Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has praised the spirit of "remarkable" teenage sailor Jessica Watson during his Australia Day address in Canberra.
Mr Rudd said he spoke with 16-year-old Ms Watson over the phone last night, while she sailed "in the pitching seas off South Georgia, somewhere in the South Atlantic".
"Jessica Watson is no ordinary young Australian. She is an extraordinary young Australian ... a remarkable young Australian," he said.
"And some 5,000 nautical miles west of Cape Town, she wanted me today to wish you all a very happy Australia Day."
Mr Rudd said he asked Ms Watson if she would like him to relay a message to the nation.
"Her message was simple. Her message was, live your dream," he said.
Mr Rudd said Ms Watson also aimed to finish school and obtain a drivers licence and a skippers certificate on her return to Australia.
Ms Watson is likely to spend Australia Day battling storms in the South Atlantic, with a low pressure system expected to cross her path and forecasts of gale-force winds.
She is still recovering after being hit by a raging storm on Friday that damaged some of her equipment and activated one of her emergency signalling devices.
OK, WTH (heck)...another teen sailor this one American going around the world by themself. Are parents just out of their mind now? What???? Your thoughts please!!!
Washington, Jan 25 – A 16-year-old American girl has embarked on a quest to become the youngest person to sail around the world, adding some competition to an effort already underway by an Australian girl.
Abby Sunderland departed from Marina del Rey in California Saturday in her 12-metre long boat Wild Eyes. She hopes the trip will take between five and six months. While underway she will subsist on dried food, communicate via satellite phone and maintain a blog at www. abbysunderland. com.
Did you guys hear about this story, where were we, we must have been under a rock, never heard this one! OMG
Teen sensation Justin Bieber was threatened with arrest if he failed to send an internet message to fans urging them to go home after a signing in New York descended into chaos.
The 15 year old was forced to cancel an appearance at the Roosevelt Field shopping mall in Long Island in November after thousands of screaming teens showed up to catch a glimpse of their pop idol.
BOSTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Children’s Hospital Boston announced today that it will partner with Atheneum Books For Young Readers, an imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing, to publish Zebrafish, a hardcover middle-grade visual novel created by local educational media developer FableVision and its co-founder Peter H. Reynolds. Written by Sharon Emerson and illustrated by Renée Kurilla, Zebrafish is an extension of an online animated series by the same name that FableVision and Reynolds developed for Children’s Hospital Boston’s Generation Cures (Gen C) philanthropic movement. Gen C teaches tweens and families the power of compassion, giving, science and medicine through online webisodes, free games, video, music and more. Caitlyn Dlouhy, Atheneum Editorial Director, negotiated the deal, which includes audio rights and a second title to be published in May 2011.
A unique book format, the Zebrafish visual novels team a traditional prose novel with four-color graphic novel panels, making it extremely accessible for middle graders. Zebrafish— named after the small, yet powerful, transparent fish used for studying disease—tells the story of friends who form a rock band of the same name. Band members Vita, Walt, Jay and Plinko wonder why their bandmate, Tanya, keeps missing rehearsals. When they learn Tanya has leukemia, the kids realize that even though they can’t cure her illness or make her treatments any less painful, they can use their music to make a difference. Their first performance becomes a fundraiser to purchase research equipment for the hospital that treats Tanya.
Co., Inc. (NYSE: BBY | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) today announced the launch of the @15 Scholarship program, which will award 1,000 scholarships of $1,000 each to students in grades 9 through 12 living in the United States, including D.C. and Puerto Rico, who plan to enter a full-time undergraduate course of study upon graduation from high school.
Best Buy is proud to award $1 million to deserving students as part of @15, Best Buy's platform to connect with teens, give voice to their perspectives and support teen efforts to lead social change.
"The @15 Scholarship program is an investment in this country's next generation of leaders -- an investment that will pay dividends for all of us," said Brian J. Dunn, president and COO, Best Buy Co., Inc. "Best Buy, through the @15 platform, is committed to empowering teens with the tools they need to drive change and make a difference for themselves as well as in their communities."
"Music doesn't lie. If there is something to be changed in this world, then it can only happen through music."
Hello everyone!
How are you all? Are you excited for Valentine's Day? Just wanted to say that I am still working on the getting artist interviews done and will hopefully be blogging about those soon! Can't wait, I'm really excited! :)
Thought I'd use this time to catch up on what's going on in the music world right now. Did any of you catch the Grammys? Beyonce took home 6/10 she was nominated for and Taylor Swift won 4/8 of the ones she was nominated for, including Album of the Year! If you didn't get to watch the performances, which by the way were AMAZING, check them out on YouTube (www.youtube.com).
