I know this is supposed to be a FAMILY blog and all, but hey, I’m the only one writing anything around here, so once in a while (okay all the time), you’re gonna be subjected to me, me, me, me, me.

• What/where to eat dinner, especially after a long busy day
• What book to read after I finish a good one … way too many options!
• What to wear to work
• How to spend a Sunday afternoon. I have a weird anxiety thing about Sundays because I WANT to relax and appreciate the time off, but I know work is mere hours away, and you’re down to the nubby end of the weekend, so you better get done whatever you needed to get done, and either way those last hours will fly by and suddenly it’s Monday. AAUGH! SO MUCH PRESSURE!
• Which kids’ movie to watch for the 10,000th time – I’m only really okay with Elf or Enchanted.
• Where to start cleaning when the whole house is a mess
• What kind of candy to get at the gas station (I bet Mom and Dad remember that one!)
• Whether or not to eat the awesome giant cookies at the work cafeteria – ultimate test of my willpower and I fail pretty much every time
• What to order at any restaurant with more than 30 items on the menu and/or more than 4 pages to the menu. I just want someone who knows all my food allergies and preferences to pick for me.
• Willingly making appointments for dental work … a bizarre “I’m actually a grownup” thing to do

Why do so many of these have to do with food? I swear I’m not hungry. Maybe because my options are so limited and it’s annoying to have 2/3 of any given menu or 2/3 of all available restaurants be contrary to my allergies. Boo on that. But maybe I should be happy that it limits my options, thus making the decisions easier?

OMG, it’s been a long week (/month/year). I’m going insane. Save me, weekend!

What decision don’t YOU people like to make??

Only 277 days until Argentina!

I plan to stare at this countdown timer obsessively until then. And I expect you all to do the same.

Who knew??

I have been getting pressure from a certain regular reader (one of the four or five) — who lives in LA and whose name rhymes with Jeff if you’re Jackson and Seth if you’re a grown-up and Bant Lethie if you’re my kids — to actually update my blog. Ask and you shall receive!

So, speaking of Bant Lethie … we all had an awesome time at the big engagement party in the Lou two weekends ago. We went to the Arch:

… doesn’t Kaya have the longest legs you have EVER seen on a 10-year-old?? That kid is gonna be 6′2″ by eighth grade. Anyway, the Arch was so fun … and of course we had to take a million pictures. Nik and the kids even got down for the best view.

See what I mean about those legs?? And if you’re at the Arch, according to municipal code A425.23 and Kelly family tradition, you have to ride up to the top in a space pod, unless you’re Gaga in which case you get to wait at the bottom. Beth and Kim made it look like a fashion shoot:

A fashion shoot in a space pod.

Anyway, once you’re at the top, it turns out the Arch is really, really scary if you’re over 30.

This is me, clinging to Kaya for dear life, trying not to pass out from the dizziness. It wasn’t just me though – check out the guy behind us! He’s lurching – LURCHING — toward the elevator to get the hell back down to the ground floor. Poor guy. But if you’re under 30, it seems to be okay and they tell me you can see Busch Stadium and the casino and even our shuttle bus if you lean way over and look out the window. NO THANKS, I’ll trust you on that one.

Then it was back to the hotel for dinner, where Jamie sat at the kids’ table:

At the kids’ table, the fun things to do include throwing all your food on the floor in a big ring around your chair (ahem, Ryker) and staring up at yourself in the mirrors on the ceiling (my three). Also, staging pictures of yourselves fake punching each other.

Do you SEE that ARM? That’s Kaya, and there is no distortion on the lens. My biggest failure as a parent has probably been not putting her in basketball at age 4. Or whatever sport/activity benefits most from long arms and legs. Trombone maybe.

If you’re in the under-12-and-male set, the fun thing to do is, DUH, cars:

The best part for me, though, was seeing Beth and Jamie. We’re not all in the same place at the same time too often, maybe two or three times a year if we’re lucky, and I can’t put into words how much I miss them. If we all lived in the same city (or even the same state) we’d be hanging out, making dinner at each other’s houses, going to movies our men don’t want to see, escaping from the kids for drinks together, probably driving each other a little crazy (Rondos, anyone?), making Beth take the fall for all our mishaps and schemes, but it would be so great.

Sorry to get all sappy, but it’s true. Maybe someday we’ll end up in the same place and get to hang out and do our old-lady stuff together. I’d be up for that. Meanwhile, we’ve got blogs (BANT FETHIE? WHERE’S YOUR BLOG??) and e-mail and Facebook and holidays and weddings (YAY!) to keep us connected.

