ice cream & cookies

Felicity Starbard- one of my dear Young Women-is turning 18 on Sunday. She also will be baptised into the LDS church Sunday evening. It has been 2 1/2 years since the missionaries knocked on her door, and she has respected her parents wish to wait until she is of age to become a 'Mormon'. I don't think Felicity has missed one day of church or any youth activities since she began attending. She has a strong desire to learn the Gospel and is a person I am glad to have become close to! Come celebrate with us Sunday night after the baptism!

isn't she lovely

Over Christmas vacation I took Haily to get a darling A-line haircut that was just too cute for words. And that very same week she had a time out in the bathroom at Grandma Janine's where she found scissors and gave herself another haircut- yes-involving bangs at a way too high place on her little red head. Those too-high bangs have grown a bit and so I gave her full funky short bangs that still work with the A-line. I guess she could chop the whole of her hair off and still look lovely- oh my sweet Haily Jane.

sunday reading

So, a while ago, I read about the creator of Grey's Anatomy and how she came to do well in writing. She said it had to do with a lot of reading. On Sundays in the household she grew up in, her mother, father and siblings had reading time where everyone would choose material or books to read in their family room- together.

That seems like a good tradition to start and so we did. We decided to read in the girls' room though because that is where all their books are... Myka is able to read many of her own books now and Haily sees this and very much wants to be able to read on her own just like her big sister.

Here is Aaron telling the story of Harriet, the woodland Princess from 'There's a Worm in My Dirt', by Gary Larsen (a Tacoma native, by the way).

mlkballet: move #10

Photo: Katherine M. Stricker in the dance film, Risk in Expectation

I recieved a happy email the other day from my friend Katie. We have been invited to show our piece, Risk in Expectation, at this month's MLKBallet installment of MOVE #10. Cool. Risk is a dance film that is projected onto a screen while Katie improvs live off of her movement from the film.

MLKBallet's MOVE #10

Friday, Feb. 20 7pm

Saturday, Feb 21 2pm & 7pm

School of the Arts Theater

1118 Commerce St, Tacoma, WA 98413

tickets, $14 @ www.brownpapertickets.org

rehearsal w/ simone

There's Kelly and her lovely self flawlessly executing a 'Russian'.



These are our choreographer's legs bedecked in the new version of the legwarmer, it's like baseball socks mixed with thigh highs, and she's got every color in the rainbow.

Ahh, well yes, I feel at times that I am happy to be 32 and appreciative of all the life lessons I have learned. I am full of the knowledge and understanding that one can only attain through living and passing the years...but sometimes I do wish to have my 18 to 25-year-old body back...

...like yesterday, when I was flinging and twisting my head, arms and legs all over the place trying to learn a fairly advanced piece of choreography with a group of looking-phenomenal-in-their-leotards-and-tights 18-year-olds. Sheesh! Laura, Simone and I were the only ones over 25- but we kept up with the wee ones. Simone actually was the choreographer and had us sweating for two hours straight with her incredibly hip and stylish movement.

This little number we are learning is the staff's piece that will be performed for May's Morgan Branch YMCA dance recital at Pantages Theater in downtown Tacoma. I had a blast doing the staff piece last year and it will be fun this year too. I just can't move today, that's all.

valentine movies

Big, fat movie buff that I am - I am gearing up to watch some favorite romance films this weekend (in between baking sugar cookies w/ the girls, delivering cards to friends and spending alone time w/ my own valentine-and yes- eating too much expensive chocolate)

I will list some of my favorites and then please tell me yours:

Last of the Mohicans (for the love part not the gory revolutionary war stuff)

Moonstruck

Shakespeare in Love

Say Anything

Cold Mountain

Moulin Rouge (maybe I can bribe Aaron into sitting through the entire thing...)

Romeo & Juliet (any version- but especially Baz Lurman's)

Far & Away

Princess Bride

There are actually tons more- but I'll stop there- oops one more- that I hope cupid brings me on Saturday- Amelie- (girlfriends that are cautious w/ R ratings- I totally respect that- but you have to see this one on Clearplay! I really can't think of a more beautiful, loving, romantic heroine than Amelie Poulain. OK! Happy love movie watching!

catherine & heathcliff

I read Wuthering Heights as a teenager and loved it and have re-read it five to six times since. It is an eerily romantic and unforgettably cathartic love story. And it was only until a few years back when I was talking with my cousin Cheryl (a french comparative literature PhD) when I realized that the author, Miss Emily, plays a trick on us female readers.

In the beginning and throughout the first half of the book we are swept away in the idea of Heathcliff pining away for Catherine and arranging everything in his life around his desire to have her. We all want someone to love us that much, right? We all want a strong, handsome man to live and die solely for us- that is the romanticized ideal that we grow up with in Western culture.

So Heathcliff never falters in his love for her- even when Catherine has married another and having pregnancy complications- he imposes himself upon her and her husband- stressing her out and causing all sorts of problems. His relentless persual of her actually destroys her happiness and ultimately her life. For the remainder of the book, Heathcliff bleeds with his obsession with for Catherine, causing his own life to become one of hate and sin.

The author paints a scenario for young starry-eyed girls (like the teenager me) who have it in their minds that they want someone to love them beyond the point of all reason and sanity. She is saying, "would you really want that? What if this were the outcome of a man's unyielding desire?" Emily Bronte is a clever and wickedly sharp writer. I will have to go read this book again. And watch it too! My vote is for the British 1995 version with Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche. 'Tis the month for undying love...

love lyrics

I love it when I find a song that has great lyrics, melody, rhythm and all over goodness. Read these lyrics to I Will Possess Your Heart by Death Cab:

How I wish you could see the potential
The potential of you and me
It's like a book elegantly bound
But in a language that you can't read

You gotta spend some time, love
You gotta spend some time with me
And I know that you'll find love,
I Will Possess your heart

There are days when outside your window
I see my reflection as I slowly pass
And I long for this mirrored perspective
When we'll be lovers, lovers at last.

Chorus

(bridge)
You reject my advances and desperate pleas,
I wont let you let me down,
So easily.

You gotta spend some time love,
You gotta spend some time with me
And I know that you'll find love,
I will possess your heart.

I will possess your heart.
I will possess your heart.