More Colorado Pictures

Mom leads the way!

Powder Trees

Graham plays with trains

View from off of Cirque pomma lift to the right

View off of Cirque pomma lift to the left

Katherine with Cirque headwall behind her

Aspen Highlands but felt like Aspen Lowlands with the intensely warm snow.

Slogging it down some Temerity offshoot. 

View through the trees somewhere in hanging valley I think

Graham is tired and grumpy after a long day of ski school

"Party on dude" in the Gondola!

Small Returns Update

After returning from trips I am always amazed by the serenity I feel in my own home and the gratification of owning a space (well, renting, technically--but emotionally owning) and within that space I get to make my own rules. A small miracle of being an adult I suppose. Also a nice discovery is that it feels like March--a wet March to be sure--but trees are starting to bloom and Seattle seems to be making it's subtle seasonal transition to spring, by which I mean 50 degrees and raining as opposed to 40 degrees and raining...last year I recall some beautiful April days, however, so hopefully we can look forward to that again. The weather currently, however, is lending itself nicely to quiet days indoors and after the busyness of previous months I look forward to some focused alone-time. Well, not totally alone of course, since we have kitty keeping guard over the house at all times. Grandma Nono kindly sent me her original ipad (since my computer is broken) and Nathan found a new fun game for Lyra on it:


Lyra meet iPad from Kaitlin McCarthy on Vimeo.

As you can see she loves it. As soon as I played this video just now, lyra jumped up on the desk from her nap and is all "meow meow meow" and scratching at it.  Another technology addicted soul...

Ski trips are valid procrastination

I always do this thing where when my life gets hectic I put everything non-urgent off until said hectic ness has ended. Having recently completed HOT MESS and then shortly after leaving to go skiing with mom and Graham, it's been all, "I'll do it when I get home in March," which apparently is this magical time when I will have no commitments and will be really motivated to blog, clean and organize my whole house, complete a dozen sewing projects, and resume going to dance classes on a more frequent basis. Oh yeah, and start looking to buy a house. Right...I think that one is getting put off for sure.
Anyways, I still have two days before my life resumes in Seattle, and since I can't really be productive from here on much of my other goals, I might as well get a blog posting up. HOT MESS went better than I thought possible (there were a lot of dire potential outcomes in my brain). If you haven't read the review yet here it is: http://seattledances.blogspot.com/2013/02/mayhem-holds-sway-at-hot-mess.html
It's not particularly insightful (especially about Jenny's piece, which I was in love with) but it is overall very positive, and since I write for this site I understand the difficulties of writing about multiple pieces, trying to convey the feeling and complexities of hours of dancing, and other important information all under a word limit. There have also been times where I was really busy and didn't have the time I would like to reflect and work on a review, so I understand it not being that in depth. In fact I feel like most professional reviews I read just skim the surface. But, excitingly, the three of us (choreographers) are being interviewed for Stance (Velocity's journal of choreographic culture) so hopefully that will turn into something and then I will post it here for sure.

On th non-dance front, I've been on a ski trip with my mom and three year old nephew, graham. So fun bonding experience since he lives far away from me.

This is mom, graham, and I skiing the other day. Graham does not like to stop, only go go go. I taught him to say "party on dude."

Today he went to ski school, then we played at the indoor climbing gym play place, then went swimming, then went sledding, then watched a movie. Busy day! Our friends Katherine and Teri left this morning, but have been skiing with us all week and we had lovely weather for it. It was even nice enough one day to lay out and get some much needed vitamin d!

Here is a video of me on the circ headwall, which I think is my favorite run on the mountain because the powder is good and the views are stellar.

Kaitlin skis from Kaitlin McCarthy on Vimeo.

Double black baby!
Anyways it "spring ahead" tonight and I want to hit the slopes by 8am (on my board this time) so I should be off to bed. Hopefully I can get some more pictures from th ski trip up, but I didn't have a chance to upload them from my phone yet. Party on dudes!

It's a Hot Mess Valentine's Day.

Ok. So it's not secret that I'm pretty terrible at this blogging thing. I was doing pretty good for a while. But the last three months have been abismal. 3 months? How is that possible?!? Yes everyone, believe it or not, it is February. The 14th no less. Nathan and I are not celebrating Valentines day this year, (except for the fact that it's like valentines day here every day with all love and snuggles that go on. It's pretty disgusting). My fam may be accustomed to receiving handmade V-day cards from yours truly, but this year I'm not celebrating even with husband, so just know that I still love ya, even if I didn't send anything in the mail this time around. I'm working tonight at the restaurant. We have a fancy-shmancy preset menu and hopefully I will make some sweet tips. I'm just nervous because with all the reservations we have packed in that someone will decide to sit around for an hour or so after they are done eating and then I will have to kindly ask them to leave because we have tables waiting and then those people will get super mad at me and then write about it on yelp. This is what happened two years ago, and why I did not work V-day last year. I've always loved valentines day in the sort of candy heart, doily, and decorated shoe-box mailbox elementary school kinda way, but the adult version of valentines day kinda turns me off. Maybe it's just being in the restaurant business. To the poor shmuck who calls in on Feb 13th and tries to get a 7pm reservation: You make me laugh sir. Good luck to you.