Thanks Beth and Nik and Mom and Dad for hosting the party!! The weekend went by way too fast and we all had a great time! But next time I’m waiting in the gift shop with Gaga.

Kaya has a fractured thumb from doing the splits. Um, yeah. How, you ask? She was practicing splits and, when she reached down to balance herself, leaned too hard on her right thumb. She got it x-rayed with Daddy and the doctor said it’s a buckle fracture. This means a splint on for a couple of weeks but otherwise she’s fine.

In an event unrelated to the problematic thumb, at dinner last night she reached up to do the “raise the roof” gesture with both hands (elbows bent, palms up at forehead level, pressing repeatedly toward the ceiling, for those of you unfamiliar with raising the roof). This would have been all well and good, except she still had the taco she was eating in her left hand.

Flip hand over to raise the roof = dump contents of taco on lap and floor

It was pretty funny though!

I’m out in Berkeley training with Suhaila this week, and I thought I’d give you all a glimpse of what I go through out here. It’s a little insane.

The workshop I’m attending this week is a Level 3 Prep. Level 3 is an intense and pivotal level within Suhaila’s format — it’s where you start emotional preparation (lots of crying involved), training in acting techniques, cultural and musical education (lots of reading and writing papers involved), layering and double-time movements, and choreography. Plus you learn two difficult pieces choreographed by Suhaila, both of which take advanced girls years to perfect.

SO, they’ve started doing this four-day prep workshop to help people bridge the gap from Level 2, which is technique mastery only. I’ve been training with Suhaila since 2005, when I got my Level 1 certification (technique basics – everything slow and simple), and I did my first Level 2 workshop in 2006. I went back last October for another L2 and got my certification — that was a big accomplishment for me and I’m proud of the work that went into it.

Now I’m staring down Level 3, and the prep is a necessary part of the process. Here’s what we had to do before we came:

• Read two books, one on creativity and one on the Sanford Meisner acting technique (which Suhaila uses — she actually studied acting with Meisner himself in the ’80s!).
• Learn two choreographies, as much as possible, from her notes — Suhaila’s format has its own language, and you’re expected to be able to interpret it.
• Collage a bunch of pages about things that inspire you creatively. We’re talking scissors, magazines and glue sticks. Sounds kind of kindergarten at first, but it’s SO FUN once you get into it.
• Choreograph a piece, write it out in her lingo, collage about it, write out all the instruments in the piece, assign them each a color and an emotion, list five representative movements in your choreo and what they mean, explain the sentiment of the song, tally the counts (a system she devised for organizing choreography)
• Write about your creative goals and the things blocking you … based on the creativity book we read

That’s just the pre-work, all due first thing on the first day.

During each day, she talks with us for a bit in the morning about theory and answers questions; we do an exhausting hourlong warm-up that you actually have to warm up for first on your own; we drill double-time and layered movements in place, at the barre and traveling around the room, which gets you breathless and sweating profusely within about two minutes, for two hours. Then lunch. Breathe. Then we have to present our choreographies and she gives us feedback and nightly assignments — add such and such, don’t repeat the 2nd and 3rd sections, add layers to everything, etc. Then we work as a group on her assigned choreographies. (I think tomorrow or Thursday we’ll also be doing some Meisner acting exercises in the afternoon.)

Then we go home to our hotels and do all the homework, which so far has included choreography work and writing training plans. My choreo homework tonight took 2.5 hours, and I was pushing through it.

Last night she and I worked on the book (after getting manicures and dinner first!), so I didn’t get home until late and THEN had to do all that homework. I’m definitely not complaining, though! We got a lot done on the book and it’s always so great to spend time with Suhaila.

To answer the question above: Why am I doing this? I don’t know. I just love it. I learn so much (about myself, dance, creativity, challenge, life) every time I come here, every time I work with Suhaila in any capacity. In a weird way it’s almost like a spa retreat … not relaxing in the least, but I come back totally rejuvenated, feeling strong and healthy.

I’ll never be a professional bellydancer — I don’t want to, and that’s not my goal at all. But I know I have more to learn, and I can feel I’m not done pursuing this yet. And why the hell not? Dance keeps me happy, motivated and in shape (mentally as much as physically), growing and learning in ways I never could without it.

Kaya – in the van, on the way home from sushi dinner and gluten-free shopping at Hy-Vee. Miley Cyrus on the radio, singing the current constant-on-the-radio song “The Climb.”

