"We're with the star of the play"

At the beginning of this month we were lucky enough to have the opportunity to go out to Palm Springs to see our cusion Ali as Christine in the Phantom of the Opera--at Palm Springs High School. She was beyond amazing and sounded JUST like the actress we saw play the part on Broadway back in October. She is trained in dance and vocally. We were all so very proud of her!! And it was fun to see the family again. : )

I got my camera out a bit late on this one, and just caught them as they were ending their final bows.

This was, the Phantom on the left, Ali (as Christine) in the middle and Raoul at the end. The guy who played Phantom was also very good, he had the perfect voice for it.

At the end we all got to explore around backstage.

The Pange family.

Marc (my Moms Brother), Chris, Carolanne and Ali : )

More backstage. We all had a lot of fun poking around back there. : )

They had these amazing billboards up around town. I didn't end up getting a photo of one out by the road, by they had these cute replicas at the after party....so, this will do. Just imagine it REALLY big. ; )

Treats at the after party!

My Dad, Mom, Ali, Me, Brody, and Anne (my Mom's Sister)

Being at the play with everyone was just so much fun!! I love every bit of it. Ali is so talented and it was great to share in something that is so special to her. And we just loved seeing and spending time with family. : )

We had a little credit through Priceline do to a hotel mishap the month before, so we used it for a nice out in Palm Springs! We ended getting the Westin Resort. It was SO nice and relaxing, and the weather was just perfect!

Eating pool side! One of my favorite things. : )

Soaking up some desert sun!

Even I came home with some sun, not a burn! Yay! : )

(taken and edited with my iPhone)

This was the bigger of the two porches we had. This one had a little bit of yard to the side of it. It was really pretty.

A little room service breakfast! It was SO good and perfect since we were kind of on a time limit and wanted to hit the pool again before we left. : )

(taken and edited with my iPhone)

Before we headed home, we took a nice walk around the grounds of the hotel. It had a beautiful golf course, a handful of pools and more.

One of the big pounds had all these great fish in it. Some were quite large and did some jumping for us!

So so beautiful!!

These ducks had no fear, and no shame to come right up and ask for food. Sadly, I didn't have anything for them.

This hotel had the coolest long arched hallway. I had some fun taking photos of it.

This was Brody walking down the hall at check in.

(taken and edited with my iPhone)

Brody was checking out while I was snapping some last min photos of the grounds, and this is how he came at me down this long grass way. haha. I love it!!

We had such a wonderful little get a way! It was so fun and relaxing. We love Palm Springs and our loved ones there! : )

The Phantom of the Opera!!

We got to see the Phantom of the Opera this past week, something we have wanted to do for years!! It was an AMAZING show!! The sets, costumes the singing....it was all so breathtaking! The Pantages Theatre was equally as amazing, we couldn't believe the detail, it was so beautiful!!

We got there a bit early and had dinner at and Irish Pub called 'Dillon's' on Hollywood and Vine. It was so good, and there were a lot of other play goers eating there too! : )

We loved being in LA for a show, it felt so big city! There was so much energy around, it was a blast--felt like being on the streets of London!

I wasn't supposed to take photos inside, but I couldn't help sneaking two shots. The first one is before it started and the 2nd is during intermission....see the chandelier? It did a lot of going up and down (in the first photo it is under that white sheet). It was amazing!

It was definitely a very memorable night and so fun to see it Halloween week!!

We are so excited to go back! : )

Last week we also stopped off in LA for lunch at Pinks and to visit the Grauman's Chinese theater. We had never been before. We didn't have enough time to really look around, so we are looking forward to going back and exploring more! : )

Hakuna matata

Backtracking a bit. We saw the Lion King while it was here in Orange County a couple weeks ago, and it was in a word, Beautiful!! From the opening number it gave you chills, they did an amazing job of bringing the movie to life on stage!

Since they don't allow you to take photos during the show, I had to "google" some. : )

These animals came down the isles right by us on there way up to the pride land....it was so much fun! : )

Most lines were taking right from the movie, which was really fun!

Rafiki (shown below) was really funny!

It was so fun to hear the songs again and see the movie in a whole different way! And the actors even sounded JUST like the ones in the movie! It was awesome!!

If you have a chance to see it, I wouldn't miss it!! : )

The Errand

Months ago Brody was asked to fill a roll in our Stakes play, 'The Errand'. He was a little apprehensive to commit to it because he is already super busy with work, school and more---but he decided to go ahead and accept the role, and we are so happy he did!

