Dance Bag Challenge

I know I'm a little late with this, but it's been crazy busy over here, with taking about 21 hours of dance a week and then teaching 6+ hours a week (my privates run over sometimes and I don't mind at all!).

I was so excited to do this challenge! It was first posted by Wellies and Pears and as soon as I saw it, I knew I had to do it! Mine is always completely stuffed and bordering on ridiculous. Not that I'm complaining - I like to be prepared! Be prepared though...it's definitely photo heavy.

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I got my bag last semester after my other bag was just not cutting it. I had the other for about ten years though, so it was a trooper, but just not nearly big enough. This one is plenty big and has a pointe shoe pocket, water bottle pocket, little mesh pocket, plus a little front zipped part with a little mesh part inside it. A downside is that the tightening thing for the water bottle pocket broke right away and the bag is ripping above the pointe shoe pocket. I really need to not pack it so much.

This is the bag I use for my shoes. It's mesh and I've had it for years but because I tend to carry too much, one of the straps is ripping so I'm glad to have finally found a use for it this semester. I really just never got around to getting a mesh pouch for shoes, so I started using this a few weeks ago. It actually works out nicely. In the front zipper, I carry a little sewing kit and tape that I'll admit I never really use, but it's good to have just in case.

Can you believe I actually use almost all of these? This is the contents of my mesh packpack. The pointe shoes on the top left are the ones I'm currently using and actually live in the pointe shoe pocket but I threw them here for this picture. Everything else lives in this mag inside my dance bag. I've got my beloved gel toe pads, and old pretty dead pair of pointe shoes (both Russian Muse), tan jazz shoes, black jazz shoes, 2 pairs of canvas ballet flats, and three different pairs/styles of footies for modern dance. My dance performance classes have plenty of modern dances, so these are a must for me. I don't really use the footies that have the holes for the toes, but they've come in handy when my boyfriend forgets his own. The leather ones are holey and I'm not sure why I still have them in there. I am loving the canvas pair. 

The contents of the little mesh pouch on the dance bag. I usually have my hair down for Dance Performance 2 and sometimes for 1, but need it up for ballet, so I need these. Also, occasionally I've been asked for one if others forget to bring something to stick their hair up, so I'm glad I have so many. The button is from when I saw the show with my boyfriend and it's a favorite of mine so I leave it in sight!

This crap was all in the front zipped pocket. A couple granola bars, a 90 calorie cookie thing, and a case with safety pins and buttons. I took this jewelry off the first day back to Dance Performance 1 this semester, and forgot to take it out. I've had the pointe shoe necklace for years, and got the other two from my boyfriend's mom this past Christmas. It's a music note bracelet, and a dancer necklace. I love them all.

This is the contents of the main part of my dance bag (plus the mesh backpack goes on top of it all before zipping up). Vitamins, pre-workout for Dance Performance 1 when I'm just dead (it's from 4pm-8:45pm twice a week). A water bottle, deodorant, moleskin I never use, two pairs of legwarmers, a sweat towel (green), a stretch band (purple), a wrap skirt for ballet, an extra set of clothes, and various types of tapes (for injuries), and a bandage for when my knee hates me. 

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That's probably a bit much. Haha.

Now on to the questions!

1. What’s in your dance bag and why?
All of the above, because I swear I'll need all of it. I could probably stand to take a few things out though.

2. Where did you get your bag and how long have you been using it?
I got it from a local dance store last semester (Fall 2014) because the one I used for ten years was just too small.

3. Is there anything dance related that you keep in your bag at all times… you know, the essentials?
All o' that! ^

4. Is there anything that you keep in your bag for good luck?
Nope. I'm not superstitious. 

5. If your bag had a name what would it be?
Misty! Because it's tough, but pretty. :)

6. How badly does you bag smell right now?
Haaaaaaa...let's not go there. *throws in some dryer sheets*

7. If there is anything you could change about your bag or its contents, what would it be?
I want one of those spiky balls because they sound luxurious after hours of dance. And I have a heel spur and digging things into my arch feels amazing. Also I wouldn't mind if my bag had more color. Like, maybe PURPLE. Or if it were floral (pastel).

