So You Think You Can Dance. . . Dance, Dance, Dance

This year for my birthday in July, my kids gave me tickets to the live show of SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE. The long awaited for date finally arrived this weekend. Since Craig is pretty much done attending concerts, I took Ruth with me. However, Craig did go to Las Vegas with me and we had such a fun weekend staying with Ruth and Dwight. On Friday night we went to Outback for a lovely dinner and then to the Improv. It was such a fun night.
On the way to the Improv, which is in Harrah's, we passed Toby Keith's I Love This Bar and Grill! They humored me just long enough to take this one picture.
The next day we had brunch at the Bagel Cafe, a great deli where everything is so delicious it's difficult to decide what to order! Josh Melvin met us there and came over to hang out for awhile while Charlie and the girls were at Disneyland for the weekend. We got home just in time to have a visit with Jeremy, Stephanie, Shelby and 8 week-old twins Asher and Bridger. It is always so much fun to see them, and the new babies are so cute and look so much like their big sister. Aunt Marcia came by for a visit so we all took turns holding and feeding babies. It just doesn't get much better than that. I think I'm holding Bridger and Marcia is holding Asher.

Marcia Rockwell is Ruth's former sister-in-law and she introduced us while the Melvin's were visiting in Moreno Valley over 15 years ago. It was fun to catch up with my dear friend, Marcia. She teaches Kindergarten and lives in Las Vegas now. Her hair is so cute short!
That evening, Craig and Dwight scored row 13 tickets to the UNLV basketball game while Ruthie and I went to our show. It was such a blast! They did all the best dances, and the dancers all took turns introducing each other. All the dancers did solos and there were video highlights of them from the season. It was so much fun to see those dances we loved from Season 5. I was so glad that even though they didn't make the top 10, Phillip and Caitlyn were included in the entire performance. So that meant we got to see Caitlyn and Jason's bollywood dance and Phillip and Jeanine's hip hop from the first show. The big joke of the night was Phillip and Jeanine sneaking out and trying to do the Russian Folk dance throughout the performance. If you follow the TV show, you'll know how awful that one was. It was really funny and finally towards the end of the evening they got to perform it, and just after they began all the dancers joined them for a much better version. I guess you had to be there, but it was such a fun show, and it was 3 hours long.

The first dance was the disco by Brandon and Jenette that was one of my favorites. We weren't sure how the pictures would turn out, but you can kind of get the idea. I wondered if the dances would be as good or translate as well on the big stage and it was wonderful! Thanks again for such a fun birthday present. You're the best children in the whole world!!!!!

I wrote down all the dances so I could tell the kids, so if you don't watch SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE, you can skip the rest of this post. Here's my list of the dances performed:

Brandon & Jenette - Disco

Phillip & Jeanine - Hip Hop (by Tabitha & Napoleon- so sweet)

Randi & Evan - Butt dance

Kayla & Kupono - vampire dance

Top 3 girls: Jeanine, Kayla and Melissa - Super hero dance

Top 3 boys: Brandon, Evan and Ade- Willie Wonka dance

Caitlyn & Jason - bollywood

Melissa & Ade - Romeo & Juliet pas de deux -amazing!

Kayla & Jason - Broadway

Ade & Jenette- Dr Funk, Love, Sex and Magic

Melissa & Evan - get me to the church on time broadway

Brandon & Jeanine - battlefield, contemporary

all 12 - group rumba, tango ( dancing on the table tops - splashing water)

all 12 - group mirror props - one(from chorus line)

Brandon & Jenetter - bank robbers

Kayla & Jason - zombies

Kayla & Brandon -Life ( O.R. table)

all 12 - group russian folk dance spin off

Kayla & Kupono - Addiction

Jeanine & Jason - Heart Necklace by Travis - my very favorite

Jenette & Ade - cha cha

Jeanine & Brandon - paso doble

Melissa & Ade - "this woman's work" about breast cancer

Rogue Disneyland Trip!

