Rockette gets a kick out of coming home to St. Charles
Many dancers in the area might remember Kristina Larson spending a lot of time at Copeland Dance Academy in St. Charles, training hard to perfect her skills, while also assisting teachers at the academy.
The 1999 graduate of Burlington Central High School still trains hard and teaches or auditions during the off-season.
Her main job now, however, is being a member of the Radio City Rockettes, and Larson, a 14-year resident of St. Charles, will join the rest of the cast and crew when the Radio City Christmas Spectacular begins Friday at the Rosemont Theater.
"A fellow dance friend was in the show and took me to see a performance in 1999," Larson said. "I knew then I wanted to be part of it."
Larson hooked on quickly and now is enjoying her eighth season as a member of the Rockettes. She is especially excited the show is coming to Chicago this year.
"We become our own family on the show, as the cast is more than 100 people," said Larson, who has been dancing since she was 6 years old.
"But it's hard to be away from your family and friends during the holidays, so I'm really excited about coming to Chicago."
The Christmas Spectacular this year celebrates the 75th anniversary of the show being at Radio City Music Hall in New York City.
Ring that bell: Talk about trying to juggle schedules. Charlie Brown of the St. Charles Heritage Center board needed to get Mayor Don DeWitte and former mayors Sue Klinkhamer and Fred Norris together for a photo that would be used to promote a $250,000 fundraising campaign for the center, tied in with the 75th anniversary of the city's historical society.
"With Sue being in Washington, D.C., now, and Don being busy on his job, it was tricky to get them all at the same time," Brown said.
The photo finally was snapped and will be used with information to signal the start of 75 straight days (symbolic of the 75 years) of someone in the community ringing the bell outside the heritage center at noon -- running Tuesday through Jan. 19.
Turkey 'cage match': Any talk about food gets my attention.
And apparently Renee Ferguson of Geneva will be doing a lot of such talking at an upcoming seminar about preparing and serving a turkey dinner -- but she also will fill in attendees about her experience in what qualified as a cage match about cooking.
Ferguson, a cookbook author and former Butterball Turkey hotline "call girl," was challenged by Food Network television chef Bobby Flay, who walked in on a film Ferguson was putting together at Kendall College's culinary school about cooking a Thanksgiving turkey.
Much in the same way wrestlers call each other out and throw down the gauntlet, Flay challenged Ferguson to explain her expertise -- all for the good of Food Network entertainment.
But Ferguson will share details at a seminar Tuesday morning at Little Traveler in Geneva.
Rethinking the quick 'no': It wasn't like anyone missed an earth-shattering revelation, but some readers might have been wondering what my point was last week in a short item about saying "no" when my wife asks if I want to go to the grocery store with her.
The last paragraph of that item in print editions was cut short. I revealed that I actually decided to go to the store with my wife for the first time in a long time. I was reminded rather quickly that a Saturday in a grocery store means … free samples! After a delicious sample of a chicken and dumpling soup, I was considering shelving the automatic "no" response.
Your own boss: It didn't surprise me the Elgin Community College newspaper recently had a story touting the entrepreneurship program of its business college.
It seems it is going to get more popular to attempt to be your own boss and find your own way in the future, and programs like this are going to become vitally important.
dheun@sbcglobal.net