8. Anything else you want to mention?
I now would very much love a Vera Bradley bag. Haha. Beauuutiful!

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Thanks to Wellies and Pears for this challenge! It was fun.

Other blogs I read who have done the challenge:
We Do Ballet
balletandorbust

Click on over and check them out, along with the original!

Lifts: NAILED IT

Ever had a problem with a particular move and then just changed one thing and then suddenly, everything was better, the clouds opened up, and the sun was your personal spotlight?


Well, that may be a tad bit exaggerated, but you feel me.

My boyfriend/waltz partner and I were struggling with the lifts we have to do in our waltz dance we're performing in June. The first is basically a turn that I get into by doing a chaines to him and then grabbing my right arm around his waist and the left just hangs open/back while my legs are in double attitude. He grabs his right arm around the left side of my waist. This was the hardest for us. I'm not one of the little size 0 girls...far from it. I'm a plus-size woman and have a good 80lbs on most of the others that are doing lifts. (Ugh, I hate that number...I need that to go down!). This makes things difficult with a lift where he has to lift around the waist.

So, anyways, we have been actually doing it with my right hand clutching his right shoulder as well, for now, until we've got it down, and then I'll do it with my arm free and hanging gracefully. But what's been happening is that we haven't been able to get around two times (he does two turns with me like that). We have been lucky to make t around once and usually, I was slipping out of it, and we have tried everything. But...not really. I was previously wearing a leotard that was a more slippery material (lycra?) and as I'm a bigger size, I was not about to go without one. NO. Not happening.


This Thursday, I wore a cotton leotard and guess what? We nailed that lift AND the third lift. (Facing away from him, I grab him around the neck with my right arm (behind me) and he puts his right arm around the left side of my waist. I end up kind of at an angle with toes pointed in second and he takes me around once.


It was SUCH a relief to get them both and almost effortless. My teacher was commenting across the room, cheering for us, because, dammit, we finally got it! YES!!


The second lift is the only one we've got to get now. It's more complicated and has me doing a fankick overhead IN THE AIR, but I have no doubt we'll get it. Our one practice with it went well. I just have to get the end. The only reason we didn't get that one yesterday was that he always ended up facing me instead of the same direction so I could get into it.


Let me paint you a picture. But um...with words. So, never mind. haha. I do a chaines away from him as he pivots to be facing the same direction (upstage). I then take a step with my left foot and battement my right leg and he gets his left arm under my butt (and right around my waist, where I grab his wrist with my right hand, and put my left arm around his shoulder/neck). Then when he's pushing me way up, I fankick the right, then left leg. and then arch my back as my legs warm around his back and he lets go under my butt and grabs my left thigh with his left hand and I'm literally wrapped around his back.

Yeah.


So, that's...happening. Now that I think of it, I'm not sure what happens with his and my right arms. We've only gotten as far as the fankick. (WHEEEEE!) By the way, the fankick is basically parallel with the ceiling. Like a helicopter over his head. It's fun.

Stay tuned for more news on THAT. lol.


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In other news, I've been nailing a double pique on both sides just about every time (single, single, double is a regular for my ballet teacher).


Things are good.

Why Are The Barres Always Gone?

     Today my Intermediate Ballet class finally started back up. My student Jenny (name changed) is back and when she walked in, I was so happy to see her! She is 20 and an adult beginner. She took my class for about 2 months before we had our studio's first annual winter show. Because she came in so late, but determined and passionate, we had quite a few long rehearsals, going as long as three hours!

     Today started like most have, with floor stretches. Ouch, that hurt, as I haven't been stretching nearly as much as I should have been. I do floor stretches and barre with her, so that she can follow the combination. I introduced an ab routine. I have yet to smooth it out, as today I basically jumped into it, but I am going to make a regular routine to some faster, catchy song. Since we were just back after a month and a half, I went easy on her, but the ab routine will be more difficult next week. I was just doing it on the spot today.

