Nobody does the holidays like Your Mother Dances.

It isn’t just because Elizabeth Johnson’s adventurous company has been the vehicle for the city’s almost-annual feast of David Parker’s Nut/Cracked, the imaginative and hilarious take on the Nutcracker ballet tradition. Several excerpts of Parker’s piece were part of YMD’s show this weekend at UWM’s Mitchell Hall, and they didn’t disappoint. Johnson was there with her sheet of bubble wrap, coyly pirouetting around it like a lion toying with its prey as the “Waltz of the Flowers” built up its momentum. Of course, her resistance broke down, and she soft-shoed, stomped and plopped her way through the music’s climax. Parker’s pleasures derive from the gleeful juxtaposition of classical and pop, with Travolta disco poses, patty-cake hand tumbles and Fonzie attitude seeming right at home with the lush melodies of Peter Ilyich.

But wait, there’s more! Johnson offered two of her own works, a rock ‘em sock ‘em tribute to grrl power set to the music of Heart. And a playful Christmas tribute that ended the concert with a lush and melancholic kicker. “Burn into the Wick,” which the company premiered at the Minnesota Fringe Festival in August, is both come hither and F--- you (apologies to Cee Lo). The Mitchell Hall stage is deep, which allowed Johnson to send her six dancers hurtling or sashaying toward the audience – a rock ‘n’ roll come on made joyfully kinetic. But for every advance, there was an ironic retreat – little kewpie-doll gyrations followed with knock out boxing combinations. It was precise and playful, and – like the music behind it – never flagged in energy.

There’s a sweet playfulness, as well, in Johnson’s “2 Good 2 Last,” which spends much of its time in childlike steps and Christmas pageant tableaux, it’s four dancers settling into a crèche scene every time the Harry Belafonte lyrics suggested it. But the mood shifted from innocence to experience in the last section, set to the lush melancholy of “Blackout,” a song by English alt-rockers Muse. In a lovely shift of tone, the dance dug deep into the familiar Christmas tropes, reflecting on motherhood and the relentless march of time itself.

The concert also included Luc Vanier’s “Triptych,” a tense duet surrounded by a chorus-like trio, set to the pointillist vibraphone music of Christopher Burns. And “Beau Geste,” in which Sara Hook and Mary Cochran set a reading of Johnson’s mock obituary to comic gestures that suggest the challenges of aging gracefully.

Trio: Elizabeth Johnson, Maryhelen Wesner and Steven Moses in "2 Good 2 Last"
Sextet: Megan Zintek, Paula Biasi, Christal Wagner, Beth Engel, Jaimi Patterson and Sarah Bromann in "Burn into the Wick"
Pictures by Luc Vanier.