Archery is a great sport and something I love to do. I am going to describe my cycle of shooting. First, I take my bow in my left hand and go to the line. I look up at my target and take a deep breath to lower my heart rate. I step up to the line and turn my back pivot foot to the right, in order to face the target slightly. I rest the bottom cam of my bow against my left leg and bend my leg slightly with my toes on the ground in order to hold it up. I place the arrow through the riser and nock it while setting it on the lizard tongue. I then grab my release out of my quiver and place it on the d loop. I make sure that my fingers are placed correctly on the release and take a deep breath and take another look at my target. I draw another deep breath as I lift my bow and slowly draw in order to keep the arrow in place. When drawn, I breathe in as I set my knuckles against my cheekbone and my nose and corner of my lip against the string. I slowly lower my pin to the bullseye, and make sure that my level is on, then grab the release with my back three fingers to get set for the shot. I then slowly exhale while thinking about pulling tight against my release. I steady in for five to seven seconds and my release goes off. I drop my elbow back and let my bow go forward slightly to stretch out for the follow through. I reset my release and rest my bow on my leg again and check to see where the arrow hit on the target. I then work through my mind any mistakes that I made during the shot cycle.

I Wonder Freewriting

I wonder where we would be at today without the Roman Empire. They conquered the known world at that time, established a language that is the root of almost all languages of today, and brought new philosophy and science that started theories and the way we think today. I wonder what the world would be like if we all spoke one language. How much could we work together to further human livelihood. The Asians and their skills with technology, the Germans and their talents on engineering, the Americans and their leadership and power, the Europeans and their livelihood with social, style, and literature. Imagine if all of these worked together and were able to communicate with each other easily. Where would our world be today? Would it even be different? Hhhmmm

Over the last few years, our family has traveled a lot for shooting in competitions. Most of the time it has been for archery, but also a little bit for rifle and pistol. It started in 2013 when I made the .22 rifle team as a freshman in high school. That summer we traveled to Grand Island, Nebraska to shoot three events over five days. I had a blast and shot in the top five a couple of times. The next year I shot on the .22 pistol team and competed at the same place with three similar events, only with a pistol. This last year, our whole family got into archery pretty hard. Our first big trip was to Des Moines, Iowa, and it was a big tournament. I got to meet some of the top shooters in the world and compete alongside them. I didn't do that well at the shoot, but had a lot of fun. The next shoot was in Kansas City, Missouri, of which I ended up taking first place. My scores started improving, and it was addicting. In March, we went to Louisville, Kentucky for the all time national shoot, where there was almost two thousand shooters. I ended up getting eighth in the nation, and it is the biggest shoot I have ever been to. This season we went back to the Kansas City shoot, and it was the first time I ever had to shoot in the adult class ever. I took second and got to have my first experience in a shoot-off. We are now planning on going to a big shoot in Illinois, back to the shoot in Des Moines, and possibly to the Vegas Shoot, which is the biggest shoot in the world held in Las Vegas. They are a lot of fun and I hope our whole family can do well in the near future.

Archery Technology

Your bow; your bow for target shooting should be long axle to axle length and have a lot of brace height for the best forgiveness on your shooting. A shoot through riser is a popular technology in order to get perfect center shot by actually shooting through the riser itself. The new Bowtech Fanatic is one of the leading technologies with  a shoot through riser, a dual cam system with yokes for the cables on both ends in order to achieve cam lean on both end equally and tune to the center shot on your bow. It also has the flex guard in order to allow your cables in when drawn, and pull them out of the way as the arrow goes by in order to get the best performance and accuracy. The Fanatic has the center pivot design on the split limbs for a smooth, accurate, and performance based feel. Bowtech also came out with micro adjustable draw stops for different amounts of let off and two pegs against the cable for the most solid backwall ever. The Fanatic is truly the best bow and target technology of the day! Shoot Bowtech!

In 2014 I made the small bore rifle team in 4-H to go to nationals on a team of four. The national shoot was in Grand Island Nebraska, and was five days. It was a lot of fun! We shot three different events; slow fire, camp perry, and silhouettes. The slow fire was four rounds of ten shots at 25 yards. I got third in that event with a one point split between each place from first to third. The second one is camp perry, which consists of ten shots slow fire, fifteen shots timed fire, and fifteen shot rapid fire. I also got third in that event. The last event was silhouettes, which is metal targets in the shape of a chicken, pig, turkey, and ram. They are shot in sets of ten from forty yards back to 110 yards, all with a .22 caliber pistol. It was a great experience and I am going back this year for archery.