     After that, I went to start our regular barre session, but looked around and discovered the barres have been, once again, removed from the room by the owners of the studio next door (the two rooms were one studio before but has been split, literally down the middle since new ownership took over our side). This barre thing is really becoming a problem. I mean, it's BALLET. Barres to ballet are like bananas to a banana split. We could do it in center, and we did, but as she's still relatively new, I didn't want to do that to her already. She's still building the foundation and it's much harder to get used to everything with also having to worry about balancing everything in center.

     We went through plies, tendus, degages, battements (for all of these these, the arms were altered for center), and rond de jambes. After that, I skipped our developpe/enveloppe combination because of time and also, I wanted to teach a few new things. I showed her frappes, with the working foot flexed in between. We spent some time going over singles, and then I showed her how for any even numbers (when to the side/in second), you put the working foot to the original direction and then the opposite vs odd numbers, where you put the working foot to the opposite from where you came first...and so on. This took some time. We did singles, doubles, and triples.

     I also taught a new (to her) combination with fondues and glissades. It's fondue en croix and then the second time to the side, leave the foot out, glissade away, glissade back, returning the outer foot to the back to reverse the whole thing. The second set of glissades returns the outside foot to the front to sous-sus to turn and do the other side. In this case, we had no barre, so I had her skip the sous-sous turn and we instead just did the other side.

     Because this all took so long, and we only had an hour, we then skipped across-the-floor and I instead worked it into learning the first section of the dance. I explained degage walks, as we do them to start the dance. I added some funky arms (basically, flexed hands, with eppaule), as the music is a funky French song. Then, we did a few degage walks with more fluid arms and prepped to go into two side pique arabesque steps. We did all of this basically across-the-floor to practice/learn then worked it in with the music, traveling forward.

     I then showed her emboites. I gave her a quick tutorial, but as time was running slightly over, we will work on them in more detail next week.

     I am so thrilled that she loved my choreography so far. She actually smiled so huge and said "Oh my god, I LOVE it!" This is a great start to this season. I'm so excited!

Lighting for the Spring Dance Concert (Post from 2012...not sure why it reposted)

     So today we had our lighting tech rehearsal for our dance concert. For Nancy's class, rehearsal was from 9am to 1pm. For Lynn's, it was 1:15 to 5. I'm in both classes so I'm required to be there for the whole day. Although it could have gone better it seemed to go by fairly quickly.

     Nancy started off going through the dances from her Monday and Wednesday classes. She basically wanted to get the beginners out of the way first so they could go home as soon as she was done with them. Fine by me. Any time to warm up is awesome. I know it's lighting and having done this so any times, I know we probably won't actually dance, but shuffle from spot to spot, but I want to be warm just in case. She went through Mischief Makers, Too Darn Hot and The Wedding Celebration. I was in Mischief Makers years ago and the Wedding Celebration music is from Brigadoon, which I was in in 2009. I thought it would be the same choreo but only part of it is, I believe. It was hard to tell as they weren't running the dance but just the spacing.

     The first number we ran that I'm in was the pointe piece, which is titled Pas De Quatre ("Step of Four"). This one, we went through fairly quickly, just stopping a few times for light queues. The music has a Spanish feel, with castanets throughout. Our costumes are black and red and frilly and definitely Spanish looking. We were originally supposed to wear pink tights but we changed Nancy's mind. She sometimes has an awful idea of which tights should go with costumes. She will almost ALWAYS select pink tights, but they don't always look right. We also helped her to see that pink tights would look awful with our black and white dresses for the ballet piece and those are now nude tights. Anyways, we were just doing lighting so we started in different shoes. Kat in her jazz shoes, Sierra barefoot, Lauren in ballet shoes and me in my white wannabe Ked's (my Hairspray/Grease shoes). When Nancy was running Sierra's and Lauren's solos (made so Kat and I have more change time), I took my shoes off because I thought I would look prettier barefoot. So we ran the number kind of (no music) and then we moved on to Raymonda Ballet.

