Varekai

Sometime last winter, Jennifer decided she wanted to see Cirque du Soleil's Varekai on her birthday when it was playing in Dallas. So when tickets became available in February, we got a group together and I ordered nine of them (Jfer and I, Danny and Joanna, Rita, Benny and Diane and Meredith and Michael). We figured that by this time we'd somehow manage to make a road trip.

We did manage to make it to Dallas. Much, much later than anticipated, though. We now know that you have to count on starting out late (you want to hit that perfect time after the baby is fed and asleep) and on stoping a couple of times to nurse. Still, we made it to my cousin's only an hour or so late (by omitting a side trip to Ft. Worth). During the drive north, we decided that staying home for Thanksgiving would be a wonderful idea. So no more road trips for us until Christmas.

We had a great time hanging out at Hanka's and noting how big Martin, her five month old, is compared to M. And he definitely favors his dad's looks -- much more so than his sister. Hanka had offered to take care of Magda while we were at the show, and Jfer had struggled the last few weeks with deciding whether she'd give her up. Eventually we decided to leave Magda at her aunt's. It was strange spending time together away from the baby, but it was a good decision, both for her as well as us. The tent was pretty crowded and loud and Jfer wouldn't have been able to enjoy the show quite as much with Magda there. And now we know that we are able to leave her with a capable baby sitter and still enjoy ourselves.

As for Varekai, we enjoyed it but weren't as impressed as we had hoped. We had watch Bravo's Fire Within last year, so we were really looking forward to the show. However, a lot of the performers have changed and some of the acts had been dropped, so it didn't seem quite as familiar. Overall, we liked Alegria, which we saw in Austin last year, better.

I had another great experience after the show. I got to sleep nine straight uninterrupted hours! How I've missed that...