 Archery is a great sport and something I love to do. I am going to describe my cycle of shooting. First, I take my bow in my left hand and go to the line. I look up at my target and take a deep breath to lower my heart rate. I step up to the line and turn my back pivot foot to the right, in order to face the target slightly. I rest the bottom cam of my bow against my left leg and bend my leg slightly with my toes on the ground in order to hold it up. I place the arrow through the riser and nock it while setting it on the lizard tongue. I then grab my release out of my quiver and place it on the d loop. I make sure that my fingers are placed correctly on the release and take a deep breath and take another look at my target. I draw another deep breath as I lift my bow and slowly draw in order to keep the arrow in place. When drawn, I breathe in as I set my knuckles against my cheekbone and my nose and corner of my lip against the string. I slowly lower my pin to the bullseye, and make sure that my level is on, then grab the release with my back three fingers to get set for the shot. I then slowly exhale while thinking about pulling tight against my release. I steady in for five to seven seconds and my release goes off. I drop my elbow back and let my bow go forward slightly to stretch out for the follow through. I reset my release and rest my bow on my leg again and check to see where the arrow hit on the target. I then work through my mind any mistakes that I made during the shot cycle.

frewriting

 Once we got the second opinion on my arm, we went to this orthopedic specialist in St. Louis Missouri. His name is Dr. Goldfarb, and he as an outstanding doctor. He determined what needed to be done and scheduled a surgery for the end of that week. I went in for surgery and they did the operation. They removed the extra bone and used a bone graft from my hip to put in and help the ulna heal. They put in four pins to hold it in place and the pins went right through a growth plate in my arm. After several weeks with a splint, they took the pins out and took some x-rays. They had some bad news when they came back into the office. The bone had not healed back even with the graft in place. They scheduled another surgery at the end of that week again. This time they took another graft from the hip, but put in some new technology of bone grower in with it. They fastened it with a plate and nine screws along the ulna bone. This time, it worked. They took the splint off, and we started some therapy several times a day. For a year, everyday, we did therapy several times, and could not get all of the range of motion back. When we went for another check up, Dr. Goldfarb recommended another surgery to try and get the range of motion back. He did the surgery and removed the plate and screws, (which they let me keep), and I was back out that day. Soon after we started the therapy again, and this time, we got a lot better results. Now I am able to do everything with my arm. Shooting my bow is important to me, and I can still do that great. I am able to touch my shoulder and get it almost all of the way straight. I am so thankful for what Dr. Goldfarb did for me.

In 2012, only a year after I got healed up from my arm injury, I had another break in the same arm, only this time much worse. At our last visit to the doctor for the first break he said that I had the worst arm break of the year at St. Johns hospital in Springfield. In September on labor day weekend of 2012 we were at the annual Mule and Donkey Days at the fairgrounds in Ozark. They had some timed events, of which one was called the rescue race. The rider started at one end of the arena and ran down to a barrel that another person was standing on, and as they turned the barrel, the person jumped on behind the rider and you ran beck to the other end of the arena. When I jumped onto the mule and we started to run back, I lost hold of the saddle and fell backwards off the mule. When I did, I landed on my arm behind my back and broke the ulna just below the elbow. We hurried to the hospital, (this time I wasn't in shock), and immediately went into the emergency room. The doctor who was there looked at my arm and said to just put a cast on it, of which we strongly disagreed. My dad asked and asked to do some x-rays the right way and see what it needed, but they drug their feet the whole way. Weeks later the doctor told us that the arm was healed and was “just a funny looking fracture” when we saw the x-ray each time. We went to go get a second opinion from the doctor who did such a great job on my first injury, and he did some x-rays and a CT scan. He told us that the bone was still broken, had not healed at all, was pushing the radial bone out of socket, and had grew an extra bone on top of the radial head because the bone was never aligned to heal. He referred us to an orthopedic specialist, and that is were the big story begins.

