Dance Sport

So have I ever mentioned how much I love dance?   I really love dancing.  I started about 2 and a half years ago and I have been dancing ever since.  This last weekend we had dance sport which is a huge competition that they have here at BYU twice a year.  I competed in 4 different events this time around.  It was pretty crazy but a lot of fun.  My partners were amazing, especially the one that I had for my standard dances (quickstep and waltz)  We took third in our level of quickstep and made it to the 3rd round in the higher level of waltz.

On top of all those competitions this weekend I have 2 choir concerts and I have to work at the football game too.  I'm going to be dead tired but I'm happy.

Christmas Melodies

So following up with my wish from a few posts ago, I am organizing a choir and orchestra to do a Christmas concert in December.

 It's crazy how much work it is.  My brother is helping a lot with the transcription of the orchestra parts and I'm going crazy organizing rehearsals and music. I'm working on an arrangement of Silent Night that I think will be really nice.  So far I have a choir of 15-20 people and an orchestra of 12 or so.  I'd like to have a choir of 40 and an orchestra big enough to support that.  I guess I'll just have to keep recruiting.

Food, Glorious Food

This is one of my favorite places to eat.

This month there are a lot of birthdays of people I work with and so, yesterday, a bunch of us went to Tucano's right after work.  

 

I really love summer because we have a lot of these work party things.  It's kinda nice to get together in a setting that is not work and just have fun.  And, if that setting involves Tucano's than all the better.  My favorite meats there are the garlic sirloin and the top sirloin.  I could eat there every day, but than I'd get really fat and that wouldn't be so great.

Ryan and Tassia came and brought little Luca.  

It was his first time at Tucano's and he loved it!!

Amazing Concert

Finally a post about music!!!!  So last weekend I went to an amazing concert.  It was an oratorio called "Messiah in America."

It was written by the director of this choir in California that also has a sister choir in Arizona.  So anyways, both of these great choirs got together with a full orchestra and a children's choir to sing this production.  The text from this oratorio comes from 3rd Nephi in the Book of Mormon.  With 600+ voices they had some really powerful parts where you could really feel the music.  One of my favorite musical parts of the work was where they sang about the storm that happened at the time of Christ's crucifixion .  The orchestra was playing all these different things that sounded like thunder and lightning and rain.  It was a very nice effect.  I went to this cause my awesome little  brother was playing french horn in the orchestra and he did a great job.

So I didn't get any pictures of the group when they performed here in UT, but this is a picture of the choir from California when they premiered the piece.  So just double what you see here and add a children's choir and that's about what it was like.  Another one of my favorite parts of the concert was after the oratorio.  They did two encore pieces.  First, the children's choir sang "Beautiful Savior" and than, the adult choir sang "I know that my Redeemer Lives."  It was a very powerful finish to a great concert I thought.
After watching this performance it made me want to (1) write something amazing like this, and (2) put together a group like this.  I'm thinking very seriously about number 2 but I'd start with a much smaller group. I think that it would be fun to get a choir and learn a bunch of fun and sacred music and than put an orchestra together to do the accompaniment.  I'll have to see what I can do.  Maybe I can get something together before Christmas...

Coolest Toy Ever!!!

So I'm sitting here outside my apartment with a couple of girls from my ward because they are making me put another post on here.  So anyways I think I'll write about my cool new toy.

I was going to buy one of these later this summer when I had a little more money but I found a deal that I just couldn't pass up.  So I bought one.  Now I just have to find ways to fill up all 64gb with something or other.  I am having a lot of fun looking for free apps and things to do with my iPod.  One of the first things i did on it was call my sister on Skype.  It was pretty amazing.  As long as I have a wi-fi connection it acts pretty much like a phone.  I got an app that you can have it listen to a song, even if it's a song that's badly sung by your brother and it will find it.  I also got this app that you put a song from your library into and than you can adjust the speed and/or pitch.  I'm excited to use this with my dance songs so they are the perfect tempo.

I also put my scriptures on here in both English and Spanish.  The coolest thing about my scriptures is that my highlights and note are all synced automatically to my lds.org scriptures.  I'm sure there is a lot more cool things that I can do but I guess that I'll have to find them out as I go along.

Spoons

So I decided that I should start a blog.  Partly so I can count it for a journal and also if anyone wants to know what I'm up to these days they can check it out.   So, last summer my dad taught me how to carve spoons and I have really had some fun with it.  I don't do it a lot but when I have some free time (usually when I am at ward functions and don't feel that social)  I'll sit down and carve or sand my spoons.  It's mostly just something to keep my hands busy.

Here are the spoons that I've done so far.  If you have any design ideas I'm looking for something interesting to do for the next one.