Birthday Opera

There are few words to best describe the past few weeks other than STRESS. But we made it through and November has begun with a running start; here it is already MY BIRTHDAY!! Okay so it WAS my birthday. But my weekend was SO full of goodness and spoilings, I barely had a moment to blog. So here I am.
We arrived in Virginia late Thursday night and almost found ourselves locked out of John's parents house around midnight. But thankfully we were able to get in without breaking anything or waking anyone. Friday, I had the great opportunity to visit a fellow-but-much-advanced-over-me artist; John's parents' neighbor Jim is an oil painter and I was beyond stoked to visit his home studio. I realized while I was there that I've never really been in anyone else's studio before and it was so inspirational to see his works in progress and his entire set-up. To sum it up: I want his house.
Friday afternoon we visited John's mom at her work and met some of her coworkers (she temps there but this is her 4th or 5th time there so she's gotten to know people...and if you learn one thing about John's mom...it's that she becomes best friends with whoever is in a 5 foot radius of her everywhere she goes.) before heading out to buy groceries and dinner (including sneakily buying my birthday cake without me really seeing it). While dinner was marinating, we watched Ratatouille (I'd had a hankering to see it again) and then dinner was served: steaks and shrimp goodness. A little later they surprised me with cake and if 26 candles weren't enough to burn down the house, John was mean enough to get me trick candles. After failing to blow any of them out permanently, we got a bowl of water to extinguish them and were a little alarmed that the fire alarms didn't go off with the amount of smoke that filled the kitchen.
Saturday was mostly a chill day. We did make it briefly to some outlet malls and I was showered with maternity clothes by both John and his mom (yay!) before we took off to get ready for dinner.

My birthday dinner was at Benihana, one of my favorite restaurants ever. John's parents came along with us and we had a wonderful time before taking off to go to the event of the weekend: the Opera at the Kennedy Center. We'd planned in advance for enough time to get there but being Veteran's Day weekend, there was some traffic, even with taking the metro.

We got there and rushed to the Opera House and John sent me ahead to our seat with my ticket while he used the rest room. We ended up getting separated and he had to sit in the back because the opera had already begun by the time he got there.

But we reunited at the intermission.
How to describe the evening...I don't even have an idea of how to start or end but what it was was marvelous. The opera is dark in nature and the set designer kept that in mind when carefully designing each scene, down to the dramatic, harsh lighting. All of the leads were AMAZING. The leading lady Lyubov Petrova, although said to be a hair shy of the other vocalist who sang alternate nights, was phenomenal. Like...literally...I have never heard a Soprano, or any singer for that matter, do what she did that night. So the thought of her being a hair shy of ANYONE sounds absurd to me.

All I can really say is...see it. It was deliciously dark, at times almost disturbing but enchantingly beautiful to see and hear. I couldn't cry because I was too dumbfounded and speechless to do so. I am now in search of a good recording and am sad I can't find one with our leading lady but hopefully her fantastic performance will get them going on making one. Hint hint.
The verdict? A wonderful birthday, my first as a married woman with my John.
P.S. Can you see a baby bump? I sure can. :)

Photos: Meself