In light of yet another movie production of Alice In Wonderland coming out soon, directed of course by the great Tim Burton, I thought we should study up on where all these movies came from!
Whether you saw the Disney movie as a kid, or one of the less well-known versions, you probably know the basics about Lewis Carroll's famous story. Little girl named Alice, talking white rabbit, grinning Cheshire Cat, Mad Hatter, and the temperamental Queen of Hearts. But did you know there are actually two parts to Alice's Adventures In Wonderland? Carroll (whose real name, by the way, was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson!) wrote a sequel called Through The Looking-Glass, which often gets combined with the first story in most editions of the book.
How are you? I went and saw the Book of Eli today. Man, it was so good! :)
Today I want to talk about beauty. You've heard the phrase, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." What do you consider beautiful?
In America, the perception that thinner is better and to have any flaws makes you ugly.
NOT TRUE.
Even supermodels have cellulite! The truth is: YOU are beautiful just as you are! Tall, short, skinny, fat = those are all just labels. You are beautiful just as you are.
How are you doing? Fabulous? Good! The other day I bought a copy of Michael J. Fox's newest memoir Always Looking Up. The by-line is catchy but also very interesting. "The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist" Are you an incurable optimist?
"Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending." - Maria Robinson It's true. You cannot change where you were born, the family you were born to or your past. You can change how you end up. That's the beauty of life. As long as you are still breathing, you have the opportunity to change your life. Every breath is a second chance.
"If I regarded my life from the point of view of the pessimist, I should be undone. I should seek in vain for the light that does not visit my eyes and the music that does not ring in my ears. I should beg night and day and never be satisfied. I should sit apart in awful solitude, a prey to fear and despair. But since I consider it a duty to myself and to others to be happy, I escape a misery worse than any physical deprivation." - Helen Keller We all have things in our life that we wish hadn't happened to us. We all have difficulties. Maybe your family life isn't the best. Maybe you have a disease that tries to slow you down. Maybe no matter how hard you try -- you just can't win. Take heart. Believe. Hope. You are still alive. You still have something to offer the world. Everything that's happened to you -- fairly and not -- is building you up for the destiny you were meant to have!
Your probably asking, "What's all this talk of destiny?" "I'm just a nobody from a small town. I like to sing but I don't think I could make a career of it." "I was sexually abused when I was young. How can I ever get over that?" "My parents are really out there Ariel. I don't think they even care about my dreams." If Carrie Underwood, Oprah Winfrey and Shia LeBeouf had thought that -- where would they be today?
Hey everyone! Hope you guys have been having a great weekend so far. As a lot of you have probably already heard, Haiti is currently suffering from post-earthquake damages. I kindly ask that you please keep Haiti in your thoughts and those of you who are religious, in your prayers, because they really do need help to get their country and lives back today. I wanted to dedicate this post to the Hope for Haiti concert and telethon that was held last night to help raise money to help Haiti. Live performances from Justin Timberlake, Jennifer Hudson, Taylor Swift, and more helped to raise funds for the grief stricken country and although the amount raised hasn't been reported yet, the event was a success. Over a million people called to help in whichever way they could and celebs like Nick Jonas, Joe Jonas, Selena Gomez, Taylor Swift, Keke Palmer, and Taylor Lautner helped answer phones during the telethon and collect funds. iTunes is also allowing customers to buy the full 2-hour
A while back--one of my earliest reviews, in fact--I reviewed Tamora Pierce's fantastic Song Of The Lioness Quartet. In that series, taking place earlier in the land of Tortall, our heroine Alanna wished to be a knight, but it was unacceptable for girls to do so. She was forced to pretend to be her twin brother in order to go to training. Now, in the aftermath of her story, she made it possible for girls to become knights. In First Test, we meet Keladry, the first one to take up the opportunity.
Lauren Conrad was very uncomfortable about answering questions about Heidi Montag? What do you think? Are you planning on reading Lauren's new book? We are!
Last year 7,752,802 people just like you used VolunteerMatch to help make it a better world. Together we joined the effort to mentor our kids, clean our parks, lift our sick, embrace our artists, and brighten our future. Thank you.
This year we hope to see you back. And tell a friend, or maybe your parents -- if getting involved is on their list of New Year's resolutions, let them know VolunteerMatch makes it easy to find what they're looking for.
Our best wishes for an engaged 2010. Happy New Year!
