Take Me Over

Sometimes I want to be taken over. Just so that I can forget about myself for a while. My class is doing a yoga unit and our teacher keeps telling us to "forget about your problems. Let your mind go blank. Let any worries that you had throughout the day float away". I never understood that. I can’t forget about the problems I have because I carry them with me by just being me. Its impossible for me to let the stress of my history test next period to just float away. Being stressed over a test is who I am.  I try to let my mind go blank but it only brings my problems to the surface. So it was very refreshing to let myself go today in class. Walking around as someone else brought new problems that weren't mine. They were so interesting to experience. I saw everybody differently as well. Megan angered me, Barry was below me and Luke scared me. Even at those times when I felt as if I was breaking character I still thought a little like her. As if I really was Irene and Irene didn't want to become Kalli. I feel bad for those art haters out there who aren't able to let loose for a while. They’re stuck with themselves for the rest of their lives. 

 

Let The Right One In

Wow what a creepy movie. It really stuck with me. I was walking upstairs by myself and in my house there is a full wall window that you see as you walk up the stairs. The window was frosted and all you could see through it was the still silhouette of a dead tree and the empty white concrete ground of my backyard. Walking up those few steps seemed to be the longest and scariest experience of my life. 

For me, the reason the movie was so disturbing was because there was a sense of emptiness to it. The snow created a wide-open alone feeling that chilled you down to your bones. The still deadness of the lack of camera movement added to the creepy feeling. They turned space and stillness from comfortable to sick and eerie. Also, the camera was either really close to the actors or the shots where taken from a distance. I felt as if I was constantly being pushed and pulled. When the cameras were close, I felt close to the characters, like they were letting me in. but when the cameras were far I felt as if I was doing something I wasn’t supposed to. Like I was spying and witnessing something that I shouldn’t have. I guess that this was a way to let the audience create what was happening in their own heads. Sound effects replaced close-ups. It was really interesting to experience a gory movie where nothing gory happened. All they did was set the situation up and use a few noises to send you to the darkest places of your imagination. I read that they would record the actress speaking for Eli eating a melon and then use that recording whenever she would feed. Amazing. 

The director also left a lot of the story up to our imagination as well. He never really goes into Eli and Hakan's back-story other than show that she is a boy. He makes you come up with what happened to them on your own. What I found really interesting was the relationship behind Eli and Hakan. At first, I thought that he was her father, and that he was afraid of her while at the same time loving her. There is no information to prove this wrong since Eli never says her actual age. I researched this and found theories on how Hakan might have been like Oskar. Maybe, when Hakan was once a boy she purposefully manipulated and befriended him so that he could become her blood supplier since she seems not to like actually killing people. It’s clear that Hakan has strong feelings for Eli as he even commits suicide for her. I don’t think that Eli loves him the same way back. Although she shows compassion towards him she didn’t seem upset when he died. It’s possible that Oskar is next in line to replace Hakan. She even seems to provoke his violent side as if preparing him to becoming a murderer.  In the novel, Eli and Hakan's relationship is completely different. Apparently she hires him to kill for her and he is happy to do so because he is a pedophile and is attracted to her child body. Personally, I prefer viewing the movie this way. I don’t think that Eli is manipulating Oskar. It’s nice that so much of the story is untold so that you can come up with your own way of seeing it. 

second to last

I can’t believe how fast worship went by. It seems like we have only just meet Joy and yet I feel like I have known her for a while. I love how comfortable the class is. This helped me today because I had a chance to perform. This was only my second time performing and yet I feel like I have improved. Watching other people perform gave me the confidence to perform myself. I've been taking into account the tips and tricks we learned in class and applied them to when I practice at home. The breathing advice helped a lot. I took a deep breath before I started and I instantly felt better. I was able to get through my monologue without thinking about if I did something wrong. I just have to remember to breathe throughout the entire monologue now and not just before and after. I need to take my time and relax.  I wasn’t frustrated like I was the last time when I went up today. I'm learning to take in my mistakes as a positive because they will only help me learn. I can work on fixing my other problems now. Now that I've got the monologue memorized and analyze I can play with different ways of performing it. I do it in the same tone throughout, so it would be interesting to experiment with finding different emotions. 

