My Welcome Moose

I don't know why this is the case, but it seems like in recent years, I have always seen a moose within the first 24 hours that I'm back in Alaska. One time this moose was standing next to the "Welcome to Anchorage" sign that you pass on the way out of the airport, so I started calling this phenomenon my Welcome Moose.

Well, my Welcome Moose did NOT show up within 24 hours of my arrival this time, which was highly strange after a long string of times with this occurring. It was even a topic of discussion with my parents. But, not to fear, my Welcome Moose did appear within my first week... so I'm not too angry :) This was out behind our house:


I officially feel welcomed to Anchorage :)

Ah, the dogs :)

One highlight of being home is being around the family dogs! I've been getting some quality time this Memorial weekend, and here are some shots from a couple of our outings. The two Bernise Mountain Dogs (black, white and brown) are Abby (larger) and Bailey. The bulldog is my brother's dog, Winston. Oh, and the humans are me and my dad, Gary (my brother, Colin, was behind the camera for all of these).

And, of course, there was a rock in the middle of the falls that I just HAD to go get on :) So my brother tooks some photos of that as well :)

Watch out New York, here I come!

I haven't mentioned it on my blog before now, but my plans heading up to Alaska also included auditioning for TBA Theatre's touring shows that are being taken to New York in the middle of June. I didn't want to jinx my audition :)

But, as I'm sure you know from the title of this blog, I got cast! I even was so lucky to get the part that I dared to dream I would get! How great is that?

So I just thought I would have a moment: WOO HOO!!!

Now the wonderful work begins :)

Some show pics

Well, I wasn't able to get any photos from the actual show performances, but I had some friends take backstage shots, so I thought I would share these photos from "The Madwoman of Chaillot" cast:

Here's Amanda and me. Amanda played the singer, and I played the violin lady, so we started off the show with me harmonizing to her singing "La Vie en Rose"[thanks Mara for the spellcheck!].


The last two are of us evil ladies, who get killed :) L to R: me, Amy, Corey, and Patty:


Too funny :) The show was lots of fun, and it still hasn't completely hit me that it's over! But I'm already memorizing lines for the next one! So acting life goes on :)

One week!

Well, I am now officially a week away from being in Alaska! I can't believe how quickly time has gone. With the days being longer, I'm finding myself doing things later and later... but I love it :)

Here a couple recent events:

Earlier this week, my friend Megan's parents and aunt were here in town. Naturally, we took advantage of the time and went out for the evening. Amongst the evening activities was a nice walk along the Mississippi, where we took these shots (Aunt Rosie and I trading out) :)



Last night was a really nice Baha'i Feast (a monthly Baha'i community meeting), and afterwards I went out for tea with my friends Diane and Sheida. We managed to take this one, long-arm shot before my camera batteries wore out :)



So now I'm in my final weekend of performances for "The Madwoman of Chaillot." It was a four-week run, and it's just raced passed! We're having a cast party tonight, which should be loads of fun.

I have no idea if I'm going to update my blog in the next week - the next post may very well be from Alaska! I hope you're all well, and I'll be seeing you Alaskans in the very near future!

Official first rollerblading adventure!

Okay, so the weather has been getting absoultely gorgeous here in the Twin Cities, so I have been wanting to get outside more. I love taking walks, but I wanted to be doing something else. So the decision? Rollerblading!!!

Baseem and I decided to embark on our first rollerblading adventure together--first stop: Purchasing rollerblades. We ran into a little hiccup when the first place we checked didn't HAVE rollerblades (I'm not going to mention where, but their initials are REI). Luckily we had success with the next place and were fitted and ready to go.

We decided to go on a path along the Mississippi (for the record, I had to pause and repeat to myself how to spell that darn word) River. Hmm... how to put this gently?... We were definitely beginners :) It's not a good sign if joggers are passing you! But it was great fun, and we're both determined to get better.

We were so proud of ourselves that we went to have ice cream to celebrate. While eating, we walked through the neighborhood around the ice cream shop and came along a very patriotic house - so like everyone, I had to take the requisite ice cream cone as torch in front of the statue of liberty photo, of course!


All in all, a very successful first rollerblading adventure... especially the ice cream :) Here's our horribly-framed-because-we-had-to-put-it-on-the-car photo at the end of our ride. For the record, it was very impressive that I got in the shot in time!