Movies I'm Looking Forward To In 2015

2015 is pretty much half over! Can you believe it? I know I can't.

2015 has been a big year for me, and still has more to come. Mainly a big transition from high school to college. (which I'm hoping to write up a blog post about because there are some exciting/scary things happening next month!)

But for this post, what I want to focus on is the "still more to come".

We all know there have already been some amazing movies out this year. Avengers: Age of Ultron, Marvel's Ant-Man, and don't even get me started on Jurassic World.

*squeals and fangirls*

But there is still more to come!! 2015 really is the year of great films. So with out further ado, here are the movies that are on my "still to watch" list for this year.

Mission: Impossible Rouge Nation

There is more than one spy movie on this list. Okay, to tell you the truth the reason I'm excited about this movie is not because of Tom Cruise but because of Jeremy Renner. He's Hawkeye! I love Hawkeye. And I loved Jeremy Renner as the secret-agent-turned-analyst in the last installment of the Mission: Impossible series, Ghost Protocol. He was hilarious. Man, I loved him in that movie. So, yes, I am thrilled that Mr. Renner is back for another Mission Impossible movie. And hey, Tom Cruise isn't so bad either. (Oh and Simon Pegg! Lets not forget the king of geeks. He's great too.) :D

Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2

I'm curious see how it all ends. And cry over the deaths. Since you know everyone dies. *spoilers sweetie* Okay, not everyone dies. That's really not a spoiler, and I did read the book. So for this movie, I'm not as excited as I am curious. I'm really not in the Hunger Games "fandom" as a lot of people are. But I did enjoy the books, and I liked the movies. Honestly what I really like about this series is how thought provoking it can be, and how it really does have some psychological depth to it. I just like to think about this one.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

 

Does this really need a description? Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, is talking about this movie. And how could you not? Its like the film series revival of the century! Mostly I'm curious to see old Han Solo, cause how are they gonna pull that off? I mean I love Harrison Ford, don't get me wrong, but I'm not keen on seeing my favorite space pilot as an old man. I might cry.

(the wild card) The Man from U.N.C.L.E

To be quite honest, I didn't even know about this movie until last week. I saw a preview before Ant-Man for it. But I immediately loved the trailer! Its in one of my favorite genres for movies, action/adventure and comedy. (Like Knight and Day. Love that movie. With me or without me?) And spys? Even better. At least that's what the trailer looked like. Not to mention it stars Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer. #swoon Needless to say, I love the idea of this movie and I hope its as great as the trailer looks. But who knows, I really have no idea if this movie is going to be good or bad. But I had to add a wild card.

What movies are you excited to see that are yet to premier in 2015?

Did I miss a good one?

Liebster Award!

I was nominated for the Liebster Award! Thank you and hurray!! Now to fulfill my duties as a nominated one. :D

Here are the rules when nominated for a Liebster:
 a) Answer the eleven questions of the tagger.
 b) Share eleven facts about yourself
 c) Nominate up to eleven other bloggers
 d) Ask those nominees 11 new questions


1.  Do you have a favorite mug or teacup?
I was about to say no not really, but then I was like "Hang on!" My totally awesome Tonight Show Jimmy Fallon mug!! I just got it and I seriously love the thing. It makes me feel so special (even if I did buy it in a gift shop BUT IT WAS THE NBC GIFT SHOP IN NYC!)

 2.  Are you an adventurous eater?  (Do you try "strange" foods?)
Sure! I mean I'm not too keen on eating something like bugs, but I'll try just about anything once.

 3.  What fandoms are you into?
Thank you for asking! In no particular order, Doctor Who, Lord of the Rings, Once Upon A Time, Star Trek, Sherlock, The Marvel Universe, etc. I'm sure there are some I'm missing.

 4.  What famous author/book do you not really care for?
Divergent. Liked the movie but the book pained me to read.

 5.  What obscure author/book are you nuts about?
Obscure? Uh... Does Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories count? Love those! Maybe Jules Verne or H.G. Wells? I love classics.

 6.  What's the oldest movie you've ever watched?
I've seen some old ones that is for sure. When I was quite a bit younger I loved the original black and white Little Rascals. Watched those all the time. As well as tons of black and white westerns. They don't make em like they used to.

 7.  What did you have for breakfast today?
A fresh peach. It was delicious.

8.  When did you first see your favorite movie?
My favorite movie? Now that is hard to pick out. I have a lot of favorites. I first saw The Avengers in a creepy tiny little classic theater when we were on a trip somewhere down south. I watch (and was amazed by) the new Star Trek movie when it was playing on tv. (I really was impressed by that one, having always been a fan of the tv shows) Lord of the Rings I watched because my brother begged me to. I guess, as for when, these have all been in the last 5 or so years.

