New Dance Year

Dance classes started again last week. I am really happy to be dancing again, though I was not pleased about my loss in flexibility. Two weeks is too long a break from stretching. Fortunately this past week I have regained most of my flexibility. My modern and rehearsal classes have been very busy lately since we are working on our dances for a show in February. Yesterday I had a ballet class. We had a grande jete combination that I didn't completely understand so I didn't do well on that. We also did some sit ups. Since there is usually an odd number of students in my class I do my sit ups with Mr. C. When everyone else switched partners, Mr. C. would have me stretch, but yesterday he had me do push ups. I did twenty push ups while everyone else did their sit ups. It was pretty easy. My thighs are sore from the adage we had.

Ambassador Events

Last night all the ambassadors had a party at my dance school. The party was celebrating the past dance year and also Christmas. Above is a photo of all the ambassadors in my age group.(The Juniors group). I had a lot of fun hanging out with my friends. Everyone has had a secret Santa for the last few weeks and we got to find out who we were getting our gifts from and receive our last present from them at the party.

This last Wednesday all the ambassadors did a show at a retirement home. Everyone performed the dance they were learning in their rehearsal classes. I think I did pretty well. Last Friday was the beginning of Christmas break for me. I'm sad I have to wait two weeks before class starts again in January and the new dance year, but I am going to continue practicing/stretching here at home.

Passion is for Ballet

This post was written to address a comment left by Chris, who said that I should not "say goodbye to the barre." Just so my readers know, ballet is still my focus in dance. Though I enjoy doing modern, my passion is for ballet and I take modern mostly because I want to be "well rounded" in dance. Also ballet is easier for me because there is a name for every thing you do and you always know what you are doing. So don't worry Chris I won't "leave the barre," just enhance my knowledge of dance by learning another genre of dance. I currently take four and a half hours of ballet per week vs. one hour of modern.

Modern Demonstration

Every February my dance school does a show and makes a video of the performance. Yesterday my modern class started learning a modern demo we will perform in the show. We start on the floor demonstrating our warm ups, then stand up and do some modern exercises, and at the end do some runs, jumps, and lifts. I don't know if I am in anymore dances than that one yet. Ever since last week I have finally able to do the right and left splits. I have been able to do the center splits for some time, but never able to do the other two until now. It felt really good to know that a years work has paid off.

Turns

Sorry I haven't posted in a long time. My mom is pregnant with her seventh baby and I have been helping her around the house. Last post I mentioned the ambassador photos and warm up suits. Now the pictures are up, and I got my dance bag and warm up suits. Lately I have been working on turns again. I can balance and spot but once I start turning I feel like I'm going to fall. Once I did fall. That was embarrassing. I like doing jumps best in class. I'm working on my tours en l'air (turn in the air). Mr. C once had my class do a jumping exercise with half turns. He asked me to do two full turns instead of the two half turns that everyone else was doing. That was another time I fell in class. So I have been working on those since then so that next time I have to do one I'll be ready for it.

Ambassador Program

At my dance school if you are a member of their ambassador program you get to have photos taken of you in different dance poses. Then, the director chooses one to put on the wall of the dance studio. There is also a group photo displayed. Last week the photos were taken. I think the pictures will look good. Another thing I did for my ambassador program was order a sweatsuit and dance bag. They will arrive in about a month. At home, I have added a pre barre warm up stretching period along with my usual after ballet stretching to my daily dance routine. I did this so that I am more flexible for my ballet combinations. If any of my blog readers have any things they do to warm up their bodies before class that they find helpful, please leave a comment telling about it.

My Classes

Class is great. I like my new modern class a lot. It seems strange to finish my ballet class with all the posture and grace and then walk into a class where you're arching your back and bending all over the place. Sometimes I forget to go to parallel and stand there in first until the exercise begins and I realize my mistake. On Wednesdays some of the girls from the next age group up are in my class so they can spend more time on point. Its cool to see them doing their positions and moves on point. I also have my rehearsal class. The dance we are learning is a "slumber party dance." I don't know why there would be a boy at a slumber party with a lot of girls but that's what the story is. The music is in sixes so I might mess up because I might forget and start counting in eights and dancing the moves in eights.