Samantha Arreloa, a freshman at Rancho Cucamonga High School, has done everything from designing to art to performing to music. She specifically plays the piano, the ukulele, the guitar, and the clarinet. Arreola loves Tim Burton’s style, and her art reflects it with darker shades and cooler colors, including her self-designed and created accessories. She’s participated in RCHS’s most recent play, “The Play That Goes Wrong,” as a crucial part of the set crew.
Arreloa loves to design and create new pieces of jewelry and clothing for herself out of the mundane day-to-day routine of her life.
“I make jewelry that I want to wear because it’s cheaper than going out and buying it,” Arreola said. “When I make jewelry, I don’t really follow a pattern, I just go with what I like.”
She knows how to crochet, knit, and sew. She particularly likes to make cropped sleeve shirts, blankets, and plushies out of yarn and her own innovation. With her unique style, Arreloa often adjusts clothes to her liking, such as sewing on patches from her favorite movies or adding pockets.
“My mom has always tried to teach me, but since I crochet left-handed she couldn’t because she does it right-handed,” Arreola said. “My cousin started crocheting, which led me to learning.”
In school, Arreola is very involved with RCHS’s drama program, enrolling in it as an elective and participating in its annual shows. For our most recent one, “The Play That Goes Wrong,” Arreloa was included in the background building and prop making. For her hard work and dedication, she’s been awarded a show necklace, a very special tradition in which a higher-up in the program gives a necklace that represents the play to a person they think worked very hard in the production.
“I met her when she signed up for tech, and every time I saw her she was always working on something. Every time I waved to her she would wave back. I thought, ’oh she’s nice,’ ” Chole Niels-Poling, a senior at RCHS, said.
Niels-Poling is the drama board member who gave her the necklace, and she has always thought Arreola was a hard-working and down-to-earth person.
Even though Arreloa doesn’t play for the public, her musical sense is outstanding. She has taught herself how to play the ukulele and guitar, and she has learned how to play the piano. In the fifth and sixth grades, Arreola played for her school, but left to pursue a more academic path.
“I started playing piano when I was four, and my mom would pick out a song and help me learn it, but now I teach myself because I know enough. For the clarinet, I learned to play it from my time in band, and it’s an icky instrument to play, but it was interesting to learn,” Arreola said. “I chose to learn guitar because I wanted to learn a string instrument. The ukulele was fun, because I taught myself how to play all of it, and I’m not perfect but I liked to learn.”
She has played for many family events and gatherings, and she plays for friends when she has the chance to.