     In this number, Kat is the soloist and does it beautifully. She's so darn adorable and she knows it. lol. This is the number with the black and white costumes. They're so beautiful! I wore one of them when I danced to Listen To Your Heart, which I loved! This number is not too exciting but it's cute. I'm in the core but I have a demi-solo with Sierra. Well, the other girls are doing some cabriolles back and then they do a port-de-bra in a way to present me. I run out, slide my right foot forward and do a port-de-bras, mostly to fill time. Then I do 3 chasse en tournants. I hate those but when Nancy asked who knew how to do them, I was the only one who did. lol. So anyways, I do three of them then do a pique arabesque in center and a bouree turn. Then I do three chasse en tournants to the right as Sierra comes out doing three to the left. So we cross each other. Then we do a pique arabesque and bouree turn all facing away from each other, then coming toward each other, we pique arabesque, recover, pique arabesque, recover, pique arabesque and do a I-forgot-what-it's-called with our backs to each other. Then we develope, pique arabesque past each other and run into another formation with toi, pas de bourees and so on. That dance went pretty smoothly.

     The next dance we did was Danse Macabre. I need to start out by saying that I have no idea what Nancy's problem is with me lately, but she's driving me insane. I have a lead in this number as the devil and she's stressing me the fuck out. I had to get my own devil costume, which I expected. The only one I could find that was anything close to what she wanted was like $70. I liked it but I was afraid just in case Nancy didn't like it. In the end, I couldn't really afford to get it because RENT, but I found a red dress at a thrift store and cut it up to look just like the devil costumes I saw online. All of my friends loved it and it looked pretty good on me, which was awesome, but then Nancy was doing lighting and from the sound booth, she asked me to come forward so she could see the costume. She had mentioned in weeks prior that I could take one of the poofy black and red tutus that she had gotten the demons and I could use it to spruce up my costume. I had no intention of wearing the tutu though because how in the hell do you wear a tutu with a dress? So she's in the sound booth and I stepped forward and everyone starts clapping and whistling, which embarrassed the hell out of me. haha. I'm sure my face matched the red dress. So Nancy says "Didn't I give you one of the tutus?" And I'm like "Yeah..." and my tone said "Yeah, and what the fuck's wrong with what I've got on?!" So she says that it looks like a Flinstone costume and I turned around and walked back upstage, totally pissed. My friends said Nancy's on crack or something because my costume looks good. So Nancy could probably tell that she upset me because she said something like "Well, with the fishnet gloves and " blah blah blah... and then she says asks that I will be wearing black jazz shoes, right? Um, no Nancy. I've only worn black jazz shoes every day but today by pure coincidence. Grr. So we ran the number and it went well and I'm still pissed but dammit, I did awesome.

     Next we did the modern piece, Don't Give Up. The music is by Josh Groban with a song of the same name. It's an anti-suicide piece and one of the better things Nancy has choreographed. The performers split up in two. Half of us are depressed and half are rescuers. I'm a rescuer. Jadie is my depressed beauty. We all start out as a group but then the rescuers run forward and we do something different from the depressed. Then we join our partners and it's partner work for the rest of it, basically. At the end, everyone goes off and Becka, who plays the Jumper, comes up the stairs onto the stage and is about to "jump" but Manny comes onstage, looking like he's trying to talk her off the ledge. She walks back, past him, looking like she's stressed and then runs past him to jump off but he catches her in a lift and it's...beautiful. She runs and jumps again, they do another lift, both lower to the ground and it ends...it's beautiful. It really is.