workshop on friday

I didn't go again on Friday but I think that watching other people is helping me. I had the problem of forcing myself and not letting the monologue flow. Seeing the improvements in other people help me recognize what makes them better. They are better when they relax, which is true in almost everything you do. Joy keeps reminding us the importance of breathing. Like tricking your brain into thinking that you are calm, and then you become calm. Also, humans breathe, and unless we are playing some type of immortal, the character your playing is more alive when you breathe. So, I'm letting go of everything now, and just breathing. It’s a miracle what simplicity can do for you. I'm going to try not to over think things. I'm going to make simple decisions about whom I'm going to play, take a deep breath and then go for it. 

love is blind

Today I did the obvious thing that an average teenage girl would do and I saw New Moon. I honestly cannot tell you if the movie was any good. I can’t give you my opinion on the movie. I can’t even tell you if the book was good. I cant because I already feel emotionally connected with the franchise. All I remember of my time reading the books was picking them up, being sucked into this alternate universe and then being violently thrown out as soon as I read the last word. I don't really remember anything else I did while I read the series because my mind was wrapped so tightly around it. Now that’s its been almost two years since reading them, I can go back, re-read them and notice all the flaws in Stephanie Meyers writing. I know that the plot is forced and that the characters that I once thought so greatly of are nothing but depressed suicidal teenage girls, emo abusive boyfriends and ill-tempered dogs. I cannot even give you an opinion of the book knowing this now because I know that it made me smile, laugh, cry and yell. Maybe this is because the book "feeds" me. It tells me exactly what I want to hear. Haters of the franchise say that the only reason it has become popular is because it gives teenagers what they want. The perfect boy, the perfect romance, the perfect best friend. And so here I sit trying to pick apart the movie, to analyze it and see what made it good and what made it bad. But I cant. I'm lost in that alternate universe that I explored those two years ago. I'm sure that people who haven’t been affected by the vampire virus can see it for what it actually is, a movie. But for now, ill just wait till I can see clearly. Maybe that’s what makes a movie good, when you don’t know what to think afterwards. 

Workshop

Today in workshop I got the chance to see other people perform their monologues.  First they would read their monologue all the way through and then they would put the monologue down and perform their version of the subtext. Joy had us sit facing a partner so that we could feed off of their reactions just like we would if we were in the play. When they re-read their monologue for a second time it was amazing. For everyone it became a little more real, more organic. By taking away the script they were allowed to perform a little more freely, and though they did not stray from the story they each added a little more umph-for lack of a better word. I remember Nicole's character was at a loss for words and her mouth twitched because she really became overwhelmed with what the character was saying. I think this happened because she wasn’t concerned with getting the monologue done right.  

Joy said something that really stuck with me, she simply said to not try to get the audience to feel for you. That is what I was doing. I tried to make an emotional connection and the monologue was not working. I was and still am a bit frustrated. I'm not doing it the way I want to, but I'm figuring out what I'm doing wrong. See, I kept trying to bring up sad and depressed emotions because I have a more calm and depressed monologue but that isn’t the point at all. It’s like imp practically screaming, "look at how sad and pathetic this character is!" instead of just performing the damn thing.   Last workshop Joy said "maybe she isn't sad" and my mouth opened. Of course she isn’t sad. Why did I think she was? Next time it my turn to read my piece, I won’t care about getting the audience on board. 

Me so far

What did you learn in STAC so far? At first I thought what a simple question. I learned about color theory, film making, improve, a bit of photography and a whole lot of art and theater stuff. But like usual my first thought was wrong. I realized that I learned so much more than the facts. I learned a lot about myself, and I think that that is the most important thing STAC has done for me. I know that this sounds cheesy and generic but it’s the truth.

I am always saying “I was wrong” and “I realized later that...”, as you can see in my blogs. Part of the reason I change my mind about my opinions so often isn’t because I’m indecisive (actually that’s a whole other topic) or insecure about my first answer, but it’s because of STAC. I change my mind because I find new ways to look at things, like the question I am answering. I think differently now. I still think like me but the way I think is different. I think more, my brain gets caught up in analyzing and figuring things out. Nothing is simple or common any more. A color isn’t just a color but suddenly becomes a feeling and state of being. The trees aren’t brown, they are purple and green and blue. A photograph isn’t something pretty to look at but a way to pull certain emotions out from where it’s buried inside you. My mind works in strange ways now. I am beginning to notice a world I’m not familiar with and it’s scary. I didn’t think that I could change so much in just two short months, but still I wouldn’t change it for the world.

