a while since I last updated you guys on my fundraising for my expedition to Tanzania next summer, so I've decided to tell all today. I would like to say that for most part, I'm doing okay with my fundraising. I'm cashing in on money where I can, amidst my hectic and often busy schedule for year 13 and things are gently ticking by. Recently, I was able to get a babysitting job with this family that lives in my village. The couple have a 4 year old son and two beautiful huskies. When I first visited their house for my first mini introduction session, I was offered a glass of water which I took gladly but as I walked into the living room to be seated down, the two huskies came bounding up to me, causing me to spill most of my water on the floor! I was clearly not used to big and boisterous bundles of energy. I felt bad for causing a bit of a mess but luckily no one seemed to mind. When I returned to the hou...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post, I was going to make the title of this blog post "5th of November celebrations after Covid" but, rather unfortunately, I realised that we're not quite out of the woods yet in terms of this pandemic. 😔 As a result, I decided that it would be better to make the title of this blog post instead "5th of November celebrations after lockdown" as that is the truth! After a year of ups and downs, it was nice to have some friends over to see the first fireworks since the start of Covid. Last year, there were no fireworks and no parties because obviously the climate was a lot different to how it is now. However, on Friday and on the exact 5th of November date, we were able to see the fireworks which was amazing. If you follow my Instagram story, you would have seen that my dad made a massive bonfire and we watched the beautiful display of fireworks from our garden. Me and my family are very privileged to be able to liv...

Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,  I hope you've all had a great Halloween! This weekend, my parents went to spend some time in Cromer whilst me and my sister Alice were minding the house for a couple of days. This was our first time home alone and although it seemed a bit daunting at first, we had a lot of fun eating loaded fries and watching movies. On Saturday night, we watched Strictly Come Dancing and it was Halloween week. Whilst we were watching one of the performances, Alice reminded me of one of my cringiest Halloween stories yet. She said, "Juliette, do you remember that time on Halloween when you carved a pumpkin and kept it for weeks? You also made a broomstick and attempted fly on it on the green like a witch. Do you remember?" I said, "Ahh yes, how could I ever forget?"😂💜 You see, I was 9 years old and my grandmother came over to stay. Me, my sister, and my grandmother were carving our pumpkins and I decided to carve out a cu...