4th of July Cupcakes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Flag Party: Swimming!

Ready…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Set…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JUMP!

Flag Party, Part 1

How do you explain Independence Day to a two-year-old?

Mama:  “See, we live in a city called Phoenix, in a state called Arizona, in a country called the USA.  And on the 4th of July, we all have a party to say, ‘Yayyy, USA!’”

Moo:  *confused stare*

After a complicated discussion about tea, fireworks, the right to free speech and the establishment of democracy, Moo found something she could understand, namely:  Hey, that flag is pretty cool.  Let’s wave it around and dance!

So now we are having a “flag party,” and to celebrate, Moo has learned all the words to “You’re a Grand Old Flag,” which, since she can’t say her L’s yet, sounds highly inappropriate, and yet also kind of fabulous.

Adieu, Pierre

I believe I’ve made my last visit to Pierre’s House of Pain (a.k.a. ballet class).  My last class with Pierre started out well – when we started plie-ing, Pierre pulled me off the barre and asked me to dance at the center barre instead.  Hooray! I thought.  Pierre wants to show me off as an example!  Then he whispered, “That barre was getting a little crowded.”  Oh.

But then things improved, as Pierre suddenly approached and asked if he could touch me.  Mon Dieu!  I said you betcha, Pierre, and he proceeded to correct my center placement (like, the place in your body that allows you to twirl and leap and oh, everything) in a way that, in one moment, improved my dancing tenfold.  But 15 minutes later, there I was scowling and miserable once again, as Pierre asked us to do a complicated center routine that exactly one dancer could do well (and she was obviously a professional, slumming it in the adult class just for giggles).  I’d had enough of feeling so discouraged, so I packed away Pierre’s invaluable piece of advice in my memory and silently bid adieu to his perfectly toned buttocks.

Then two things happened:

1.  I learned that Phoenix Theatre is having a summer dance program!  Last week I went to their musical theatre dance class, expecting the teacher to make up a dance to a Broadway tune a la Tyce Diorio on SYTYCD.  Instead, she’s actually recreating original choreography, so I learned the Jerome Robbins choreography to “Cool” from West Side Story, something I would never get to dance normally, since I am not a man, and also kind of old.  In addition, the teacher made us do about 200 sit-ups and 20 (non-girly-style) push-ups.  Who does that??  Ow.  But my sleeveless tops and bathing suit appreciated it.

2.  My friend Leslie (who has embarked on a quest of her own) told me about a jazz class at this new(?) studio called Sway, which is a dance studio MEANT FOR ADULTS, something I have dreamed about since moving to Phoenix.  I went last Tuesday and felt like I’d found a new dance home.  I felt really comfortable with the level of difficulty, and oh joy, we did a dance to “The Way You Make Me Feel,” my favorite MJ song to dance to, so I feel like I got to say goodbye to MJ in my own way.

In one week I went from suffering through a miserable ballet class to finding two dance classes I love.  Ballet is wonderful exercise, but there’s very little joy in dancing ballet (at least for me).  When I dance to Michael Jackson, or pretend I’m a member of the Jets, dancing to “Cool,” I feel – well, like that wise Billy Elliot once said, I feel like I sorta disappear.  And I’m just there.  Flying like a bird.  Like electricity.

A Trip to the Dentist

For the love of God, people, FLOSS!   Floss like your life depends on it!  (Of course, according to my dentist, it does, but…he’s like the Ahmadinejad of dentistry.  Kind of a dental fundamentalist.)  Anyway, I have learned today that there are dental hygienists out there who will happily dig at your tender gums like they’re cutting into a nice juicy steak.  OW.

I brought my Ipod with me because Herbie assured me that it would all be easy-peasy if I listened to the soothing sounds of NPR podcasts.  But no no no, when dental sadists shoot that cold water jet/air missile doo-hickey at your super-sensitive teeth (it’s true, I’m sensitive, the dentist told me so), Ira Glass is just an annoying PRICK, and his self-satisfied prattling about the ad men of the 60’s just made me want to stab him repeatedly in the eyeball.  So I tried Michael Jackson, but even MJ couldn’t help, and I had to resort (apparently – I didn’t notice the scratches until later) to digging my nails into my arm to keep from having a Hulk moment and throwing that sanctimonious, skinny, tooth-torturing bitch and all her evil suctiony diggy tools across the room.

Okay, I’ve learned my lesson, I’ll floss.  Jeez. 

Now - what am I supposed to do with this little stringy thing?

Best Navel-Gazing

I received a sweet surprise yesterday at Tempe Little Theatre’s end-of-season party – an award with a guy on it who looks like he might have a bad tummyache, but actually he’s taking a bow.  My name is engraved on it and everything!  I even had to make a speech!  I thought about thanking Herbie, but after all we were in a small community room, not the Shrine Auditorium, and I thought people might roll their eyes.  I won the award for best actress in a featured role, for my little role as the crazed stage manager in “Kiss Me Kate” last fall.

To drop the ironic detachment for just a moment – it’s just so incredible to me that for so many years, I believed the theatre world was as impenetrable as, oh…the UCLA Medical Center last Thursday?  Complete with angry guards ready to beat me down upon approach.  I have found the opposite – theatre groups that have welcomed me, encouraged me, and even given me awards to boot.  I’m trying not to think about all the years I wasted sitting at home thinking it was such a scary world.  I’ll just enjoy my little tummyache man instead.

Looking ahead, Herbie says that I should audition for as many shows as I like and not worry about him and Moo.  (Herbie is a pretty wonderful guy.)  But I feel like I should try to get myself on some sort path that would lead to making money, not that my hazy plan (writing?? oh yeah, big moneymaker) is a surefire hit.  I’ve been struggling the last few months, missing the security of having a quest, knowing my purpose and even having a handy-dandy set of rules to follow.  Now I’m twisting – enjoying Mommyhood but feeling a whole lot of blankness all around me.  What’s next, little tummyache man?  Do tell, do tell.