I feel bad for the people who make fun of STAC as being a cult or some group of weirdos. They don’t know how to make the most of their life and live by the unwritten rules of normalcy. I realized that first day of STAC that I am not normal. A friend pointed it out to me actually. Sometimes I say exactly what is one my mind and I’ll act exactly the way I feel like when I feel like it (hard to believe since I seem so shy in class right). Other than that I can’t exactly point out why I feel this way but I know that I don’t think like other people. I’m not saying that everyone thinks the same, because they don’t, but I am saying that the majority of people hold themselves back from being different like it’s a crime. STAC let me know that it’s my right, no, my privilege to act and think the way I feel like. I am not normal because there is no normal and I’m not afraid to show it. Ignore the fact that this paper is beginning to sound like a self help speech and realize with me that STAC is helping me uncover the little me inside that is disguised in the high school need to be normal.

Everyone is so free in class. I can describe everyone so easily and that not something I can do in a “normal” class because they all blend together like one person. STAC is full of individuality and I love that. I can be myself, which is difficult for me to explain. I’ve done what I can to translate my jumbled brain into words on this paper. STAC is another big step in “discovering who I am”, as they say.

Microexpessions

A couple of days ago I began watching the second season of a show called Lie To Me. I saw the first season at the beginning of the year but I didn’t think of it as anything special. It was my fall back show, I only watched it when I was bored and it was the only thing interesting enough to watch. But as I began to follow the show again I realized that I am beginning to see people more clearly now. You see, the show is about these scientist/psychologists/criminal investigation type people who specialize in lying. They can tell how a person feels and whether or not they are telling the truth or not just by looking at them. A raise of an eyebrow, the change in the angle of your mouth, how many times you blink, anything you do is a dead giveaway to how you are feeling; the universal signs of communication. Of course there are the easy ones to pick up, like crying as sadness and laughing as happiness. But the small changes in behavior that they teach about in the show are what fascinate me. I remember having a conversation with my mom where I completely tuned out her words and instead focused on her face, I found out a lot more them what her sentences would have told me. So, I did some research and I found out that the small changes are called microexpressions The Wikipedia definition is: is a brief, involuntary facial expression shown on the face of humans when one is trying to conceal or repress an emotion. Anyway, when I watched T.V. that night it became very clear to me who was ehh and who had the extra spark. The ones who were more interesting for me to watch were the ones who used microexpressions. This reminded me of when Mr. DeLalio replayed the scenes of the two talks with Bela in the movie Kontroll (that movie is still running through my head).

out of kontroll

when i saw kontroll for the second time, i tired to look at the subtitles as little as possible. the first time through i focused too much on the words that the characters said and not enough on the meaning behind the words. i think that the best way to absorb the meaning behind the words, and to digest the movie in general is to look at the characters expressions. of course this can only been done with a movie such as kontroll where the characters are real ( i believed they were as i watched it).  it helped that it felt as if i wasn't looking at actors acting but of real people feeling real emotions. it reminded me of a documentary, the way all the footage is of peoples natural reactions.  it seemed as if they were in deep thought of  the situation the characters were in, especially the scenes of both Buscul's and Sofie's talk with Bela. I'm trying to work on not acting like a character but feeling like a character. no matter how hard you try and fake it you can never be anyone else but yourself, so you should use your own emotions. it was almost as if Buscul (?) made the character his instead of the other way around. its hard to explain, but i see it as adapting to a certain situation and then taking what you've got and running with it. 

anyway, i already knew where the plot was going and i was even beginning to memorize the conversations, so i was able to allow myself to view the movie in a new light. i realized that i had missed so many clues that were right there on the characters faces. like the way Buscul's hand twitches exactly like the killers when he is anticipating something, or the way Tibi lowers his head when he is with the professor or Buscul and puffs up his chest when he asks for tickets. 

Out of Order

Although we were going to film it chronologically, and we wrote the movie step by step i wasn't thinking chronologically. in my head a pictured filming parts of the movie separately in each location and then putting them together and cutting out the unnecessary parts.  i had to constantly check myself for doing that. i had to picture how the film would play out in my head periodically to make sure that we wouldn't be caught in a situation where we had to have a huge fight scene in front of the senior lounge, and then have a long awkward walk to the lunch room for the next scene. in "professional" movies you rarely see leading man actually driving to his love interests house (unless it serves to either develop character or a relationship) but instead the movie  cuts to the part where he shows up on her doorstep to beg for forgiveness. then came the problem that if we did stop recording, change locations, and then continue recording, the movie would jump around too much. i was beginning to see that happening more as we continued to develop the plot. by trying to avoid awkward and unnecessary scenes, we only developed the main scenes and at the end they didn't connect at all. while organizing the movie, we often got caught up in the big conflicts, or the scenes that had the most meaning. this left huge plot holes that we had to fill up at the last minute. i think that if we thought chronologically instead of thinking about the individual scenes the entire movie would flow naturally and we wouldn't have the problem of forcing the pieces to connect and fill up the gaps in the plot. 

merry berries

these are my bippity bobbity mag ideas whoooo!!

