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'Beyond Geronimo' on stage Ren Fest Festival flight festival

Geronimo exhibit gives window into history of Apache people

You’ve likely heard of Geronimo, the fearless and infamous Apache warrior of the Arizona Indian Wars of 1880-86.

'Untold Stories/Unsung Heroes' shares stories of lesser-known Arizonans

Three women, each from a different era in Arizona history, sit around a table playing cards and swapping stories.

Hear ye, hear ye: Renaissance Festival returns Saturday

Ladies and gentlemen, have at your turkey legs.

Get your joust on at Renaissance Festival

See the world with Queen Creek’s Passport to Discovery

Think Queen Creek, and peaches come to mind. So do olives, lots of single-family homes and equestrian culture. West African drums, Chinese lion dances, Scottish bag...

Mesa Takes Flight Festival highlights city’s ties to aviation

What do a flash mob dance, flight simulators and a truck full of video games have in common?

Voices

Bring on the chocolate

Judy Toth, Special to Tribune
SciTech Festival brings out the geek in all of us

By Mandy Zajac, Tribune
Summit a mountain, but savor the climb

Shannon Sorrels, Special to Tribune
Community leaders take stage for arts fundraiser

By Mandy Zajac, Tribune
Menopause a time to make important decisions

Heidi Rula, Special to Tribune

Things to do

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Mesa

Mormon Tabernacle Choir members with EV roots return for Arizona performance

Only a few of the thousands of kids in junior high and high school marching bands in Arizona are going to become professional musicians and odds are long on any becoming the next Louie Armstrong or Benny Goodman. But Cliff Bentley is living proof that the marching time and music study can pay off with something really rewarding. Bentley is a graduate of Mesa Junior High School and Mesa High School and for the past 11 years has been singing in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in Salt Lake City. "Marching band in junior high and high school is where I learned the music theory stuff I needed to know to be in the choir," said Bentley in a telephone interview Monday. He is one of 360 members of the Tabernacle Choir and 110 members of the Orchestra at Temple Square that will be performing Friday and Saturday at US Airways Center in a signature event of the Arizona Centennial Celebration. Three members of the choir with deep Arizona roots - Bentley, Jan Petersen and Clark Edwards - talked this week about how exciting it is for them to return home and offer the choir's unique blend of classical hymns and patriotic songs as part of the state's 100th birthday. It is the Tabernacle Choir's first performances in Arizona since 1967. Most Arizonans that are familiar with the choir likely listen to the live half-hour broadcast, Music and the Spoken Word, on the radio. It is the nation's longest-running network program, having run continuously since 1929. The broadcast takes place every Sunday morning at 9:30 a.m. in the Tabernacle on Temple Square.
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3 to try: Valentine Treats

Place orders now for sweet eats Rose Cupcake Bouquet Lovely Little Cake Shop 444 W. Main Street, Suite. 108, Mesa. (602) 478-4114 or www.lovelylittlecakeshop.com Thinking of getting flowers for that special someone? How about cupcakes instead? This local shop makes “rose” bouquets out of cupcakes. For $29.95, a bouquet includes seven red- or pink-frosted cupcakes nestled in a white vase. A mixed bouquet of red and pink cupcakes is $2 more. Cupcake flavors come in chocolate, red velvet or champagne. Bouquets will be ready for pick up Feb. 13 and 14. They can be delivered, in the East Valley only, on Valentine’s Day for $10. Chocolates by M. Josephs P.O. Box 323, Higley. (480) 988-9150 or www.chocolatesbymj.com
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E.V. stay-at-home moms turn DIY experience into successful businesses

If you can look at a dented, chipped, dusty piece of furniture that’s been in someone’s garage for years and see potential and beauty, then Debbie Nelson is impressed. “The average person has a difficult time piecing it together,” says the East Valley furniture refinisher. Nelson, a single mother of seven, has made a living out of finding treasure in other people’s trash. Her online furniture store, Funky Junk Restore, is half a year old, and she already has so much business that she’s looking for help beyond her current work crew (her kids, ages 7 to 23). She works from home in Mesa, where home foreclosure rates are sky-high and one in five office spaces sit empty. But Nelson is among a growing number of stay-at-home moms around the country who have turned years of do-it-yourself experience into successful businesses. The idea is similar to TV cook Sandra Lee’s “semi-homemade” philosophy in cooking. Lee has built a cooking-show empire on the idea that mostly ready-made food plus some fresh ingredients can result in “food that looks and tastes from scratch.” Nelson likes the parallel to what she and other furniture-refurbishing moms have done with pieces bought from estate sales, yard sales, Craigslist or secondhand shops. She looks for secondhand pieces from well-known furniture makers, and uses paint, wood finishes and new hardware to make them look and feel new — for the same price as a new piece made of flimsier materials like particle board or wood veneers.