 9.  Do you prefer fantasy or sci-fi?
Science fiction all the way!!

 10.  What did you expect your blog to be like when you started it? 
This blog? Just a place to talk about (and possibly fangirl over) movies. And to write up posts about my life. This is my second current blog. I write another one about my horses which you can find at www.thehorsenextdoormya.blogspot.com

 11.  Has it changed?  If so, how?
Its changed in the fact that I've made a lot of new friends and have found lots of new topics to write about. I have certainly enjoyed this blog a lot.

And as for eleven facts about myself... I'm a dog person, tv person, and chocolate person. I like adventures, going new places, and airplanes. I want to own a mini cooper, a horse farm, and a jet. And I love English and Scottish accents.

I nominate:
The Adventures of An Elven Princess
Running His Road
Bays Over Baes
In the Depths of Dreams
Amber on the Mountain
.... and anyone else who wants to be nominated!

11 Questions For You

1.) Tv show you liked that you wished hadn't been canceled?

2.) What is the last thing you watched?

3.) What is the last thing you watched in theaters?

4.) What is your favorite song from a musical?

5.) Do you have a dream car? 

6.) Favorite fruit?

7.) Do you have any posters in your room?

8.) What song do you have stuck in your head right now?

9.) What movie are/were you most excited to see that premiers in 2015? 

10.) What book have you read and re-read the most?

11.) Favorite Olympic sport?

A Trip to New York City

 

So in my little bio thing over there underneath my picture, I say that I am a "world-traveler". I figured I ought to fill you all in with what I meant.

The short version: I love traveling!

The long version: I've done a large amount of traveling over the last eight or so years. It all began when my dad got a different job that took him all over the country. And on the majority of those jobs I have accompanied him on. Most people when I tell them I'm headed to such-and-such a place they think vacation, which isn't really correct. That's not to say we haven't done our fair share of fun things while on a trip (we love trying out new stuff and going on adventures!), but more to say we don't have much of a choice where we end up.

Our style of traveling is not for the faint of heart or the non-adventurous. (Just ask my mom. She's got about a bazillion hilarious stories of our adventures.)

I've kind of grown up on the road. Its like second nature to me. I'm the worlds fastest packer. (maybe not really, but we have set a few personal records for how-fast-can-you-pack-a-suitcase-we're-leaving-in-an-hour type deal.) I rock at writing and doing school in the car. (and somehow I managed to get great grades and I'm headed to college in a little over a month!) I even have one of the most do-anything dogs I've ever met. (Princess. Poor thing I've taken her everywhere. But she knows she loves it.)

Speaking of college, one of the things I'm kind of sad about is the fact that I won't be able to go too many places this Fall. I'm definitely going to miss it. The nice thing about being homeschooled all these years is the fact that I've been able to take my work on the road with me.

Funny story: I visited Peru a couple of years ago (not work related; mission trip). Everyone had drilled into your head before hand the cultural differences and how you'd experience culture shock etc. Well, I attribute it to the fact that I'd been traveling the country since I was little, but I never experienced any type of culture shock. It didn't bother me at all. I was used to seeing new things. I thought that was funny when I got to thinking about it.

ANYWAYS, (yikes that got longer than I thought) all that to say I visited NYC again a couple of weeks ago. We had a job up in Queens and I thought it'd be fun to take the subway to Rockefeller Center in Manhattan.

Pretty much the whole point was to find the NBC Studios Experience Store where they have a Tonight Show gift shop.

 

 

I'm a big fan of The Tonight Show and Jimmy Fallon. I really don't know why. lol. :D

But to make an already long story short, we found it, I bought a Tonight Show mug, I fangirled a little bit, and we had a super fun time! (We also explored the New York Public Library a little which was cool. Mostly because I had watched the movie the night before where the world has the second ice age and they hide in library in NYC for the better part of the movie. My inner film nerd coming out.) (The Day After Tomorrow)

Oh and I took my camera with me and made a video! I felt like filming a bit of a vlog that day. :D

So there you have it! I hope this post made some sense. I feel like I just rambled on, like a lot. But I just wanted to share something else that I love with you guys! I hope you don't mind. ;)

Until I write again!

I Graduated!! (and senior pics)

Its official! I graduated!! I am now a high school graduate. Now more school!! Ok, not really. Just for a couple of months and then I go off to college. But whatever. :D I'll enjoy the feeling of accomplishment while I can.

