Fencing By Fiona

My Passion

 I have many passions but this is one I love overall. I have been studying fencing for about 3 years now. I have always loved the Idea of sword fighting and since I was 8 I got to live my dream. Fencing is more difficult than you would think. It involves skill, strategy, patience and balance. Why do I like it you ask, well, I love fencing because I love sports, I love skill/strategy games and I LOVE swords!!! So basically fencing is the sport for me.

 I fence at Phoenix academy in Poughkeepsie NY. The teachers are great and we get to do workouts/obstacle courses in the beginning. So if you are maybe just a little bit interested, I would recommend going for it. I was nervous to start but now, it is my favorite sport. So whatever your passion is, carry on with it. Because when you are older, you might regret quitting!

 

Kleibrink (GER) v Imboden (USA) DSC_1937 Plashing Vole via Compfight

My Passion~ Piano

Since this week the topic for  quadblogging is what is your passion , I chose mine as playing piano. I absolutely love piano. I take private lessons (outside of school) every Thursday at Paul Effman from 4:30 to 5:00. The reason why I chose to start taking piano lessons is because I didn’t play any instruments. Also because my mom had taken piano lessons when she was a kid , but now she has forgotent how to play. This is my second year playing piano.

 

I really love to play piano, my parents say it’s a natural talent that sort of just came to me and it was just really easy for me to play. I have recital at the end of February each year. This year, my piano teacher, Lauren said she thinks I’m ready to participate in NYSSMA which stands for New York state school music association. NYSSMA is basically held at a school and you go into one of the classrooms and perform a piece of music, 3  scales and you have to sight read (but they give you that), for a judge. There are 3 levels with 1 being  beginner and 3 being advanced. Since this is my first year doing NYSSMA, Lauren  thinks I should go as a level one. You can play any instrument you want. (The reason why I knew this was because my friend has done it for a while and she told me).


I have learned many different songs on the piano, I know how to play Ode to Joy , a Waltz and many other songs. My piano teacher is a really good teacher in my opinion and I really think she teaches me a lot. I have a keyboard right now at my house which I use to practice , but we are thinking about getting a piano! Which I’m very excited about. I don’t consider actually becoming a piano player, but to just have it as a hobby. Anyway, I think piano will be something that will always stick to me and be my passion and I hope to learn more and more and really become a skilled pianist.

 

Here is a link for the history behind piano: http://pianonet.com/all-about-pianos/history-of-the-piano/

Here is another link for more to know about NYSSMA:  http://pianonet.com/all-about-pianos/history-of-the-piano/http://pianonet.com/all-about-pianos/history-of-the-piano/

 

piano_2014_5072
A picture of a piano.

Mike Davis via Compfight

My Passion is Skiing – By Eden

I am passionate about many different things but some of the other ones I have already written about but this one I did not. I like to ski, I have been skiing since I was little. I started skiing when I was little, about 5 or 6. I started on easy trails like greens and almost always took a lesson. As I got older I wanted to start doing things by myself so I stopped taking lessons every time and I tried skiing more on my own. It did not come naturally for me though, I almost always fell or got frustrated and just sat down. I did not want help and I kept trying but kept failing. Then for one season I stopped skiing and just took a break from it all.

 

In 6th grade through 12th grade at my school (PDS) they take us skiing every Friday in January. I knew I had some skill from previous years of skiing but I did not want to seem like a bad skier so I watched videos and tried to scrape as much memory of ski skills from my mind as I could. We traveled to Catamount and I skied that first Friday very happily. I stayed on my feet and was much more daring. Throughout those weeks my parents and I went to Belleayre on the weekends, which is a ski place up Highmount, NY. I skied with my dad and went over some of the jumps and terrain. I was a lot more confident and had more pleasure in skiing in general.

 

The last week of skiing with the school I tried going on actual terrain parks. I went with a couple friends on the smaller less advanced one. After that I tried the harder black diamond one. I made it down successfully and did some jumps as well. Before this ski season I did not have a lot of confidence, I gathered up some and used it in skiing. I am now more stable and ready and enjoy it more. I especially like skiing with my friends, as it is fun comparing skills and falling but always getting back up again.

 

Below are two links to the mountains mentioned in this post:

Catamount

Belleayre

 

Movies Passion by Adam

Well my passion isn’t too exciting but I really love watching movies. Horror, Comedy, Romance (Not so much but..), Sci-fi you name it! I’m not so much of a critique but I just enjoy sitting down with friends or by myself and watch a movie! My mom doesn’t really approve of my passion though, she usually tells me to read a book. However reading and watching are kind of the same except anyone can watch TV. Just tonight actually I watched a movie called Disturbia which was SO interesting.

 

Though I will never forget, the first time I ever watched a movie (Well first movie I could actually understand). Inspector Gadget with Matthew Broderick, though it wasn’t to popular at the time it was one of my sisters favorite movies. It was very funny as a child to see all the cool special effects.