1. a how-to-make-your-summer-clothes-work-for-the-winter type thing. we are teenagers,we are broke! we cant afford to go shopping for every season, so why not recycle? i know that i bought an entire closet full of clothes for the summer and no one at school has yet to see me in them because its freezing out. they wont be able to tell if i have worn the clothes already!. im not just talking about wearing leggings and a thermal under everything. im talking about getting creative so that no one can tell your wearing summer clothes. 

2.excuses. a list of excuses/tricks to get you out of trouble, could be humorous or could even be secretively giving advice. for example if you can tell that your mom is right about to yell at you for not cleaning your room you could interrupt her and say," my oh  my, look at this mess, i cant even concentrate in here" and start picking up something off of the floor. she'd be too surprised to say anything and would probably forget to check if you cleaned your room or not since you were so dedicated. 

3. virgin holiday drinks. my mother has a little book of holiday drinks and my on the holidays when my family comes over they have a blast experimenting with their little concoctions. my brother and his friends even made them with soda instead of alcohol.  so i was wondering... why not create or find really cool tasty virgin versions of famous holiday drinks?

quotes

"Being with him made my brain quiet."

-extremely loud and incredibly close 

p.s. ima add more

Paul Klee

Paul Klee has the type of name that begs to be spoken with a British accent..He was born on December 18, 1879, in Munchenbuchsee, Switzerland. He was a painter who focused on Modern Art and was influenced by expressionism, cubism and surrealism. Before deciding to become an artist Klee played the violin with the Bern symphony orchestra. He then moved on from music to study etching and later painting at the Munich Art Academy for two years. Paul Klee studied and eventually mastered color theory, by which many of his works were based on. He is most known for his childlike use of watercolor and for being apart of the avant-garde circle Der Blaue Reiter co-founded by his friend Wassily Kandinsky. Klee later went on to work alongside Kandinsky, in 1922 at the German Bauhaus School of art and architecture. There he taught free-form painting and color in relation to nature.  Meanwhile he wrote famous essays and textbooks including Pädagogisches Skizzenbuch. Paul Klee died on June 29, 1940, in Switzerland.

 

Letting Go

i'll admit, i have trust issues. most of us in high school do. can you really trust the people you call your friends? i find my self asking this question whenever i open up to people. i used to trust everybody, i didn't feel the need to hold back. but i made the mistake of putting my trust in people who seemed kind to me and wound up getting hurt. depending on someone else for your safety is hard. i didn't like not knowing who was guiding me across the stage. i felt the need to tear off my blindfold and demand to know who grabbed my arm. i thought that by the end of the running across the stage blindfold exercise id be sick, but i was mistaken. i slowly began to smile, and by the end i was the one running. i had a lot of fun. 

it was much easier when we were paired up. i no longer had a stranger guiding me. even though i didn't really know doug as a person, at least i knew who would be guiding me around the school. 

waking around the community center blindfolded is an experience ill never forget. all of my other senses sharpened. i wanted to feel, touch and smell everything. i wanted to soak the musty old center all in. i wanted to use what i had left because i couldn't see. 

i thought that the blindfold served to block my sense of sight. along with not being able to speak i though that i will lose connection, to the world and to the people around me. i guess thats why i though that feeling, hearing and smelling were so precious to me. but i was wrong. i tried relaxing and found it to be quite rewarding. i tried to not think about soaking everything in and to simply go along with whatever doug wanted me to touch, smell or hear. its when i let go of trying to control what i took in that i realized that i trusted him. in a weird way the blindfold didn't serve as a restriction, but opened me up to the world a little more. the community center became a new vast and interesting thing for me to explore. this became clearer when i became the leader. i recognized some of the places that i was led to, but they were completely different.  it was like revisiting a place you used to go to as a child. you remember it being so grand and astonishing in your memories. but when you go back to it , it becomes smaller, blander, disappointing.  

a question for you

i was thinking about something that luke said. he said something about how we cant talk about what is buried deep within out minds. its too complex to be put into words. the human mind isn't a language we can understand.  he said that we look to things in art, like a movie or painting and talk about that when we're really talking about the unspoken in our minds. for some reason this lead me into thinking about Rilke. he thinks that artists have the need to be creative and do art. i think this is because they need an outlet to put those things that we cannot say out of our minds. i then realized that i do the same thing. 