The words are all about “always gonna be another mountain/always gonna wanna make it move/gonna be an uphill battle/sometimes I’m gonna have to lose” or something like that. “Doesn’t matter what’s on the other side/it’s the cliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiimb/it’s the cliiiiiiiiiiiiimb”

Kaya: I don’t get it. What is she talking about? Climbing mountains, uphill battles … all she has to do is put on a wig and sing to a bunch of little 6-year-olds! What’s so hard about that?

So … I’m officially breathing again, kind of, because … I GOT INTO GRAD SCHOOL!!!

They called this afternoon — only about 2 weeks after I sent in the last of my application packet. Super fast! The admissions lady said TWICE that they love me and my work and have a space for me this fall, even though I applied for next summer. I’m sticking with summer 2010 because I really, really want to do the international residency, and that’s only offered in summer, plus this fall is too soon logistically.

This means that next June, 2 weeks after Beth and Nik’s wedding, I’ll be headed to BUENOS AIRES for the first workshop and then a 9-month semester working on my own with a mentor teacher (via phone and e-mail). The summers after that are Northern Italy, Paris, Greece and Dublin. OMG. I need a passport!!

 

 

A few summer photos to recap the past few weeks:

No part of the following situation appears safe or even reasonable, but it’s true. Chip rigged up a very questionable ladder setup to cut back some limbs on a big tree that blocks sunlight to our garden. In the process he got a chainsaw STUCK IN THE TREE, hanging upside down and pinched in a big branch (it’s the little yellow thing to his left in this pic). Many MacGyver-esque moves later it was rescued, the branch cut and the lumberjack inexplicably unharmed.

Just in case you can’t see well enough just how precarious that ladder is:

Um, yeah. Even the kids were like, “THAT doesn’t look like a good idea!”

What is a good idea every summer is the pool Mr. Lumberjack sets up in the little yard behind the garage. It’s a nice, flat, sunny spot, and close enough to the garage he can power the filter on the pool so the kids will actually swim in it. This was one of Joshua’s inaugural dives of the season — that water is cold right out of a hose!

While we’re talking about Joshua, I must share big news. He looked like this before Saturday morning (the hair, not necessarily the scrunchy face):

And he looked like THIS after a Saturday morning visit to Sport Clips!

Yes, you’re really seeing ears; that’s no Photoshop trick. He’s been stuck on the longer “skater” cut for years, and when he recently said he was ready to go short again I almost fell out of my chair. His long hair looked great and really fit his personality, but it had been a long time since I’d seen his ears, neck or forehead; there’s a fine line between “skater” and “shaggy.”

I love it! He looks simultaneously older and younger to me, but Kaya says it’s the same haircut he had when he was 3, so she thinks he looks much younger. Taking votes: what do you think? Older or younger?

(By the way, his Show-Me Games soccer team, the Tucans [not sure if that spelling was intentional!], tied one game and lost two. But this was a fantastic showing considering they are the only non-competitive-league team that played in their division. The Tucans had players from several recreational teams, most from the same school but one or two miscellaneous kids thrown in. Totally scrappy and enthusiastic — their uniforms were tie-dye shirts and whatever shorts they could find, while every team they played had these fancy coordinated jerseys and matching shoes and duffle bags. MATCHING DUFFLE BAGS. The team they tied creamed a competitive team from here in town, so we were proud of that!)

Kaya, meanwhile, is loving the summer dance intensive — she’s dancing from 9 to 5 every day with only a lunch break. Hard core! I’m jealous, big time. They’re working on ballet, jazz, tap, modern, musical theater-type choreography and Russian character (like a Russian folk ballet, kinda).

She’s gotten so into it that she insisted on signing up for three dance classes next year (ballet, jazz, hip hop), after only having taken ballet last year. She’s also practicing splits at night and running through her tap piece on the concrete floor downstairs. It’s kind of a miracle that she’s learning to coordinate those crazy-long arms and legs!

(practicing splits during one of Joshua’s soccer games last weekend – that’s her friend Zoe standing there)

Overall it’s been an awesome summer. We’re way lucky to have had this perfect weather, and the kids are getting to do a lot of fun stuff. Joshua finished summer school last week (where they watched three movies on the last day), having fun in soccer camp this week (they get to eat in the college dining room and he had ice cream, a Coke and Fruity Pebbles for lunch on Monday), partying with Gaga and Papa next week. Kaya’s in dance camp through the end of the month and then has a big recital to show off everything they learned.

Mommy is still not breathing. Supposed to hear back from the MFA program by mid-August … that’s a long time to hold one’s breath.

Josh, in the van on the way home from Kaya’s piano lesson: Do you have to screw your OWN license plate on your car?

Me: Yeah.

Josh: That SUCKS! What if you don’t have the BOLTS?