Christmas Workshop

Hard at work making this year's Christmas ornaments for grandmas, grandpas, aunts & uncles

Pageant Practice

A shepherd with her goofy sheep

A baby mouse and an angel

Our dedication in the program for Juneau Dance Theatre's production of The Nutcracker tells the story of how the girls got to the auditions for their parts in this year's holiday ballet performance.  After watching The Nutcracker last year, both girls left saying "I want to be in The Nutcracker.  Mom, Dad, can we do it?"  And we gave them the "well, we'll see..." answer,  thinking that their enthusiasm would all but disappear after a few weeks.  But it didn't, and they kept asking.  It meant switching from their ballet classes at the local gym to Juneau Dance Theatre, a true ballet school, forgoing playing indoor soccer, rehearsals on Saturdays and Sundays in addition to their regular classes and then of course, getting up on stage in front of all those people. But they did it.  And loved it.

And guest blogging, here are some reactions straight from our baby mouse:

It's not that scary.
In some parts, you can't really see the audience.
No bad costume, no bad part.
Look for her to return to the stage next year.

This little contingent of mice met each other preschool and their paths joined back together for this production.  So fun to see their friendships pick up right where they left off.

Oh the multitude of angels!

Here's what our angel had to say about the experience:

It was a little hard to keep my smile that long, but I made it!
Costumes were comfortable.
The Sugar Plum Fairy was nice.
And, look for her return to the stage next year.

Here the high school age company dancers give a little good luck gift to the angels.  So sweet.  I'm not sure sure if they know how much the younger girls just adore them, particularly the ones that assist with their classes.

The 90-person cast! were all students (parents of students) of Juneau Dance Theatre except for The Sugar Plum Fairy and her Cavalier, who were professional dancers from the Miami Ballet Company.  The Sugar Plum Fairy, in particular, was so kind with all the young dancers, willingly signing autographs and just chatting with the girls.  This picture showed up on the webpage for Juneau Dance Theater and I recognized the bun; she had told me how she ripped off a scrap of paper from her notebook to get the Sugar Plum's autograph.

So proud of these girls!

Hair & Make-up!

The nice blog post talking about our Nutcracker fun will follow but I just had to post this picture of Addy's hair after a day of Nutcracker performances.  The amount of make-up, hair gel and hair spray we used over the course of that week surpasses what I think I've used in my entire life.

When we took Addy's bun down Saturday night, this awesome twisted ponytail was left.  We think it looks like something straight out of Star Wars :)

AK Winter Living: Fun at the Glacier

Winter seems to be getting off to a good start this year :)

Turkey Trotting our Thanksgiving Blessings

Daddy Daughter Dance

Girl Scout tradition - the Daddy Daughter Dance

Songs & S'mores & and an Octopus?

Sunday was the annual Girl Scouts Songs & S'mores event at Sandy Beach.  Always fun.  Camp songs.  Campfire.  S'mores.  You get the idea.  This year, some of the girls elected to go with some troop leaders on a hike.  Cora did.  And came back to tell us all about the octopus she found washed up on the beach.  Highlight of the afternoon for Cora; she couldn't wait to tell us about how big the suckers were, the three hearts it has and the "delightful" aroma.  She led Addy and I back to check it out again with her.  

The most glorious Juneau fall

If you ask me what September and October are like in Juneau, I'd say grey and raining, all the time, every day.  But not this year.  This has been the most glorious Juneau fall.

We went to our friends' home on Saturday and got to explore the beautiful Douglas Island woods, taking a trail that starts out of their backyard.

At times, it required a little bit of bushwhacking..

...but with the late afternoon sun streaming through the trees and the subtle changes in colors of the moss and ferns, it was easy to want to keep pressing on.

Some of us stayed firmly planted on the ground, exploring the underside of a fallen tree,

others (namely, Cora) climbed up to get a view from a higher vantage point.

The trail went up quite a ways and then led out to a beautiful muskeg, which again the afternoon sunlight just seemed to make glow.

This has been the most glorious fall in Juneau!

Moose?

We don't have moose in Juneau.  Or we didn't have moose in Juneau.  We heard stories of a small herd of moose who lived well out of the road.  Now we hear stories of moose spottings off Back Loop Road, near the area of the glacier.  We took a leisurely family hike on West Glacier Trail on Sunday afternoon and saw the tracks ourselves; the moose are here.  And their footprint is enormous!

The girls animal sense elevated also found some old signs of beaver activity.

And our own animal made lots of tracks of her own, splashing though Mendenhall Lake and the forest.

We also got to play, or if you're Cora turn into a popsicle and eat, with the first ice of the season.

Hawaiian Getaway

The number of things that lined up to make this trip work out is quite staggering, but we're oh so glad it did. 

Mai tai's, appetizers, sunset and hula music on our first evening, at the House Without A Key bar in Waikiki.

Morning hike of Dimond Head.  You start from inside the crater and make your way up to the top where there are bunkers and military installations left from O'ahu's coastal defense system. 

You can tell we're not used to this climate - between the sun and the 80 degree temp, we were dripping with sweat.  Thank goodness a shower rolled in shortly after so we blended in with the crowd.

An afternoon at Lanikai Beach

And we even pulled off the surprise of the century by rendezvous-ing with my parents during their vacation to Hawaii.  Working secretly with my Dad, I managed to sneak up behind Mom in the ABC store and oh my, was she caught off guard :)

Sunset at Waikiki Beach, and our getaway.  Until next time, Hawaii...