Let the wedding planning begin!!!

We are so excited to announce that Drama Queen has found the man of her dreams, Mr. Director. He has proposed, and she has accepted said proposal. Wedding bells will begin ringing late summer/early fall. They are so fabulous together, and we couldn't be more excited.

Welcome to the craziness, Mr. Director!

The End of Era

Last week, we traveled to Cedar City to see Drama Queen in her final production as a student at Southern Utah University. She played the title role in Hamlet. Yes, that Hamlet, the famous one by the Bard of Stratford-upon-Avon. The director looked at the talent in the program and decided to do a gender-swap version, so she wasn't Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, but Hamlet, Princess of Denmark. Claudius was also a woman, as were Horatio and Laertes. Ophelia and Gertrude were men. The only roles sticking strictly to the traditional genders were Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and Polonius. Although you may call me biased, I think she did an amazing job. She owned the role and the stage every time she was present, even when not speaking.

We're not the only ones who think so. Here's a link to a review of the closing night in USA Today.

It's been an amazing journey, and we are so glad that she has found something she is so passionate about. She will graduate in December and, if she's in Utah, walk in April.

We were told that photography wasn't allowed, so we didn't take the good camera to the performance. During the opening announcements, they said that only flash photography wasn't allowed, so I snagged a couple of pictures with my cell phone. Next time, we'll just take the big camera and then use or not use it, depending on what's allowed.

Drama Queen and the Utah Shakespearean Festival!

We were so excited when Drama Queen told us that she was picked to participate in an internship with the Utah Shakespearean Festival this season. We love USF, and we love Drama Queen. It's a perfect combination. We can't take pictures of her in her costumes for Amadeus or South Pacific, but here are a couple of her working the crowd as part of the Greenshow.

So everyone head on down to the Cedar City and catch our girl in one of these fabulous performances!

Lawyer-in-the-Works graduates to Lawyer-in-the-Family

We just came back from a lovely trip to Spokane, Washington to visit Lawyer-in-the-Works for her law school graduation. It was truly memorable. Her class ranking was 25th, and she graduated with honors (Magna Cum Laude). It was also wonderful to meet her new man, Seahawk's #1 Fan, and get to know him and his family. Here's a quick picture I grabbed of them after the ceremony.

Man in Plays is leaving the nest

In just a few short weeks, Mr. Perfect and Most Happy Girl will be empty-nesters. I mean, we've always been part-time nesters anyway, but with Man in Plays graduating from high school this year, this era of our lives is coming to a complete end. Soon there will be no more kids' weekends or weekly Tuesday dinner nights. Fortunately, when Lawyer in the Works and Drama Queen are home, they come see us and eat with us and let us know that we are still part of their lives, but this is the time for all of the kids to be creating their own places, even if they are college temporary.

So, to Man in Plays, we say, "We love you! We are so proud of you! And we are excited to see where your next adventure takes you." Right now, it's looking like either Cedar City or Price. And it's wonderful that you have really good options in both places.

Thanks for being so wonderful.

Man in Plays becomes a man indeed

This past weekend, Man in Plays turned 18. It's quite the milestone in several ways. There is the obvious one of him reaching his majority, being half-way through his final year in high school, and working hard at deciding what he wants to do with his life after graduation and which college will help him get there the best way possible.

Then there is also the fact that our youngest is now 18. It's a new stage in life. While we've always been a bit of empty-nesters, because the kids have spent the majority of their time at their mom's, soon we'll be empty-nesters in the complete sense of the word. No more kids' weekends; no more high school plays and events to attend. The ability to plan a trip or activity without working around someone else's schedule (or lack of communication). It will be fun and sad all at the same time.

Life moves so fast, it's a little scary at times.

A brief visit

We had so much fun last month visiting Lawyer-in-the-Works that we decided she needed to come home sooner than Christmas. Well, it wasn't just us telling her this. She was also getting this from friends, her mom, other family members ...