Mama Say Mama Saw Mama Coo Saw

With all my talk of getting old, I don’t know if I ever really felt it until yesterday, when Michael Jackson died.  Is this how it felt for the generation of Elvis-lovers?  I’m sure it’s a little bit different, since so many people really did love and lust for Elvis, and I, and probably most people, have mostly felt befuddled and/or deeply disturbed by Michael Jackson, the man, over the years.

But his music!  His music, as I’m sure many folks my age would say, was the sountrack of my childhood.  Not just my childhood, but my adolescence, and even my young-adult New York years.  My mom thought I was too young to see the videos for “Beat It” and “Thriller,” with their somewhat violent content, but I watched them, again and again, at my friend Kelly’s house after her parents went to bed.  I remember crowding around the TV with a bunch of friends when the video for “Bad” premiered as a primetime special in high school.  In New York, studying dance, all my teachers choreographed again and again to “Man in the Mirror,”  “The Way You Make Me Feel,” and that “Free Willy” song.  I did my first triple pirouette to “Black or White.”  In fact, a few years ago I realized that while I never really obsessed over MJ’s choreography, all of my childhood dance teachers did, and so I was brought up learning MJ-style jazz dance, minus the moonwalk.

Even as an adult, whenever I’m in a funk, all I have to do is put on Michael Jackson and I am flying around the house.  “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” is my go-to sit-ups song.  A few years ago, Herbie and I had to pull over so we could bust out, car-dance-style, to “Smooth Criminal.”  Once, at a dance party, I made an instant friend in Jenna the Great when we spontaneously recreated the entire knife fight from “Beat It.”  And two years ago, Herbie and I won a “Thriller” dance-off at his office Christmas party.

Every generation has that icon – that ICON – and when that icon dies, a generation gains instant age lines.  I feel like all stores and radio stations and public venues everywhere should be playing MJ non-stop… and maybe they are, after all, we’ve only been to AJ’s and My Gym today.  At our house, it’s nap time, and with all these songs bouncing through my head, the quiet is feeling very heavy. I can’t wait for Moo to wake up, so that I can, despite my new age lines, try to teach Moo the zombie walk.  I’ll save the spin-and-crotch-grab until she’s just a bit older.

If You Give a Moo a Milkshake…

Have you ever read that children’s book, “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie,” by Laura Numeroff?  We read it with Moo about six months ago, and just recently checked it out from the library again.  I used to think it was just a silly, charming story about a demanding, crazy little mouse who scampers about the house, causing chaos and destruction. (”If you give a mouse a cookie, he’s going to ask for a glass of milk.  When you give him the milk, he’ll probably ask you for a straw.”)  Later he asks to read a book, and then the pictures make him want to draw a picture, and then he needs tape to hang up his picture, and then he remembers he’s thirsty, and then he wants another cookie, and eventually the mouse ends up eating more cookies amidst a huge mess of milk, crayons, cleaning supplies, random jars of condiments, and cookie crumbs. 

How could I not realize before that the story is a metaphor for life with a toddler?  Oh, right, because six months ago my Moo was a sweet angel baby, and now she’s a crazy  kid who literally runs in circles until she falls down, and politely asks me after I vacuum the playroom, “And now can I mess it up again?”

In the book, the beleaguered little boy/cookie-giver ends up zonked out, fast asleep in the middle of the mess.  Which is exactly what I’m about to go do… just as soon as I figure out what that jar of mustard is doing in the middle of the room.

If it Wasn’t for Those Earthquakes…and House Prices…and the Fact That Our Parents Live Here…

Our trip to California:

Enjoying Harry’s Berries, the best strawberries in the world.  Moo: “The juice is dripping down my chin!”:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Moo, don’t throw the sand, please.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clara teaching Moo how to do a handstand:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“I’m SWIMMING and I’m LAUGHING!”:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Here comes a big one!”:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am having a GREAT time (perhaps too great?):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Home again, home again, jiggety-jog:

Preferably Iceberg

I just bought the book ”The Chocolate Touch” for my nephew (shh, don’t tell), which is about a boy named John Midas who eats a magical chocolate and suddenly, everything he puts in his mouth turns into chocolate.  I loved that book when I was a kid, and just like when I was 9, it still makes me desperately crave a nice crisp salad.

Some of my other favorite childhood books included Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, Ramona the Brave, James and the Giant Peach, Where the Red Fern Grows, and the Incredible Journey.  How about you?  During the summer, I always came home from the library with a giant stack of books, which my mom neatly stacked on a shelf in the family room.  But within the hour, there was a trail of them all over the house, a trail that usually led to the bathroom.  I learned very young that nobody could tell me to stop reading and clean my room if I read on the toilet.  If someone banged on the door, all I had to do was yell, “I’M GOING TO THE BATHROOM!” and even though perhaps they were suspicious, nobody in my family was brave enough to come in and check.

So it was on the potty, with numb thighs, that I rolled my eyes at Ramona, giggled at Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, and wept when Billy’s dogs sacrificed themselves.  It’s still my favorite places to read, even though I know it irks Herbie (who won’t touch a magazine if he suspects it’s been in the bathroom).  And now as I watch Moo reading on the couch, surrounded by a huge stack of books from the library, I imagine it’s only a matter of time before I knock on the door to the bathroom and hear, “I’M GOING TO THE BATHROOM!”  But I’ll know, ohhh I’ll know, that really she’s reading “The Chocolate Touch.”  That’s okay.  Eventually she’ll emerge, craving a nice crisp salad.