Dog of the Day

When we were in Victoria, B.C., last fall, my granddaughter, Kirsten, asked, each day, "Don't you think that dog's cute? Don't you think it's the cutest dog we've seen so far today?" The rest of us nominated, as the day went on, other "cutest dogs", and in the evening we decided which one was the "dog of the day."

Last weekend was Pioneer Day. Dave and I celebrated with a flag in front of our house,

but also with a trip to the Farmer's Market to pick a "dog of the day.

As Dave relaxed with "young coconut juice," canned in Thailand, and Thai barbecue,

I auditioned dogs for "dog of the day status." Who do you think should win?

Next stop on this holiday weekend was This is the Place Heritage Park, for a taste of pioneer times. We walked through one-room cabins and historic buildings like a scale model of the Brigham Young Academy.

We checked out the barbers, the weavers, and pioneer types just lolling around.

We watched a pie eating contest, junior division.

We checked out the old-fashioned flowers, hollyhocks, which were much more common when I was a little girl.

And we checked out the pioneer costumes in the general store. I will need one for the Christmas in Nauvoo party Dave and I are planning for our ward.

And we checked out the handcart "floats," lined up for the holiday parade. The rivalry between the BYU Academy and the University of Utah was portrayed as already raging, back in pioneer times!

Finally, we spent the evening at Deer Valley, watching the sun go down as Lee Ann Rimes, famous country singer, performed with the Utah Symphony.

The only drawback--we got there late and could only find a seat back of the garbage cans! Oh, well, we lay back and relaxed, and the sound carried....

Footloose

Dave and I were footloose in Southern Utah the weekend of July 18--no responsibilities, no one to please but ourselves. Our goal was to have fun.

We watched two plays--"Private Lives" and "A Secret Garden." "Private Lives" was a classic Noel Coward play from the 1930s--a very witty society romance. A Secret Garden was a touching story of a little girl, orphaned in India, who finds love and a family in Scotland.


There were clever displays for each of the shows, highlighting fashions, furniture, and art from that time and place.

A fun part of any Shakespeare Festival experience is enjoying the preshow, with its attractive young performers.

I wandered around the campus, after the shows, enjoying the flowers, the waterfall, the carillon, the Shakespeare theater, and the statue of Nellie Unthank.

Nellie was a little girl in the Martin handcart company whose feet froze in the snows of Wyoming. Her legs were cut off below the knee, but she went on to become a plural wife and a mother of six children, living in Cedar City and remaining faithful despite an achingly hard life. President Hinckley dedicated this statue of "Nellie Unthank before Traveling West."

I also enjoyed a show by Southern Utah artists.


Just when I thought I understood the themes that interested those local artists, I was surprised.

On Saturday evening, Dave and I visited Dave's mom and admired her new, copper brown carpet.

We went to dinner at an excellent Italian restaurant, Scaldoni's.

We then attended the performance of "Footloose" at Tuacahn.

Again, the preshow activities were as fun as the show itself. We roamed through the gift store, searching for treasures.

We watched people ride the mechanical bull.

And we admired a rock band performing outside the amphitheater.

"Footloose," itself, had phenomenal dancing and music.