So she came home for a very brief (flew in late Thursday evening, flew out Sunday morning) visit, but it was so much fun to see her. Her birthday was on Tuesday, and Mr. Perfect and Most Happy Girl were able to take her and her older half-sister (Super Teacher Woman) out to dinner. It was really nice for Mr. Perfect and Super Teacher Woman to reconnect (he helped raise her from age 2 until she turned 18). We were also able to catch up on what's been happening with Lawyer-in-the-Works for the last five weeks and eat some really good Italian food (excellent restaurant choice, Lawyer-in-the-Works).

Drama Queen and Mr. Perfect

While in Cedar City last weekend, we were able to spend some really fun time with Drama Queen. I snapped this quick picture of her and Mr. Perfect at lunch on Saturday. It just makes me happy.

Drama Queen and The Women of Lockerbie

We headed down to Cedar City the past weekend to visit Drama Queen and to see her in her first main stage show at SUU. What an amazing show. I'm posting a few pictures I took during the performance. We could take non-flash photos (I asked before the show started), but unfortunately our camera has this annoying red light that helps the auto focus when the lighting is too low, so I had to stop taking pictures about half-way through the show. It is better to not annoy the actors and other audience members.

Never Never Land is never far away

Game Boy just wrapped up a wonderful performance as Smee in Cottonwood High's production of Peter Pan. The whole cast did an amazing job. Mr. Perfect and Most Happy Girl happily came out twice to see it (opening and closing shows). Kudos to everyone involved!

Here are some pictures from the closing night performance.

Drama Queen came up from Cedar City to see the show (and to stay for Thanksgiving). It's always so fun to see them together.

Game Boy goes to Homecoming

Game Boy went to the Cottonwood High School Homecoming Dance last weekend. He was with us, so we got to see him in all of his finery. He borrowed the suit from Mr. Perfect and matched the vest, tie, and pocket hankie with his date's color scheme. We thought he looked very dashing. Her dad took some pictures, so we hope to get copies of the files so we can post them soon, too.

A trip to Spokane

Mr. Perfect and Most Happy Girl had been looking forward to visiting Lawyer-in-the-Works for several weeks. We planned that we could make the drive there and back (about 1,500 miles in all) over the Labor Day holiday weekend. It couldn't have been better.

We headed out Friday night after work and stayed in Boise, Idaho. Getting to Boise was a little more exciting than originally anticipated as we drove through a major thunder storm between Twin Falls and Boise. It's a bit nerve-wracking to feel the car trying it's best to be pulled one way or the other off the highway. Keeps you awake, though, when you've been in the car for three hours and still have two to go.

In Boise, our hotel put us in the Executive Suite. See?

It was the most comfortable bed I've ever slept on in a hotel. The next morning, we had a nice breakfast and headed off for the next seven-hour leg of our journey, which included a stop at Boise State University (about two minutes from our hotel) to look at a parking structure Mr. Perfect designed. Isn't it beautiful?

The proud papa.

Next stop: Spokane, Washington. To make the trip go faster, I started reading a book written by a friend who had asked me to write a review. In the second chapter, I started laughing at something, so I read it to Mr. Perfect, and from that point on, he asked me to read the rest of the book out loud to him. It meant that he did almost all of the driving from Boise and I was in desperate need of constant liquid refreshment to keep my voice from going out. But it was worth it. (Great book, David! Good luck with it!)

Once we reached Spokane, we met up with Lawyer-in-the-Works. We wanted to get her a housewarming gift for her apartment, so we took her shopping and found her a great vacuum (a definite need in an apartment that is almost entirely carpeted) and a toaster. She was so excited that we put the vacuum together as soon as we got back from the store, and she immediately used it.

We had a lot of fun enjoying the city. There was a festival called Pig Out in the Park that weekend, and we tried some great food.

Mr. Perfect and Most Happy Girl made it to the Spokane Temple on Sunday after church. It was closed, but we got some lovely pictures of the outside.

Just what is he thinking in this one? I'm not sure. It might be "Why are you taking my picture now?"

More pictures and trip detail coming soon...