freewriting

 In 2010, I had my first experience with a broken bone. I was twelve years old and had just finished vacation bible school at our church in Springfield. We had a big carnival and games and inflatable slides. One of the slide had a maze that you had to work through and a slide at the end. All the same time you were racing somebody in an identical maze right beside you. At the end of the maze I jumped and landed about halfway down the slide. When I did, my arm happened to be under me and it broke the humorous bone right at the elbow. The broken bone also slide up my forearm, ending up with my elbow in the tricept area of my arm. Of course I started freaking out and going into shock. We hurried up and jumped in the truck and headed to the hospital. The road seemed very rough on the way there. When we got there, they took some x-rays and decided that they needed to do surgery right away. Before I knew it I was awake with a big cast on my arm and a dizzy feeling from anesthesia. Over the next few weeks we had checkups with the doctor, cast changes, and x-rays. Then one checkup, the doctor said it was time to pull the pins out that were in place to hold the bone together. They were only sticking out about half of an inch, but went in a long ways through my bone. This part hurt the worst. They laid me down on a table and used locking pliers to slowly twist and pull the pins out from my bone. It was some bad pain, but only lasted a few moments. The doctor did a great job, and after some therapy, I was able to have full range of motion and a 100% recovery from the break.

Freewriting

                        This year my dad and I went elk hunting in Colorado with some buddies of ours. It was my first experience in the mountains, and was very exciting. When we arrived there well into the night, we could hear elk bugling all around the camp ground we were staying at. We set up camp and went to bed that night, ready for morning to come. That next day, I headed out on my first expedition in the mountainous terrain. I climbed the closest mountain to camp in just a few hours, and was looking down on camp by midday. I had a cow call and had seen some mule deer and elk on the way up to the top. Before long I was able to get a bull to answer me and the chase was on. I don't know for sure how many miles I traveled that day, but I went all over two mountains that were side by side. I got close enough to some cows to get a shot, but never saw the bull, even though he was bugling at me less than one hundred yards away. The cows ended up busting me and I was unable to get them to answer me anymore; plus, it was getting dark and I was miles away from camp on the top of a mountain. Thankfully, though, going down a mountain is much easier than going up one. By the time I got to camp, I was wore out like no other time in my life, but I had a lot of fun. The next two days I spent learning and catching trout out of the river next to camp. We had mountain trout for dinner that night and it was wonderful. By the end of the trip, I ended up getting to see a bear and one more elk, and killed a couple of mountain grouse that were great to eat. The trip was a lot of fun.

What's Cooking?

The Best No Bake Cookies!

Maybe this is different from most teenage boys, but I love and have always enjoyed cooking. I don't know what it is that I get such a thrill out of it but I really like to cook things. The earliest I can remember cooking things was when I just wanted something like mac and cheese or a grilled cheese or scrambled eggs; something simple and quick. Then I started making pancakes, that was what really kicked it off! I started looking up different recipes for pancakes and making them until I fount the perfect one, and it was a buttermilk recipe. Ever since then I have made that recipe of pancakes, and the whole family loves them. But, the best thing I can cook up that everybody loves, is no bake cookies. And surprisingly, it is super simple and fast! The family loves them, our church family loves them, and my classmate really love them! Here is how to make them:

The recipe is how follows:

1 stick of butter

½ cup of milk

2 cups of sugar

4 tablespoons cocoa powder

1 cup of peanut butter

1 tablespoon of vanilla

3 cups of oats

First, in a large pot, melt one stick of butter on medium heat:

 Once melted, add your milk, sugar, and cocoa powder; stir very well over the heat:

 Turn your burner up to medium high and bring to a simmering boil, once at a boil, immediately start a timer for exactly 1 minute. When one minute is up, immediately remove pot from hot burner:

 Stir again, and add your peanut butter in. It should melt to where you can mix it well:

 Add in your vanilla, and then your oats. (We make our own vanilla with vodka and vanilla beans; this makes this recipe much better, or if you can buy a natural kind of vanilla, that would be better)

 Don't forget to lick the spoon when you are done!!

 Makes a great fudge over ice cream when it is hot,

 Or try them by themselves or with a glass of milk!