Anyways...

So what's going on? Currently I have a cold that I have been fighting off for like 2 months and it finally caught up with me. Yes mom, I'm taking zicam. As well as echinacea tea, emergen-C, hippy dippy immuno tonic, and crazy chinese herbs. Last week I pulled my oblique muscle, which I will diagram for you here with this silly image of a baseball player:

Because it's a large part of your abdominal muscles, it's involved in basically everything. So I was not doing so good for a while. BUT it's doing a lot better, however, it stressed my body out which I think is why the cold got an "in." Anyways, it also means I haven't danced really in a long time (aside from sort of half-assing it in rehearsal) so I'm pretty out of shape. So good news for my upcoming dance show:

Which has been a huge project for me for the past six months, and is really the biggest news in my life right now. I'm excited. I'm nervous. In some ways I'm ready for it to be over--which it will be very quickly I suspect, even though time in the last few weeks has seemed to move glacially for some reason. I had my last rehearsal (for my piece) yesterday and now it's just the nitty-gritty kind of administrative/event planning details that stress me out. Also, the vulnerability of art-making is another stressful element, but this is part of what you sign up for I suppose. I hope people come. I hope people find it interesting. I hope it's the best it can possibly be. I hope everyone is healthy and injury-free come next weekend. I hope I hope I hope. But does our promo look amazing or what?! Super thanks to Lauren and Jenny for that. 

Other exciting news! So many of my beautiful and supportive family members are coming out to see the show (and us probably mostly) which is so wonderful. And I know all my family would be out here if they could (and if I could handle it) because they are just all so great. So I have been getting the house ready a bit. I mean look at this sparkling kitchen:

I mean, what am I saying--my kitchen looks like this all the time. I definitely didn't have professional help or anything (I totally did). I've also been procrastinating on working on show stuff by making these beautiful terrariums (totally necessary).

I've been obsessed with moss/terrariums forever, so even though they are so trending right now I just want to say I liked them first. Terrariums for life! Also hopefully I won't kill them super fast. I have a problem with killing plants. Or they just continue to look worse and worse after they enter my care. Maybe when my dad is here he can give me some Pro-Tips as I would really really love to be good at growing things. And in case you are wondering, moss is very abundant here--it (literally) grows on trees--and then falls in big clumps onto the sidewalk. So when I gathered this moss it was not like I was destroying something beautiful in nature. This was actually kind of a "moss rescue" if you will, assuming I don't kill it. 

Dad, Grandma Margaret, and the Bankas arrive Sat evening. So probably I should stop procrastinating and wash something. Or procrastinate by washing something. True confession: my dance piece doesn't have a title yet. 

Thanksgiving through Christmas in 3...2...1...

Thanksgiving!

We had Stephanie and James over for the second year in a row

Lauren helped us cook all day!

Nathan "Spatchcocked" the turkey, which is like butterflying. The upside to this method is that it cooks evenly (eliminating the problem where the breast finishes before the dark meat and then dries out) and also all the skin crisps up nice and golden. Read all about it here:

http://www.seriouseats.com/2012/11/how-to-spatchcock-cook-turkey-thanksgiving-fast-easy-way-spatchcocked.html

Here is a blurry picture of how it turned out. I would highly recommend this method. Also saved us from buying a costly roaster that we wouldn't use often.

Also our kitty is adorable as always.

Got our "peace tree" from the peace center in the CD.

All decorated!

Dec 9th was the first day for same-sex marriage in Washington. Lauren and Hannah and I went down to City Hall to support and throw birdseed. It was beautiful to witness both the newly weds and the support for them. People were passing out flowers, and a 5-or-so-piece band played festive klezmer-ish music to accompany couples as they traveled down the long staircase.

Action shot! Hannah throwing bird seed.

You can see the tuba in this shot!

My friend Ariel from work had a girls-only sleepover party with all the Plum ladies.

Lots of good food

Amanda made two amazing salads. One was kale with parmesan, lemon juice, and olive oil. And it was super simple and good. 

 Ariel's cat is a maine coon and is HUGE for a cat.  

His name is Chicken.

He is also very beautiful.

It was a loosely craft-based party. I taught some folks how to make snowflakes.

I used the opportunity to make Lauren's stocking (or get started on it anyways.)

Here it is finished. She likes possums.

Here it is hanging with the stocking I made nathan last year and the new one my mom made me this year. LOVE.

Michael came up for the weekend, and took Steph and I to Discovery park, where I had never been!

We saw the lighthouse, three sea otters playing in the water, a GIANT seal, and a bald eagle, who seemed so close in real life, but on the pictures I took he looks far away:

He's on top of the tower.

CHRISTMAS!

kitty hiding under the tree

Nathan, Lyra, and I pose for an intentionally cheezy christmas shot

I made a hard sauce snowman to go with the christmas pudding!

Happy Lauren. Grumpy Kitty.

Swedish meatballs, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and yummy goat cheese salad

The traditional christmas pudding for dessert--it turned out so good!

The Christmas carnage was extensive.

Happy Holidays everyone!!!