I was homeschooled so I graduated with a bunch of other homeschoolers. We planned the ceremony, and I think it turned out really nice. And had quite the turn out! There were about 10 of us graduating more or less. (I'm too lazy to actually count) And a lot of people came to the ceremony. Like A LOT. I was really impressed and felt honored.

The actual ceremony was semi traditional. We walked in to the normal "pomp and circumstance". We walked out to a classical piece. We had a speaker. (whom I will attempt not to comment on) Each set of parents handed their kid their diploma. I debated after getting my diploma to hold it over my head and present it to the crowd like Simba in Lion King, but I decided to restrain myself.

 

The class (mostly the guys) were split on wearing caps and gowns. So the group ended up deciding to just wear caps. Which I thought was weird and made them look even stranger, but I made it work. (I actually was pretty proud of myself for my color coordinating my fashion that day.)

After the ceremony, I invited a lot of people back to my house and we celebrated with a party. We played games (one of which involved getting a pie smashed in my face, whose brilliant idea was that?) (actually it was hilarious and I was laughing hysterically). We randomly decided to go swimming in my pond. And we did Chinese lanterns. (Like in Tangled!)

AND A TARDIS CAKE!!! My totally awesome talented Aunt made me a Tardis cake for my graduation! Is it not amazing! And tasted super good too. Something like chocolate cake, Swiss buttercream icing on the inside, and white chocolate (dyed blue) on the outside. Like I said. Delicious.

 

All in all it was a super fun day. I'm so thankful for everyone involved! Y'all made it memorable.

So, in honor of graduating, I thought I would also share some of my "senior pictures". Which ended up being funny, because I got so busy I didn't have time to like actually plan a day to get a photographer to take them. But I really needed a picture to put on my invitation. So, one afternoon when I had some time, I roped my mother into using my camera to take some quick shots. It was quite amusing because my mom isn't much of a photographer so the whole time I was explaining how to set up the shots or whatever, but she really actually got into it and did a great job. I was impressed. Yay for awesome mothers! And I'm happy to say I sent out invitations with a picture. Success.

Anyways, here are a few of the pics we took that day. I'm calling these the honorable mentions because they didn't actually make it on the invitation. But I thought they were cute anyway and deserved to be posted somewhere. :D

Ya, and that's just me being weird. I couldn't resist.

Now its goodbye high school and hello college! (But more on that later...)

Photoshop Fun with our Avengers Pictures

So remember that Avengers: Age of Ultron photoshoot some friends and I did?

Well I have another friend who, upon seeing the pictures of facebook, decided to do a little "editing" on them.

Needless to say, it was very entertaining, and he did a great job!

I got a good laugh out of it so I thought I'd share.

Enjoy!

 

 

The gun. lol.

10 Favorite Screen Characters Tag

I was nominated for the 10 Favorite Screen Characters Tag by Hamlette, so thank you!

This tag looked like so much fun, but seriously how in the world am I supposed to pick my 10 favorites? You have given me a difficult task. But I think I've just decided to list 10 OF my favorite characters cause there's so many and I'd hate for one to be offended because I left it out. I've also tried to just pick one from each movie or series, cause otherwise I'd list every character on Sherlock and I'm attempting to make this list as diverse and interesting as possible. So here's 10 characters, I could think of, that I thought are pretty cool.

 

 Clint Barton/Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) from the Marvel Universe. He's smart, quiet, has mad archery skills, and a great sense of humor. Hawkeye is the type of person you can depend on and would want to be your best friend. He's that guy you know you could fight side by side with. And I'd love to take a few martial arts and archery lessons from him! I really love what they did with his character in Avengers: Age of Ultron.

 

Killian Jones/Captain Hook (Colin O'Donoghue) in Once Upon A Time. I love a good redemptive story. And a pirate. And a guy with swagger. Seriously how could anyone not love Captain Hook from this show? The character development they have Hook go through is really a great piece of writing, probably my favorite of any character from any show. Heartbreak and revenge turned to love and loyalty, this guy has seen a lot. (and somehow still come out the other side with a great sense in fashion.)

Dr. Rodney McKay (David Hewlitt) in Stargate Atlantis. What can I say? I like smart people. There's more than one genius on this list. McKay is that quirky annoying character you can't help but like. He gets the best science-y dialog in the show and more often than not makes me laugh. There is never a dull moment when Dr. McKay is around. (he also may or may not have something to do with my liking of astrophysics...)

Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) in Doctor Who. I love how fearless, adventurous, and independent she is. She's not afraid to fly off in a spaceship and save the world. She is also loyal and would do anything to protect the ones she loves.

