Bournonville

Last summer, Freestone participated in a one-week ballet intensive called Bournonville, Ballet With the Masters, at Imagine Ballet Theater in Ogden. Bournonville is the Danish style of ballet, taken from the French tradition in the 1800's and incorporating lots of fast footwork, turns and jumps, jumps, jumps. This year, he was invited to do Bournonville again, and we pretty much looked forward to it all year. The teacher above, Henning, is Danish and lives in Toronto. He told the dancers last year to "Eat a banana every day, even if you don't like them. It's good for you." I can't tell you how many bananas Freestone consumed this year, each one prefaced by that statement in Henning's voice. "Eat a banana every day..."

On Thursday of Bournonville week, Carol Browning hosted a fancy reception at her beautiful estate. We love being part of it. We had three or four extra boys staying at our house all week, depending on the day. We took them all to the reception with us, all dressed up.

Elliott, Carol Browning and Rhys Hudson, our dancer from Houston who will dance as a trainee in Boston with our friend Henry Winn next year. He was in Boston Ballet's professional training division this past year.

Rhys, Elliott, Freestone and Mac

After the final Saturday night performance at the Egyptian Theater in Ogden. Elliott, Henry, Henry's dad, Jhaelyn, Val (Henry's mom), Carol Browning, Rhys, Freestone and Fernando, a BW trainee.

Friday night we had a bunch of dancers at the house painting their shoes in the Bournonville style with the white triangle and sewing on white elastic, while discussing philosophy and "spilling tea" about their ballet colleagues. I love being in the midst of all of this.

Lucky slice after the final performance.

Each morning after dropping off Freestone, Mac, Elliott and Rhys at Grounds for Coffee, I picked up Ethan at Frontrunner and took him to the studio, until the other boys convinced him to stay at our house for the rest of the week.

Every night, there was ukulele accompanied by Ruby's Ghanaian drum and singing. These kids are the absolute best. Rhys, Mac in a onesie :), Elliott, Amelia and Freestone

At the Browning reception: Elliott, Rhys, Elijah from BW, Freestone, Amelia and front and center, Ethan. The kid has stage presence even when he's not on stage. And when he is, watch out! I saw him wink at his mom during the performance. Ha ha

Mind you, this was concurrent with Clytie's recital week, so at the time of the reception, Golda, Araceli, Ptolemy and Tziporah were at their Clytie performance. Scott and I had gone to it the night before, but the second night was Araceli's last performance, since she isn't doing ballet next year, and Scott wanted to see it. He stopped in at the reception briefly, then went to see Araceli and the other kids dance. Golda had taken over a modern class when the teacher had a baby, so she was there as a teacher. Anyway, Xanthe was only in Cast B and wasn't in that performance, so I took her to the reception as my "Plus One."

Ethan, Mac and Elliott with Carter in the background trying to find vegan food in our kitchen on burger night. Oops!

Elliott and Carter discussing Plato's cave. :) I love these boys so much.

Golda got in on the action

The performance was SO FUN! The first half was the different chosen dancers doing variations from the ballet Konservatoriet and other Bournonville ballets. Freestone and Mac were chosen to do one of the variations, and Freestone looked so good!!! Mac did too, of course, but I had to keep my eyes of Freestone the whole time. He has improved exponentially since last year's Bournonville. Grandma and Grandpa and Coco and Bill were probably bored during the first half, but the second half was Konservatoriet, the Bournonville ballet, which hasn't been performed in its entirety ever before in North America. It's a shame it's become so obscure, too, because IT IS FUNNY! Jeff Rogers was the main character, an old widower/ballet master looking for a beautiful or rich new wife. Jeff stole the show. He was hilarious. Tziporah and I were laughing our heads off the whole time. I was laughing at Tziporah too, because she thought it was so funny. Freestone was one of the corps, and played a waiter for part of it. At one point, Jeff threw a goblet in the air for Mac, the other waiter, to catch. I could see what was coming. He was going to throw the next goblet to Freestone. Scott and I exchanged a glance. Nobody said there would be sports! har har. I could see Freestone gear up with a look of concentration n his face. Jeff tossed the goblet, we held our breath, and he caught it! It was so funny.  The ballet is terribly athletic and incorporates a ton of mime and character. It must be exhausting, and they pulled it off in ONE week. Unbelievable.

Some ballet moms, Teri Mumm and Kathy Needham. We talk a lot. They're my support system and information hub.

Someone was introducing everyone and saying, This is Kathy, Mac's mom, this is Teri, Elliott's mom, this is Circe...everyone's mom. I'm sure I beamed. Can I tell you how much I love that? I love that.

Margrete, Rhys, Mac, Elliott, Freestone, and Elijah

and Amelia, Freestone's crush from Imagine

and her adorable little brother

Jhae and Henry giving Carol Browning a little master class in port de bras. And that wrapped up the best week ever. We loved having all the ballet boys at our house. It was so interesting to have a glimpse of Freestone's ballet life; the boys' work ethic, their personalities, how much they can eat, the humor. Oh, the humor! The boys are so funny.  It was also informative for me to talk to Rhys about the ballet world, him being already a trainee and having gone through what Freestone is beginning to go through moving up through the ranks. I'm sad the week is over, but there are plenty more guests and experiences coming at us faster than we can take in. Onward!

Ballet West Spring Show

Everyone is wearing gingham these days! I felt left out, but not enough to go to a store. Then I found this in Araceli's closet! I wanted to look half-decent for my date with Scott (and like 10 of our kids) to Freestone's BW performance.