when we talked about it in class i was jealous because i though that i do not have the artistic need. but thinking about what luke said with what rilke said at the same time, and i realized that i do have an artistic outlet. i have had one every since i was little, i just didn't know it was art. i know this sounds weird but, before i go to sleep i have to tell a story to myself in my head. i have different characters going on an adventure and at the same time they are realizing their problems and work though them in a hidden way. these characters that i write in my head really deal with what i cannot talk about.  i write scrips and i didn't even know it. i now fell bad for people who do not have an outlet. they have to look into other peoples outlets, like reading a book or watching a movie. 

so now, after all of that rambling i post a question. What acts as your artistic need to deal with what cannot be spoken?

poem re-write

Falling stars re-write 
Just a heads up... i'm not sure if this poem was in the packet that was given out in school.
i just googled poems and picked one that i liked. oh and i have to warn you that i am not a good poet,
the last one i wrote on my own free will was in sixth grade and went something like this;
drip drip
icy cold ice cream
drip drip
runs down my hand.

but i'm staying positive throughout this one. here goes...

Original:
Do you remember still the falling stars 
that like swift horses through the heavens raced 
and suddenly leaped across the hurdles
of our wishes--do you recall? And we 
did make so many! For there were countless numbers
of stars: each time we looked above we were 
astounded by the swiftness of their daring play, 
while in our hearts we felt safe and secure 
watching these brilliant bodies disintegrate,
knowing somehow we had survived their fall. 

My Version:

I remember the falling stars
chasing worries away across the velvet of dark 
so innocent we were as we wished
for in young minds stars can brighten all
they were grand creatures those stars
their danger flickered in our wide eyes
but we kept sight out of admiration
and let out a breath only when they died 

Drama Queens are Mute

As many of you already know, i lost my voice yesterday. to tell you the truth at first i thought it was pretty cool. it kept going up and down and up and down. one minute it was so low that people in the halls actually mistook me for my brother. imagine their surprise faces when they yelled, "OH Dimitri I didn't see you. Wait up!" and i turn around. the next minute it went up so high that i earned the nickname "mouse girl" in my science class. i have never heard myself like that before. i talked a lot that day, just to hear myself. STUPID IDEA. at dinnertime my brother was saying something ridiculous about me, ( i don't remember what he said, but its not important) and when i opened my mouth to defend myself nothing came out. not even a squeak. 

Baffled i tried again, and again, and again. it was like when you are in a really good dream that you don't want to wake up from but you know you're about to wake up anyway. you try your hardest to stay in the dream but you're suddenly pulled away. you hold your arms out to grab something and everything gets blurry. the voices get distant. everything is clouded. you cant breathe. i felt like i was losing myself. i wanted to control what was happening but i was being pulled away. i was underwater while everyone else was on shore. i tried to swim my way up to the top but with every stroke i fell deeper. i became disconnected. 

Of course being me i started to cry. And thats when i realized i was being a drama queen. 

If i felt so alone just because i lost my voice for the day, how do people feel when they cant speak at all? i know that my voice will come back, i'm nothing compared to the little boy in africa who was forced to become a soldier and has no voice in the matter. or the little girl who was a rape victim but is too afraid to say anything about it. Who am i to be upset by something like this when there are people who have it worse? 

Did it work?

Oh sorry. this was misleading. no, i did not take it, its my wallpaper and i was just trying to figure out how to put pictures on the blog. haha

Michelle a la Tart

What you need:

For the Filling...

• 1 can of silly expressions
• 4 cups of giggles
• 1 tablespoon creativity
• 3 teaspoons vanilla extract (for additional sweetness)

For the Topping...

• 10 mini tart dancing shoes
• An assortment of sliced seasonal fruit 
• 1 can healthy glaze
• 1/3 cup anti-school 
• 5 teaspoons seawater
  

Mix all of the filling ingredients together while listening to "We're in the Money". 

Scoop one teaspoon of filling into each mini tart dancing shoes. Top filling filled dancing shoes with fruit, ant-school.

Mix together the glaze seawater and and sauté in saucepan until bubbly. Using a paintbrush apply seawater glaze to the surface of the tarts.

Serves 10. Enjoy!

Dancing Numbers

I wrote this yesterday, but didn't think it was good. then i thought "what the heck" and so i'm posting it anyway. true story by the way. 