The play is about one man's journey back to the Gospel and the Angels among us who are sent to help us through trials, big and small. It was such a beautiful play! And the music was amazing---we are still finding ourselves singing the songs from it. : )

Brody did SUCH a great job!! His role was the main characters non-member friend. It was so much fun seeing him up on stage! I was SO very proud, and saw all 6 performances (and each time I saw it, I teared up, it is such a touching play. I can't wait until we get our DVD)! : )

(some more scene's from the play. Click to make the photos larger)

The 2nd scene Brody was in! :)

I volunteered to help with tickets and ended up doing it for 4 of the shows. It was fun to be a part of it all in a small way. We always had a nice big line about an hour before they would let people into be seated, and a lot of them were our regulars. : )
After the final performance they had a nice cast party till almost midnight! : ) We just LOVE our stake and ward, we are so lucky to have such amazing and talented people in our lives!

We had so many of our dear family and friends come to support Brody, it meant a lot to us! Even Brody's parents & Sister tried to make the effort to come from AZ to see him, we missed them, but so excited to show them the DVD, and see them all for Brody's Graduation weekend!!

Thank you all so much for coming out!! We love you! : )

Weekending....

Brody mentioned that it seemed like it had been awhile since we had a Disneyland (not California Adventure) night---So we went Friday night, it was a great night to go. The big rides had longer lines (30mins+) so we headed to some of the shorter lines....like Haunted Mansion, which looked pretty cool that night with the moon over it mixed with fog (which I don't think you can really see in the photo---but there really was creepy fog around it).

I have this APP for my iPhone called 'GotPlans', for Disneyland. It tells you the up-to-date wait times (that people at the parks submit) for rides and many other things (has all the menus for the restaurants too---came in handy for us that night) that make your trip to the park easier.

Since I help out some by submitting wait times and other info while in the park ---they sent me (and many others) a $5 dollar gift card to the park! I was so excited. It may not seem like much, but hey, it's always nice to have some free money to spend at a place you spend money at anyway. I assume it is a little incentive to all of us App people to continue to help keep the ride times up to date so it continues to be useful to everyone. : )

After we had a nice dinner in New Orleans Square (Sorry AZ, no 'food photo' of dinner) and went on several rides.....it started to rain!

...but we started getting flashbacks of about a month ago when we were there during the BIG rain storm and got soaked to the bone......so we left! haha : )

...and stopped off at 7 Eleven---one of our new favorite spots for hot chocolate, to warm up! It is hot, creamy, milk chocolate that you can serve yourself and add fun flavors---I love adding Hazelnut to it!

And you can get two of any size for less than one Starbucks! It's more fun too! : )

Saturday night was our 2nd stop on our little Broadway ticket package, "The Music of Andrew Lloyd Webber". It was much different than we were expecting it to be. It turned out to be more of a concert, and not really what you would think of as being put into the Broadway Play category. After we separated it from the "Broadway Play" thought, and accepted it as more of a concert.....there was a lot to love.

The music was amazing and the voices even better. It was really fun to hear songs from other plays we didn't know (some we liked, some not so much), and songs we have always loved. Our favorite part (and by the reaction of the theater, everyone elses as well) was when it came time to hear 5 songs from "The Phantom of the Opera". They dropped the curtain and projected the mask on it while they played the overture.....and then lifted a couple other curtains until the stage was again revealed all covered in smoke. The guy who sang the Phantoms' part had played the role on Broadway for a record-setting 2,500 times. He was SO good. When he would come out before, and sing songs from other plays (before he came out as the Phantom), Brody and I were like, "Oh, there's Phantom again"---he just had that distinct 'Phantom voice'! : )

It was a great weekend.....

Two for the show

For Christmas we invested in a small season ticket package with the Orange County Preforming Arts Center, for their Broadway Series.

Our first play on the list was 'Annie', this past Sat night. It was such a blast!

Ready for the show...

View from our seats.

They may not be the best seats in the house, but we sure loved them!

They even have our favorite numbers & anniversary numbers in them, 112 &111.

This play was awesome. The talent was amazing right down to the smallest little girl (with the biggest voice) to the dog, Sandy.

The sets, songs, music and actors really carried you away with them in the story--and we loved being taken along for the ride! : )

It was such a fun experience to get dressed up, and have a night at the theater to catch a Broadway play together!! We LOVED our first play and are so excited for our other upcoming shows!

{ Click here to see upcoming shows - and plan a trip to the OCPAC } : )