"Seasons" ballet

 

You would think everyone would have been all balleted out after "Giselle," but the girls' studio did another show too because none of the youngest classes got to have parts in Giselle! This one was more of a recital format (loosely held together with the theme of "Seasons") and it was fun because the older girls could choose more of what they wanted to do, and Daisy got to do a "Senior Solo" since she is graduating this year! She danced a solo from "La Corsaire" and wore this beautiful costume. It was bittersweet to see her dancing her (probably) last solo! When we tried out ballet classes just for fun during the Pandemic, I never knew she would become such an accomplished dancer in just a few short years. This is a part of her life she'll be sad to leave behind!

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People Doing Notable Things

Of course, Malachi is always doing great things. But one particularly great one was that he won first place at his final Speech and Debate tournament in oratory. Sam and I went to hear the last several rounds and had to concur that he really was the best! 😄 From a very good field, I might add. There were about 250 competitors in just the oratory category (which is writing and then giving an 8-10 minute speech entirely from memory). I loved Malachi's speech about facing in to the people close to you rather than facing outward to an "imaginary audience" (it wove in all kinds of surprising connections and metaphors; I can't do it justice in a summary) and was just so impressed with his maturity and thoughtfulness. He is so smart. Such a deep thinker. And he works so hard.

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Intentions, Murderous and Otherwise

Have you seen Giselle? It's one of those ballets one always hears of, but I had never seen it before the girls' ballet studio put it on this year. The story is a bit horrifying, I must say! Giselle is betrayed in love, dies of a broken heart, and then after her death, she (for some reason??!) saves her faithless lover, barely, from being danced to death by the ghostly wilis in the forest! And whom do you suppose were two of those vengeful wilis? Daisy and Junie, that's who. Tsk tsk!

Even though I didn't think I'd seen Giselle or the wilis before, I was somehow familiar with their signature step, this strange flattened arabesque that the wilis do while hopping across the stage (arabesque chugs, they call them). You will perhaps be shocked to hear that this move "signifies their murderous intentions"! Yes! They are quite evil! Not a role I can condone at all.

But let us leave this ghastly scene and go back to earlier in the ballet.

Thank goodness Goldie remains sweet and innocent. A charming village lass. (I suppose Daisy is one too. But not for long!)

Here is one of their pretty peasant dances

Junie had a part in the pas de trois and also a long solo!

j

Watch her, if you'd like! She is so good! (link: https://youtu.be/RNuIESzD2Rs)

https://youtu.be/XEB5g-Aces8

I like this picture of Junie and Brynn just standing casually in midair

Such high leaps!

In the last few performances, someone (another mother, I'm afraid😬) has been VERY ZEALOUS about the costumes—excessively zealous, we might say—not wanting the dancers to so much as set FOOT in the lobby while wearing them, and since they also didn't have any dress rehearsals to speak of (they had them, but no one dressed for them)—it was very difficult getting pictures of Daisy and Junie in costume. We had to sneak out the back door like thieves in the night! (DO thieves in the night sneak out the back door? They probably have to sneak IN the back door first, but then surely they must then sneak back out again?) But I'm glad we did it because their costumes were very pretty and they wanted a record of them!

The wilis do this low, cradling-arm pose a lot too, and we read somewhere that it might represent the babies they will never have.😢

It doesn't excuse their murderous intentions, though!

The Second Act of Giselle looks really spooky and cool. The backdrop is all black and the wilis, with the spotlights on them, really do look like glowing ghosts against it.

The girls have these long veils on at the beginning of the Act. They tied fishing line to the tops of the veils and then at a certain moment, people backstage pulled on the fishing line and all the veils just whisked off their heads and disappeared behind the curtains. It was really cool to watch!

(Like this)

Here is Clementine's depiction of one of the veiled dancers, drawn a couple weeks later

It was so dark, and their dresses were so white, I had a hard time even taking pictures of them.

https://youtu.be/4YCa0g0eecM

Here are those murderously flat arabesques. They're so interesting to watch. So distinctive. And the girls have to do it without crashing into the lines of other dancers going the opposite way!

https://youtu.be/6vLxL3mrrTw

Sometimes their murderous intentions are emphasized by a red light from below. Scary! And they do not smile. Never. It wouldn't be fitting for such murderous young ladies.