This was Tziporah after the show. She had a black eye from school and she'd been asleep for the whole second act. Poor kid!

The rest of us were alive and well! It is so exciting to watch Freestone onstage! He has been at BW for a year and a half now. It's incredible to see the progress, though not surprising, given how very driven he is. He has taken double classes all year with the goal of getting into the Professional Training Division, PTD. He got accepted for next year, which is pretty exciting! Mst of his friends are already PTDs, so he feels like the designation legitimizes him. Starting in September, he'll go to ballet from 1:30 to 6:45 every weekday and 10-3 on Saturdays. Unless there are rehearsals for a show or master classes, or YAGP. There's always something extra. Freestone is basically never home. This week, the week after the spring show, is his week off. I love having him around! The first day, he sais, "I can't live like this! There's nothing to do! It's only been ONE day?!" Granted, he is working at my store and has actually had some social life, but it's hard to come down from that intense schedule. He's usually at Ballet West from either 1;30 or 3:00 to either 6:45 or 8:15, and he's normally extremely punctual and likes to stay late. If he rides the bus or train, it take three times as long to get to and from, so we try to drive him, but he often rides public transportation.

Anyway...the spring show was so fun!!

Saturday morning, I relaxed with my boy for a few minutes before dropping him off at warm-up class on my way to Laura's funeral. He's a fun kid.

My gorgeous, glamorous parents at the Saturday matinee.

Mr. Jeff right before he pretended to hit Freestone on the head with his bouquet of flowers.

And Mr. Jeff pretending to be nice. Ha ha! Freestone worships Mr. Jeff. He is an icon. He and Mr. Nicolai are such colorful characters. Freestone has a lot of excellent teachers, but those two seem to conjure up the most stories. They're just very demanding. Of Nicolai, Freestone said, "He's a terrible teacher, really, but somehow, we all improve in his class and we have fun." He's not a terrible teacher, though, and Freestone knows it, but that's a perfect description. Scott and I watched his class. He grunts or waves his hand and everyone knows exactly what to do. His Ukrainian accent is thicker than the coffee he drinks with his cigarettes, but somehow all the students get him. He'll sashay over to a student during class and sneer something like, "Jonas did it better." And suddenly, that student has fixed whatever was wrong. A genius disguised as a "terrible teacher." 

After the last show, Scott and I took Freestone across the street to Squatter's. He ordered an apricot Hefeweisen. What a card! He got water.

And this was Freestone three years ago. It kills me! This is even before the stage that Mr. Jeff calls Freestone's "Little Porker" stage. So much has happened to that little mind and body!  And so many good things are in store.

Delicate Adventure

Araceli always has big ideas, and I love it when I can facilitate them. And if I can combine her big ideas with a road trip, even better! The kids didn't have school Monday, so we set off early Sunday morning with a motley crew of teens and tweens, to hike Delicate Arch. The weather looked iffy, so we left at 5 am instead of 4, to avoid the cold and possible rain.  We had Riley Servoss, Araceli's friend who moved to Idaho Falls, Carson Gapinski, Araceli's love interest du jour, Vilina, Freestone, and Ptolemy, our trip mascot.

Well, the weather didn't pan out like expected. There was son on Highway 6 between Provo and Price. When we got to Price, I thought we were through the storms, so we stopped for an unhurried breakfast. I was peeved when the snow started falling between Price and Green River. It got bad. There was noplace to pull over, low visibility and the roads were starting to cake with snow and ice. The kids were having a jolly old time in the backseat, which led to more angst on my part as I gripped the wheel. Long story short, there was an accident just ahead of us and we were stopped on the roadway for over an hour. The whole time we were stopped, I was just grateful that we were safe. Nobody minded much that we were delayed, and soon we were on our way again, driving slowly past the grim scene of the accident. It didn't look like there was enough damage for anyone to be seriously injured, so I hope everyone was ok.

The weather cleared for us as we started our hike to Delicate Arch. It's a fun hike with a big payoff at the end, so I like it. Delicate Arch is one of the most iconic landmarks in the state. By the time we got there, however, it was windy and there was a fine snowfall pelting us in the face. We stayed for awhile taking pictures and joking around, but it wasn't comfortable, necessarily. On the way down, Araceli realized she had lost her glasses. Carson sprang into action and found them by asking various other hikers, one of whom has set them on a rock. Crisis averted. This was the most easygoing, fun group of kids ever. By the time we got to the car, we were frozen, and it took us hours to thaw out. We had lunch in Moab and headed back to Price to enjoy our hotel's hot tub. That was nice!

We stayed at the Greenwell Inn, which I highly recommend next time you're in the boomin metropolis of Price, Utah. It was 60 bucks a night, and the pool and hot tub are in a nice, big building. There's actually plenty of food options in Price, and even some things to do.  The kids were pretty beat, though, and everyone fell asleep without me having to tell them to. Mission accomplished.

In the morning, Ptolemy and I went on a little tour or Price where we admired the Greek Orthodox church and the McDonald's. He's at an age where he realizes that not everyone is just like him, which is important. The other day, he said, "I was watching a show, and I'm guessing the characters weren't Mormon, because the dad said, 'It's Sunday! We dont have anything planned! We can spend the whole day together as a family!'" Poignant, sad, funny. I guess that's how a kid feels when his dad is in the bishopric. Anyway, the Greek Orthodox church in Price is beautiful.

In no tie, we were headed home, with no weather or traffic problems, and another fun adventure was in the books. For one last memorable event, my car hit 100,000 miles between Price and Provo. Exciting! I've put over 75,000 miles on it in 2.5 years. Man, that's a lot of memories!