I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas!

Yesterday, the holidays kicked into a little higher gear when I attended a beautiful Ladies’ Holiday Luncheon at The Rainier Club hosted by my friend, Susan Neumann. The program featured The Seattle Girls’ Choir singing carols of the season directed by Artistic Director, Jacob Winkler. My personal favorites of the ten carols they sang were “The Carol of the Drum” and the “Wassail Song”. Their voices were pure and beautiful and when I closed my eyes for a moment, they sounded how I think a choir of angels would sound. Pictured in the top photo from left to right are Diane Kuenster, Jan Rogers, Sandi Premselaar, Susan Neumann, me, Denise Nielsen, Suzy Krabbe, Nancy Strom (hidden) and Carol Anderson.

And then last evening, my friend Trudi Syferd and I attended opening night of the 5th Avenue Theatre production of “White Christmas” complete with the recognizable and often toe-tapping music of Irving Berlin and snow falling throughout the theatre during the finale. It was a festive night at the 5th Avenue Theatre as the new Marquee was celebrated. Klieg search lights blazed overhead while the block of Fifth Avenue in front of the theatre was closed to traffic and people stopped in the middle of the street and gawked at the flashing, lighted new sign. A picture of Trudi with the sign in the background is above.

We ran into Marilyn Sheldon, the 5th Avenue Theatre Managing Director, who is retiring at the end of December after 29 years. She along with Producing Artistic Director, David Armstrong, were celebrating the unveiling of the new sign 30 years after a group of visionary Seattle businesspeople (husband, Ken Hatch, then of KIRO Radio & TV, was one of them) completed the renovation of the theatre in 1979, but did not have the funding to complete the marquee at that time.