Hunter Hogan
English 101 Composition
Mrs. Anthony
October 5, 2015
This I Believe

I determine who I am, who I am going to be, and who I have been in the past. A blank canvas and I hold the brush. From day to day I paint my picture, from day to day my skill changes, and from day to day I add to my gallery. Each stroke of the brush determines accomplishments, disappointments, and experiences through my life. Each dip of a different color represents feelings, just like the fruits of the spirit, things such as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. With these colors I can paint a beautiful picture each day of my life, and God never stops supplying me with these colors. I make it my purpose to paint a better picture today than yesterday, and improve each skill each day. My motivation comes through relationships. Relations with friends, relations with family, and relations with people from day to day. Sometimes I have no control of how the picture looks at the end of the day, but that does not keep me from staying with it the next. I paint each picture as if it were my last, and make every stroke count as I go. Maybe someday this art will influence others in the right direction.
Through my whole life, as long as I could remember, I have never enjoyed or even liked art. I never understood why people got such a kick out of spending hours upon hours putting effort into something that you can’t even use for anything when you are done, just look at it. I have always been the type to put my time into something that is useful.
But, when I was asked to make a credo, the best thing I could think of was painting a picture of my outlook on life. Starting new everyday and making the day into what you want it to be; or just how it turns out.
One very important asset of my life is my faith. God provided for us and sent His son for us, the least we could do is serve him and at least make mention of Him. He is the center of my life, and gives me what I need and my credo is through His word
On another subject, my whole life I have lived on a farm in the Ozarks; three different ones as a matter of fact. One of them we raised horses, mules, cattle, and did a hay crop. The other two we sold the cattle and started doing some row crops. But no matter what you are doing with a farm, there is one consistent factor. Hard work. Spending hours upon hours putting into something so you can watch it grow, whether it is a horse colt, a newborn calf, or a field of crops. It all takes determination and effort. It is one of the best feelings when you put this effort into something and can watch it succeed.
Hard work is an important thing to me. The harder you work, the more you will get from what you are pouring into, and the more respectable you become to others. This is true for farming, your workplace, sports, relationships, and anything else you can work hard at. It makes for great success and accomplishment. Even if you cannot see a good outcome, if you try your best, something good will come out of it. Try your best and God will take care of the rest
People who do not work hard at anything end up failing at everything; simple cause and effect. If for nothing else, try for yourself. People have so much opportunity in America during this age and time, all they have to do is reach out and grab it; unfortunately, some choose not to.
What I am working up to here is things that make a person respectable. The last factor in this is honesty. Honesty is probably the most important, the reason is that if honesty is the only thing you have, and nothing else, at least you have something to hold some credibility to your name. I once saw a quote that said, “ Honesty is appreciated, respect is earned, trust is gained, and loyalty is returned.” That has to be the best quote I have ever read, you can’t put it any simpler than that. Mix a little hard work into that, and you can’t go wrong. That is my best idea for a credo

This I believe essay

I determine who I am, who I am going to be, and who I have been in the past. A blank canvas and I hold the brush. From day to day I paint my picture, from day to day my skill changes, and from day to day I add to my gallery. Each stroke of the brush determines accomplishments, disappointments, and experiences through my life. Each dip of a different color represents feelings, just like the fruits of the spirit, things such as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. With these colors I can paint a beautiful picture each day of my life, and God never stops supplying me with these colors. I make it my purpose to paint a better picture today than yesterday, and improve each skill each day. My motivation comes through relationships. Relations with friends, relations with family, and relations with people from day to day. Sometimes I have no control of how the picture looks at the end of the day, but that does not keep me from staying with it the next. I paint each picture as if it were my last, and make every stroke count as I go. Maybe someday this art will influence others in the right direction.

Fluency writing 3

Today I am going to write about my stance on Constitutional gun laws in America. The Democratic Party and Obama have been trying to put more gun control on the US citizens throughout the past few years. The constitution clearly states the law on guns in the second amendment; "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." Ok, so this says that we have the right to a militia, (a militia is an army of normal volunteer civilians), and not just that we have the right, but that it is necessary. After it explains the militia, it says that the people have the right to bear arms. It does not specify what kind of arms, just that we have the right to bear them. The statement ends on that these rights shall not be infringed on. Definition of infringed? To actively break the terms of (a law, agreement, etc.). So the right of the people, citizens of America, is to bear arms, and the government is not allowed to infringe upon that; no matter how politicians want to twist their way into making you think that they can, according to the constitution, they are not allowed to. Now that that is cleared up on legal stance, lets talk about the logical stance. Crime rates over the past couple decades have risen since some people have stopped owning guns due to the gun control laws. Politicians state that they are trying to protect the people with these laws, when really they are doing the exact opposite. Owning guns will cause the crime rates to go down, if a criminal assumes you have a way to protect yourself, their not going to take the chance on you having a gun. But, if you advertise that you are for gun control, your just an easy target for those guys. Furthermore, if they do pass the gun laws, all the bad guys are going to break it anyways and keep some guns, while the good men, wanting to obey the laws, will give up their guns and you can guess where we would end up then.