 

Na na na na na Inspector Gadget.. Majin Buchoy via Compfight

 

Not only have I always loved watching movies but I’ve always wanted to star in them. When I was about 9 or so I got really into acting and I am now auditioning for a couple of student and short films. Hopefully at the age of 14 I will get into a rather popular movie! Thanks for taking the time to read this post. If you are going to comment please remember to leave your link!

 

I am Passionate About Horseback Riding By Olive

Wild HorsesCreative Commons License Kevin M Klerks via Compfight

I am very passionate about a lot of things, but I am most passionate about horseback riding. I love to be able to canter around the ring and have the wind in my hair. There is a camp in Connecticut called SJ Riding Camp that’s a horseback riding camp. It is super fun and where I learned how to canter and jump. There is this part of  horseback riding that makes me feel free and happy. So I started riding when I was about four but then I took a break because I was only four, and then I got into riding again when I was around six or seven. I rode until I was like nine and then I took a very short break, and when I was ten I took up riding again until now.

I was riding at my friends barn, because I wanted to start riding there. I was cantering around and I was had to jump but I was very nervous because I never jumped while cantering and there were a lot of experienced people watching. so I cantered around two times before I jumped, and while I was going around I was remembering all the different things. Keep your heels down, two point (jumping position), releasing (loosening the reins) and soon it was time to jump I went over and forgot to loosen the reins and that makes the horse pop over over the jump. Then that made me pop out of the saddle and on the horse’s butt, we all started laughing and I had a good time.

Sadly I left that barn and now I am going to Southern Dutchess Equestrian Cnter, I like it here and now I am learning how to canter without voice cue. It is harder than with voice cue because when you are riding a horse with voice cue you can just sit back in your saddle while trotting (a gate that a horse uses) and kiss in the air. Also I am now jumping more and taking on more challenges, it is always fun to be able to do things like jumping. And soon I will be leasing a horse from SJ.

Cat Passion By Isaac

 

Passion: Cats

I think cats are really neat because there are so many different types that live in all sorts of environments! I love cats so much that I have four of my own. But this isn’t about me, this is about the cats. There are cats on just about every continent! There are over 50 breeds of cats, too! It sounds like a lot, but there are really two categories of cats: domesticated and undomesticated.

Domesticated (or house) cats:

Domesticated cats are the type of cat that you think of when you hear the word “cat”. If you don’t know a lot about cats, you’ll probably think there’s only one type. If you’re semi-knowledgeable in this subject matter, you’ll categorize cats into domestic short hair and domestic longhair. Those are categories, but if you go by breed, there are over 40 types of cat breeds. These cats were small and were domesticated by humans around the year 7500 BCE, around the Neolithic period. 9500 years later (current day) they are the second most popular pet in the world (first being the freshwater fish).

Undomesticated (or big) cats:

This category of cat has about 10 types of cats in it; the biggest being the tiger. These cats live everywhere, but many are incredibly endangered. Most of these cats live in Asia and Africa, but some live in the Americas, too. This category contains 3 genuses of cats (Panthera, Acinonyx, and Puma), and most of them fall into the Panthera category.

That’s it? (other cats):

Well, there are some other types of cats that are small wildcats that I don’t include, because they don’t really fall into one category or the other. There are probably some cats that haven’t been discovered, I don’t know, and they may not be talked about. But, those two categories basically put cats in a nutshell.

My cats:

I have four cats which I really love and I love to teach them to do tricks. It’s a passion of mine. Here’s a little about my cats-

  • Jasper – The biggest, strongest, most muscular cat. He’s gray and has beautiful patterns on him. Surprisingly, he’s a complete scaredy cat, and hides under couches a lot.
  • Creamsicle – Creamsicle is a tiny orange and white cat that’s really small and likes to hunt really big birds (which a lot of the time she catches). She’s outside almost all the time and we don’t see her often
  • Jimmy – Jimmy’s Sort of blind and a little deaf. He’s all black and he’s the youngest cat. He’s really playful and likes to be snuggled and petted. He’s personally my favorite cat.
  • Dusk – Dusk was a stray cat that kept showing up at my house, and eventually we let him in. He’s a black cat, with a patch of white fur on his chest. He ate a lot of food and couldn’t control himself and he’s really fat now. He’s sort of mean to Jasper

 

Dusk (before he was rotund):

Photo on 9-15-15 at 7.48 PM #2.jpg

Sources:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_cat

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat

My Passion By Alex

I am really passionate about Joe Namath and how he inspired me to play football. When I first started playing football I felt scared of getting hurt and maybe breaking one of my bones. But when I saw Joe Namath throw the ball and sometimes getting hit, and then just getting up with a smile, I was not scared anymore.

