stephanie

This is Stephanie. She is a beautiful dancer who has a section in Michael's piece where all eyes are on her. Steph is as tall and thin as a runway model, yet she is strong with powerful legs, arms and core. It is great to have her as part of our ensemble for the show. (Show post to come soon...)

barefoot dancers

These are some lovely dancers in air moments from Michael's rehearsal on Saturday. Please excuse the blur from my old, not fancy digital camera...

red & turquoise

Just so fun to find cute dresses for a cute girl! Although Myka does not like me to call her 'cute'. She prefers me to say 'beautiful', and yes, I make sure she knows that I also think she is smart, funny and kind. (But she is going to be a knockout at 18 when she's, like, 6' tall, willowy w/ a little bit of mom's curves and long flowing red hair!)

thank you marcia!

Marcia, Aaron's sweet mom, sent me a whole pack of pictures of Aaron today! I haven't seen any of these before. Here he is at six months with his grandfather from Italy, who has since passed away, Ernest Mariana.



Aaron in kindergarten.



Aaron in 6th grade. (He is sooo cute. He looks like Atreyu from The Neverending Story- that kid was my first crush ever... fitting that Aaron is now my last crush, my crush for life!)

m.j.

I have never put these two pics side by side, but now that I have I realize why my family calls Haily 'M.J.'. Can you guess what that stands for? Marianne Junior! (I love that dark brown shag rug used in 1976 for baby portraits...)

polka dots & pears

OK- so these little polka dot dresses were just too cute to pass up so there they are. And our pear tree in front drops, like, 20 fat, juicy pears per day. It may force me to use some unhoned domestic goddess skills. Ummm...anyone know how to can pears?

advanced hip hop

Last weekend we had a dance staff training meeting with all the YMCA branches in the area. It was great to collaborate with other teachers and to take mini classes in different levels of hip hop and tap. Here is the routine that Kristi taught for advanced hip hop:

Kristi teaches at a competitive studio and the Morgan Family Y- she's my age and a mother of two and she's going to be in our dance show at Barefoot! ...she's awesome.

'family futbol'

This is the last week before I start teaching dance at the YMCA, so we have been doing lots as a family after dinner. Last night we went over to Myka's elementary for some soccer.









'Gooooooaaaaaalllllllllll!!!!!!!!' (She's so darling, but that is her own outfit she picked out, I can't win 'em all...)



(Aaron did Tae Kwon Do as a boy instead of soccer, but he also was quite the hackysacker in highschool and the skills transfer rather nicely, so he showed off for us.)






It was a fun evening as a family. Here is a shot of me and my girls. (Oh what a lucky momma I am!)

quick trip

I flew to Utah last weekend to help send my little brother Jeff off to the MTC. He is going to serve in the Alberta, Calgary Mission, spanish speaking. Here is Gramdma Carol at the evening open house we had for Jeff at her home.



Jeff loves the 'Slam Burger' from Denny's, and he'll be in the MTC for two months, so we got him his 'last meal', so to speak.



I snatched a shot of Jeff sending a last text to his girlfriend, Joy. Hee hee! I zoomed in on photoshop and read what he was texting...I'm terrible! But it was all kosher, nothing steamy...



Our family photographer, Meikel.



It was so fun to visit with Jeff and my mom and to spend a little time with my Utah family. Meikel and Jeff are same age cousins; they played together as kids and have remained good friends to this day. She was so sweet to take a whole photoshoot of Jeff in his suit. Ahem, Meikel...anyday now with a post, please...

navy, khaki, black & white

The kids at Myka's school must be dressed in navy, khaki, black and white, or some combination of those colors to comply with the uniform dress code. It was fun to get her skirts, polos, khakis and these navy shorts...but she, 'hates them, Mom!'. 'Oh yeah, deary? Cause we couldn't tell from your huge frown!'






There's my girl. And she did start kindergarten Wednesday. I was out of town, so Aaron took the day off and helped her on her first day. It sounds like she's got a great class and teacher with a little girlfriend to play with named Jordan. Happy.