Dance Party USA!!

The kids love to put on performances for Neil and I. Now that Lyndee is part of the family, she brings her innate ability to dance, flip and sing. Samantha has long been a fan of creative play, opting for it over toys. Alex loves to get in there too and he can almost do a perfect handstand. Lately the music has come from High School Musical 2 and I know almost all of the words to the songs. This particular evening brought Neil and I a great laugh do to the costumes!

Grandma Rydalch, Part Two

So my post on Grandma's anniversary opened up a fload gate of wonderful memories and I decided I want to put them here to share with all of you. I think I'm going to need to carry a notepad with me in my purse so I can jot things down as they come to me. If anyone has pictures of Grandma and Grandpa, please email them to me and I will post them on this blog.

Grandma had a love of music. Some of her favorites were The Mormon Tabernacle Choir, The Three Tenors, barbershop quartets, and hymns. I loved to hear Grandma sing at church. When I was a little girl sitting next to her at church, I would watch her mouth move and rub the soft skin on her arm. Sometimes it would put me to sleep (I think it would put Grandpa to sleep as well). Grandma and Grandpa were proud supporters of any choir, band or play that their grandchildren were in, sometimes traveling 2 hours or more to see us perform.

I spent many evenings enjoying performance with them, including plays, muscials and choirs. They almost always had one of us grandkids with them.

Chruch hymns were such a comfort to me while Grandma was in the hospital. I sat by her side with my hymn book and sang all of her favorties; Oh My Father, I Need Thee Every Hour, Love at Home to name a few. Silent Night always reminds me of her because Samantha learned it and sang it for her.

I'm sure they are enjoying the beautiful choirs of angels in heaven. I'll sing extra loud and sweet this Christmas so they can hear me!!

Andrea Bocelli in Las Vegas

Neil surprised me with a trip to Las Vegas Nov.30-Dec.3 to see Andrea Bocelli in concert at the MGM arena. It was such a wonderful concert and we even had some of the worse seats in the house!! I still cried because his voice was so beautiful live. He had a huge orchestra, a choir, a soprano and a tenor who shared the stage with him. I would say he sang about half the songs that were preformed. The rest was split up among the others. It was an opera style concert and most of it sung in Italian.
We stayed at the Gold Nugget on Fremont St. It was a very nice hotel but quit far from the strip so everything we wanted to go to was a cab ride away. A plus to staying off the strip is that your hotel room is cheaper. We won't stay there again or on Fremont St. Neil and I aren't into the gamboling thing so most of our time was spent on the Strip.

Another fabulous evening was spent at the Paris Hotel listening to the dueling pianos. We got there really early (the show started at 9) so we could get a seat. We stayed until they ended at 1am. How the show works is the audience requests rock-n-roll songs, along with a tip, and these guys play and sing it for you along with some comedy. It's a free show, except for the tips and alcohol you consume.