ballet slipper / ballerina sugar cookies

“This Book Drive is an exciting partnership with the Daly City Public Library Associates and a great way for locals to give back to our community,” said Serramonte Center Marketing Director Marie Villarosa. “Also, for each book donated, shoppers will be eligible to win a mall gift card — so the more books people donate the more chances to win!” The mission of the DPCLA is to raise private funds to add to public funding of the Daly City libraries by developing community, civic, and business support for fundraising, advocacy, and innovative programs that benefit the diverse community and promote greater awareness of the library’s valuable resources. To learn more, go to www.DPCLA.org.

A Scottish Nutcracker: The San Jose School of Highland Dancing presents its ninth annual evening of music and dance, featuring solo piper Bruce Cotter and the Macintosh Pipe Band, Dec, 13, 7-9 p.m, Sacred Heart Gym, 13716 Saratoga Ave., Saratoga, $15-$20; free for children under 5, sanjosehighlanddance.com, Hansel and Gretel: Presented by Bayshore Lyric Opera, Dec, 13-14, Saratoga Civic Theater, 13777 Fruitvale Ave., Saratoga, $12-$16, bslopera.com, A Winter ballet slipper / ballerina sugar cookies Wonderland: The Academy of Classical Ballet presents an hour-long ballet with ice skaters, woodland creatures and professional adult ballerinas, Dec, 14, 1 p.m, and 5 p.m, Campbell Heritage Theatre, 1 W, Campbell Ave., Campbell, $15, 408-886-2700, HeritageTheatre.org..

The California Symphony season comes to its finale with Brahms’ second symphony and a world premiere. The performance is at 4 p.mm. May 8, at the Hofmann Theatre at the Lesher Center of the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, in Walnut Creek. Also featured is the commission of Young American Composer in Residence Jason Vieaux. Tickets are from $42-$72 and can be purchased in person at the Lesher Center ticket office, online at www.lesherartscenter.org or by calling 925-943-7469. Poison Apple’s ‘Music Man, Jr.’ set for April 29.

The program began with the seamless, often impish ingenuity of “Swipe,” a West Coast premiere, which puns seven ways to Sunday– it swipes movement, especially African steps, It swipes dance motifs — seaweed arms from the “The Little Mermaid,” semaphoring from “Artifact Suite” and the pert bounces from “Apollo”, It swipes the air, the body and floor with body parts, and by association, it swipes the music: Gabrielle Prokofiev, grandson of the great Russian composer Sergei, stole and brilliantly remixed his own “String Quartet No.2.” The dance got under way in a circle, starting with calisthenic arm thrusts that arched the back, as though the group were performing West African dance boiled down to cool ballet slipper / ballerina sugar cookies abstraction, The five men and women then seamlessly morphed into line patterns, exits and entrances, returning several times to the circle, as to a touchstone..

“First of all, female sexuality seen in a natural way is very rare in movies,” del Toro says. “It’s always objectifying, always serving glamour or a wink-wink perversity. It doesn’t exist except from the male gaze. What I wanted to do was show how integral water was to her. When you’re blessed to have your first encounter in the bath where you’d been alone, it’s a very special repairing of your soul.”. “I land in her bathtub as my place of refuge,” Jones says about his amphibious character. “Now we have no barriers between us, … so our touching becomes a big love scene. It had a purity and innocence to it that communicated volumes, I thought.”.