The VolunteerMatch Team
We Posted this from VolunteerMatch's Newsletter so that you can get involved! Please do :)
Deko and Posh are bringing recycling to schools to raise money for schools. The Deko and Posh Recycle Club is a program where kids at schools can start the club and start collecting recyclable's to raise money to buy supplies, books, and even computers for their respective schools.
OK, so it's not exactly true that every actor in Hollywood is in the romantic comedy Valentine's Day, but it's close enough. With the likes of Jennifer Garner, Jessica Alba, Jessica Biel, Jamie Foxx, Topher Grace, Ashton Kutcher, Emma Roberts, Hector Elizondo, Julia Roberts, Bradley Cooper, Taylor Lautner, Taylor Swift, Eric Dane, Kathy Bates, Anne Hathaway, Queen Latifah and Shirley MacLaine starring in this story about romance in Los Angeles, it's pretty much impossible that there's not at least one actor you love in Valentine's Day. The series of interlocking stories about life and love on the romantic day of the year pretty much makes an ensemble movie like Love Actually look like My Dinner With Andre.
A $3,000 check, a viewing party of Disney’s Wizards of Waverly Place The Movie DVD sponsored and paid for by Sponsor in Grand Prize winner’s hometown at location to be determined by Sponsor with celebrity visits from Jake T. Austin* and David Henrie*, (1) Panasonic VIERA 46” Plasma HDTV and Home Theater System, (1) DVD of Wizards of Waverly Place The Movie and an opportunity to accompany Jake T. Austin* and David Henrie* to a food bank located near the Grand Prize winner’s hometown area to deliver bread donation.
Harmonies for Haiti which connects the youth with helping the relief efforts in Haiti, will take place at the House of Blues on Sunset Blvd in Los Angeles on Wednesday, February 10th.
Performing:
Tyler Hilton, Anna Maria Perez de Tagle, Savvy & Mandy, the Record Life and more.
The event is being put on by Chelsea Staub to benefit Haiti.
You and three guests can meet Scarlett Johansson on opening night of the play “A View from the Bridge” this Sunday, January 24th, at Cort Theatre in New York City. Watch the play, meet Scarlett at the after party, and help earthquake survivors in Haiti!
All proceeds go to Oxfam’s Haiti Earthquake Response Fund. Oxfam is a leader in disaster response and is working on the ground in Haiti to provide clean water and sanitation.
Since the event is taking place this Sunday, full payment is required immediately after the auction. Transportation, accommodations, and any other expenses are not included.
SoCal ShutterBooth is ECSTATIC to support the Down Syndrome Assocation of Orange County’s (DSAOC) by participating in the Sixth Annual Red Carpet Ball for teens and adults with Down Syndrome. Don’t be late for a very important date! ”Adventures in Wonderland” will take place on the evening of February 27, 2010. Guests are instructed to follow the white rabbit to the Doubletree Hotel in Santa Ana. DSAOC is a wonderful organization that empowers people with Down Syndrome to reach their full potential. They offer a wide spectrum of interactive services including seminars, events, support groups, and community outreach. We look forward to seeing the smiles on their faces, and to supporting DSAOC in the future. Check back after the event to see all the fun photos in our ShutterYou event gallery and to read our blog.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has praised the spirit of "remarkable" teenage sailor Jessica Watson during his Australia Day address in Canberra.
"Music doesn't lie. If there is something to be changed in this world, then it can only happen through music." 
I can't believe I haven't reviewed this yet! I just saw the movie a couple of weeks ago, and it was really good! Definitely a must-see.
Hello everyone!
Hello everyone!
Hey everyone! Hope you guys have been having a great weekend so far. As a lot of you have probably already heard, Haiti is currently suffering from post-earthquake damages. I kindly ask that you please keep Haiti in your thoughts and those of you who are religious, in your prayers, because they really do need help to get their country and lives back today. I wanted to dedicate this post to the Hope for Haiti concert and telethon that was held last night to help raise money to help Haiti. Live performances from Justin Timberlake, Jennifer Hudson, Taylor Swift, and more helped to raise funds for the grief stricken country and although the amount raised hasn't been reported yet, the event was a success. Over a million people called to help in whichever way they could and celebs like Nick Jonas, Joe Jonas, Selena Gomez, Taylor Swift, Keke Palmer, and Taylor Lautner helped answer phones during the telethon and collect funds. iTunes is also allowing customers to buy the full 2-hour 
Amazing Austin is what we are calling him! He started 
OK, so it's not exactly true that every 
our team on twitter