My sister Suzy and I had planned to go to lunch after visiting Grandmommie, but I had a wild idea that we should just go to Disneyland and have lunch there. Since I had my season pass, we got one for her and we were set. It had been awhile since she was there so it was super fun. We only stayed for a few hours, but it was a blast. The weather was perfect and the park was the emptiest I've ever seen it. We walked right on the Buzz ride, and then Sue said, "let's go on the Matterhorn just to say we did it". So we almost walked right on that one too, with maybe a 10 minute wait. All the fun Christmas decorations are just beginning to go up. The castle was all done and the shops are filled with Christmas ornaments and other fun stuff for the holidays. It was very fun to go with just adults, no stroller, etc. Weird, but fun! We don't do things on the spur of the moment like this very often, which added to the fun!

We took pictures on our cell phones to send our kids, but this one is much cuter and you can see the pretty sky. We left just in time to be ahead of the traffic, and I got to drive home to the prettiest sunset. Such a great day! I can't wait to go again once all the Christmas Decorations are up after Nov 13! Thank you Disneyland for Southern California Season Passes!!!

My Grandmommie

At almost 97 years old, my Dad's mother is my last living grandparent. (Her birthday is in January). She has given us several scares with her health over the past 10 years, and we have thought several times that we would lose her, but she keeps on rallying. We are so grateful for her energizer bunny constitution! Granmommie was so alert and so happy to see us. Her eyes were so bright. My sister, Suzy, and I have been trying to coordinate a trip to see her for months. Finally the stars all aligned and we were able to meet in at Granmommie's care center in Orange.
My Aunt Sharon has taken such good care of Granmommie all these years. It is a shame the planning and timing always seem to get in the way of our visits and make them much farther apart than we would like.

It was especially fun to share the news with her of Dad's mayoral victory in Parowan the day before. (He beat his opponent with 67% of the vote)She was so tickled and she said, "I knew he could do it!" Then she said "The Mormon's are taking over!" (My Dad is the only member in his family). It was hilarious. The weather was perfect so we sat outside on the patio and had a lovely visit!

HALLOWEEN FUN

Rebecca sent me the cutest pictures of the girls on my phone:

Mark's Mom made these cute costumes for Paige and Claire.

Reese wore Claire's old Fairy Costume. It doesn't seem that long ago that Claire was wearing this.
When I asked Claire on the phone what Reese was going to be for Halloween, Claire said, " A widow fowwee" So adorable! We are so excited to see them in 3 weeks when we fly to Idaho to spend a week with them for Thanksgiving.

Ben & Jamie spent Halloween with Greg & Melissa in Lake Elsinore. Dylan was Buzz Lightyear, Luke was Spiderman, Kaylee was Tinkerbelle, Blake was Smee, Captain Hook's first mate, and baby Austin was the cutest pumpkin in the patch!

It has been so great having Ben home this past week. He left this morning for Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri where he will be in training through Feb. He'll be able to come home for Christmas for hopefully a week or two. He checks in tomorrow afternoon, so it will be interesting to find out the details. Then in March he will be assigned to Fort Polk, Louisiana.

Austin and Blake

Josh is having way too much fun in Provo. Here he is with my nephew, Danny as Hans & Franz.

Dylan came to preschool with Luke for our Halloween party. He was very serious about it and was such a sweet boy. The other kids are so nice to him!


Luke flexing his muscles!

Kaylee was the cutest little Tinkerbelle.

Only 2 boys in preschool this year: Luke & Ian

Here's the girls: Lyndsey, Kaylee, Marijane and Cayce. So sad that Kaitlyn was absent and it was her day to be the helper, poor thing.
The class: Kaylee, Cayce (didn't feel like dressing up), Luke, Marijane, Ian and Lyndsey. This is such a fun group of kids.

Bridger and Asher Melvin, Ruthie's new twin grandsons! I lifted this from her facebook page, it was too adorable! They about 6 weeks old, I think.