 

When I was walking onto the field – Home of the Haldane Blue Devils, I felt that I was going to fail badly,  but then I remembered one of Joe’s quotes “ When you have confidence, you can have a lot of fun. And when you have fun, you can do amazing things.” That quote gave me the courage to play.

 

I always remember Joe’s quote during my own football games. When Joe Namath took his team ( New York Jets ) to the super bow, l I felt that I could take my team to the Super Bowl, but in my league we call it the Championship game. We made it all the way to the semifinals but then we lost 28-14. I still have a smile on my when I think about how I took my team to the semifinals and we tried our best.  

 

Soccer Passion: By Caidin

football boots fotoizm via Compfight

My Soccer Passion

I didn’t really like soccer, but when I was three my parents enrolled me in a soccer camp. Everyone was playing the game (well sort of  -they were only three). I on the other hand was just running around the edge of the field, because I had no interest in the game whatsoever. After that day I never played soccer again, that is until I got older.

 When I was ten I heard that my school had a soccer team, I forgot about not liking the game. After hearing this I did what any sensible ten year old would do, I got home and pleaded with my parents to let me play on the team. Guess what my parents said? They said,”yes.” The one thing that I had not thought about, was the gear I needed, so we went out and bought cleats, shin guards and shorts. Once I stepped on the field with my new gear I thought whoa this is  weird (I had never wore cleats before). So I tried for offense –  nope – tried defense – YES!  I thought defense was my thing. We started playing games and I was not that comfortable with defense but did not want to do offense so that was my dilemma. For the whole season I was defense and after the season I was disappointed that I did not say anything.

 It was a new season of soccer and I joined the team again. I thought well I am eleven now and it’s a new year, so time to find my spot. I was put on defense again –  wow! But this time I said to my coach hey can I try goalie? He said yeah why not give it a whirl. I was a little stiff at first but he could tell if he worked with me I could be a really good goalie so he did work with me. Once my putts were good and my blocking was usually on point, I went to the goal for a game. Guess what? That was the only game we won. It was almost a blowout but at the last second I let one ball through. Hmm I thought… I think I found my spot on the team. Now my mom is enrolling me in my town team and I am watching soccer almost every day!

 

 

My Passion- Skiing- By Zacharias

My passion is skiing because I have been doing it since I was four years old and now I am apart of a race team. I am very passionate about my ski racing and do the best I can do. Every weekend I go to my ski mountain called Butternut and I train Saturday through Sunday. Sometimes I have a race on one of those days and that is why we train a lot. I am not very competitive about it but I enjoy it and work very hard each weekend to get my skiing skills to a good point. We have a practice course almost every time we go to training so we can practice going into gates and smacking them down.

 I love when I hockey stop and the fresh powder sprayed in my face. When that happens I feel very refreshed and I can keep on doing my training and racing. When I am the start gate I get zoned in on what I am doing and I look around to see how the terrain is because it is important to see in the ground is icy or powdery. I have to do this to see how much on edge in need to be. When they say 5.4.3.2.1….. Go, I take a deep breath and then I push myself with all I have and I tuck halfway down the track and then I tuck for the end. After I stopped, the spectators took the bib that had my number and then I went to the lodge and ate lunch. That is what a race is like in skiing.

 I think that skiing was a passion for me when I first started, but when I joined the race team I felt a totally different feeling about skiing and I wanted to do the best I could do without getting hurt. I have been in the race team for four years so I have improved a lot and for that I am grateful to my coaches for training me the right way. I am always a little nervous for the races because I do not know if I am going to do good or not. I really like skiing and I think that others should enjoy racing even if they do not do good because the way that  I look at it is that is an achievement for me. I really like my skiing and one day I hope to end up in senior ti-state league. Again my passion for skiing is strong. So ski on!!!


Damo with skis crossedCreative Commons License Matt Biddulph via Compfight

Swimming by Aidan

83948905The The passion I am writing about is my passion for swimming. I am on the swim team Club Fit Jefferson Valley. Our LSC is Metro Swimming. We practice every night, except for weekends. There are 5 training groups (levels). I am currently in SD2 which is the second level. I am moving up to JE which is the third level, I can go only two times a week to this level.

 

We have about two competitions every month. At the competitions you get entered into events like 50 FREE or 100 BACKSTROKE. They do the events in heats, heat one is the slowest and the highest numbered heat is the fastest. They divided all swimmers into groups called age groups. You have 5 age groups they are: 8 and under, 9-10, 11-12, 13-14 and 15-18. They are done by age. I am in 11-12 because I am 11 years old.

 

There are winners but it is more about the time. If you get fast enough times you can qualify for championships that is where winning matters. There are many championships but people my age only get to the first four. Each championship gets harder. The highest I have ever been to is the third one, it is called JO Championship. My 50 FREE time is 34 seconds.