Ballet Creole's Spring Rites

Last night Dad and I went to Ballet Creole's Spring Rites at the Fleck Dance Theatre.
There will another performance tonight and one tomorrow.

It's finally Spring! And we get to celebrate Spring through dance with Spring Rites. You can see how happy the dancers are that Winter is finally over. There is that time after all the snow melts and everything is brown and grey and gloomy and then you see these little tiny buds and then the flowers come out. It's a happy time and the dancers show it.  I loved Spring Rites and I liked that they used classical music along with contemporary dance to express themselves.

Throughout the whole show the dancers had lots of energy and showed how strong, talented and acrobatic they are.

Here is a link with a preview of The Ripple Effect and Spring Rites.
http://youtu.be/JvFHzD4cKfc


You can buy tickets for Spring Rites through the Harbourfront Centre's website:
http://www.harbourfrontcentre.com/nextsteps/ballet-creole/

Roger Ellis at York Mills Subway

Yesterday, we spotted Roger Ellis playing guitar at the York Mills Subway station.

Roger Ellis used to play guitar with Edward Bear. He's a great musician and we always look forward to seeing him when we pass through York Mills. I always miss him over the winter.

I was so happy to see him yesterday.

Mackenzie House

Yesterday we were downtown and we stopped by Mackenzie House.

It was the home of Toronto's First Mayor, William Lyon Mackenzie.

The flowers are looking very pretty!

I liked these tiny flowers called Bleeding Hearts.

When I went on the tour of the house, I got to use the stereoscope. 

You can see the picture of ostriches in this one. It would have been a good way to learn about far away places in 1800s unless they we able to visit.

 I was able to take a close look at the Tea Set that was in the parlour. You could keep hot water in the silver piece in the middle so you could pour it into the kettle.

I really like what they have done with the Dining Table. They've set it up like how they think Mackenzie would have used it. It's like how we use our dining table. :-)

We went looking for old pictures of the dining table and we found these.

Christmas 2011

May 2013

Hogmanay 2013

In the back of the dining room, you can see an Invalid Chair. It's like a recliner. Mackenzie might have used one when he was older.

We saw the daughters' bedroom. Hanging on the mirror you can see the whalebone hoops that would have been used in a hoop skirt.

They have a new carpet in the Master Bedroom!

Here is a closer picture of the carpet.
They found a specialist who could weave the carpet on a loom and it took 3 years to make.

I really like this Sampler that is in the Master Bedroom.

And we noticed this picture of Les Invalides. (Maybe it's because we just went there last week.)

We saw this special cup that they would use to give teas and medicines to people sick in bed.

We found out a little bit more about Pearlash.
It was used to make "Quick Bread". It could be used instead of yeast to make the dough rise.

We found out ways of preserving food could include dehydrating, pickling or turning it into a jam.
When they make jams, you have to boil it and add lots of sugar which the bacteria doesn't like.

Before we left we printed a souvenir in the Print Shop. 

This time we printed something very different.
Instead of typesetting my name I got to print pictures of 3 of the City of Toronto Museums.
We had to make sure that they were the same height.

Here is what it looks like.

When we were looking through the old pictures we came across the "Cholera Man". They used to have this display up in 2011 (before I started my blog). It's really the Cholera Preventative Costume.
In 1834 when Mackenzie became Mayor of Toronto, they didn't know what caused cholera and there was an outbreak going on. Mackenzie banned people from building shanties on the waterfront because he thought it was a breeding ground for cholera. He was pretty smart!

It was in 1854 that John Snow found out that cholera was spread by infected drinking water. 

Flight Back to Toronto

On our flight back to Toronto we were able to sit together and we got a window seat!

When we were taxi-ing out to the runway I got to see some cool planes.

I really want to go on a Boeing 747.

And I'd love to go on an Airbus A380.

It was so cool being able to see out the window and see what was going on.

We spotted this island.
It was so cool being able to take a picture of a whole island in one shot.
I think it is Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands.

Château de Versailles

When we were in France, we went to the Château de Versailles. The last members of the Royal Family to live at Versailles were Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette and their children. They were forced to leave Versailles 3 months after the Storming of the Bastille during the French Revolution.

When I learnt about the French Revolution, I learned about the 3 Estates - the Clergy, the Nobility and 'the rest'. Some people in the third estate didn't have enough money for basic things like bread but the clergy and the nobility weren't even taxed. Louis XVI tried to change things but he wasn't able to get the nobility and the clergy to agree. 

Versailles with all of its excess became a symbol of the Ancien Regime. 

People didn't like Marie Antoinette. They thought she was to blame for everything that was going wrong.

We went to the Château de Versailles 2 years ago and they have changed it up a bit.

You can see that they are doing some construction.

They are putting in a new Visitors' Entrance which will have a new lobby and information for visitors. They are also putting in a restaurant and an auditorium.

This is what the first Versailles looked like from 1624 - 1668.
It was originally a hunting lodge but Louis XIV wanted it to be his residence and so he added on to it.

Here is a painting of Louis le Grand (Louis XIV).

This painting is of Marie-Antoinette, Madame Royale and the Dauphin in the gardens of the Trianon.

We went through the Hercules Drawing Room,

The Drawing-Room of Plenty,

The Venus Drawing room,

And the Diana Drawing Room.

But I really liked the Mars Drawing Room.
It had a painting of Marie Leszcynska who was married to Louis XV.

I really liked the paintings on the ceiling,

And the gold details.

The Mercury Drawing Room was the "State Bed Chamber".

In the War Drawing Room we saw the piece which has Louis XIV crossing the Rhine in the war with Holland.

This was the King's Bedchamber.

We could see into Louis XV's bed chamber.
Louis XVI spent his last night at Versailles in October 1789 in this room.

The Hall of Mirrors was humongous and very bright.
I wonder how they clean all of the windows, mirrors and crystals. And was there any mercury in the mirrors?

Here is a picture of me and Mom in the Hall of Mirrors.

This was the Queen's Bedchamber.
This is where people would rush in to see the Queen give birth to her children.

This was in the antechamber of the Grand Couvert where the King and Queen would eat meals in 'public'.

We got to see what it looks like when they are restoring the paintings on the ceiling.

There's a painting of Napoleon's Coronation in the Coronation Room.

And here is a painting of young Napoleon.

This is a statue of Louis XV.

And Louis Philippe.

We got to go through the entrance from the Marble Courtyard.

We got to see the Apartments of Madame Victoire.

We got to see Madame Adelaide's Apartment as well.

The last room we saw was the Archer's Room.

I think it was amazing that during the revolution the people wanted to keep Versailles for the people. They wouldn't let Louis XVI empty out the furniture and they didn't sell it and they didn't tear it down.