This past weekend was one of the best weekends I've had in a long time. There was a lot to do, and most of it was the kind of stuff that I don't get to do too often.

Friday night, I took Shelly to her first opera. We saw "Porgy and Bess," performed by the Washington National Opera at the Kennedy Center. I'm not sure how to describe it. Parts of it were so operatic that it would have fit in well with any old 19th-century European opera (other than the fact that it's in English (well, pidgin English) rather than Italian or German). But there were very jazzy and Gershwinny elements that stood out in stark contrast to the traditional operatic elements. It was very easy to see why it's such an important work of art, but when all was said (sung) and done, I think I'd rather see a good quality musical like "Les Miserables" again rather than "Porgy" again. It was just simply maybe a little too weird at times. But we had a great time.

Saturday morning we all went out to the National Kite Festival on the Mall. We've done this for several years in a row now, and we're finally to the point where we can give Ellie her kite (after getting it off the ground for her) and let her go with it. Annie was self-sufficient most of the time, but when her kite fell (the wind wasn't great), she would try to start wrapping up the string and get herself all wrapped up in it. "I tangled! I tangled!" she kept telling me.

From there we went up to the Building Museum for the Family Day activities of the National Cherry Blossom Festival (there are a lot of national festivals this week!). There were lots of free crafts and activities for the girls, and it was just fun to be with so many people having a great time in that gigantic, beautiful hall. The only thing I didn't like was that the activity that was sure to be the most popular - face painting - only had one lady painting faces carefully, beautifully (she mostly did cherry blossoms coming off of peoples' eyes), and most of all, SLOWLY. The line was just too long to brave.

After naptime, the big girls went off to the babysitting swap, and Shelly and I went back downtown to join up with the Utah State Society of Washington, DC, which was having a dinner at a nice restaurant across the street from the Verizon Center just before the Jazz game. Joining the society provided me and my family with a free dinner and access to tickets to the game that were about as much as I would have paid anyway, so it was worth it. We had some great food, met some new Utahns, and had fun.

Then I traded Shelly for my friend Aaron and his little boy, and we went to the game. Our seats were not great, but it was fun to be in the live atmosphere. As they were announcing the Wizards' starting lineup, I realized that I don't know anyone who still plays for the Wizards anymore - it seems everyone noteworthy on the team has been either traded or arrested in the last couple of months. Eventually I did recognize a couple of names, but they weren't much better than that other Washington basketball team, the Generals. The Jazz won handily. My favorite parts were 1) when Kyle Korver and Sundiata Gaines were featured on the "Kiss Cam," and Kyle goodnaturedly made a lunge at his teammate, and 2) when Carlos Boozer mistakenly thought the referee was on his team, and flung a pass to him (the ref had to dodge the ball to let it go out of bounds, but you have to admit, he had a wide-open three from where he was standing).