 

Mycroft Holmes (Mark Gatiss) in Sherlock. I really debated which of the Sherlock characters to put down here, cause I obviously had to put down at least one. Sherlock himself is probably my favorite but I'm also a fan of his older brother Mycroft. Having read the books, Mycroft is just as brilliant if not more than Sherlock. Only he has slightly more common sense and prefers not to do the "leg work" as he calls it. I admire Mycroft's brilliance and his ability to solve problems and direct people with logic. Not to mention his interaction in the show with his family is actually quite funny. That awkward family of geniuses.

 

Robin Hood (Richard Greene) in The Adventures of Robin Hood. This black and white version still stands as my favorite portrayal of Robin Hood. (Though I am liking the guy on Once Upon A Time) To me this is what Robin Hood should be, fun and lighthearted. Most versions today portray only the dark and decaying side of the middle ages. I'm not saying that it wasn't, I just like seeing the fun legend of Robin Hood that we all grew up reading about. A bit more fairytale and a little less dark.

Spock (Zachary Quinto) in Star Trek. I love Spock's logical personality. Also how he tries to convince everyone that he is only Vulcan and does not have emotions. But he's only half Vulcan and I love when the human side comes out in him. Zachary Quinto also does an amazing job portraying him. Making Spock my instant favorite in the film. The first time I watched the rebooted Star Trek movie I was blown away. Despite the solar flare thing, I think they did a phenomenal job making this movie.

 

Alfred (Michael Caine) in The Dark Knight Trilogy. Otherwise known as Batman's butler.I just like this guy. And he makes some great inspirational speeches in those movies. I love how he is always there for Bruce no matter what stupid thing he does. This guy makes me wish I had a loyal butler. Maybe I should become a vigilante and hire him...

 

Maddy Shannon (Naomi Scott) in Terra Nova. She is not your typical "teenage girl". She is really smart. She's sweet, brave, and the right amount of girly. And she's  not afraid to take on a dinosaur or two to protect her little sister. I love the family dynamic in this show, and I really wish they had made more seasons of it.

Thranduil (Lee Pace) in The Hobbit. There is more to this elf king than meets the eye. My favorite part of the entire that movie his the exchange between him and Tauriel as the end. You just know there is more to Thranduil than he is letting on. Lee Pace does a great job playing him. He ended up being probably my favorite character from the movie. Not to mention he has some pretty great costumes.

     And there you have it. I think I ended up with a pretty diverse list, as I was trying to be unique. 

     And that took me longer to write up than I care to admit... Haha... 

     Until Later!

Lessons from the Farm

I actually live on a farm. You may not have known that. Granted it's a small farm. Nothing commercial or anything. We grow some blueberries to sell at farmers markets. We had dairy goats for several years. Even a milk cow once. I've raised chickens, rabbits, pigs. We actually just got some ducks for the first time, and they are super cute. But you have I idea how weird ducks are. Cute but weird.

My current thing is that I own a couple of horses. I call them my ponies, really only one is a technical pony though. Lately with all my school stuff and graduation plans and life I haven't been able to spend as much time with them as I'd like. But each night I go out to put them up by the stable for the night. Generally they are always waiting by the gate but tonight I was later than normal and they were out in the field. But that was actually quite nice. After a long day it was relaxing to walk out into the field underneath the stars to retrieve my ponies. There is something about the smell of horses to me. It's so good. Like immediate stress release and burst of happiness. I totally recommend just hiding your face in an equine mane and take in the scent. Maybe it doesn't do it for you, but I have so many happy memories associated with the horse smell it just makes me happy.

 

I hear someone has actually made a horse scented candle. I should buy it.

Then there were strawberries. Now we have a few strawberries. Just enough to make a strawberry shortcake every once in awhile. But this morning we headed out to a local strawberry farm owned by some friends. Why, you ask? They needed people to pick the berries. You pick they pay. I like money. Hey, who doesn't? But when it came right down to it, it was less about earning money and more about the principle. I suppose I just wanted to prove to myself that I could indeed get up early on a Saturday and go spend all morning in a field. It was hot. You're in the dirt. I'm not the most robust person in the world. Health dealt me a few bad cards. But in the end I did accomplish it, and I'm proud of myself. I picked a lot of strawberries. I honestly didn't know one could pick that many strawberries in a morning. With all that said about farming, I'm really not a farm girl. I kinda like heels better than boots. So I suppose the point of all that is to prove to myself that I am still capable of getting down in the dirt and working hard. *mentally high five-ing myself*

 

Needless to say I came home and painted my toenails and watched about 3 episodes of Person of Interest while lounging in my pajamas. Give a little take a little.