Poor Hilarion pleads with the queen of the wilis for his life. But she refuses. She is heartless. They're all heartless. (Except Giselle, of course. She manages to save her own [unfaithful!] lover, Albrecht, when he shows up later. But Hilarion has no such luck.)

The queen of the wilis dooms him to dance until he dies!

And then he is forced to do so, hemmed in on every side by the unrelenting wilis!

Very sad!

Clementine wore her tutu to the ballet and enjoyed it very much! I can only imagine what valuable life lessons she was learning from the story.

She was definitely paying attention, as evidenced by this dance she did for me me later the next day!

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Lodged in Your Heart

Quickly, before the Christmas Season is over, the time has come to post this long-awaited third movie in the trilogy of Hallmark-esque films the girls made in Quebec! This makes us all homesick. Oh, to be ice skating in Place D'Youville again!

Will Holly find Christmas love at the Lodge? Watch and find out! (If you can hear it. The sound quality isn't very good in this one!)

Youtube link: https://youtu.be/D4zsPVygNUc

See the first two movies here:

Apple Cider at Fall times

Off the Field and Onto the Floor

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Coppelia

The spring ballet this year was Coppelia, which I'd heard of but never seen. It's a weird story, to be honest. A mechanical doll (who gets mistaken for a real girl, and later switched with a real girl, of course) figures into it. The other characters are things like "villagers" and "harvesters" and "friends." My girls were…some of those things. (I realize I don't even know which. Villagers, perhaps?) They had pretty costumes and looked beautiful in their dances, several of which (I have it on good authority) were quite hard!

So, here are some pictures.

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Phoenix trip with Junie

Every once in a while I see really cheap plane tickets to Phoenix, and my first thought is, "We could go visit my brother Kenneth!" And my second thought is, "We could have those fish tacos again." I don't know what it was about that taco place we tried in Phoenix several years ago. Maybe just that it was really hot and the lemonade slushies tasted so good? Or that I am already predisposed to like fish tacos, so if they're above average I like them disproportionately? But I remember them with a fond sigh every time I think of Phoenix.

At any rate, plane tickets to Phoenix were $38 (!!), Junie had been complaining nonstop (hee hee, not really, but she had mentioned it several times) about how she was the ONLY one of the children who hadn't ever been on a plane [besides Goldie, but Junie never admits that, because I went to Russia when I was pregnant with Goldie and Junie says that counts]—and Kenneth and Sheila said we could stay at their house, so—we went!

It was really sweet how Goldie and Daisy reacted when I told them we were going to take Junie on a tiny trip. They could have been envious or resentful or annoyed. But they were only thrilled and excited. Daisy immediately started planning out how we could keep it a total surprise. She and Goldie would pack Junie's suitcase secretly while Junie was babysitting another family. And we'd load it in the car before she got home. And then the night of the trip we would tell Junie we were going to get ice cream and ask if she and Sebastian wanted to come. And then Daisy would ask if she could come, and act really disappointed when we said no. And then Seb would take us to the airport instead of the ice cream store. It was all surprisingly devious and it went like clockwork! When we got to the airport Junie was so surprised and confused. Even as we handed her her backpack and started walking in, she was saying, "Is the ice cream store in the airport?" It was late at night, she was wearing Goldie's shoes (ha! We didn't plan for her grabbing the wrong shoes as we went out the door!), and she said it felt like she was in the strangest dream.

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Off the Field and Onto the Floor

If you enjoyed the previous Hallmark Movie, you'll love this one!

Famous soccer player Jacques Hopkin is devastated when a career-ending knee injury sidelines him. But will Miss Sophy's dance studio be the unexpected solution to all his problems?