...and that was only half of my dance day. But I'm out of time. lol

Subbing Foundations

     Today I got to sub for a Foundations class. I was asked to about a week ago because the instructor for the class (the studio's owner) was having surgery today. I got there after that class started because I was told more than likely, nobody was coming. One of the seven year olds that takes that class was sitting in the parking lot with her mother in their car. Whoops. I opened the studio (we normally open at 4pm and it was well after 3. After being asked if the class was going on, I said I could teach in my 4pm slot as I was not expecting students until next week. I teach my 17+ ballet at 4 (and then 12+ Lyrical at 5). The mother said that would be fine and I called the manager so the mother could pay over the phone and then the mother went to wait in the car. I actually prefer the parents to not be in the room as I find it to be distracting for the kids. We don't have a hallway or anything, just some beautiful handmade wooden benches that are right on the sideline of the dance floor and sometimes the parents/grands are a little bit...loud. I love them but yeah, it's sometimes difficult working with them right there, sometimes saying things to the kids.

     Anyways, I had "A" color for a bit until 4pm hit and then I had her sit on the floor so that we could start with some stretches. I have subbed a class that had her once before, months ago, so it was nice to be able to work with her again (though it was just half of a modern class before, as the instructor was running behind, and this was ballet technique, basically). After some stretching, I had her do some ab work. She is only 7 so it was fairly easy. After around a minute and a half of that,it was time to do some barre so we dragged it to center and got to it! One of the things stressed that I do was to work on getting her to remember some vocab. That was good since I try to do that with my Littles class that her age falls into (my class is 5-8 year olds). I have noticed that no matter how many times I've had my Littles repeat terms after me and no matter how much I say the terms as we're at barre (a lot), it never seems to stick, so I thought I'd try something new today. I wrote out everything we would be working on at barre and center/across-the-floor on the mirror with a dry-erase marker. After I felt she knew that term, I had her find it and cross it off. We were pretty much going top-to-bottom, left-to-right so that was easy enough but I wanted her to see what the words looked like as well.

     We started with just foot positions, which she mostly knew. She did get stuck at 4th and did 5th in it's place but I told her we could go 1,2,3,5,4 because to get to 4th, I do find it easier to slide forward from 5th. After she got the feet, I showed her the arms for each, which she hadn't done before. After I felt she had them all down, I crossed that one off because it was too high for her to reach. Then I moved on to plies. We, again, went through all five positions (both hands on the barre...the young ones do that here). Then to help with tendus, I told her to imagine drawing a line in the sand , but had her going ball THEN point the toe. We did these en croix. Then we did degages en croix. Then after both were done, I showed a tendu and asked what it was called and she said "Degage?" so I gently reminded her that degages pop up off the ground. Then I mixed them up, doing a degage back, tendu side, degage side, tendu front (for example) until I was certain she could remember the term to the move. She was excited to cross two things off of the mirror. She was so adorable!

     Next was rond de jambes. She said the first two parts right and then was having trouble with "jambe" so I asked what she thought "rond" meant, and I held my arms overhead in 5th. She said "Round!" so I said "Very good! And 'Jambe' means 'leg,' so 'rond de jambe' means 'round of leg'." Then she caught on to what I was talking about and showed me a rond de jambe, so I told her she had it and we did them en croix a terre. Then I went over the difference between a terre and en lair. Once she had those, she crossed them off. We then did battements. I had her say "Batman" and then "Bahtmahn" and she recognized it and we were golden for that one too!

     She was really bright, enthusiastic, and had an excellent memory. We were almost finished with barre at that point, and across-the-floor was just as fun. I swear it was! Once we were done with everything I had for class, we had under ten minutes left, so I went over the whole list with her, but this time, I'd point (must resist spelling it "POINTE"!) to a word and have her say it aloud and then demonstrate it for me. Would you believe this seven year old girl got all but one right? I was so happy! I rewarded "A" with a handful of marshmallows once we were done and sent her on her happy little way. I seriously had a blast and I'm certain she did too. I will definitely be using this method in my Littles class.

P.S. This kid's feet were incredible, by the way! When seated on the floor with her legs extended, her toes were nearly on the floor. Flexible feet and strong ankles already. I'm jealous.