Know Your Audience Analysis

The 'Know Your Audience' exercise we did was fun and interesting while getting to know my classmates. I found out that we all have similar beliefs and stances while coming from a variety of backgrounds and lifestyles.
The first question that let me get to know everybody pretty good was by Kourtney, she asked, "If you had a one way ticket to anywhere in the world, where would it be? Why? And who would you take with you?" The most popular response, including mine, was that people were satisfied where they are and wouldn't want to move anywhere. That kind of surprised me with the age group that most of the class is. Usually people at this age are wanting to spread their wings and find their own path in life, and surprisingly for most that is right here.
The question that I asked was where they were going when they died. Most answered that they were going to heaven, but different people had different ideas on how. Most believed the same way I do, that you must be saved through Jesus Christ to go to Heaven for eternity.
Many of the classmates like fiction books and definitely come from a different background than myself. A lot answered to the question of 'if they were the last person on earth', that they would first of all cry, and then they didn't know what they would do. Others answered as if they had control over the situation, even though you could tell that they didn't know what they were talking about.
To sum it up, I really enjoyed this assignment and responding to the questions. I feel like I know the class a lot better and where they stand. I feel like that I can adjust my writing accordingly now that I know everybody.

Freewriting 2

I think it would be awesome to go back to the Western days. Back when America was first expanding. Back when the cowboys were doing cattle drives through Texas and the trappers were trading in St. Louis and Kansas City. I think it would be cool to go back and visit for a year during these times. The first thing I would want to do is go on a cattle drive with those cowboys. Living off the land for a while until they got to the next city. It would also be amazing to go west when there was no civilization out there and see the beautiful country, from the plains of Kansas, through the Rockies, to the great pines of Organ, that is some beautiful country. To live off of the land and the flourishing wildlife, and meet and trade with the Indians during that time. To take a trip like Louis and Clark, though it would be hard, it would be a great experience.

Fluency writing 1

So I thought I would talk a little bit about myself and my future plans. As for right now, I am finishing high school and trying to prepare for college. For sport, I shoot competitive archery. This year I am trying to qualify for 4-H nationals and am going to go to some of the national pro tour shoots and try and prepare for next year, of which I plan to go on the pro tour around the nation. For college, I would like to go somewhere on a shooting scholarship, although there are few colleges that have these, and try to get that to pay for my college. I would like to go into college for engineering and business. I am going to try and start a business based on an invention that I have came up with, and I would like to have the college education to start this. After college I plan to expand this business and possibly open up a archery pro shop. Some things I would like to do is travel around North America and do some hunting. This year my dad and I are going on an elk hunt in Colorado. We have mules and horses that we take to the Rocky Mountains and ride looking for elk, once we find where the elk are we will tie off our horses and bow hunt. Some other hunts I would like to do someday is hunt for Dall sheep in the Rockies, and I would like to go to Alaska and do some moose, bear, and caribou hunting, along with some salmon fishing. One other place is I would like to go to New Zealand hunting for the Greater Stag; that would be a blast! Anyways, that is some of my future plans, goals, and dreams

I am going to free write on farmers being the most important people in the world. Farmers are the roots of society. I mean, seriously, they are the ones who feed the world. It is not an easy task, and for the importance of their role, they are not appreciated enough. A lot of people think that a king or president or governor are the most important people, but they are just over celebrated. What would we do without farmers? Some people would be able to fend for themselves, but most now days wouldn't even know where to start. 10min is finally up.

I believe archery is a great sport
I believe that every person should have to work for themeselves
I believe that Christ came to be our savior
I believe music has an impact on people
I believe that people need a purpose in their life
I believe that parents are the most influential people to their children
I believe farmers are the most important people in the world
I believe education is a key to success
I believe hunting is a great sport

First Post :)

Hey Guys!

This is my first time making a blog but it doesn't look too bad to figure out. I hope we will be able to get to know each other through this along with improving our fluency in writing. This weekend I had a state archery try-out to go to nationals. I am in first place right now and still have two more to go to. I'm very excited! Here is a picture from this weekend, I had just released and the arrow is actually in the air, pretty cool!