(This one is worth watching for Daisy's accent alone!😂)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GKTZaF7LNw

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Apple Cider at Fall Times

I must humbly ask the forgiveness of my Dear Readers. I have been terribly remiss in not sharing these videos with you earlier! My girls found themselves at loose ends while we were in Quebec and decided to make "Hallmark movies." They are so good and so funny! I don't know how the girls became such good actors. They seem to have a knack for it!

First, we have "Apple Cider at Fall Times," which Daisy summarizes thus:

When big-city man Jake Collins visits a smalltown cidery, Goldie Ginger is unimpressed. But will the two be able to overcome their differences and pursue the warmer feelings that are beginning to spark between them?

Well? Can you resist such a description? Watch it and find out!

(YouTube link: https://youtu.be/36gj92_BvJo)

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Consumed with Costumes

I think my girls love wearing their ballet costumes above all other things! Besides getting to wear make-up for the performance, I suppose. They do love that too. Things were weird with the dress rehearsals this year (something about the middle school where they perform charging more money…it's crazy how much it costs to rent out a [sorry to say it, but rather dim and mediocre] school auditorium!) so it seemed like they never had their costumes on in the daylight. And there was never any time! We were always rushing everywhere…rushing to get to class on time, rushing home to make dinner, rushing to Young Women's and Activity Days, rushing from cross-country practice, rushing to pick up Malachi from work…it makes me tired to remember it.

I did get a few photos at one of the dress rehearsals, when they were taking pictures of Daisy for the program.

I love this view of Daisy and her teachers looking over the photos, surrounded by racks of costumes…they were telling her things like, "Okay, lift your leg a little straighter and curve your arms a little more!" It took forever to get the shot exactly how they wanted it! (Meanwhile I was getting more and more annoyed about the dinner getting cold at home!)

(Daisy's smile was a little forced too after doing this for the ten thousandth time)

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Junie's baptism

I can hardly believe that five of my children have now turned eight and been baptized as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints! I remember how amazed I felt when Abe turned eight and took that wonderful first step on the path back to Heavenly Father. And yet now…he is a Priest, and old enough to be the one baptizing Junie! I just can't get my mind around it.

Just for old times' sake, here's little Abe when he was 8 himself:

Standing in front of the exact same painting! We have switched stakes twice since then, but now we're back in the first stake center we started in!

Anyway, I know it was special to Junie to have her big brother baptize her. How do I know? Because my big brother baptized me too! :)

I was also amazed because in February or so, Junie decided she wanted to finish reading the whole Book of Mormon before her baptism. She has been making her way through First and Second Nephi for about two years now. :) So she started reading a LOT—like ten chapters a day. She would get up early and read the Book of Mormon, spend her free time during the day reading the Book of Mormon, and then read the Book of Mormon during her reading time before bed! And it paid off—she finished the book on the Wednesday before her baptism. We went out to breakfast together to celebrate. I love this spunky, determined little girl!

I told everyone I wanted ONE family picture with EVERY PERSON in it. We don't get those very often. In fact, the other kids' baptisms are some of the only occasions on which it's happened. It is fun to look back and see the changes over the years—at Abe's baptism, Seb's , Ky's, and Daisy's. So! Here we all are.

Junie with Grandma Nelson. Grandma and Grandpa Nielson came too, but I didn't get a picture!

Junie's "twin" Daisy (yes, they are 20 months apart, but everyone thinks they are twins and they love it) was so happy for her best friend. Daisy told me "When I looked at Junie coming out of the water, I knew exactly how she was feeling—because it's the same way I felt myself when I was baptized! I could just see the happiness shining out of her eyes."

If I ever did one thing right as a mother, it MUST be bringing these two little girls down to earth to be sisters. I have never known two who love each other so much.

I made millions of orange muffins with orange juice glaze (Junie's request) for after the baptism. I wish I had taken a picture of the pans and pans of them! (Why didn't I?!) We ate them at a park afterwards, and it was a perfectly bright, sunshiney, beautiful morning—just like Miss Juniper Lark herself! We are so happy to have her in our family!

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