lightbulbheart storylady, performance, writing, creativity, childhood, collaboration, fancy cat

MEOW! (All kinds of CAT updates)

CYP 2026

The performance of select scenes from FANCY CAT at the Children, Youth, and Performance Conference (CYP) in Toronto was a resounding success! A child left dancing and many adults were left in tears, which is as it should be. I got to give away FANCY CAT stickers and met and learned from many theatre and arts professionals.

I highly recommend CYP to anyone interested in the arts and childhood (littles through college) learning. FANCY CAT is featured in the snapshot below and throughout this Instagram reel by CYP:

FANCY CAT is on the move!

We begin in libraries on October 31, 2026, followed by touring performances in 2027:

VIDEO COLLABORATION

Unrelated to FANCY CAT except in “cat” name is this collab with MaryAnn Clark and aerialist Damla Ari. Please enjoy “Indoor Cat,” with song and voiceover by yours truly!

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Storytime in Canada!

For the love of libraries, and in solidarity with rural Nova Scotia residents in the Annapolis Valley who are fighting the loss of their library branches, my next public storytime is all about LIBRARIES!

I’ll be reading a selection of the many books about libraries from my personal Lending Library at the Locke Street Farmers’ Market (260 Locke St. South, Hamilton, Ontario) on July 11 at 9:30, 10:00, 10:30, and 11:00AM. LOLA AT THE LIBRARY, by Anna McQuinn, illustrated by Rosalind Beardshaw; BATS AT THE LIBRARY, by Brian Lies; and I’M SO HAPPY YOU’RE HERE: A CELEBRATION OF LIBRARY JOY, by Mychal (“The Librarian”) Threets, illustrated by Lorraine Nam. Also with me are my perennial favorite, LIBRARY LION, by Michelle Knudsen, illustrated by Kevin Hawkes (a story so well loved, its dust jacket is in pieces); and Nikki Giovanni’s poem A LIBRARY, illustrated by Erin K. Robinson.

I’ll be singing the Reading Rainbow theme, end with Skinnamarink (as is my habit), and have a handful of Lightbulb Heart bookmarks to give away.

Forthcoming news – I will be attending the Children, Youth and Performance (CYP) conference in Toronto next week (repping FANCY CAT) and in Lawrencetown, Nova Scotia in a couple of weeks, participating in a new children’s literature festival! More details soon!

lightbulbheart fancy cat, performance, writing

Fancy Cat Update

It’s been a minute since I’ve updated Lightbulb Heart news, which rightfully should have included the August 2025 development workshop of FANCY CAT, hosted by Canada’s National Ballet School and supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, and Community One Foundation Rainbow Grant. Special thanks to Monica Default at Carousel Players for her ongoing support of this little show that can.

  • Open auditions brought us 6 marvelous humans who joined us for the ride. It was the kind of audition I’d always craved as a performer — honest, humane, and welcoming — I was proud to be part of it.
  • The script grew and changed in beautiful ways. Example: we added a completely new character; much to my joy since it allowed us to re-welcome our dear collaborator and therapeutic clown Jody Boston as the school janitor.
  • Sid Ryan Eilers’ choreography and direction glued us all together in love and wholeness, with a focus on people over productivity, and still somehow managed an almost completed staging.
  • Raphael Roter created amazing orchestrations and new pieces of music that brought my simple melodies into glorious technicolor.
  • About 30 people (including three kids!) joined us for an in-person workshop staging.

While fully realized music, choreography, and costumes (by the incomparable Tanis MacArthur) are still on the horizon, I am thrilled to announce that the first kiddos to experience FANCY CAT in all its glory will be library kids! We will perform starting in October 2026 in the Toronto Public Library system, with many festival dates to follow in 2027. More news and details to come as we get closer. In the meantime, please join me in this workshop performance joy captured by Cass Cabral Pucci:

lightbulbheart childhood, collaboration, creativity, fancy cat, performance, writing

Porch View Dances Meets Fancy Cat

Porch View Dances is a site-specific celebration of dance put on by Kaeja every summer in Toronto for the past 13 years. I’m thrilled to say that Sid Ryan-Eilers and Raphael Roter (Fancy Cat collaborators extraordinaire) are respectively choreographing and composing for one of the pieces this year! “Joy is a Home With Many Rooms” will be performed by three young dancers and their caregivers and features the chorus of one of Fancy Cat’s songs (Our Story is Joy). It was such a delight to sit in (via Zoom) on a rehearsal and hear these transcendent performers singing one of our songs!

Porch View Dances will be performed on:

  • July 17, 2024 @ 7pm
  • July 18, 2024 @ 7pm
  • July 19, 2024 @ 7pm
  • July 20, 2024 @ 7pm
  • July 21, 2024 @ 2pm

Performances are Pay What You Can. FAQ and other details available on Kaeja’s Porch View Dances page.

We’ll make the world such a beautiful place
We’ll make a mark no one can erase
Whoever we are
Whoever we’ll be
Our story is joy
And we will be free!