Class Number Struggles

     It's proving to be very difficult to keep consistency with students at this studio. I started out with my Intermediate Ballet class, which I should possibly just call Ballet since I end up with beginners or students of all levels. I really don't mind at all. I do like the complexity of more difficult choreography and barre work, but I also love seeing a student who has never taken dance (or not since they were little) grow and grow.

   I started my first class by just teaching my boyfriend, J. As I said in my previous post, he partially took my class so I could figure out how to fit everything into just an hour. The next week, I had a girl come in and take it on a whim and loved it so much that she signed up for the month. Jean kept coming, so that was great. I think I may have just had her for a few weeks. Then a friend came and brought her twin sister and their friend. I'd danced with all three in ballet classes before. T was with me for months, as was Jean. Then another of T's friends came and she was there for months as well. T was most advanced and en pointe. Jean and T's friend, Jenn, were both basically beginners. Neither had ever danced so it was interesting trying to manager the different skill levels. T and Jenn were adults and Jean was 16. It was mostly kept at a more basic level but some of the steps in the dance were more advanced (saut de basques, tour jetes, beat jumps, etc).

   So anyways, first Jean dropped off because she got a summer job. I was bummed out because she was my first beginner to teach and I was thoroughly enjoying watching her progress from week to week. Then I had to switch the class time to two hours earlier and I never saw Jenn again. Then around a month or two later, I lost T as she was transferring to a university over an hour away. I had no students for around a month and then a 20 year old I was in a musical (Hairspray) with in 2011 messaged me about wanting to take my class. She hadn't danced since she was 6 so she's basically a beginner. I am loving teaching her. She takes corrections well, is super quick with learning the terminology, and has passion and drive. I just need more like her! I heard I should be getting a 12 year old who is moving up because of the age group so I'm happy for that. My next dance requires at least 4 so I hope to get that...at the very least!

   Now on to the Littles! When I got the class handed down to me, there were two students - Lydia and Dalia. Lydia is seven and Dalia is six. My first day teaching, Lydia was absent but I had little Dalia. She was so cute and sweet! She had good focus and good technique/knowledge of the steps for her age. There was a three year old that dropped in that day to try it (even though it wasn't her age group) and we played games that I combined with ballet steps and they seemed to have a blast.

   Lydia is a little firecracker. She knows the technique and picks up everything quickly but she is always trying to test me. She'll start out doing rond de jambes right and then when she thinks I'm not looking, will just kinda move her leg a little and squint at me with a little mischievous smile on her face. She keeps me on my toes (ha), for sure.

   I have since gotten two more students. Lilly is seven and though I have a difficult time keeping her attention sometimes, has passion for ballet that astounds me. I put on some music and she immediately recognized it as being from The Nutcracker. The same happened with music from Swan Lake. That makes me happy since she's so little. Her grandma also tells me that Lilly gets up at 5:30 in the morning every day, puts on her classical music, and practices barre and stretching, and so on. Good kid, that one.

  Samantha, I fear, has come and gone. She was five and transferred from another class into mine but I haven't seen her in three weeks now, so I don't think she's returning. It's so frustrating. And I haven't seen her or Dalia since the class before Thanksgiving.

   I choreographed a little dance to Christmas, Don't Be Late when I had three students, because there are three Chipmunks and had them all (in turn) doing a soutenu turn when each Chipmunk name was spoken. "Simon" - Lydia, "Theodore" - Dalia, "Alvin...ALvin...ALVIN!" - Lilly (on the first mention). When Samantha came to us, I just had her between Dalia and Lilly so timing-wise, it still worked out. Now that I'm down to two, there is too much time. I told them to do two soutenu turns now but it still doesn't quite work, but we will have to deal with that since the show is Monday.

I have lots of flyers and now that this show is about to come and go, I can get back to plastering any place I can think of with them. I have held off for the last month or so because it would be too little time for someone to learn the respective dances. So I'm crossing my fingers that I pick up more students! I want to keep my classes. I absolutely love what I'm doing.