I came home from school with the intention of getting through my homework first so that i can have time to relax (not really). But, i ended up falling asleep (my intention all along). I had the weirdest dream ever. Going to sleep with your head full of lessons from the day topped off with watercolor paintings and magazines will do that to you. i was sitting with my math textbook out and i was doing my math homework, except i was using a paintbrush. Not those stupid plastic watercolor brushes, but a real Mulan type brush. I was to find the greatest common factor in several problems, so i dipped my paintbrush into my text book and gently lifted it up so that a wisp of numbers would float off the page and follow my brush. It was like when Dombledore took out a copy of a memory from his head in the Harry Potter movie. The numbers were transparent and they elegantly danced behind the brush like i was a ribbon twirler. i danced around with them, watching as the rays of sunset made them twinkle the colors of the rainbow. With my paintbrush i lead the three's into waltzing with the sevens and the x's and y's into leaping and twirling around each other.  then i turned back to my sketch book and lightly stroked the page with my brush so that it left behind the numbers, now paintings. 

This is the first picture. I like this picture because she looks like she's telling a friend a joke. I can picture her saying "Am I right? Do you get it?"

I had an interesting day today. I don't think i have ever had a day where i experienced every emotional possible. Im not talking about confusion. Confusion is when you don't know what to feel and your emotions are jumbled together all at once. Thats not what happened. Today i went from extremely happy to extremely depressed and then extremely terrified to extremely relived within minutes. And this happened on a loop... ALL DAY. See, today was the day that my grandfather was  going in for serious surgery. A real life or death situation.  Of course since im still a "kid" i had no idea that this was going on. so naturally i acted the way i usually act, completely unaware that the sentence, "Hurry up in there Eva, I'll die waiting for you", will cost me. 

I'll be joking with my mom one minute and the next we'll be arguing because i did not hold the food we were bringing to my grandmother properly in the car. My dad would put his arm around me and then suddenly give me the cold shoulder because I wanted to take my time eating but nooo, "Life is short". I truly believed the whole world was on it's time of month. It was like i was plucked out of my world and thrown into an alternate universe. It was when we drove up to the hospital that i realized what was going on, but even then i still felt like it was all a dream. I never realized how much my feelings are so interconnected with the people and environment around me. i was oblivious to the seriousness of the situation and yet i was acting bipolar like everyone else. Now, im going to bed with no feelings left in me. i think you can only feel so much before you cant feel anything at all. 

First Day of Class

These are my favorite pictures from the ones taken in class. 

There was an epic battle between this picture and a sour lemon face that she made. But in the end this one won (obviously) because this one looks innocent. I like how she is looking away.

I like this one because its where she i really laughing and not just smiling for the camera. It looks natural. 

Her hands and facial expressions make this picture look interesting. I want to know what she was saying. 

I like this because it isn't boring. To me her hand is not distracting and it makes the picture more interesting.

I like this because she has a pretty smile and she raised her shoulders a little bit. It feels more relaxed. 

This is an awesome picture. Her hair withcheeks and makes it look like an explosion of energy. Her eyes are also twinkling. 

I like how this picture is simple. 

I like this picture because looking away like he doesn't know that someone was taking his picture but he is still smiling. 

 

This picture could be of the president giving an important speech or of someone looking at Big Foot, and thats exactly why I picked it.

He looks shy in this picture. I like how he is looking down. 

Even though you cant see his face, I like it because it looks like a hand balancing a blob of hair. 

I like his expression in this picture. He has a huge smile and his hands look like he is describing something exiting. 

I like this picture because its funny. SHe is either thinking really hard or is confused. 

I like this picture because her face is off to the side and there still isn't much background distractions. 

I like this one because she is laughing really hard and her eyes are shut tightly. 

 

I like this one because it looks like he is right about to say something important.... or sneeze.

I like this one because the little growl face is cute. 

This picture is nice because she looks like she's telling the camera to come closer. 

I like this one because she looks like a shy little girl.  

I picked this one because i liked how he was off to the side. Also because he was smiling. 

I like this one because he's facial expression. It's funny how his eyebrows are raised. 

I like this one because it is close up and her glasses are hiding her eyes.

I like this one because she looks peaceful. 

I like this one because it looks like she was very interested in what she was talking about and her hand is up. 

Her facial expression is funny in this picture. Makes me wonder what questions she was asked...

I like this one because her head is tilted to the side. It reminds me of my elementary class picture where everyone tilted their head. 

I like this one because she can't control her laughter. 

I like this one because she squinted her eyes and has a nice smile in it.